The 48th Annie Awards ceremony will take place on Friday, April 16th, 2021.

As I have been doing for a few years, as we get into the awards season, I’ll post the fictional ballots for some of the guild awards, showing what my vote would be if I had one. I will, as a rule, abstain from my fictional vote if I haven’t seen at least half of the nominees. And to be perfectly clear, I’m not a member of any of these guilds and organizations.

The list of nominees can be seen here.

Here it goes:

Best Animated Feature – Independent: WolfWalkers (Cartoon Saloon/Melusine Productions)

The animation is beautiful, with rich colors and fluid shapes used to create a well-designed world and characters, all to serve a classic story with modern-day sensibilities. (Not seen: Calamity Jane.)

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Best Animated Feature: Soul (Pixar Animation Studios)

A perfect storm, combining a touching story that manages to be entertaining and thought-provoking with stunning animation. All the elements are there: visually beautiful, well-designed characters and environments, strong voice acting, and great music.

(Not seen: The Croods: A New Age, Trolls World Tour.)