Top 10 Saddest Moments in Animation

I've decided that people aren't nearly sad enough, so I created this list! Hooray! Selections from this list are from varying animation companies, though mostly from Disney. Disney apparently knows how to pull on people's heartstrings. The only rule I made for this list was that there could only be one selection from one franchise. I have a ton of honorable mentions, but this list has all the scenes that have always affected me. If you haven't seen any of these movies, then you may not want to read the entry. Also, make sure you click the links in each of the titles!

10. "Mother Earth and Father Time" (Charlotte's Web)

This movie was a mainstay of my childhood, but I haven't had the pleasure of watching it since. That being said, it doesn't mean that I have forgotten about Charlotte's death at the end of Charlotte's Web. Charlotte has saved Wilbur from certain destruction by spinning messages of Wilbur's worth into her web for the world to see. He pays her back by protecting her egg sac which contains her unborn children. She tells a crestfallen Wilbur that she will pass away soon, and indeed she does, leaving behind her eggs. Adding insult to injury, after all the spiders hatch, they all fly away in the wind, much to Wilbur's dismay. Luckily for him, three stay behind to keep him company. The whole scene is sad of course, but it's Wilbur's reaction at the end that always gets me.

9. "Baby Mine" (Dumbo)

This movie moment is notorious in my house because my wife is literally unable to watch it. She has a good point, as this is a terribly sad moment. It's not higher on the list because everything get's better. Mrs. Jumbo has been locked up because she is believed to be a "mad elephant." Dumbo comes to see his mother and she rocks him back and forth with her trunk while the song "Baby Mine" plays. The song makes the whole scene worse. It was bad enough seeing the two elephants hesitant to leave each other, but the song just hits you. Like I said though, everything turns out alright in the end with the two being reunited.

8. "Kitty!" (Monster's, Inc.)

This scene takes place at the end of the movie when Sulley and Mike finally take Boo back to her room. There is a true friendship between Boo and Sulley, so the goodbye between them is a hard one to bear. The worst part is after Sulley leaves, Boo attempts to see him again by opening up her closet,  only to find clothes and toys. Boo's door is destroyed and it's assured that Sulley will never see Boo again. Luckily, Mike gets all the pieces of the door back and put them together for Sulley. The closing moment of the movie is Sulley stepping back into Boo's bedroom and hearing a familiar name. Happy tears.

7. "An Empty Chair" (Mickey's Christmas Carol)

This is another favorite animated feature from my childhood, and it has one of the rare moments that made me sad a child. For whatever reason, I didn't get sad during traumatic scenes when I was a child. Now that I'm older, these moments hit me harder than I could ever imagine. This scene has always made me sad. Scrooge meets the third spirit and learns that Tiny Tim has in fact passed away. You see Bob Cratchit walking up to Tim's grave with a crutch, tears flowing and everything. He sets the crutch onto the grave and slowly walks away with his family. Seeing Mickey Mouse cry is not cool. It's not something that I had ever experienced as a child so it was a complete shock. This scene still gets me today. I could only find this video on dailymotion so you will have to skip to the twenty minute mark to see the scene in question.

6. "Goodbye May Seem Like Forever" (The Fox and the Hound)

The Fox and the Hound is not a bright and happy story. In fact, it's pretty depressing. There's one moment in particular that breaks your heart, though. Widow Tweed adopts the orphaned fox, Tod, and cares for it until he reaches adulthood. Tensions mount between Tweed and her hunter neighbor, so she sees no other recourse than to take Tod to a game preserve, where she feels Tod with be safe. The movie may be about Tod and Copper's friendship, but the relationship between Tweed and Tod is a strong one, so it hurts to see her leave Tod behind. She loves Tod more than anything, and tries to put him out of harm's way, even if it means that she doesn't have his company anymore. People saying goodbye to pets in movies is hard as it is, but seeing an old woman force an animal that loves her from following her back home is heartbreaking.

5. "When She Loved Me" (Toy Story 2)

Seeing that I can't put moments from the same group of movies, I chose this one over any other Toy Story moment. A close second was Andy giving his toys away at the end of Toy Story 3. That moment stung (I felt like I got punched in the gut when Andy pulled Woody back toward him), but Jessie's song about her owner that eventually left her gets me every time. The whole thing is sad enough, but the beautiful song just makes it a million times harder. It's a song that speaks to anyone who has felt abandoned in life or in love. It's tragic and by far the saddest moment in the Toy Story trilogy. A fan theory that is making the rounds believes that Jessie's owner, Emily, is in fact Andy's mom. The evidence is the hat Emily wears is the same as Andy's. I don't know about you, but that just makes this whole thing far more tragic.

4. "The Hunter" (Bambi)

It's a given that this infamous death makes people's saddest moments list. It truly deserves to be there, though. This moment has made anti-hunting advocates and even vegetarians because it's so startling. What's so powerful about the whole scene is that you neither see the hunter, nor Bambi's mother getting shot. In fact, you never see the Hunter throughout the whole film, yet he completely drives the plot. He shoots Bambi's mother, so Bambi is instead raised by his father. The Hunter leaves his fire unattended and basically burns the whole forest down, leading to a climactic battle and the rescue of Faline. Anyway, the death of Bambi's mother isn't the really sad part about the whole scene, but what happens afterward. Bambi steps out of their home, calling for his mother. While Bambi blindly searches the forest, it begins to snow. The whole scene makes you believe that Bambi is now completely on his own, but then out of nowhere the Great Prince appears and coldly tells Bambi that his mother can't be with him anymore. Bambi slowly follows the Great Prince into the cold winter. It's a masterful scene and one that has resonated in people's minds for generations.

3. "A Mother's Sacrifice" (The Land Before Time)

Littlefoot and Cera are playing together when out of nowhere, Sharptooth (or as I called him as a child, Sharktooth) attacks. Luckily for them, Littlefoot's mother protects them. An earthquake causes Sharptooth to fall into a ravine, but not before he mortally wounds Littlefoot's mother. Littlefoot and Cera are now seperated from their herds and much journey to the "Great Valley" by themselves. Littlefoot's mother tells him that she will always be with him, and that she knows that he'll find a way to the "Great Valley" if he follows his heart. It's sad enough watching this and knowing that she's dying, but the fact that Littlefoot is completely oblivious to this fact is heart-wrenching. It's basically the same reaction that any child would have if their parent were dying. That is what makes this scene so hard to watch. Also the end with her cloud showing the way the "Great Valley."

2. "Carl and Ellie" (Up)

This is by far the saddest opening to any movie that has ever been made. Pixar movies can be pretty sad at times, but Up takes the cake and throws it out the window on your birthday. Carl and Ellie meet as children and both have an affinity for adventure. They vow that they will someday travel to Paradise Falls in Venezuela, but life keeps getting in the way. We watch as the couple gets married, prepares for children, and then finds out that they are unable to. That scene is sad enough, but it keeps going. Years pass and they are now old, and Carl decides it is finally time to go to Paradise Falls. Before he can surprise her with the airline tickets, Ellie gets sick and soon passes away. The scene of Carl sitting by himself after the funeral is by far the worst part. The whole scene is beautiful, extremely sad, and unforgettable. I don't think anyone expected this when going to see a Pixar movie about an old man. Oh, and being married has made this whole scene way harder to watch.

1. "Long Live the King" (The Lion King)

This scene has affected me more and more as the years go by. I don't know if it's because my father is getting older and I'm becoming more afraid that someday I'll lose him. It's harder to think about that when you're younger because you think you're parents are invincible. Now that I'm older, all these movies and shows about parents passing away is hitting me harder and harder. Growing up stinks sometimes. Anyway, this scene is about as infamous as Bambi's, if only for my own generation. Scar plans for Mufasa and Simba to get trampled by wildebeest, but Mufasa manages to save Simba. Mufasa attempts to get himself out of the gorge, but his lousy brother throws him back down to his death. Simba watches his father fall, but does not see how it happened. Simba tries to wake his father up, but to no avail. He cries out for help, and getting none, goes back to his father and puts himself underneath the fallen king's paw. That part kills me. Guh. What makes the whole thing worse is that Simba is made to believe that he is the reason his father is dead, so he carries that around with him for years to come. The relationship between Mufasa and Simba is just too relatable, and that's what makes this movie so great, and also very tragic.

The Land Before Time

An American Tail was a hit, and it allowed Bluth a period of time where he didn't have to worry about one of his companies going bankrupt. The next film being planned with Steven Spielberg (George Lucas jumped on board too) was described as a story like Bambi, but with dinosaurs. The early title was The Land Before Time Began, and it was originally planned to have no dialogue, similar to the Rites of Spring segment of Fantasia. Spielberg and Lucas decided that this would alienate children, so they made it a talking dinosaur movie. A lot of research went into the movie, with many of the film's animators and production teams visiting natural history museums and especially the Smithsonian. The film featured many different types of dinosaurs, but the research team didn't do a perfect job: in the setting of the movie, five species of dinosaurs depicted would have already been extinct. Oh well, kids aren't going to nit-pick that sort of thing. Plus, people are trying to tell me that there's no such thing as a triceratops, so now Cera isn't real! Scientists, stop messing with my childhood! You took Pluto away, don't tell me certain dinosaurs didn't exist!

A lot was changed in the movie as time went on. Littlefoot was originally going to be named Thunderfoot, though they had to change it when they found out a triceratops in a book was named that. I think Littlefoot has a better ring to it. Thunderfoot doesn't fit the character of Littlefoot, really. Maybe if Littlefoot wore cool sunglasses the whole movie. I'd pay to see that movie! Cera's character was originally going to be a male named Bambo (why so close to Bambi?), until Lucas decided that Bambo should instead be a girl and have a clever name instead of a stupid one. Also, I had no idea until a few years ago that Cera's name was spelled that way. I just assumed it was Sara, or some variation of how we spell it. My mind was blown. I mean, come on, triCERAtops?! Who does that? Spielberg and Lucas took one look at the finished project and realized that they had made one scary dinosaur movie. They had to tone it down a little or they would be stuck with a PG rating. This may be a common thing today, but back in the eighties it was pretty risky to let your animated film get a PG rating. The only two I can think of that did it around that time were Watership Down and Disney's The Black Cauldron. With Bluth complaining the whole way, Lucas and Spielberg cut about nine minutes of the film, mostly consisting of Sharptooth scenes, making the film only sixty nine minutes long. That's barely longer than Dumbo! Littlefoot's mother dying was deemed too emotionally scarring and the character of Rooter (the old clubtail dinosaur) was introduced to soften the blow. Doesn't matter, it's still probably the most tear jerking scenes in all of animation. Even the theatrical version seen in 1988 is different from the version you see on DVD. In the original, Littlefoot's mother is shown being bitten by Sharptooth on the neck and back, but apparently it was later deemed to intense. While the movie isn't the darkest of the Bluth films, it's easily the most depressing.

The cast of dinosaurs centers around an Apatosaurus (Littlefoot), a Triceratops (Cera), a Saurolophus (Ducky), a Pteranodon (Petrie), and a Stegosaurus (Spike). In the story, a tyrannosaurus named Sharptooth (I always thought it was Sharktooth as a child, I can't be the only one!) attacks a group of dinosaurs while a random earthquake happens. Littlefoot's mother fends off Sharptooth, who falls into a deep crevice, though it costs her her life. Due to the earthquake, both Littlefoot and Cera are seperated from what's left of their families and have to set out to find them. Their ulitmate destination is the Great Valley, a place that hasn't been ravaged by volcanoes and earthquakes; a place where food is plentiful and there are no sharpteeth. Along the way they are joined by Petrie, Ducky, and Spike. They run into trouble along the way involving other, more dangerous dinosaurs, though in the end they defeat Sharptooth and make it to the Great Valley. I know that was a short run-down, but there isn't much to this story in terms of plot. What I will go into however is the relationships between the dinosaurs.

Whether you knew it or not as a child, you were watching a big story about tolerance and acceptance of people different from you. At the beginning of the film we learn from Littlefoot's mother that there are four other main groups of dinosaurs that they live around, "Three-horns", "Spiketails", "Swimmers", and "Flyers." We also learn that historically these dinosaurs don't associate themselves with each other and generally mind their own business. This conversations stems from Cera's father insisting that Cera not play with a "Longneck." This is an easy reflection of race/class relations in our own culture. Two children of different backgrounds or race play with each other for a time, until one of the parents insists that they stay away from each other. The other child questions their parents, who tell them that's just how it is. Maybe you've been in that situation yourself, or have seen examples of it in your daily life, but the movie does a good job of setting up a realistic scenario of how fear of other kinds of beings will lead to chaos instead of union. Both Littlefoot and Cera are OK with playing with each other until they are told by their parents that it's not acceptable behavior. Each gets a different response; while Littlefoot's mother says that's just how it is, Cera's father makes Longnecks out to be an inferior group. Cera's attitude throughout the movie carries her parent's indoctrination, though it doesn't help that she's kind of bossy to begin with. It's only through their travels together that they realize that's there's nothing wrong with associating with other dinosaurs. In fact, they probably all would have perished had it not been for each other. I know I didn't pick up on most of those things when I was a kid, but I did know by the end that you shouldn't dislike someone just because they are different.

Released in 1988, The Land Before Time was a huge hit for Bluth, grossing over $84 million dollars worldwide (around the same as An American Tail, though Land Before Time did better domestically). Disney's Oliver & Company came out around the same time,  but came in about $10 million less than Land Before Time. Critics liked the film more than An American Tail and confessed that it was more like a classic Disney movie than Oliver & Company. The only common complaint against the film was that it spent more time on tragedy than it did on the sense of discovery and natural history. The film has spawned twelve direct-to-video sequels and even a television show. I've honestly probably only watched one of the sequels, but I remember it being garbage. So why isn't this film my favorite of the Bluth films? Well, honestly Cera and Littlefoot kind of bug me. I loved this film as a kid, but it's lost some of its sheen in more recent viewings. I love all the other characters, but for some reason Cera and Littlefoot just rub me the wrong way now. Still a great animated film, though, and a classic Bluth film.