I think this recent development is a good one. It's a counterreaction to the old rule that dominated for decades up to sometime around 1990, that if an animal appeared in a movie, it would have to die, especially in a very loud or graphic way. Now THAT was a cliché! When it finally switched because the "creative" folks finally realized how ridiculous it had gotten, my reaction to those scenes you're talking about was "Yay! Finally someone breaks the standard rule on this!"