If the folks at Pixar can keep making Toy Story movies that are as great as all five have been so far, then I’m willing to believe there is hope for the future of the world. And, making Toy Story 5 even better, one of Pixar’s founding fathers, Andrew Stanton (who also directed Finding Nemo/Dory, A Bug’s Life, and the all-timer, Wall-E), came on board to direct this further adventure of a ever-growing collective of toys attempting to stay relevant to playtime in the face of the very real threat of technology.
But this being a product of the Pixar storytelling system, this is not simply a toys vs. tech adventure. Instead, the film ultimately acknowledges that tech—mostly in the form of a new tablet named Lilypad (or Lily, voiced by the great Greta Lee)—is here to stay, but there must be a balance made between the hypnotic force of screen time and the purely creative juices that get flowing when kids play with tactile toys and create their own storylines in the process.
Toy Story 5 shifts its focus to cowgirl Jessie (Joan Cusack), whose owner, Bonnie (Scarlett Spears), is now eight years old and has a tough time making friends, even with the kids in her neighborhood, all of whom seem to be in the same chat rooms on their tablets. When Bonnie’s parents break down and buy her a Lilypad, it does connect her with other girls in her dance class, one of whom even invites her to a sleepover. But when Bonnie brings her Jessie doll, the other girls make fun of her for still playing with toys, and for the second time in her life, Jessie is in danger of being abandoned by her kid—something she never fully recovered from the first time it happened. Painted as the villain initially, Lily even fakes text messages from Bonnie to her father asking him to box up all of her toys and put them in the garage.
Woody (Tom Hanks) and Buzz (Tim Allen) are still around, with Buzz also in Bonnie’s house, pining over Jessie but lacking the courage to tell her how he feels. Meanwhile, Woody is working with Bo Peep (Annie Potts) and others to save lost toys, left by their owners in places like parks, forests, and other places kids play and lose stuff. These rescuers are in constant touch with Jessie and Buzz, and return to home base when needed. There’s a kooky side story here about a group of 50 packaged Buzz Lightyear, all of which crash landed on a coastline when the cargo ship carrying them accidentally lost them as cargo. It just so happen they are in an adjacent town where the toys and their owners live, and they begin a reconnaissance mission to find their leader, the OG Buzz.
Jessie and her horse Bullseye get separated from the other toys after the sleepover incident and are found by an elderly couple who mistakingly return them to their original owner, where a new family lives, including another eight-year-old girl named Blaze (Mykal-Michelle Harris), who just happens to love animals and Western storylines and still plays with toys. When Jessie arrives at the farmhouse, she meets a shed full of forgotten toys, including a potty-training piece of electronics named Smarty Pants (expertly, hilariously voiced by Conan O’Brien), whose batteries are nearly dead, resulting in the device acting like it’s actively having a stroke. But once he gets his batteries replaced, he becomes the best new character in this film. We’re also introduced to other pieces of discarded, slightly outdated tech, such as Atlas, a GPS hippo (Craig Robinson) and Snappy, a toy digital camera (Shelby Rabara), all of whose ability to connect to the internet help Jessie in her mission to get noticed by Blaze and hopefully get back to Bonnie. Jessie still doesn’t trust devices, but during the course of working with these three misfits, she starts to see their potential usefulness.
Back at Bonnie’s house, Lily feels like she’s let her kid down after an incident involving her battery not getting charged, leading to Bonnie getting left out of a shared game with her new girlfriends, and she self-exiles herself by throwing herself in a donation box. Fortunately, the other toys catch up to her and convince her to help them connect Bonnie and Blaze to make them friends. Toy Story 5 is a masterful blending of thoughtful, considered storytelling, a script that address the dangers of tech while still seeing its potential in helping kids socialize, learn, and discover. But the most enjoyable moments and characters are our old friends Rex, Hamm, Mr. & Mrs. Potato Head, Slinky Dog, Dolly, even newcomer Forkie (Tony Hale), who opens the film getting married knife partner Karen Beverly (Melissa Villaseñor) in one of Bonnie’s legendary storylines. Even Keanu Reeves returns as stunt toy Duke Caboom; and if you pay close attention, you’ll even hear Bad Bunny play a new character that I won’t give away.
The film also acknowledges that, like its core audience, these toys are getting older. Woody’s painted hair is rubbing off, looking a lot like a bald spot, and his stuffing seems to collecting right around his gut. It’s a great gag, but there’s a biting truth in there too, which is basically Pixar’s entire blueprint. At this point, a new Toy Story film is an exercise in catching up with old friends, some of whom have taken turns for the worse, chosen new career paths, or simply learned a whole lot more about living in 31 years. It’s a glorious film that I’m guessing adults will more fully appreciate than kids, and I actually prefer it that way.
The film is now playing in theaters.
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