Misused or Misplaced songs in animation

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mayra.nava

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I'm creating this thread because sometimes there is a certain song or piece of music that feels like it really shouldn't belong in a certain scene or animated series/movie.

One of the biggest what the hell examples of this was the song "Round and Round" by the hair metal one hit wonder 80s band Ratt at the end of the Billy & Mandy Christmas special. Seriously, what the hell? That song has no place there, that's like putting "November Rain" by Guns n Roses at the end of an episode of Dexter's Laboratory.

The Simpsons has seemingly been guilty of this in later seasons also, I recall the Homer as an Ice cream man episode to misuse "Money for Nothing" by the Dire Straits in a scene of him selling ice cream to kids. It seemed as if the Simpsons crew was simply waving the fact they can use any song they want in the viewers face.

What other examples of this are there?
 
WB and Film Roman turning Elmo & Patsy's throwaway novelty song "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" into a family-friendly animated Christmas special. Add to that including in said special a calypso-themed musical number about suing Santa Claus. :shrug:
 
"A Guy Like You" from The Hunchback of Notre Dame. I know the point of the song is that the movie had gotten so dark at that point, so they needed a song to lighten the mood a bit. However, it's still somewhat doesn't fit the in with the rest of the movie. It's a tad too goofy.
 
Far worse is the silly "A Girl Worth Fighting For" song in Mulan. In fact, all of the songs in Mulan are terrible and should have been cut. It's a very good movie, but the songs drag it down several notches.
 
Yeah the only reason that song works (and to a lesser extent the only way the gargoyles work) is that it's litteraly Quasi's daydream and the gargoyles are a figment of his imagination. So, since it's really just him fantisizing at his highest point, it's justified in being over the top light and silly. Still, it does seem out of place.
However, the breakneck switch back to a starkly dismal reality right after that number is fantastic. The contrast looking back at the lifeless garyoles is almost heartbreaking, so at least the song still works. It's just very odd.

While we're on the subject of Notre Dame, "Court if Miracles" always seemed out of place and a bit unnecessary to me. I like the song a good deal, but it still seems really tacked on.
 
I think the entire Maximum the Hormone Death Note theme fits here. I just find it hilarious how the song is so fast paced and heavy, you expect it to be more suited for a show that had more gore in it. Ironically, the gorey anime end up having some eerily peaceful themes. Hmm...


 
I actually liked most of the songs in Mulan. "A Girl Worth Fighting For" is definately my least favorite, but I think some of the others are good (mainly "Reflection" and "Honor To Us All").

Anyway, I'm still wondering why "Can't Fight This Feeling Anymore" is at the end of Horton Hears A Who. I thought the scene itself was pretty funny, but the song just comes out of nowhere, and the lyrics just barely relate to the movie.
 
I think the point in A Girl Worth Fighting For is to provide a funny, upbeat number with goofy visuals...

And then slam the viewer with the destroyed village. I mean, the song cuts off right then and there.

As for "What's Up People?", I actually think it sorta fits...in a weird way. It just sounds a little bit like Light's mental breakdown put to music, for lack of a better term, but yeah, I can understand finding it out of place.

Now, one song I personally thought was misused was ELO's "Don't Walk Away" in the Don Bluth sequence of Xanadu. Thankfully, it looks like the stage musical version moved it to a more appropriate point in the story.
 
That song was actually cut out of the stage musical version, which played in Berlin. It's replaced with a much better instrumental dance piece called "Dance of The Gypsies." Plus, Clopin and the gypsies have an awesome song early in the musical called "Balancing Act." Now if only this stage show could come to Broadway, which there are apparently plans for...
 
Probably doesn't count, but so much random music covers in the Digimon first movie dub. The movie starts off nicely, then BAM "It's been...FIVE DAYS SINCE YOU LOOKED AT ME!"


Another bad use of music I remember is Gundam 0083. Two male soldiers are fixing up a robot, and a love song plays in the background. I'm told the Japanese had no idea what the actual song was singing, so...
 
What!? Man, Mulan has some of my favorite songs of any Disney movie. Be A Man is definitely at the top, but A Girl Worth Fighting For is a very catchy song - and the sudden tone change at the end is just fantastic.

Though the earlier ones are mostly forgettable.
 
Ah, my least-favorite animation cliche of the 00's...the "spontaneous" karaoke finale where the entire animated cast sings along to some worn-out pop standard on the soundtrack. :sad: Horton wasn't an especially good movie overall, but the inclusion of that song at the end made me actively dislike it at just the wrong moment. I guess we have Shrek's "I'm A Believer" number to blame for this (although Toy Story 2's Robert Goulet version of "You've Got A Friend In Me" is probably the very first example). I know that having Broadway-style musical numbers had run it's course by the end of the 90's (Anastasia and Mulan being the last major examples I can think of), but the karaoke thing is not an adequate substitute.
 
The karaoke end number seems to be the movie trying to make adults laugh because the original Shrek came out of nowhere with its "I'm A Believer" end number, so everyone thought it was really funny and cute. But by the end of the 00's, it had become such a standard in every animated movie to have them sing a bad 80's song such as Horton.
 
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