The 20 best animated film sequels

We could have, arguably, included all three to-date “Toy Story” sequels. However, we will shout out “Toy Story 2,” a movie that a lot of people think is better than the original. To think, originally it was going to be one of those straight-to-video sequels. Instead, it became a robust success, building a franchise.

Once Nemo was found, what could be done? How about Dory, the forgetful fish, becoming the center of the story? We will admit skepticism about “Finding Dory,” especially since it came after Pixar movies lost some of their juice. It turned out to be a worthy sequel, though, not to mention a billion-dollar film.

Brad Bird is the only “auteur” of the Pixar landscape. He’s meticulous, and he both wrote and directed the two “Incredibles” movies. Bird took a lot of years between “Incredibles” movies, because he wasn’t going to phone something in. Indeed, he did not do that at all.

We move from Pixar but stay within the Disney family. “Frozen” was a phenomenon, so a sequel was bound to follow. The first film imposed limitations on a sequel, though not on the box office. “Frozen 2” made $1.45 billion dollars! This is not about financial success, though. The film was still good as, you know, a film, if a step down from the first.

This list isn’t all second films! The third “Hotel Transylvania” movie switches up the format by sending all the monsters on a vacation away from their hotel. It is perhaps not a coincidence that “Summer Vacation,” the best movie in the franchise, was not just directed by Genndy Tartakovsky, but co-written by him as well.

If you love the Minions, you have the Minions movies. However, we aren’t gaga over the Minions, and by the time “Minions” came out, this franchise already felt a little phoned in/playing to the audience that just loves the movies regardless of quality. In “Despicable Me 2,” Gru gets to do the antihero thing, which worked well.

Getting Ralph out of the arcade and onto the web was able to give this sequel some momentum. After all, “Wreck-It Ralph” ends with both Ralph and Penelope in places of contentment. Sure, a lot of the commentary on the internet in “Ralph Breaks the Internet” is a little obvious, but there are plenty of good jokes along the way, and the voiceover work is still strong.

“Shrek” as a franchise became very internet-y, and “Shrek 2” in particular got caught up in people trying to seem interesting by doing the exact same thing everybody else was doing. That being said, the first “Shrek” is legitimately fun, and the first sequel is a good movie. The third and fourth movies weren’t very good, but maybe the fifth will be better.

Yes, a sequel to a spinoff of “Shrek.” The thing is, “The Last Wish” is in the running for being arguably the best movie in the franchise, full stop. We aren’t the only ones who think that. This Puss in Boots tale has the highest Rotten Tomatoes score for the franchise, and the third-highest Metacritic score.

There is something to be said for a franchise with a high floor, even if the ceiling isn’t as high. None of the “Kung Fu Panda” movies is great, but none of them is bad, either. They are all solid to quite good. Of the sequels, though, we think the third film in the franchise is tops.

The drop from “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” to this sequel is not insignificant, but that’s because the first movie was better than it had any right to be. It’s a “Let’s ratchet things up a notch!” sequel, not unlike the second “Jurassic Park” movie. The island of Swallow Falls has become overrun not just by food, but by food-animal hybrids that have become sentient.

“Into the Spider-Verse” won the Best Animated Feature Oscar, and rightfully so. It’s remarkable visually, but also a well-done story. The sequel is quite good, and just as impressive visually, but there is one issue to be broached with “Across the Spider-Verse.” It is part one in a major way, effectively lacking an ending. The problem is that part two, “Beyond the Spider-Verse,” isn’t scheduled for release until 2027.

As you have likely noticed, these are a bunch of 2000s, 2010s, and even 2020s movies. The new millennium didn’t invent the animated sequel, though. “An American Tail” is your typical story of a family of Jewish mice immigrating from Russia to the United States. The sequel, as you might be able to glean from the subtitle, is an animated Western about young Fievel lost in the Old West.

Hey, we’re as surprised as you are! The first “Angry Birds” movie, based on the once-popular mobile game, is kind of unremarkable. And yet, the sequel is actually pretty good. The birds and the pigs join forces, and apparently, that’s what this world needed, cinematically speaking.

George Miller directed the “Mad Max” movies. He’s one of the most important, most revered action directors to ever do it. He also directed both “Happy Feet” movies. Yes, the man behind “Fury Road” directed an animated jukebox musical about dancing penguins. Maybe “Happy Feet Two” isn’t as good as “Fury Road,” but it’s directed by George Miller!

“How to Train Your Dragon” is as venerated as any animated franchise. Every movie has at least 90 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, a 71 on Metacritic, and an “A” CinemaScore. “The Hidden World,” the third film, is good and better than some of the movies on this list. However, the second film is a bit better than the first one, so we have it here.

Ahhh, the era when Americans were really into Australia. “The Rescuers,” a 1977 Disney film, is about two mice who help rescue kidnapped victims. Seriously. When they opted to do a sequel, they sent Bernard and Bianca Down Under. “The Rescuers Down Under” is also historically significant, as it was the first feature film to be fully animated using digital ink and paint rather than cel animation.

Extra bites at the apple benefited this seriously. Honestly, the first “Madagascar” is the least of the four films. The third one, which sees the animals hiding out with a circus as they make their way across Europe on their way back to New York City, is the best of the bunch. Again, it has the best critics' score on Rotten Tomatoes, but it is also the only “Madagascar” movie to get an “A” CinemaScore.

We are allowing ourselves one direct-to-video sequel, because it’s a fun one. It’s also cleverer than basically any film of this ilk. In essence, “The Lion King 1 ½” is the “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” of the “Lion King” universe. Basically, it tells the story of the first film from the perspective of Timon and Pumbaa. And yet, somehow that keeps it from just being more of the same.

This list is neither chronological nor alphabetical, but we end with 2025’s “Zootopia 2” anyway. Somehow, it managed to be both more critically and more commercially successful than the first film, which was a hit on all fronts. In addition to having a strong story, “Zootopia 2” ended up the highest-grossing movie of 2025.