The Highest-Grossing Kids’ Movies Since the Original ‘Toy Story’

The animated musical that took the world by storm, “Frozen” was inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale “The Snow Queen.” It follows a princess who sets out on an adventure with an iceman, a reindeer, and a snowman. The movie passed the $1 billion mark worldwide and it set records when it went to DVD and Blu-ray, selling 3.2 million discs in one day. It also won the Academy Awards for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song.

In Pixar’s “Monsters, Inc.” the monsters under the bed aren’t scaring children out of malice but rather because their world is powered by their screams. This means they need professional scarers working in a corporate environment to extract enough screams to keep the lights turned on. But is all this trauma really necessary? The film won an Oscar for Best Original Song but lost Best Animated Feature to “Shrek.”

The second film based on Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale continues the story of Princess Elsa and her mysterious magical powers. The film ran in theaters from November 2019 until March 2020, when it was put on streaming service Disney+ earlier than expected, likely due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Turns out we’re not the only ones that aged as Andy, the owner of toys Woody and Buzz, is headed off to college. “Toy Story 3” was released nearly 11 years after “Toy Story 2” and was still a massive success. The movie adds new characters and brings back the old while keeping the story refreshing and drawing in audiences of all ages. During its theatrical run it set the worldwide record for highest-grossing animated film which has since been surpassed.

Thirteen years after “Finding Nemo,” Pixar came out with a sequel to that aquatic adventure. This time, the plot focuses on telling the backstory of regal blue tang fish Dory and how she came to meet clownfish Marlin and Nemo in the first film. Voiced by Ellen DeGeneres, Dory begins to have flashbacks of her parents and sets off to find them. Upon release, “Finding Dory” broke the record for highest debuting animated film in its first weekend with $135.1 million at the North American box office.