First shot of animation: Establishing shot of a forest and a wanted poster.

There’s a cycle. After a period of rougher films; due to staff changes, budget pressure, WWII, etc; the lessons from those experiments get folded into making a phenomenal movie about a fairytale princess.

Turns out if you make the software do what history’s greatest American animator says, it looks good. Weight, momentum, posture, we’re telling stories in acting beyond just the face. Great physical comedy, and comedy editing. The action scenes flow, and the shots tailored to 3D projection are rarely egregious. All rendered in a way that reflects their inspiration for once (sorry Bolt, but you don’t look like a Hopper painting)

Rapunzel isn’t “an every-girl”, but is every girl, youthful femininity itself. She has every hobby and interest, confidence to overcome her insecurity, and is hemmed in at every turn by patriarchy. Gothel is the patriarchal woman, vain and manipulative. The Stabbingtons are dull, cruel muscle. Eugene adapted himself under the same pressures, “a fake reputation is all a man has”, and can’t find happiness until he allows his macho front to fall away.

And it’s held up by a plot that juggles these characters, and their motivations, and their secret knowledges, to produce forward motion by bumping them into each other in different combinations. A plot that hinges on a textual justification for Rapunzel being cute as a button in adversity: she’s literally a ray of sunshine in the world.

The festival dance song is probably the best piece of music Alan Menken ever wrote. Yes I did consider the counter you’re thinking of.