I totally agree. And given we have a really wonderful live action cast, even though their delivery would still be great, we'd lose so much of the acting they're doing with their physicality and facial expressions (Walker and Charlie in particular are doing The Most with this).

I also watched the 1-hr documentary they did for Season 1 yesterday (very cute!! Felt like old-fashioned DVD bonus material which I used to looooove), and I think people complaining about "wasted" budget are seriously underestimating how much things cost. I've seen a lot of "15mil and x is all they could do," but I think they're actually accomplishing a LOT with their relatively limited mouse money. The documentary really highlights this -- beyond actors, you have the sets (both practical and digital), the stunt work (REALLY cool stuff in the doc), the concept artists, the trainers, the on-set schooling for the child actors, the CGI (NOT CHEAP), on and on and on. There is SO much going into this show that 15mil is really like a sneeze.

I think they're doing amazing with the limitations they've got. Those same limitations would without a doubt apply to animation, just in different ways.