TRAVIS BYRAM'S MOVIE REVIEWS

In a span of 12 movies Pixar has made more memorable films than most studios that have been going 100 years have made.  It's easy to see the ingredients to a good Pixar movie: stunning animation, humor for all ages, and actually complex characters worth seeing into, rather than the one-dimensional dribble kids are fed nowadays.  With the exception of a rare lemon that occurred with last years "Cars 2," Pixar (almost) never gets it wrong.  I take a look back at the five most enjoyable characters from the past 17 years in preparation for the sure to be conversation-provoking Princess Merida in the new Pixar film "Brave." 5. SYNDROME While not instantly recognizable as other Pixar villains (Randall from "Monsters, Inc.", Stinky Pete from "Toy Story 2" for instance), Syndrome (voiced effortlessly by Jason Lee) is undoubtedly the  super-villain to end all animated super-villains, especially in Pixar's only superhero movie. What makes him ...

I have been so hyped about this movie through friends, TV, the enormous box-office numbers and of course the Internet that I was afraid I would walk in the movie and just positively hate it. Luckily , Pixar is too smart for that. Pixar has never once created a bad film (see my above blog post) but they have had a few not-as-good ones. Once you make a movie like "Toy Story" to start out with, it's hard to reach that bar. They've reached it and far above so many times now it's ridiculous. Now they're taking a break from originality (long overdue) and are churning out sequels (Cars 2 and Monster's Inc. 2 are due '11 and '12 respectively). "Up" was a beautiful blend of kiddie comedy and adult themes, and was one of my favorite films last year. It went on to win 2 Oscars and was up for the biggest of them all: Best Picture, which "Hurt Locker" took home as we all know. It was only the 2 nd time in history an animated movie'...