The 42nd annual Annie Awards will take place this Saturday (Jan. 31) at Royce Hall on the UCLA campus. Four of the five Oscar contenders for Best Animated Feature dominate the nominations for these industry kudos: “The Boxtrolls” leads with 13, followed by “How to Train Your Dragon 2” with 10 and seven each for “Big Hero 6” and “Song of the Sea.” The fifth Oscar nominee — “The Tale of the Princess Kaguya” — has three nominations in all.
And what about Oscar-snubbed “The Lego Movie“? Well, it contends for five Annies including Best Animated Feature, Best Writing and Best Directing. Can it win here and get sweet, sweet revenge on the Oscars for failing to nominate it in the top category?
In addition to these six films, “Cheatin'” and “The Book of Life” are also in contention for Best Animated Feature.
See complete list of Annie Awards nominations
Last year, “Frozen” won five of its 10 Annies bids, including Best Animated Feature. However, one of its Oscar rivals, “The Croods,” picked up three prizes and another, “The Wind Rises,” won the writing award. One of the other two Oscar contenders — “Despicable Me 2” — prevailed with just one of its nine bids while the other — “Ernest and Celestine” — was shut out entirely.
Aside from the top trophy, “Frozen” also claimed Direction, Music, Production Design and Voice Acting (Josh Gad as the snowman). “The Croods” took Animated Effects, Character Animation and Character Design. “Monsters University” won Storyboarding and Editorial. And Animated Short went to “Get a Horse,” which famously lost the Oscar to “Mr Hublot.”
Oscar outrage: Why was ‘The Lego Movie’ snubbed?
Since the Oscars introduced Best Animated Feature in 2001, the Annies have previewed the winner nine times; the exceptions were:
2006: “Cars” (Annie), “Happy Feet” (Oscar);
2008: “Kung Fu Panda” (Annie), “WALL-E” (Oscar);
2010: “How to Train Your Dragon” (Annie), “Toy Story 3” (Oscar); and
2012: “Wreck-It Ralph” (Annie), “Brave” (Oscar).
Among studios this year, Disney reaped the most nominations with 28. DreamWorks Animation is in second place with 21. This marks the first year Pixar has not had a contender up for the top Annie and Oscar.
Gold Derby’s Oscar rankings, which combine the predictions of Experts, Editors and Users, have “How to Train Your Dragon 2” is way out front to win Best Animated Feature with 4/9 odds.
Second place goes to “Big Hero 6” with 3/1 odds, followed by “The Tale of the Princess Kaguya” in third place with 33/1 odds, “Song of the Sea” in fourth place with 50/1 odds and “The Boxtrolls” in last place with 100/1 odds.
What are your Oscar predictions? Make your picks now — click here — or scroll down to predict the Best Animated Feature champ using our easy drag-and-drop menu. Best predictions will win $1,000 prize. And the 24 Users with the best scores advance to a team to compete against our Experts and Editors next year. See who’s in our current Top 24 and their early Oscar predictions. Meet the guy who won our contest to predict Oscar nominations last year — and learn how he did it and how you can be our next Gold Derby superstar. Register/log in to your account so you can also compete to predict the BAFTAs, Grammys, “The Walking Dead,” “AHS: Freak Show” and more.
