Valiant (2005)

  Seriously, except for The Mandalorian, Disney+ is not making much of a case for why I should throw money at it.  (But also seriously, The Mandalorian is totally worth the money.)

This is a fucking weird one.  It's not properly a Disney film, it was made in conjunction with several British production companies, and you can tell.  It also goes to show you how devastating Pixar was to Disney in the early 00s, since this was made just before Disney's re-acquisition of that company in 2006.

Valiant (Ewan McGregor) is a small pigeon desperate to join the war effort in WWII England but keeps getting rejected for his diminutive stature.  So he agrees to be a test subject for a super-soldier serum -- just kidding.  He name-drops the pigeon commander Gutsy (Hugh Laurie) in a bid to scam his way in with his buddy Bugsy (Ricky Gervais), and it works.  After mostly completing basic training, Valiant and Bugsy join Commander Gutsy in a super secret mission to retrieve plans from the French Resistance and carry them back without falling prey to the German falcon, Von Talon (Tim Curry.)

This movie has an incredible cast for how shitty it is.  The computer animation is obviously still in its infancy and the plot is weirdly dark for a Disney film, even a borrowed one.  Example:  There's a shot  of all the pigeons Von Talon has killed, sewn back together, and stuffed on his mantle, a row of little corpses on display that our hero has to hide among to escape notice.  That's creepy AF.  There's also a weirdly gross sexualization of female pigeons at the beginning.  I get that it's meant to emulate the real WWII propaganda but A) still gross and B) this was made in 2005, no excuses.  Also, C) it's a kid's movie.  WTF.