Western Animation / Heartwarming

"Well, a lot of times, a family is just a bunch of people who are forced to be together just because they came out of each other. But, every so often... a miracle happens."

— Rev. Putty, Moral Orel

Ink on cels with a prerecorded voice track, or characters generated on a computer... who knew they could be so moving?

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Other Examples

Avenger Penguins - the Xmas Special has Doom about to demolish the diner that is the meeting-place of many of the show's good guys. As the Penguins watch, the Evil Rival Bikers that they've battled so often roar up. Marlon is furious, believing them to be working as hired muscle for Doom. But then the leader quietly says that they're there to SUPPORT the Penguins and their friends. "We holy fools..." Excuse me, I have something in my eye...
The beginning of the Exodus in The Prince of Egypt, when — as part of the song "When You Believe" — the departing Hebrew slaves burst into joyous song in their native tongue. Hm. Come to think of it, the whole of "When You Believe". One particularly powerful moment is when the Hebrews pass a couple of Egyptian guards, and the two men drop their spears and begin to walk along with the Hebrews.
At the end of an episode of Home Movies when they let McGuirk join their pizza club. (After all, he just wants a family...)
The Christmas Special The Town Santa Forgot tells the story of a greedy boy named Jeremy Creek who writes a really long letter to Santa, requesting every single toy he can think of. When Santa passes him by on Christmas Eve, he is greatly upset at first. The next morning, he finds out from a TV report that the toys he wanted were delivered to a poor swamp town that happens to have the same name as him (which Santa had forgotten to visit previously). When the kids in the swamp town say they want to say thanks to whoever wrote to Santa about them, it makes him feel better than any toy could and teaches him the joy of giving. And that is why The Town Santa Forgot is the best half-hour show to ever come from Hanna-Barbera.
A musical episode of the Canadian cartoon Kevin Spencer featured Kevin and his fat mother Anastasia leaving their father/husband Percy after they become sick of their crappy home lives. It doesn't go well, with Kevin ending up in an orphanage, Anastasia ending up on the streets after a rich man's attempt to reform her fail miserably, and Percy ends up in jail on drunk and disorderly charges. The Spencers all realize that they're even worse off separate, and so they reunite at the Camel Toe Inn in a rousing song-and-dance finale, knowing that if they're going to be miserable, they might as well be miserable together.
The end of the Road Rovers episode "Gold and Retrievers" where Oso, a guide dog makes a wish that his blind boy can see again and it comes true. Cue Manly Tears. Also, when Hunter gets reunited with his mom in the last episode.
This Popeye cartoon.
Mission Hill had several in its all too brief run. One that really stands out is "Plan 9 From Mission Hill" when Wally sees the joy his cheesy Ed Wood-esque movie was bringing to audiences, after spending the episode deeply embarrassed about it's very existence. The episode is just a wonderful love letter to cinema that is heartwarming in and of itself.
- All wrapped up in the last minute: Wally comes home to find Gus sound asleep in his old costume. Removing the helmet, Wally kisses Gus on the head, and then drifts peacefully off to sleep.
Stōked has one of these in its second episode, "Another Grom Bites The Dust". When Emma, a girl obsessed with surfing despite having never done it before, realizes that spending the summer working at a surf resort isn't all it's cracked up to be, she gets terribly homesick and consequently has a tearful breakdown in the laundry room. Enter Broseph, who offers to give Emma a surf lesson out on the beach, resulting in this montage set to Novillero's "The Hypothesist". Her fellow employee Johnny, seeing how nice Emma is compared to one of the other new employees, Martha, decides to switch Emma's bad aptitude test results with Martha's to keep Emma from getting fired.
Although it might be treading on Glurge territory, there's the cartoon The Enchanted Square where Raggedy Ann befriends a little blind girl.
Not a story per se, but the opening of the French educational series Il était une fois... la Vie starts and ends with possibly one of the sweetest representations of a child's conception. But the second instance is even sweeter considering the context: the two characters involved were already appearing in a previous series (''Il était une fois... l'Espace"), and although it was pretty obvious there was some romantic tension between them, it never got fully resolved. So seeing them loving each other and conceiving a child RIGHT IN THE OPENING OF THE FOLLOWING SHOW is an awwwwww-worthy moment.
From the Five-Episode Pilot of Gargoyles, Goliath realizes that Elisa has been protecting him all day. No one says anything about it, but it's clear that he's now starting to become open to the idea of trusting humans again.
- In "Mark of the Panther", when Goliath finally starts treating Angela as his daughter.
- At the end of the "Hunter's Moon" arc, when Goliath and Elisa share their first kiss.
THE IRON GIANT. Not only do we have a great idea on What Measure Is a Non-Human?, but we also get the ultimate Heartwarming Moments, the Giant sacrificing himself not only for his friends, but also the many people who hated him. I am not ashamed to admit that Manly Tears were shed.
- Superman...!
- "I am not a gun."
- The ending where we see the Giant rebuilding himself in the Artic counts as well.
Even Johnny Test has one of these. In the episode Bath Time For Johnny, Dukey is crying because Johnny forgot his birthday so a squirrel gives him a nut with a candle in it.
- Not to mention how Johnny manages to get an indoor water park for his best friend as a birthday gift.
In the end of The Critic episode "Lady Hawke," Jay Sherman confesses to his personal assistant Alice Tompkins that he loves her. He gives her a white rose and reads her a poem ("The woman I love will be my best friend. We'll make each other laugh, and I'll never be lonely again. Her name will be Alice, and she'll have a sweet Southern accent, and I hope she'll love me too.") Alice becomes completely touched, and she and Jay share a kiss.
- "She's a super freak! Super freak! She's super freaky! Oh sorry..."
  - "Oh Jay, you're the sweetest man who ever called me a super freak."
In the El Tigre Halloween Episode the Grave Escape, Manny and Frida have just left the land of the dead with the Rivera's ancestors. While the reunion between Rondolfo, Manny, and the other heros and villains, there's obviously some tension between Manny's evil grandpapi, Puma Loco, and Justice Jaguar, his heroic father...
(Both are glaring at each other)
Jaguar:....(Spitefully) Son.
Puma:....(Bitterly) Father.
Jaguar: (Tearfully) Son!
Puma: (Crying) Father!
(They both embrace and cry)
Just know that fishing metaphor means "I love my son."
An old MGM cartoon, "Li'l 'Tinker", about a lovesick skunk, has a sweet ending when he finally gets a girl...made very effective coming on the heels of a Tex Avery barrage of horrified reaction gags, insane lust gags, and increasingly morbid "Frank Sinatra is skinny" gags.
The first chronological appearance of Splinter in the 2003 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in "Tale of Master Yoshi." Awww ...
One Jackie Chan Adventures episode has Jackie poisoned with a toxin that's going to slowly petrify him, unless he offers to exchange the Talismans for the antidote -he's refusing to even consider making the deal. Jade is not so accepting of this, and they end up sitting in a park after dark with her almost begging him to make the deal. The phrase "I don't want a boulder for an uncle!" was a lot more heartwarming than it honestly has any right to be.
- When they're not driving each other to distraction (which is most of the time), the Chan family in general tend to pull out a good few CMOH.
An animated short that hasn't shown up on the internet at all called something along the lines of "Seven Wishes" is about a girl named Jenny who is given a magical flower with seven petals and she gets seven wishes. There's a series of adventures in it, and throughout the short she teases a kid named Victor who is sitting on a bench in the park reading, which Jenny finds weird because it's a perfectly good day outside. Series of adventures, she has just one wish left and comes back one last time to tease him. Victor has enough and decides to go home, so he closes his book...then pulls out a pair of crutches from underneath the bench and begins to walk home on those. Jenny then uses her last wish.
Jenny: I wish...for Victor to be healthy again.
- This is a Russian cartoon called "Цветик-Семицветик", or "The Seven Coloured Flower." It can be seen here.
  - Alternatively, here, the 1977 remake.
One episode of Lloyd in Space shows a flashback to when Lloyd was a kid and had a crush on Alpha Bitch Brittany. In the flashback Brittany catches him carving "Lloyd loves Brittany" into a tree and he runs off crying. In the episode Brittany gets hit with a love beam that causes her to fall desperately in love with Lloyd but near the end of the episode she takes him to the tree with the initials and pulls the branches back to reveal she's written Brittany loves Lloyd too.
Any time it's made apparent just how much Maurice means to King Julien in All Hail King Julien. When Julien thinks he's dying and sets out to make amends with everyone he's wronged, all of his apologies are half-hearted or just plain bad, but then he gets to Maurice and delivers a completely sincere apology for being himself that causes Maurice to start crying.
In Your Face, a Plympton cartoon, the first thing that happens is that the man's mouth flies off of his face like a butterfly. The surreal tone is maintained throughout. The song is a gentle love ballad about how much the singer adores their lover and their lover's beautiful face. This accompanies a man's face morphing and twisting and flipping itself in innumerable bizarre ways.