I don't really judge a film's quality by what period it comes out in. I think sometimes we put on nostalgia goggles and are harsher about newer films. I think something like
Frozen is as good as any of the films I grew up with; same with
Encanto, TP&TF, and
Raya. Most of the films Disney has put out since
The Princess and the Frog have been "good," other than
Wreck-It Ralph and
Big Hero 6 to me. I think those two are their weakest releases in recent times. At worst, some of the newer films have a sort of bland, factory pipeline-like quality--
Moana, for example. That's not the same as "bad," it's just not as interesting for me as it could be.
Medium--such as hand-drawn animation, 3D, or live-action--isn't really indicative of a film's quality. But I do have a preference for hand-drawn animation, I find drawings and paintings to be beautiful in a way 3D seldom is. 3D too often in most films seems to attempt to simulate real life to the point it feels like why not just make it in live-action? I do love stop-motion films like Laika though, they have a different feeling from real life entirely. I prefer when 3D films take risks stylistically at least. I think that's why I've been a little more satisfied with PIXAR films lately--like
Turning Red and
Luca--because they take more risks stylistically since Lasseter was removed. WDAS is doing the same. True, I think the aesthetic they chose for
Strange World is kind of ugly, hopefully they won't keep doing that one, but what they're doing with
Wish (the whole watercolor effects) sounds really pretty...
As far as villains, the answer's sort of the same. A film doesn't need a villain to be good necessarily, although I do have a preference for them in WDAS films. I just don't care for the repetitious Twist Villains who lack all flavor. I think Hans is the only one from WDAS that even worked for me, they make you really hate that character almost as much as Scar. No, wait, King Candy was another decent one. But most of them are like Bellwether from
Zootopia, forgotten almost the minute after they leave the screen, having left no impact. Disney films have never been in the same league as Ghibli as far as presenting "mature" themes with nuance and lack of villains, imo, that's why most of Disney's attempts to make movies without villains end up delivering a sort of boring experience in comparison. Disney movies are more about big, flashy moments of emotion to me, whether it's a next level song (usually of the "I Want" variety), a tragic death scene, or a villain losing their shit--those are almost always guaranteed to be highlights in a Disney film.
I do agree that PIXAR and WDAS became indistinguishable from one another. That started with Lasseter and PIXAR employees taking over WDAS, but it still felt slightly separate overall. For example, Zootopia feels like a straight PIXAR film, the only thing that saves it is Judy being a classic Disney heroine with her "impossible" dream, innocence and good nature. Only recently, things have started to become even more blurred.
Coco felt a bit too much like WDAS with Miguel's love of music and his family's reaction. And now something like
Turning Red feels just like a WDAS film with all the female characters and an almost
Lilo & Stitch-type of modern world quirkiness.
As far as politics or whatever, I think that's something spurred on by a Republican figure like DeSantis latching onto a "liberal" company like Disney to make a name for himself nationally, now every online conservative troll attacks Disney because they're following the leader so to speak. I don't think modern films are any more "liberal" than they ever were. I mean, you could put the '90s films under the same microscope and find all the same supposed "flaws."
Aladdin,
Mulan,
Hunchback, and
Pocahontas having people of color either as the full cast or at least split in half with White characters (and
Hercules has the Muses); all the major female characters are stronger, have more agency, and showed a wider range of emotions than any Disney had made before that time (and to be fair I'd say the same was true for the male characters--Aladdin, the Beast, and others for example wipe the floor with characters like the princes from
Snow White,
Sleeping Beauty, and
Cinderella as well as Mowgli or Peter Pan). There's a regular theme of the other characters "learning from" the female character in the '90s films. Whether it's Triton learning not to hate humans from Ariel, the Beast growing into a good person and human being again in order to deserve Belle rather than a self-centered monster, John Smith understanding to see value of life for its own sake rather than its monetary value through Pocahontas, Esmeralda being a figure of true compassion versus Frollo being a hate-filled hypocrite, all of China bowing to Mulan after she's saved them all, etc. Themes of environmentalism and bigotry abound ("The Mob Song" in B&TB, "Colors of the Wind" in
Pocahontas, Triton's reaction to Ariel being in love with a human as a metaphor, everything in
Hunchback).
Rodin said:
The old movies had fun villians but not fun leads. The new movies are the opposite.
I'm not sure I agree with that. I mean, true, when there was a great villain, they usually outshined everyone else in the Walt Era films (see Maleficent, the Evil Queen, Cruella). But they were much closer to even in the '90s films. Ariel is almost as strong a protagonist as Ursula is a villain to me, Hercules and Megara as much as Hades, Belle and Beast as much as Gaston, Mulan as much as Shan-Yu, Pocahontas and Tarzan far outclass Ratcliffe and Clayton. I think only Frollo in
Hunchback and Scar in
The Lion King eclipse the protagonists entirely for me. And even of the last films that had major villains, I'd say Tiana is on level with Facilier and Rapunzel is much stronger than Gothel. Whereas someone like Moana probably wins the contest of strongest character in her film not because she's stronger than '90s protagonists--I'd argue she's not as good as many of the '90s protagonists--but because there simply is no villain available for the audience to prefer to her. And oftentimes I believe a strong villain makes a strong protagonist, when the protagonist has to deal with the villain themselves anyway.