Um, because he still has zero resume doing anything besides writing and plotting animated features and series.  No film screenplays, no directing or cinematography gigs.  I know it's Hollywood and it seems like someone's hairdresser can direct a film, but the big boys don't work like that.  Also I bet his agent sucks.

mechgreg: deadsanta: Um, because he still has zero resume doing anything besides writing and plotting animated features and series.  No film screenplays, no directing or cinematography gigs.  I know it's Hollywood and it seems like someone's hairdresser can direct a film, but the big boys don't work like that.  Also I bet his agent sucks.

Brad Bird had never done anything except animation when he directed Mission Impossible Ghost Protocol. They still gave him a $145 million budget. It turned out pretty good and was a box office success. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller did a pretty good job switching from animation to live action. Even Tim Burton got his start as an animator and his 3rd live action movie was Batman.

That's a very misleading simplification: Brad Bird had interned in old-school Disney studios as an animator and feature creator and went to film school but after one failed animation short pivoted into the screenplay and production side on both live action and animation, He worked with Steven Spielberg on Amazing Stories for 4 years and executive-produced The Simpsons for 8.  He spent 30 years writing screenplays and pitching original ideas to studio heads in Hollywood before he got a shot at directing.

In comparison, Timm seems like he is just sitting around doing his daily job and waiting for the call up, he had no formal film education and no film studio work.

It's funny you mention Tim Burton also, because he went to the same art school with John Lasseter and Brad Bird, and like Bird had an internship at the old Disney studios under the original team of classic animators and filmmakers.  Like Bird, he studied every aspect of filmmaking at Disney and worked in every aspect of their animation features, which was still run like a classic movie studio.  Burton's first live action work was Frankenweenie with Shelley Duvall and his second was Pee Wee's Big Adventure.  He hustled, he got fortunate, but he kept pushing his projects until he hit something.  You only really need one film to hit to get a big contract in Hollywood, unless you work for Troma or something.