Even last winter it was obvious that this year would be stacked with new animated feature classics. Fresh TMNT and Spider-Verse films were well on their way, as early as April, The Super Mario Bros. Movie Ground Pounded the box office and, in Suzume, a mythical worm threatened to do the same to Japan’s metropolitan centers. It’s been a huge year for original work from directors like Hayao Miyazaki and Alberto Vázquez but also for splashy IP comebacks alike. Somehow, in the age of content removals and cost reductions, we even wound up getting a Venture Bros. movie — and it ruled! It didn’t come without a cost: We’ll never get back the time spent watching Disney’s godawful Wish, Adam Sandler’s so-called comedy Leo, and the irredeemably bad Trolls Band Together. Feel free to skip those in your end-of-year catch-up. Watch the best animated movies of the year instead.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem

If Mutant Mayhem’s single test was to distinguish itself within the various canons of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle–dom, it passed with flying colors. The first thing you’ll notice while watching is its indelible art style, awash with gouache-infused paints and textures (apparently inspired by school-notebook doodles). The second is the script, which foregrounds the raucous dynamic between Leo, Raph, Donnie, and Mikey (“Do we not have last names?”) and their relationship to Splinter (“Dad” to them — be still my heart), and fills the rest of the screen time with Gen-Z-aware jokes about TikTok and Attack on Titan. The movie’s origin-story plot sends them gallivanting across New York to battle Superfly, a gang leader and fellow mutant with designs on ruling the world. Did I mention the soundtrack is full of incredible hip-hop, and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross did the score? Turtles forever.

Spiderman: Across the Spider-verse

The labor that went into the Spider-Verse sequel’s hyperkinetic, ultrastylized animation is undeniable from the first scene — an opener that leads with pops of color and line work precisely timed to the aggressive pounding Gwen Stacy inflicts upon her drum kit. As a resident of Earth-65, she moves in a world of mood-ring watercolors, one of several uniquely illustrated universes the movie uses to show off its artistic chops and creative ambitions. Miles Morales looks fresher than ever, zipping and flipping and thwip!ing through the frame, and his character arc in this film is as compelling as it was in his first — a journey that cannily lets his attachments to his family and civilian future mirror the attachment he shares with his Spider-brethren and superhero destiny. Its plot stops short on a brutal cliffhanger, yes, but unlike other recent two-part films, the primary thematic threads of Across the Spider-Verse almost all find their conclusions. It’s not half a movie. In fact, it’s a more complete movie than most superhero fare dares to be these days. And stylistically, it’s self-evidently one of the most visually complex and inspired films of the decade.

Nimona

In 2021, years into the film’s development at Blue Sky Studios (the animation shop behind Ice Age), the staff of Nimona got tragic news: Its new owners at Disney were killing Blue Sky after acquiring its parent company Fox, and the film — reportedly after Disney execs whined about a same-sex kiss — was to be buried along with the studio. Two and a half years later, the film is finally out, after a rescue by Annapurna Pictures, DNEG Animation, and Netflix, and it is far better than anyone could have hoped. Based on the comic by ND Stevenson, Nimona is a queer parable about a shape-shifter who refuses to adhere to society’s rules for what she should look like or whom she should present as. When she meets a knight, Ballister Boldheart, who is falsely accused of killing the queen, the two team up and take a stand against the repressive order that previously employed him. Nimona’s action is staged in a stylized blend of 2-D and 3-D animation, which crescendos toward a kaiju-size climax. But the way the film foregrounds the friendship between the ever-fluid Nimona and her gay bestie Boldheart, voiced respectively by Chloë Grace Moretz and Riz Ahmed, is what makes it beautiful.

Super Mario Bros. Movie

The year’s biggest, silliest IP grab was also one of its hottest at the box office — now a $1.36 billion worldwide hit that topped every other 2023 release until Barbie rolled around. The Chris Pratt–led movie has made nearly 40 times what the notorious live-action Super Mario Bros. flop did 30 years ago. And it’s also pretty good for what it is: a highly watchable, 92-minute color wheel of Nintendo fan service. Its spins through Mario game mainstays like the Mushroom Kingdom, the Jungle Kingdom, and Rainbow Road are all delightful. Though The Super Mario Bros. Movie takes basically no narrative risks, it’s also not as irritating as a more winking movie would have been. Directors Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic give Mario about as simple a character arc as his games do, liberally mine elements from those games, and cram them in as many of Illumination’s thrillingly artistic sequences as the run time can support. We call that an “Okey dokey!”