AniMat (a.k.a Mat Brunet) is an internet reviewer on RVT and has several main shows, all focused on animation. The shows are:
- Animation Lookback: His flagship show, which takes an in-depth look at the history of various animation studios (such as Pixar) and animators (such as Don Bluth).
- AniMat's Reviews: A Video Review Show that looks at new theatrically-released animated films in a critical light by judging the story, animation, and characters (and, when necessary, the songs) separately.
- He also has AniMat's Classic Reviews, which is exactly like his normal reviews, except they're about older animated films not in theatres.
- He has also reviewed live-action films and other media that have to do with animation, such as the Epic Mickey games, Persistence of Vision, and Saving Mr. Banks. Here, he ditches the Story-Animation-Characters critique system and just talks about what works in them and what doesn't work, and he's on-camera frequently. note In 2015, he made an announcement that his fans can request him to review anything they want him to, as long as he's able to review them note and if a fan donates $100 or more on his Patreon.
- The Epic Mickey Files: A series that takes a look at the characters from the video game Epic Mickey, as well as its sequel and spinoff, and talks about their first appearances, the characters themselves, some of their later appearances, and their role in the game.
You can view his videos at the above links, as well as on his YouTube channel. He can also be found on his Twitter account, Patreon account (where fans can support his work), deviantART account, and the Animation Lookback Facebook page. He also used to have a Blip account, but it is now deleted due to Blip shutting down.
Here is a list of all the animated films AniMat has reviewed, both regular and Classic Reviews, along with non-animated films or other media that he's reviewed. Please note that this does not include any films or other media that he only reviewed via crossover, such as the Scary Godmother duology review with Hewy Toonmore or the live-action Smurfs review with Cartoon Palooza. Bolded denotes films that he's reviewed in his Classic Reviews. Italics denotes special reviews that were requested by fans via Patreon. Bolded Italics denotes films reviewed in AniMat's Classic Reviews that were requested by fans via Patreon. Also, while the film are listed in alphabetical order, the only time they won't be is if a film and it's sequel(s) get the same rating, in which case, they will be listed chronologically.
10/10
- The Curse of the Were-Rabbitnote
- Fantasianote
- Inside Out
- The Iron Giant
- The Lion Kingnote
- Perfect Bluenote
- The Prince of Egyptnote
- Princess Mononoke
- The Road to El Dorado
- Shrek 2note
- Soul
- Spirited Awaynote
- Toy Storynote
- Toy Story 2note
- Toy Story 3note
- Toy Story 4
- WALL•Enote
- Waltz with Bashir
- Who Framed Roger Rabbitnote
- Wolfwalkers
- Yellow Submarinenote
- Zootopianote
9.5/10
9/10
- The Adventures of Prince Achmednote
- The Adventures of Tintin (2011)note
- Aladdinnote
- Animal Farm (1954)
- Anomalisa
- Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
- Big Hero 6
- The Boy and the Heron
- Boy & the World
- The Castle of Cagliostronote
- Chicken Runnote
- Chico & Rita
- Coco
- Coonskin
- Coralinenote
- The Emperor's New Groovenote
- Encanto
- Ernest And Celestine
- Finding Dory
- Frozen
- The Great Mouse Detectivenote
- The Illusionist (2010)
- Incredibles 2
- Isle of Dogs
- How to Train Your Dragon 2
- How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
- The Hunchback of Notre Damenote
- The King of Pigsnote
- Kubo and the Two Strings
- Kung Fu Panda 2note
- The Land Before Timenote
- The LEGO Batman Movie
- Luca
- Madagascar
- Moana
- The Nightmare Before Christmasnote
- NIMONA (2023)
- Paprika
- Professor Layton and the Eternal Divanote
- Puss in Boots: The Last Wish
- Ratatouillenote
- Raya and the Last Dragon
- The Rescuers Down Undernote
- The Secret of Kells
- The Secret World Of Arrietty
- A Silent Voicenote
- The Simpsons Movie
- Song of the Seanote
- South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut
- Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
- Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
- The SpongeBob SquarePants Movienote
- Tanglednote
- The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Cut
- Tokyo Godfathers
- Turning Red
- Watership Down
- Whisper of the Heart
- The Wind Rises
- Wreck-It Ralph
8.5/10
8/10
- An American Tailnote
- Arthur Christmas
- The Bad Guys
- Baltonote
- The Bob's Burgers Movie
- The Book of Life
- Brave
- A Bug's Life
- Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie
- Despicable Me
- Despicable Me 2
- Despicable Me 3
- Elemental (2023)
- Fantastic Mr. Foxnote
- Felidae
- The Good Dinosaur
- Herculesnote
- Ice Age
- The Jungle Book (1967)note
- The King and the Mockingbird
- Kung Fu Panda 3
- Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole
- The LEGO Movie
- Lightyear
- Lilo & Stitch
- Megamind
- Missing Link
- The Mitchells vs. the Machines
- Mr. Bug Goes to Town
- Orion and the Dark
- ParaNorman
- The Peanuts Movie
- Penguin Highway (2018 film)
- The Pirates! Band of Misfits
- Pocahontas
- The Princess and the Frognote
- Puss in Boots (2011)
- Ralph Breaks the Internet
- Rango
- Rise of the Guardians
- A Scanner Darklynote
- Shaun the Sheep Movie
- The Sponge Bob Movie Sponge Out Of Water
- Steven Universe: The Movienote
- Surf's Up
- Vivo
- Wendell & Wild
- Wish
- You Are Umasounote
- Your Name
7.5/10
7/10
- The Animatrix
- Antznote
- The BFG (1989 film)
- The Boxtrolls
- Carsnote
- The Croods
- Early Man
- Epic (2013)
- FernGully: The Last Rainforest
- The Fox and the Hound
- Frankenweenie
- Gnomeo & Juliet
- Hey There, It's Yogi Bear!
- Horton Hears a Who!note
- How to Train Your Dragon (2010)
- James and the Giant Peachnote
- Justice League: The New Frontiernote
- The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part
- Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted
- Minions
- Mr. Peabody & Sherman
- My Father's Dragon
- My Little Pony: A New Generation
- Onward
- PAW Patrol: The Movie
- The Phantom Tollbooth
- The Pointnote
- Rio
- Robin Hood (1973)note
- Ron's Gone Wrong
- Sausage Party
- Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island
- The Sea Beast
- The Secret Life of Pets
- Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seasnote
- Sing
- Storks
- Strange World
- The Super Mario Bros. Movie
- Team America: World Police
- Teen Titans Go! To the Movies
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem
- Treasure Planetnote
- Under the Boardwalk
6.5/10
6/10
- 9
- Abominable
- An American Tail: Fievel Goes Westnote
- The Angry Birds Movie
- The Angry Birds Movie 2
- Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood
- Arlo the Alligator Boy
- Atlantis: The Lost Empirenote
- The Black Cauldron
- The Boss Baby: Family Business
- Cars 2
- Cars 3
- Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget
- The Croods: A New Age
- Dante's Inferno: An Animated Epic
- DC League of Super-Pets
- Diary of a Wimpy Kid
- Diary of a Wimpy Kid Christmas: Cabin Fever
- DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp
- Ferdinand
- The Flight of Dragonsnote
- Gay Purr-eenote
- Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence
- The Grinch
- Gulliver's Travels
- Ice Age: The Meltdownnote
- Jungledyret Hugonote
- Kung Fu Panda 4
- Leap!
- The LEGO Ninjago Movie
- The Little Prince
- Looney Tunes: Back in Action
- Migration
- Minions: The Rise of Gru
- Monsters University
- My Little Pony: Equestria Girlsnote
- My Little Pony: The Movie (2017)
- Night at the Museum: Kahmunrah Rises Againnote
- PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie
- The Pebble and the Penguin
- Penguins of Madagascar
- Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure
- Rio 2
- Rock and Rule
- Rumble
- Saludos Amigos
- The Secret Life of Pets 2
- Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero
- Shrek Forever After
- Sing 2
- The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run
- The Sword in the Stone
- The Transformers: The Movienote
- Trolls World Tour
- Wish Dragon
- Wizardsnote
- Yu-Gi-Oh! The Movie: Pyramid of Lightnote
5.5/10
5/10
- Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters
- Back to the Outback
- BIONICLE: Mask Of Light
- Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Beginsnote
- The Care Bears Movie
- Chickenhare and the Hamster of Darknessnote
- Cleopatra (1970 anime film)note
- Dinosaurnote
- Happy Feet Two
- Home (2015)
- Ice Age: Continental Drift
- Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie
- The King and I
- A Liar’s Autobiography: The Untrue Story of Monty Python’s Graham Chapman
- Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch
- The Lorax (2012)
- Luck
- The Magician’s Elephant
- Mars Needs Moms
- The Monkey King
- My Neighbor Totoronote
- Planes: Fire & Rescue
- Pokémon: The First Movie
- Quest for Camelot
- Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken
- SCOOB!
- Smallfoot
- Smurfs: The Lost Village
- Spies in Disguise
- Spirit Untamed
- The Swan Princessnote
- The Tiger's Apprentice
- Titan A.E.
- Trolls
- Turbo
- We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story
- The Wild
- Yo-kai Watch: The Movienote
4/10
- The Addams Family (2019)
- The Addams Family 2
- Alpha and Omeganote
- The Boss Baby
- Chicken Littlenote
- Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
- Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rulesnote
- Free Birds
- Gumby: The Movie
- Happily Ever After
- Hey Arnold! The Movie
- Hotel Transylvania
- Hotel Transylvania 2
- Jetsons: The Movie
- Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return
- The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea
- The Little Mermaid III: Ariel's Beginning
- The Nut Job
- The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature
- Open Seasonnote
- Open Season: Scared Sillynote
- Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank
- Planes
- Ratchet & Clank
- Rock-A-Doodle
- Sherlock Gnomes
- Spark: A Space Tailnote
- The Star
- Surf's Up 2: WaveManianote
- TMNT
- Trolls Band Together
- UglyDolls
- Wonder Park
3/10
- All Dogs Go to Heaven 2
- America: The Motion Picture
- Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Magical Worldnote
- Escape from Planet Earth
- Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer
- Happily N'Ever After
- Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evilnote
- Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation
- Hotel Transylvania: Transformania
- The Hunchback of Notre Dame II
- The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild
- Ice Age: Collision Course
- Open Season 2note
- Open Season 3note
- Playmobil: The Movie
- The Secret of NIMH 2: Timmy to the Rescue
- Shark Talenote
- Star Wars: The Clone Wars
- Strange Magic
- Walking with Dinosaurs
- The Wild Life
2/10
- Arctic Dogs
- Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2
- Doogalnote
- The Emoji Movie
- The Legend of the Titanicnote
- In Search of the Titanicnote
- Norm of the North
1/10
- Foodfight!note
- Where the Dead Go to Dienote
10/10
- Gravity Fallsnote
9/10
- Castlevania (2017 Netflix series)note
- Cowboy Bebopnote
- Cybersixnote
- Death Note (2006 anime series)note
- Epic Mickeynote
- Hot Fuzznote
- The Muppets (2011)note
- Persistence of Vision
- Tangled: The Seriesnote
- Young Justice (2010) (Season 1 only)note
8/10
- Clone Highnote
- Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba (2019 anime series; Season 1 only)note
- Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion
- Higurashi: When They Cry (both the 2006 anime and Kai)note
- The Insidernote
- Iron Mannote
- The Jungle Book (2016)
- Knyacki!note
- Office Spacenote
- Ratchet & Clank (2002)note
- RWBYnote
- Saving Mr. Banks
- Small Townnote
- The Spectacular Spider-Mannote
- Star Wars: Clone Warsnote
- Telltale's The Walking Dead (Season One)note
- Wonder Boysnote
- ×××HOLiC (2006 anime series)note
7.5/10
7/10
- The Avengers (2012)note
- Baccano! (2007 anime series)note
- Beast Warsnote
- Cinderella (2015)
- Cruella
- Dilbertnote
- Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two
- Gungrave (2003 anime series)note
- The Muppets Mayhem
- Muppets Most Wanted
- Newsiesnote
- October Skynote
- Peter Pan (2003)note
- Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Talesnote
- Pokémon Detective Pikachu
- Pokémon: Twilight Wingsnote
- Quaq Quaonote
- Richard Simmons Aerobics Videosnote
- Tomorrowland
6.7/10
6.5/10
6/10
- 100 Greatest Cartoonsnote
- Aladdin (2019)
- Beauty and the Beast (2017)
- Christopher Robin
- Hellsing Ultimatenote
- The Incredibles (BOOM! Comics)note
- Mulan (2020)
- Pete's Dragon (2016)
- Sonic the Hedgehog (2020) (Film)
- Stretch Armstrong and the Flex Fightersnote
- Tiger Mask Wnote
5/10
- Detentionairenote
- Dumbo (2019)
- Hopnote
- Jungle Cruise
- The Lion King (2019)
- Maleficent
- Muppets Tonightnote
- New Cutey Honeynote
- Peter Pan & Wendy
4/10
- Alice Through the Looking Glass
- Cats (1998 direct-to-video film)note
- The Happytime Murdersnote
- Maleficent: Mistress of Evil
- Medabots (1999 anime series)note
- Pinocchio (2022, Disney)
- Space Jam: A New Legacy
3/10
2/10
- Serenity (2019 film)note
1/10
- Bratz (2007 film)note
Not given any rating
- BioShock Infinitenote
- Dug Days and How to Stay at Homenote
- Nominations for the 93rd Academy Award for Best Animated Short Filmnote
- The singing career of Paige O'Haranote
His videos provide examples of:
- Arch-Enemy: He refers to Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs as this. Time will tell if Norm of the North, a film he considers worse than Cloudy, replaces it.
- Artistic License – Biology: In his The Wild Life review, he incorrectly refers to a Pangolin as an Armadillo.
- Audience-Alienating Era: What he feels Sony Pictures Animation is going through. He believes that after the first Cloudy film was released, they started going on a downward spiral (not counting the Aardman co-productions), fueled by poor corporate decisions and other matters. He claims in his review of Surf's Up that if they don't progress, then eventually they will be shut down. However, he has expressed positive interest in Smurfs: The Lost Village, praising the character designs revealed in a photo and the animation in the teaser trailer, considering it promising overall. Unfortunately, though, Mat thinks that it might not save the company since it, and The Star, are at high competition with other movies (Mainly, The Fate of the Furious and Star Wars: The Last Jedi, respectivelynote ). To make matters worse with The Star, it is mainly a Christian movie, so Mat feels that it most likely won't bring in a large audience. And to add extra salt to the wound, they made The Emoji Movie...Yeah...
- Berserk Button:
- Sony Pictures Animation used to be this, with Animat getting mad with pretty much everything they do(Though he no longer does this)
- Environmental messages thrown in at the last minute, particularly in Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 and Jetsons: The Movie.
- Big "NO!": During his Nightmare Sequence in the “Top 10 Worst Films Based on a Cartoon” episode.
- The Cameo:
- Hewy Toonmore appears in “Don Bluth Part 4” upon hearing about AniMat's signed DVD copy of The Secret of NIMH.
- Mr. Coat and his fellow members appear at the end of the “Top 10 Worst Films Based on a Cartoon” episode.
- Catchphrase:
- “Hey guys, this is AniMat.”
- "Let's find out!"
- “See ya later, dudes!”
- “What the fridge!?”
- Caustic Critic: Averted. While AniMat isn't a professional film critic, and his reviews are, for all intents and purposes, an entertainment web series, he mostly gives a fair criticism for the works he reviews. He does get rant-y when it comes to reviewing a work he dislikes, though.
- Cliffhanger: Used at the end of his review of Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two. The following review is the spinoff game Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion.
- Content Warnings: This is used prior the Number 1 Worst spot of the “Top 5 Best & Worst Animated Films of 2012” (Hotel Transylvania).Voice Over: Warning: The following animated film may cause blindness of rage and angry comments due to it being on the worst list at #1. It may contain arguments about the film that not everyone would want to hear. If you’d like to avoid this, please skip ahead to here (20:13). If not, then please listen and try to understand the reasons why it’s at #1 on the worst list. You have been warned.
- *Cough* Snark *Cough*: He considers Dracula from Hotel Transylvania to be a ripoff of Marlin from Finding Nemo because they both play the "overprotective dad" role, and another reason.AniMat: (coughs “dead wife”)
- Double Standard:
- He has repeatedly taken a potshot against films that are primarily aimed at younger audiences because they tend to be lazily written to squeeze money out of the most gullible of all audiences. However, he made an exception to My Neighbor Totoro, which he doesn't personally enjoy very much, but appreciated the thought put into it, and even gave it two separate grades (as a kid's movie, and as a movie in general).
- He also did not seem to have any issue tearing Sony Pictures Animation apart for losing Lauren Faust as a director, while ignoring similar instances of this happening at other studios.
- He also gladly tore Sony Pictures Animation when it was revealed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller that the studio mistreats creators and artists and not allow creative work there, but ignores or even gets defensive when studios like Nickelodeon face similar accusations.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: The original Top 5 Best And Worst Animated Films Of The Year in 2011 did not include Rio or Winnie the Pooh (2011) anywhere on the list but instead the 3D re-release of The Lion King (1994) as an honorable mention. All lists after 2012 included every animated film he reviewed throughout the year and put the films that did not make either top 5 as an honorable mention.
- Everyone Has Standards: His "it's fine to have disagreements over movies and television" viewpoint comes to an abrupt end when it comes to Where the Dead Go to Die.note ).
- Evil Laugh: During his “exit” at the end of the “Top 10 Scariest Disney Moments” episode.
- Fan Hater:
- He is to the Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs films, but especially the sequel in any sort of context (he likes the books though). Just watching it for a second in the animation montage at the Oscars made him go on a short rant, comparing the Academy acknowledging its existence to an American Heroes slideshow featuring Charles Manson.
- He has called people who like Where the Dead Go to Die "freaks", and urged them to get help. This however is actually something he's admitted to deeply regretting.
- Fanon Discontinuity:
- Zootopia review, he mentioned that Zootopia is Disney's first computer-animated feature that uses a world full of anthropomorphic animals. As he was saying this, an image of Chicken Little popped up from the corner, and AniMat quickly shoved it away, screaming, "NO! Shut up! That movie doesn't exist!" Averted later on though, as he does openly acknowledge Chicken Little both near the end of the Zootopia review, and in its own review. During his
- He's also implied to hold this sentiment toward Muppets from Space.
- Fatal Flaw: He states that the addition of non-stop voiceovers in the Walking with Dinosaurs movie completely destroys the experience.
- Formula-Breaking Episode:
- He reviewed all of the Epic Mickey games, which include Epic Mickey, Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two, and Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion.
- He reviewed the live action films The Muppets (2011), Muppets Most Wanted, Saving Mr. Banks, Escape from Tomorrow, and Maleficent. The first two, because he's a huge Muppet fan, the third because it's about the making of a half-animated feature film and he's a huge Disney nut, the third because it's an independent film that looks at the "dark side" of Disney, and the fourth because it is a remake of Disney’s Sleeping Beauty.
- His review of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 was done in a vlog style, completely different from all his other reviews. This is because he was going into way more detail about why he hated this particular film (particularly when talking about the animation). He would later do the same with his review of Where the Dead Go to Die, but unlike the previous, he only did it since a lot of the movie is way too messed up and violent to be shown on any website.
- He has also reviewed Persistence of Vision, a documentary about The Thief and the Cobbler.
- Four-Point Scale: Averted. He has a ten-point scale and tends to distribute his rankings evenly. Anything below a five gets a Seal of Garbage, and he only tends to give one Seal of Approval (9+) per year.
- Only sixteen films (or seventeen pieces of media if Special reviews are counted) have a perfect score, and only three of them did so in the year they were released as opposed to being on AniMat's Classic Reviews.
- Heroic BSoD:
- In his Animation Lookback series on Pixar, he briefly turned into a sobbing wreck and needed a time off after realizing that Pixar made its first bad movie that is Cars 2.
- After watching Where the Dead Go to Die, his brain needed a CTRL-ALT-DEL.
- Also happened near the end of his Lets Watch of The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure.
- I Work Alone: Most of his videos are made only by himself.
- Kindness Button: Disney 's animated films, especially their modern films where he would pretty much praise anything they make. Even for the modern films he doesn't like that much, he still thinks are just okay or good but not amazing.
- The Ken Burns Effect: Being a documentary series, Animation Lookback features a lot of this.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: At the beginning of his review for The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild, Mat receives a video call from a Disney representative who wants to tell him about the movie:Disney rep: You're one of those cartoon reviewers, right? I hope I didn't startle you there too much.
Mat: I'm actually more weirded out that you look a bit too much like me.
Disney rep: Well, that's what happens when you don't hire other actors. - Medal of Dishonor: His "Seal of Garbage", which he hands to films he rates below 5/10.
- The Mockbuster: He calls Turbo a full-on ripoff of Cars.
- Nightmare Sequence: In the “Top 10 Worst Films Based on a Cartoon” episode, Mr. Coat members bombard him with “announced” live-action film adaptations of cartoons.
- The One Thing I Don't Hate About You: He admits the only redeeming thing about Gribble in Mars Needs Moms is that he’s the only human character who actually looks like a human, as opposed to the others.
- Precision F-Strike: From his review of The Emoji Movie: "So with that said, f*** Sony, f*** emojis, and F*** THIS MOVIE!!!"
- "Psycho" Strings: He uses these in his "Top 10 Worst Sequels" when he shows the Yellow Bellies' song in The Land Before Time XIII: The Wisdom of Friends.
- He uses them again in the "Top 10 Animated Box Office Bombs" when he shows some details of a planned CGI remake of Yellow Submarine.
- Rage Quit: Animat Watches Bratz the Movie. Animat dropped a censored F* bomb and says that he is done with Bratz the Movie with only Twenty Minutes left of it's run-time. Also counts as Screw This, I'm Outta Here.
- Running Gag: Whenever a film is overly cutesy and trying to pander to a very young demographic (i.e. A Troll in Central Park, The Care Bears Movie, and to a lesser extent Trolls), expect him to use the phrase "happy rainbow butterfly pony flowers."
- Shout-Out: Crossover links.
- To the web series Vaulting in his review of Jetsons: The Movie.
- To his fans who personally did the ultimate Patreon pledge in their requested review. (Click on the "notes" for films in italics or bolded italics for the names of the Patrons)
- So Okay, It's Average: These types of films usually receive the 5-6 score from him.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: He demonstrates in his review of The Legend of the Titanic how replacing the soundtrack can make Tentacles very threatening.
- Spiritual Successor: He considers Epic (2013) to be the spiritual successor to Rise of the Guardians.
- Standard Snippet: The end of reviews have one of five themes depending on how high a score the film got. These include:
- The Seal of Approval worthy films get the celebration remix from Super Smash Bros. Melee Smashing... Live! Live Orchestra Music Track 5: Original Medley.
- Films scoring an eight or seven get the orchestra "stage clear" theme from Sonic the Hedgehog (2006)
- Films scoring a six or five get the tense $500,000 question music and the "Final Answer" jingle from Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?.
- Films scoring a four or three play the Game Over music from Sonic the Hedgehog & 2.
- Films scoring a two or one get a snippet of the demonic climax part of the "King of Pride Rock" score from The Lion King. However, due to copyright issues with Universal Music Group, the music was later switched to the Game Over music from Super Mario 64, starting with the Arctic Dogs review.
- Strictly Formula: Anytime something he's reviewing has this, he ends with "Rinse and repeat."
- Take That!:
- When he responds to a question on why he reviewed the CGI/live-action hybrid Walking with Dinosaurs movie and not The Smurfs 2.AniMat: Look, Walking with Dinosaurs did it much more differently so that the animation plays a bigger role. How 'bout I say no and forget it so that both of our lives would be much more simpler.
- During the CN Real segment in Part 4 of his Animation Lookback on Cartoon Network, he gives a little jab at Fox News with this:AniMat: If you take away the "Fox" from Fox News, then you would get a channel that would report real news from credible journalists that would respect women.
- When bringing up the Misaimed Fandom of Coonskin in Part 2 of his Animation Lookback on Ralph Bakshi, he brings up pictures of Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, actor and far-right activist James Woods, actor and martial artist Steven Seagal, Fox News correspondents Sean Hannity and Tomi Lahren, alt-right leader Richard Spencer, and a klansmen.
- The entire Office Space review is an elaborate one towards The Nostalgia Critic.
- During Top 10 Biggest Animated Box Office Bombs, he makes fun of all the people who ship Jack Frost with Elsa.
- The ending clip for the Turning Red segment in his Top 5 Best & Worst Animated Films of 2022 takes a potshot at The Mysterious Mr. Enter's infamous review of the film, where the scene of Ming Lee exposing Mei's art of Devon as a mermaid in front of him has said art replaced with a drawing of The Twin Towers and a summary of the September 11 Attacks.
- When he responds to a question on why he reviewed the CGI/live-action hybrid Walking with Dinosaurs movie and not The Smurfs 2.
- Talking Poo: In his review of The Emoji Movie, he mocks Poop as being a possible mascot for Sony Pictures Animation: "A poorly-drawn animated piece of crap that spews jokes that no one would ever think is funny."
- Tempting Fate: In the intro to his review of Open Season, he makes a side comment of how people will endless request him reviewing the Direct-to-Video sequels. Low and behold, that is what happened as he has managed to review the three in the span of a year.
- The Stinger: Mat often ends Animation Lookbacks with these, most of them just directly hinting at the subject of the next lookback.
- More recent installments have done a more traditional stinger. The History of The Thief and the Cobbler ends on a shot of four Disney films arranged in a circle while the words "10 Years Later" appears below them, and The History of Walt Disney Animation Studios+ ends on a upward panning shot from Mat's Disney film collection to a poster of The Muppets while Rainbow Connection plays.
- This Is Gonna Suck: Has this reaction in his review of Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie when he finds out the franchise is a Religious Edutainment series, and of course religion does have a tendency to lead to widely heated discussions online even if he tries his best to review the film objectively.
- Villain Song: Parodied in his second Animation Lookback for Walt Disney Animation Studios. At the end of Part 11, Michael Eisner sings "No More Hand-Drawn", set to the tune of to the reprise of "Prince Ali". This song talks about how Disney's legendary hand-drawn animation formula has begun to run its course due to stiff competition, and how they must begin to make CG movies like them (and Pixar) in order to survive.
- Why Won't You Die?: Brought up word-for-word at the beginning of his review of Ice Age: Collision Course:I would like to categorize Ice Age as a zombie franchise, where no matter how many times you keep shooting at it, it always comes back and all you can do is shout out "WHY WON'T YOU DIE!?"
- Worst News Judgement Ever: This trope is discussed in the AniMat's Crazy Cartoon Cast episode "Remembering Russi Taylor''. Mat mentions that in some instances, major news stories regarding animation sometimes are released after he finishes recording his podcast, and that when the podcast finds its' way onto other sites, some fans complain that he missed covering said news story. The example he gives was how the previous week's episode, "Saving Mister Rogers", was released a few hours before Russi Taylor died.
“See ya later, dudes!”