Not since Walt Disney has there been a figure in the animation world who has transcended the medium like John Lasseter and the studio he oversees, Pixar.
Yes, Jeffrey Katzenberg and DreamWorks Animation had their time, but for over 20 years, Lasseter's Pixar has consistently put out box-office hits (the company has earned close to $10 billion worldwide) and created stories that affect us on an emotional level that we can't wait to experience again and again.
From the "you've got a friend" tale of the "Toy Story" movies to a commentary on how we need to protect our planet in the multilayered "WALL-E," Pixar movies are much more than kids' movies or cartoons. Which is exactly how ol' Walt went about it.
Now that we've seen Pixar's latest, "Finding Dory" (out June 17), we've taken on the gargantuan task of ranking all 17 Pixar releases including "Dory"— scroll down to find out how the sequel stacks up and what's the best of them all.
SEE ALSO: 18 movies that never got a sequel but deserve one
17. 'Cars 2' (2011)
Taking Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) and Mater (Larry the Cable Guy) away from Radiator Springs and going international (plus making Mater a spy) didn't grab critics. This sequel became the first "rotten" Pixar movie on Rotten Tomatoes. Deservedly.
16. 'A Bug’s Life' (1998)
In the second movie ever released by Pixar, an ant named Flik (voiced by Dave Foley) sets out to find others to help save his colony against grasshoppers and ends up recruiting a unique group of allies.
Though the movie was successful at the box office, with the release of DreamWorks' "Antz" a month earlier, you're more likely to remember the Lasseter-Katzenberg feud than the films.
15. 'The Good Dinosaur' (2015)
Perhaps one of the more serious stories in the Pixar inventory, this coming-of-age tale about an Apatosaurus and his human friend Spot trying to return home didn't catch on nearly as much as Pixar's other release in 2015, "Inside Out."
Burnout may have been at play here, but mostly Pixar challenged its core audience with a darker story than they were used to.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider