Eric Heidemann's Top Ten Toon List

Three by Chuck Jones:

1. "What's Opera, Doc?"
   
   
2. "One Froggy Evening."
   
   
3. "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" (1966).
   Can't beat the combo of Jones, Dr. Seuss, & Boris Karloff!
   
   

Three by the Fleischer Brothers:

1. The original Popeye animated series from the 1940s
   Based on E.C. Segar's Thimble Theater comic strip. I don't know individual episode titles (can anyone help with that?) so I'll cheat & name the whole series.
   
   
2. the original Superman cartoons, also from the 1940s
   Based on the early DC comics. "Mechanical Monsters" is probably a good representative episode. These fun, handsome cartoons are the template for most of the super-hero cartoons that have followed.
   
   
3. The Betty Boop cartoons from the 1930s.
   My favorite is the surreal sorority rushing cartoon, with the continual repetition of "Wanna be a member?" in strange situations.
   
   

One by Disney:

1. SNOW WHITE (1937)
   The original full-length animated feature, is a hard act to follow.

One by Jay Ward

1. BULLWINKLE from the 1960s
   Surely one of the best WRITTEN cartoons not produced by Warner Bros.

One by Matt Gruening

1. THE SIMPSONS
   comparable in wit--though different in style--with BULLWINKLE.

1. ALLEGRO NON TROPO (1976)
   Italian director Bruno Bozetto's hilarious send-up of FANTASIA (the original, of course, remains a classic in its ownright).

Honorable mention to Ralph Bakshi, for his years of keeping the light burning for serious, ambitious full-length animation during animation's Dark Age. I especially like his under-rated 1978 THE LORD OF THE RINGS. A flawed film, to be sure, but it's serious, intelligent, & sincere, with a good script by fantasy novelist Peter S. Beagle.