Woody, Buzz and Jessie are back for the fifth toy movie, but does it warrant another entry? Here’s our Toy Story 5 review. It’s been over 30 years since Pixar made history with Toy Story, the first ever fully computer-animated feature film. It’s a banger of a film too, one that has aged remarkably well. ... Toy Story 5 review | The Final Frontier?
Woody, Buzz and Jessie are back for the fifth toy movie, but does it warrant another entry? Here’s our Toy Story 5 review.
It’s been over 30 years since Pixar made history with Toy Story, the first ever fully computer-animated feature film. It’s a banger of a film too, one that has aged remarkably well. If you haven’t watched it for a while, it’s absolutely worth a revisit.
Now the fifth – the fifth! – Toy Story film is heading into cinemas.
Toy Story 3 brought the so-called “Andy years” to a beautiful close, so Toy Story 4 was understandably met with some hesitation. That film ended up being, if not on par with the previous three films, at least a meaningful entry into the Toy Story canon. Toy Story 5, directed and written by Andrew Stanton and Kenna Harris, now has that same pressure on its shoulders. Match the previous films and offer something new.
It’s tech versus toys this time around as sweet little Bonnie is gifted her very own Lilypad (voiced by Greta Lee), a tablet that allows her to play and chat with other kids. However, the device that’s supposed to connect her to her friends ends up doing exactly the opposite, and the toys don’t know how to help their owner.
It’s a solid premise (and this year’s The Magic Faraway Tree also zoned in on screen time) and one that most of us are likely able to relate to. Pixar has always been renowned for mixing magic and issues that really affect kids into compelling cinema. Just look at how Inside Out 2 tackled anxiety. In fact, Toy Story 5 and Inside Out 2 might make quite the double bill.
The toys, then. Naturally, Tom Hanks, Tim Allen and Joan Cusack are all back as Woody, Buzz and Jessie, and at first, it seems that Toy Story 5 might try to break some new ground. Jessie gets separated from the other toys early on and we follow her on a completely different journey. No spoilers here, but get the tissues ready.
But: Toy Story 5 ends up hopping between Jessie and the other toys for most of its runtime and it’s like a frustrating game of tug of war. Woody and Buzz are reduced to bumbling idiots, so whenever we leave Jessie to go check on them, the film feels like it comes to a halt. At the end of Toy Story 4, Woody finally learned to let go and departed to live more of a freelance life, which brought a nice bit of closure for the character. It’s maybe a little too radical to cut Woody altogether, but if you’re gonna bring Tom Hanks back, give the man something meaningful to voice.
We do get a lot more emphasis on Bonnie. Toy Story has rarely focused on the kids themselves, so it’s a nice little change here. Bonnie is glued to her tablet, day and night, and it’s not just her either. In the previous Toy Story films, the toys have had to be careful not to get caught by the humans, needing to drop dead any time Andy was nearby. Here, the toys can move around with relative ease as neither kids nor adults can tear their eyes away from their screens.
In fairness to them, Stanton and Harris have really hit the nail on the head with so much of Toy Story 5. The story here is strong at heart, yet the film keeps looking backwards rather than forwards. Every time it tries something new, an old gag is reintroduced. A huge crew of Buzz Lightyear figures are thrown in, but how many times can you have another toy scream at a stoic Space Ranger that they are a toy before it starts losing its entertainment value?
We do get some new blood. Conan O’Brien’s toilet training toy Smarty Pants is a particular highlight, while Craig Robinson’s Atlas and Shelby Rabara’s Snappy are less well served. Still: if Toy Story 5 had the courage to let go of the old, much like Woody in Toy Story 4, the film would go from good to great.
There is a nagging sense as the credits roll – stay for the after credit scenes! – that this is franchise that needs to soon reinvent itself. Sequels have always been important for Pixar and a Toy Story 5 or an Inside Out 2 will allow the studio to try something new like Gatto. But now they need to find the courage to try something new with their existing franchises as well. There might be too much money involved to do it, though.
Toy Story 5 is in cinemas 19th June.
