...Goodness, what a mess of a discussion.
To the actual topic:
I don't think I could choose which I think looks better; especially considering there's no single overarching look of what cel animation looks like, nor what digital animation looks like.
It's quite foolish to say that digital animation can't replicate the look of cel animation. Toon Boom, Flash, and TVPaint (probably others too) have the ability to do texture fills, so if you want the grainy, slightly uneven paint look to your colours, you can have it. That typically isn't done is because it was rarely, if ever, the intention in cel animation to begin with. It was a necessary caveat of the only tools that were available at the time. The goal was to paint the colours as flush as humanly possible, and now that's largely been replaced by digital tools that do it without any imperfection. You're free to dislike that, but that's a purely subjective stance.
As for linework, there are countless textured brushes you can find online for just about any art or animation software. Some programs have brushes like that to begin with.
If it can be displayed on a computer screen, then it can be replicated on a computer.
Truth is, I have no problem with cels going away for good. They were a necessity of the time, they had a long and admirable run, and now they've been replaced by something that's capable of achieving the same result with less. That's not laziness, that's efficiency. The animation industry has always thrived in embracing change and new technology for whatever reason it needed to. The xerox era of Disney movies existed simply because it was no longer affordable for Disney to do clean-up and colouring the way they did before, but that sketchy look was beloved by many. I'm not interested in seeing the old tried and true replicated ad nauseum. I'm much more interested in what new ground we can break with new artistic technology.
Sergio Pablos's absolutely stunning
Klaus has a look all it's own that uses hand-drawn animation with digital painting and volumetric shading done in TVPaint that really would not be possible to do working on cels:
https://vimeo.com/126287950
Also you can see some beautiful pencil tests of that here:
https://vimeo.com/135202004
Sigh...I just love animation in all forms. I love so much of what I've seen done with non-traditional methods when those methods are pushed. I've spent the last couple years working very happily in TV animation; as such I've been afforded the opportunity to live comfortably and spend my free time working on a short film in which I'm using both hand-drawn animation and digital cut-out animation.
