Christmas card from Warner Bros. displaying the fruits of the Time-Warner/Turner Broadcasting merger.

The American animation industry is riding high these days in more ways than one. Its sheer size and dominance in both the domestic and most international markets has made it the envy of most other animation nations. And for better or worse, it's where the action is.

Los Angeles studios have now become home base for an increasingly international cadre of animation artists. The glamour and money that have long attracted their live-action brethren to Hollywood are now working their magic in the frame-by-frame world.

Only a few years ago, it was something of an oxymoron to talk about animation art and Hollywood in the same breadth. After all, its "Golden Age" had long since disappeared into a nostalgic haze--a concept glorified some 30 years ago in André Martin's magnificent poster-sized chart on the "Origine et âge d'or du dessin animé américain de 1906 à 1941/Origin and Golden Age of the American Cartoon Film, 1906-1941." While there were there have been revisionists who have disputed the parameters of this period, there was no dispute that it represented an era that was no more.

However, the recent boom has caused most commentators to speak of a new Golden Age. In terms of the sheer volume of animation being turned out and money being earned, there has never been any period like it in the history of the medium. Animated features are almost becoming a commonplace in theaters, while the direct-to-video market is providing an increasingly lucrative market for lower budgeted titles. Television production is not only expanding, but is showing an increasing willingness to venture out of the kiddie rut into more adult programming. The interactive realm, despite recent setbacks, promises continued expansion, especially as the introduction of DVD-ROM, with its increased storage capacity, should increase the demand for animation in terms of both volume and complexity. Finally, the increased use of animation in live-action films (as in Mars Attacks!) and of digital special effects (as in Forest Gump) have started to blur the line between live action and animation, providing even more employment for animation artists.

However, it is almost too easy to fall into the trap of characterizing the current era more in terms of expansion (of the number of animators, the number of theatrical films and their increasing box office returns) and to almost neglect looking at "artistic" side of things. Animation has been a stepchild so very long, it becomes tempting to stand in awe of blockbusters like The Lion King and quickly put aside any critical qualms one may have about them. For a film like Space Jam, Warner Bros. publicity machine hyped the film's technical wizardry that to talk about anything else seemed like heresy. (Somewhat the same approach was taken by Disney is promoting Toy Story.)

While the current batch of animated event films may often something to be desired, there is still much to be admired in American animation today, especially in television. After all, one rarely hears of "creator-driven" in the same way in theatrical circles as in television. Producers perhaps feel they can ill afford to allow the creative freedom in theatrical films that big name directors get in the live-action arena. Perhaps, as one wag pointed out to me, the reason most theatrical films follow the Disney fashion for using two or more directors on a film is not so much to share the workload, as it is to better control the creative process.