I’ll throw out an oft ignored Disney movie: The Emperors New Groove. I know. I know, but it runs like a 90 minute looney toon. It’s probably my favorite of the new disney films.
Spirited Away
Bambi
Fantasia
Sleeping Beauty
Beauty and the Beast
Little Mermaid
Nightmare Before Christmas (stop-action annimation)
The Flintsones
The Charlie Brown Christmas Special
How the Grinch Stole Christmas
Olive the other Reindeer
In no particular order:
Iron Giant (Suuuuuuuuperman!)
Futurama (the animation quality not good? Are you mad! Next time you watch, notice the colors, especially the sky. What they do is amazing.)
The Simpsons
Gargoyles (I would say the frist two seasons, but that’s all there was. never was a third season. Nope, didn’t happen.)
Aladdin (mostly the first movie, though the TV series was suprisingly good being based on the movie)
Clone High. Highly underrated. Go watch the musical episode (Oh, wait…you probably can’t…damn)
The Venture Brothers (Soooooo happy for a second season)
The Emperor’s New Groove-- seriously. It’s one of the most overlooked Disney movies of all time. It was marketed badly to make it look like a lame redemption story, and it’s got David Spade. STILL, it’s one of the funniest animated movies I have ever seen. GO. Rent it if you haven’t seen it. It’s hilarious.
Futurama- Great writing, cool animation.
King of the Hill- I know it gets a bad reputation sometimes, but being from Texas, I can definitely say that that show is spot on in its humor. In fact, even their neighborhood looks like the neighborhood where I grew up.
The Simpsons- duh
Clone High- Will it ever come out on DVD? 
Batman the animated series-0
Oops. I meant to say it was the Best. Batman. Ever.
I’ll third or fourth Animaniacs, although it’s all about the writing. The episode where Wakko was afraid of the Jerry Lewis channeling clown had me rolling on the floor.
I’d also go with an oldie but a goodie: Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. Them cobras scared me!
It’s a 6-episode anime involving a boy, a woman with a Vespa and a guitar, and big honkin’ robots that pretty much appear from nowhere. (It’s also often called Fooley Cooley, or Furi Kuri, so any references to these are actually talking about FLCL)
My list, in no particular order–
Ghost in the Shell (all three of them)
FLCL
Gargoyles
Millenium Actress
Triplets of Belleville
Good God, 28 posts and no love for Yellow Submarine?
Wanted to give props for bringing up Star Blazers. I don’t guess the art is up to snuff to discriminating tastes, but the show was incredibly engaging. It’s been an easy 20 years since I’ve seen it.
Also, I wanted to throw in the obligatory nod to Heavy Metal. Yeah, also not high art, but fantastic brain candy during my teenage years that’s worn surprisingly well for me. Bonus points for an amazing soundtrack.
It’s hard to deny that Disney in its prime had some real masterpieces (Snow White, Fantasia, etc…), but I’ve never really been a big fan of Disney films.
Nobody mentioned Tex Avery’s “Tom and Jerry” shorts or Max Fleischer’s “Superman” shorts? Or Hanna-Barbera’s 1960’s “Jonny Quest” series?
Anyway, my current list of animation favorites:
Cowboy Bebop, including the “Knocking on Heaven’s Door” feature film.
The Incredibles
Heavy Metal (Sentimental favorite from my mid-teens. Animated boobies! Great soundtrack, too. Thanks for the reminder, bordelond!)
The Animatrix
The Venture Brothers
Beavis and Butthead, Og help me…
Batman: The Animated Series.
End of discussion. That show NAILED Batman. When I think Batman, that’s the image I see, and Kevin Conroy’s voice is what I hear.
Any cartoon that actually contributes to the original source material (Mr. Freeze’s origin, Harley Quinn) is a damn good cartoon.
Movies
- Pinocchio (1940, Disney)
- Snow White (1933, Betty Boop/Fleischer Bros.)
- Duck Amuck (1953, Daffy Duck/Chuck Jones)
- Begone Dull Care (1949, Norman McLaren)
- The Man Who Planted Trees (1987, Frédéric Back)
- The Wrong Trousers (1993, Wallace & Gromit/Nick Park)
- Little Rural Riding Hood (1949, Tex Avery)
- Dimensions of Dialogue (1982, Jan Svankmajer)
- The Tale of the Fox (1930, Wladyslaw Starewicz)
-
Spirited Away (2001, Hayao Miyazaki)
I’m not much of a follower of TV animation, but I’d have to say The Simpsons would come first because of the calibur of writing and performance (plus the animation can be quite excellent when it needs to be)
They mader a cartoon version of Metropolis?
Me, I’ll vote for the early, pre-Code Betty Boops.
I would add: Mr. Magoo’s A Christmas Carol.
Batman: The Animated Series over The Iron Giant? I dunno, I 'd have to flip the two myself.
Can’t make a list myself, because there’s just too much good stuff to choose from. I’ll just toss out an obscure reference and mention the short-lived TV show Mighty Orbots, if only for the drool-licious Tokyo Movie Shinsha animation. 
And I’ll add that the Shrek movies are like cotton candy – fluffy and fun for a bit, but nothing substantive. Nobody will look back on those films in twenty years and proclaim them to be classics.
Whoops, forgot to mention The Grinch Who Stole Christmas (Chuck Jones), also based on the caliber of writing and performance.
[QUOTE=Kaspar HauserMy top five, as of this particular moment:
-
Watership Down[/QUOTE]
Although the story drags at times, I thought the animated adaptation of Richard Adams’ The Plague Dogs was very attractively done. Even moreso than Watership Down, perhaps.
D’oh!
Of course, the Animatrix and the Incredibles.
Duh. :smack:
(1) The Simpsons
(2) The Iron Giant
Honorable Mentions:
Spirited Away, Fantasia, Fantasia 2000, Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Toy Story 2, The Incredibles
Special Mention:
Hemo the Magnificent