Just last month, I noticed Google was celebrating their 25th anniversary, meaning they were just five years old when we started this site in 2003! Wikipedia was just two years old at that time. Facebook wouldn’t launch until the year after us, YouTube was two years later, and Twitter wouldn’t come on to the scene until our third anniversary.

Now, we’re obviously not on the level of those sites when it comes to readership! But being in the same breath as them when it comes to longevity is amazing to me.

As I like to say every anniversary, we started this site for one reason: we enjoy sharing our love of animation with fellow fans. But let’s be honest. The real reason we’re still here after all these years is because of you, our readers. So thank you all for giving us this opportunity!

To celebrate our 20th, we have a few fun features for you, with a new one going up each day.

• Best Animated Year Poll: On our 10th anniversary we asked you to pick the best year for animation during our existence to date. Now it’s time to vote again, this time for the top annual slate of movies during our second decade.
• Twenty Questions: Get to know more about the AV staff as we each answer twenty questions ranging from our site resume to our favorite movies.

A downside to being able to celebrate another milestone like this one is that we’ve kinda said all we can when it comes to the AV backstory. However, we were able to find another dusty bit of long lost content under some old boxes of studio cease and desist letters and moldy Norm Of The North promotional plush.

• Animated News Weekly Archive: From the first week of our launch in October of 2003 and intermittently over the next six years or so, we had an email newsletter. Sure these messages may not be too useful anymore. But they’re actually kind of fun as a sort of virtual time capsule. So travel back 20 years with us to see how we covered the top stories of the day!

And be sure to take a look back at our previous anniversary features for even more AV history.

• Animated Views: A Retrospective: The people that started it all and bring you Animated Views tell the site’s story in their own words.
• Animated News Logo Archive: Just a week after launching in 2003, we started a tradition that would become a trademark — changing our logo for holidays and film openings. Come take a look back at the over 70 logos that have held the top spot on this site.
• A Pictorial History of Animated Views: Let’s dig through the Animated Views archives! We’ll show you how things used to be and give you a peak behind the scenes at some things never meant for public consumption!
• Animated Movies Database Archive: Take a trip back in time to 2003 and the site that we descended from! Olivier Mouroux’s Animated Movies held a treasure trove of information about past, current, and upcoming films. Now you can explore the database he compiled during its existence, as it last appeared online.
• Animated Views Timeline: Looking back over the years, there were a lot of people, events, and stories that brought us to where we are today. Take a scroll through time with us as we recall some of the milestones and highlights in the website’s history and revisit key posts and images from our past.

I’m still having trouble wrapping my head around the idea that we’ve been doing this this long! My son had just turned one month old when AV launched in 2003. Last month he moved to another state on his own and into his first apartment! I’ve watched this place grow up right alongside my children. And while I’m proud to see my kids leave the nest to start their own lives, I’m happy knowing that Animated Views isn’t going anywhere.

And that’s thanks to you. We sincerely appreciate you for continuing to make us part of your web browsing routine. There’s no way we could have made it to twenty years without you!

The big night is here! Oscar statuettes will be bestowed on lucky filmmakers this evening at the 95th Annual Academy Awards. And we’ll be covering it as part of our annual Oscar event, now in its 19th year!

Join us at 7:30pm ET for a live chat during the Oscar telecast in the Animated Views forum where you can join the AV staff and other readers as we discuss the people, the story-lines, and the awards.

If you entered our contest (for a chance to win a $50 Amazon of Fandango gift card!), you can view or print a PDF of all the nominees and your picks to check how you’re doing at home. You can also follow along during the show as we track the results of the contest online in real time as each award is announced.

Want a sneak peek at who might be taking home the trophies tonight? Here are the the consensus picks in each category according to people who entered our contest!

While all will be listed as champions in the record book, only one can win the prize. After applying the tie-breaker, congratulations again to bill_peloquin who got all three animation categories correct.

Tonight is the night. The winners of the 94th Annual Academy Awards will be announced tonight. And we’ll be covering it as part of our annual Oscar event, now in its 18th year!

Join us at 7:30pm ET for a live chat during the Oscar telecast in the Animated Views forum where you can join the AV staff and other readers as we discuss the people, the story-lines, and the awards.

If you entered our contest (for a chance to win a $50 Amazon of Fandango gift card!), you can view or print a PDF of all the nominees and your picks to check how you’re doing at home. You can also follow along during the show as we track the results of the contest online in real time as each award is announced.

And soon we’ll be revealing our selections for the Best of 2022 and your picks in the Readers’ Choice poll!

Want a sneak peek at who might be taking home the trophies tonight? Here are the the consensus picks in each category according to people who entered our contest!

It’s time — the winners of the 93rd Annual Academy Awards will be revealed tonight. And we’ll be covering it as part of our annual Oscar event, now in its 17th year!

Join us at 7:30pm ET for a live chat during the Oscar telecast in the Animated Views forum where you can join the AV staff and other readers as we discuss the people, the story-lines, and the awards.

If you entered our contest (for a chance to win a $50 Amazon of Fandango gift card!), you can view or print a PDF of all the nominees and your picks to check how you’re doing at home. You can also follow along during the show as we track the results of the contest online in real time as each award is announced.

Want a sneak peek at who might be taking home the trophies this weekend? Here are the the consensus picks in each category according to people who entered our contest!

OK, so in reality we’re way behind the times when it comes this! While we’ve had message boards since our launch in 2003, we’ve been reluctant to add commenting. We worried about our readership’s conversations being split up in different places, with some people talking about a topic in the forums and others doing so in a comments section, with both groups having a diminished experience because of it.

After much (maybe too much!) deliberation, we’ve finally found a way to allay those concerns — by combining per article comments with the forum! Basically, when someone makes a comment on a website story, forum users will see it; when forum users make a comment about a website story, commenters will see it. A side benefit is one account allows you to post in both places, for those that choose to.

Commenting will be active on most reviews and feature articles going forward. We’re still working out details on how to add them to the news section. For now, you can try them out here below, on last week’s Onward review, and our recent Blazing Dragons retrospective.

We’ve been testing this for awhile now, but definitely be on the lookout for any issues and let us know abut them.

So dial up AOL, fire up Internet Explorer, sign up for an account, then speak up in the Animated Views community! It’s gonna be da bomb diggity!

It’s time — the winners of the 92nd Annual Academy Awards will be revealed this weekend. And we’ll be covering it as part of our annual Oscar event, now in its 16th year!

Join us at 7:30pm ET on Sunday for a live chat during the Oscar telecast in the Animated Views forum where you can join the AV staff and other readers as we discuss the people, the story-lines, and the awards.

Did you participate in our Readers’ Choice Poll of the best films of the decade? Those joining us during the chat will get a first look at the winners before they’re announced on the site.

If you entered our contest (for a chance to win a $50 Amazon of Fandango gift card!), you can view or print a PDF of all the nominees and your picks to check how you’re doing at home. You can also follow along during the show as we track the results of the contest online in real time as each award is announced.

Want a sneak peek at who might be taking home the trophies this weekend? Here are the the consensus picks in each category according to people who entered our contest!

I’m not just ready, I’m ready Freddy!

The show holds a special place in the hearts of my family. It premiered in 1999, the year before my first child was born, and both my children grew up with it as their favorite cartoon. OK, let’s be honest here — it was their dad’s favorite cartoon at the time too! Having a coral father who loved animation meant we watched and enjoyed all sorts of shows together. But SpongeBob was the best — he was number one!

One of the funniest moments my wife and I experienced with our daughter when she was very young was when she was starting to speak but wasn’t always intelligible. She came up to us one day, put one arm in the air, the other out in front of her, and with a big smile on her face starting repeating “ma may ta ya ha sa”. We had no idea what she was doing! It wasn’t until later when watching the show one day that we realized she was quoting a scene where Patrick repeats , “May I take your hat sir” several times in a silly voice!

TWO YEARS LATER: she would have her little brother giggling hysterically when she would repeatedly purposely have him drop a toy she would put a toy in his hand, while telling him to “FIRMLY GRASP IT“! She and her grandfather even made a real-life secret box!

But, as they do, kids grow up and move on to other shows. It is nature’s way.

Just like kids move on, so too do writers and producers and directors. Shows that have been on the air past the decade mark usually aren’t as high in quality as they were at the start with their original creators excitedly working on something new and fresh. And SpongeBob is no exception. I can sit down and watch just about any episode from the first five seasons (which aired from 1999 to 2009) and laugh along even all these years later. After that even the show’s biggest fanatic has to admit things started to go downhill. With the decrease in quality and the kids no longer as into it as they got older, I stopped watching too. (See my review of the second theatrical outing for more of my thoughts on the show’s decline from it’s original high).

So it’s been almost a decade since I’ve regularly watched the show. But with the 20th anniversary starting the same week my now 19 year old daughter returned from her college orientation, nostalgia and longing for the good old days when my kids were still kids washed over me and I was ready to go back to Bikini Bottom.

Nickelodeon is kicking off the “Best Year Ever” tonight with the premiere of SpongeBob’s Big Birthday Blowout. My daughter and I sat down to watch it together — I can’t remember the last time we did that! The episode still had many of the things I didn’t like from when I stopped watching originally. Too many cheap bodily function jokes, characters making weird faces too often, random storylines rather than coherent plots, and just plain bad jokes. But there was a lot more of the old SpongeBob humor than I thought there would be. And after my ten year hiatus, those moments more than made up for the bad. In addition to that, one of the most fun parts of the episode were the segments featuring the voice talent of the show playing live-action doppelgängers of the animated characters they voice! That alone was worth the price of admission!

The celebration doesn’t end tonight! Here’s what you can look forward to in the coming year:

— New episodes throughout the summer. Highlights include: “SpongeBob closes the gap in his teeth and his personality changes; his dream comes true when he becomes boss for the day at The Krusty Krab; and Plankton and Karen, somehow, have a baby”.

— Brand new toys, collectibles, plush and novelties are on the way. A “Masterpiece Meme” line of vinyl figures, bringing to life fan-favorite viral memes like Mocking SpongeBob, Imaginaaation SpongeBob, Surprised Patrick, SpongeGar and Handsome Squidward; SpongeBob toys that incorporate Nickelodeon Slime; the first-ever range of SpongeBob cosmetics”.

— New digital media include the “debut of an official global SpongeBob SquarePants YouTube channel, featuring the most iconic SpongeBob moments, music from the show, brand-new content, and more”; a brand-new global mobile game; and “new short-form content across YouTube, Facebook, Facebook Watch, Instagram and Twitter, celebrating fans and their favorite episodes, cast moments and more”.

— “The lifestyle brand Cynthia Rowley will feature a SpongeBob SquarePants wetsuit in their New York Fashion Week runway show in February”.

— “International artist Romero Britto will reimagine SpongeBob SquarePants with his trademark vibrant, bold and colorful style in a mixed media art installation that will be exhibited at pop-up SpongeBob experiences across the US”.

— The celebration year concludes with “the Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies theatrical, The SpongeBob Movie: It’s a Wonderful Sponge, coming summer 2020″.

Even though I may not watch as much as I used to, SpongeBob is still a big part of the family. We have wonderful memories around the show, references still litter our conversation, and the character is a pop culture phenomenon even if you haven’t seen an episode. The inner machinations of the show may be an enigma, but it’s no secret why so many people love it: at it’s best it’s sincere, optimistic, and just plain F.U.N.

Find opening dates for upcoming animated films on our calendar, along with a count to how many days until it hits theatres and (if you click the image) a link to the film’s website.

Carry the calendar in your pocket with our app — AV Countdown. Tap one of the movie posters and you’ll get a full screen countdown for that film. Pick your favorite and every time you launch the app you’ll start with that countdown screen. It’s a fun way to get your inner animation geek excited about what’s to come or to just answer your kid’s question when they ask you about an upcoming movie. It’s free and will work with most any smart phone! Check out our AV Countdown page for details or visit the forum for more.

Join us at 7:30pm ET for a live chat during the Oscar telecast in the Animated Views forum where you can join the AV staff and other readers as we discuss the people, the story-lines, and the awards.

If you entered our contest (for a chance to win a $50 Amazon of Fandango gift card!), you can view or print a PDF of all the nominees and your picks to check how you’re doing at home. You can also follow along during the show as we track the results of the contest online live as each award is announced. A new feature this year: you can see what your fellow competitors chose in each category by moving your mouse over the grid!

Want a sneak peek at who might be taking home the trophies tonight? Here are the the consensus picks in each category according to people who entered our contest!

And things are a bit different around here too. A couple of the same guys are hanging on, but we’ve got some newer faces as well. We changed a few letters in our name. We’ve had a facelift or two. And we’ve widened our focus dramatically. But other than that, we’re doing the same thing we did back then: sharing our love of animation with fellow fans!

Our recent site wide revamp was a huge part of the anniversary celebration. But we also have a couple of fun features to kick off today’s festivities!

First up, those of you who have been with us the longest may remember the site we were descended from: Animated-Movies.com, run by Olivier Mouroux. Besides news updates, Olivier also kept a popular database of facts and figures on past, current, and upcoming films. When he left the site in 2003, all that information went with him. We’re very pleased to announce that as a special birthday present, Olivier has graciously allowed us to rehost the original files here at Animated Views! You’ll find tons of interesting info on old classics (facts that never made it to the then nascent Wikipedia!), learn about major changes to films you thought you knew since released in the 2000s, and discover details on titles that you may have never heard of that were eventually shelved. Be prepared to get sucked back down this old internet rabbit hole! (Please keep in mind that these files are being posted as they were when last published on the internet in 2003, with no updates since.)

We also have a history of the website told via the milestones and highlights of the last fifteen years. Be sure to check out this timeline, where you can revisit key posts and images from our past.

As always, thanks to you our readers, how ever long you’ve been on this journey with us. Without you there’s no way we would be where we are today doing what we love. We hope to see you all many, many times over the next five years to our next anniversary!