During the creating of "The Fox and the Hound" Don Bluth and several animators left Disney, disheartened with the direction things were going. In the years to come they would produce several critically-acclaimed children's animated films (to call them cartoons seems rather derogatory in the face of such praise) which not only presented kids with a vastly different group of films to watch, but ones that contained elements different than the Disney pictures of the same time frame. With graphic death, scary scenes and dark lessons, Bluth (often quoted as saying "Kids can accept anything as long as there is a happy ending") has been criticized for going against the grain of what children's films should contain. Examining this unusual event in film history, as well as other "children's films" that have been controversial (including Disney's own "Snow White and the Seven Dwarves"), discern what merits both sides of children's filmmaking have (traditional and new age) and whether it is more beneficial to take a darker path or only allow happy endings and bright stories to fill the screens of young impressionable human beings.
