I'm still on my Watching Animated Movies to Placate the Child era and we recently watched Ice Age (2002) and Brother Bear (2003). 3d animation ages so poorly in comparison to 2d like. Some of the scenes in Ice Age are hard to watch but Brother Bear looks stunning even today.
I've always had the opinion that Brother Bear is a better film than Brave in terms of "human transforms into a bear in order to experience a stronger bond with someone" films. And upon rewatch I still believe that. Don't get me wrong, Brave is probably a stronger film structurally- but it's so much of an emptier story. And Brother Bear isn't perfect either (the film drags in its inclusion of comedians taking away from the pathos of the brothers), but especially from a "let's look at this media through a nature perspective" Brother Bear is a stronger piece of fiction in its portrayal of nature vs humans.
Brave's inclusion of bears is purely as a stand in for "powerful evil mindless monster". The comedy is getting a lady like queen to inhabit this "brutish form" or the silliness of three rambunctious little brothers to transform into bear cubs. But the twist that an ancient prince was transformed into a bear relies on the belief that bears are evil violent creatures. That this prince from earlier in the story had lost his humanity- and soon the queen will too. The conflict is resolved when the evil creature is killed, and the human soul trapped within it can move on.
Meanwhile Kenai starts Brother Bear with these very assumptions. He thinks it's ridiculous that his totem symbolizing love takes the form of a bear. "They don't think, they don't feel" he says. His needless murder of a bear (who was never at fault for his brother's death) is punished. Kenai as the rambunctious youngest brother, is suddenly placed as the protective older brother of a bear cub (Koda). Through this he gains a radically different perspective on nature and creatures he once assumed were mindless brutes. There's such a special touch in the moment he learns that bears know about The Spirits. Even once Kenai learns his lesson, he knows Koda won't survive without his mom. And so he takes the form of the life he needlessly took away.
It was so jarring after seeing so much "evil predatory animal" animated movies, to suddenly see so much care put into how bears were characterized in Brother Bear. Koda's mom didn't attack anyone. She just stole some fish supply that wasn't tied up properly. They made sure she didn't directly kill Kenai's brother Sitka- that Kenai projected malicious intent onto the bear. It's a world of difference compared to how the wolves in GDT's Frankenstein were depicted that makes Brother Bear age remarkably well. At it's core, it's an inherently indigenous story in the way it portrays human relationship to wildlife.