Following this was the Silver Age, which featured Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty, Dalmatians, The Sword in the Stone, and The Jungle Book (this particular film would serve as a major turning point if ever Disney was given a massive oral history).

Then, there is the War Era, which includes anthology films like Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros, Make Mine Music, Fun and Fancy Free, Melody Time, and Ichabod and Mr. Toad.

Often times, when discussing Disney's theatrical, animated filmography, movie fans and Disney fans alike will tend to separate the company's output into distinct phases.

Often times, when discussing Disney's theatrical, animated filmography, movie fans and Disney fans alike will tend to separate the company's output into distinct phases.

First, there is the Golden Age, which includes Snow White, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, and Bambi.

Then, there is the War Era, which includes anthology films like Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros, Make Mine Music, Fun and Fancy Free, Melody Time, and Ichabod and Mr. Toad.

Following this was the Silver Age, which featured Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty, Dalmatians, The Sword in the Stone, and The Jungle Book (this particular film would serve as a major turning point if ever Disney was given a massive oral history).

The Bronze Age is commonly said to have followed, but even then, bronze is putting it nicely. This group of films is said to include Aristocats, Robin Hood, Winnie the Pooh, and The Rescuers.

The Dark Ages came after this, where the future of Disney animation was in jeopardy. This era produced Fox and the Hound, The Black Cauldron, The Great Mouse Detective, and Oliver and Company.

Of course, the era that most people know best is the Renaissance, which boasted The Little Mermaid (Jodi Benson vocalizing the theme music changed Disney forever), Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King, which I believe are four of the greatest movies ever made and doing them almost in succession is a massive accomplishment. This period also featured The Rescuers Down Under, Pocahontas, Hunchback, Hercules, Mulan, and Tarzan.

Following the Renaissance, Disney moved away from that formula of success and entered the Experimental Era. Gone were musicals and light Disney fantasies, instead replaced with outside the box narratives that featured comedy, sci-fi, space adventures, and new forms of animation. This era includes Fantasia 2000, Dinosaur, The Emperor's New Groove, Atlantis, Lilo and Stitch, Treasure Planet, Brother Bear, Home on the Range, Chicken Little, Meet the Robinsons, and Bolt.

That era had severe highs and severe lows, which eventually led into the phase Disney is currently in (though, with only sequels on the horizon, they may soon be exiting it): The Revival Era. Disney returned to its "roots" with Princess and the Frog, Tangled, and Winnie the Pooh in succession, before following them up with some even more highly acclaimed films, Wreck-It Ralph, Frozen, Big Hero 6, Zootopia, and Moana.

And since I will be going to Walt Disney World for the next five months on an internship, I decided to go back and fill in the gaps of my Disney animation experience. And what I learned (what I was surprised to learn) was that no era was as cookie cutter as many Disney historians made them out to be.

Yes, some eras come pretty close to perfect (Golden, Renaissance, Revival) and some come pretty close to downright terrible (looking at you, Dark Ages), but each has their own ebbs and flows, just as the company does, as a whole.

The Fox and the Hound is an amazing movie and yet, it is often lumped in with the Dark Ages. Likewise, Bambi is decent, but it is grouped in with the Golden Age.

My favorite Disney movie, Emperor's New Groove, comes in the same era as my least favorite, Home on the Range. And there are arguably just as many reasons for Moana, their most recent movie, to be an all-time classic as there is for their first, Snow White.

The fact of the matter is, Disney is just like every other film studio. Some clunkers. Some gems. A lot of films in between. But when you reach the heights of movies like Beauty and the Beast and Fantasia and the general pleasant feeling of movies like Ichabod and Mr. Toad, Make Mine Music, and Sleeping Beauty, it makes you appreciate them that much more when Bolt or The Rescuers or some other disappointing film gets rolled out.

Despite all these narratives surrounding Disney and all the discrepancies in quality over the past eighty-one years and counting, one thing never changed. Watching that Disney logo with the enchanting music at the beginning of each film never stopped being magical, whether I've grown up with them or I just watched them for the first time yesterday.

(Note: this is perpetually subject to change.)