“Toy Story 4” is like one last rodeo with the old gang, an unexpected revival long after we thought they’d retired. It doesn’t have the energy or emotionality of any of the others, but it’s nice to see the old-timers back up to their old tricks.
A fourth feature for the cornerstone Pixar Animation franchise seems unnecessary. After all, the third one from nine years ago felt like a very conspicuous wrapping of the bow, as the little family of toys who come to life when people aren’t around were passed on from Andy, now all grown up, to adorable pre-K Bonnie.
And yet, here we are.
Not much time has passed since Bonnie became “their kid,” although a flashback to nine years earlier shows us how Bo Peep (Annie Potts), the love interest of Woody the cowboy sheriff (Tom Hanks), disappeared between the second and third movies. It seems she didn’t share Woody’s enthusiasm for “always being there” for their kid, so when Andy’s sister decided to pass Bo on to another child, she was ready to go.
She returns triumphantly, in a much more athletic iteration than we remember. Eschewing her modest shepherdess’ cape and laughing off a broken arm kept attached with tape, Bo swings and swoops all around using her hooked staff and a bottomless reserve of guts. She embraces her status as a “lost toy” free of human constraints.
She’s practically a toy superhero.
When Bonnie’s family goes on a road trip in an RV, it reveals fractures in the toy universe. Woody chafes at no longer being the head toy calling the shots. Even worse, he’s fallen out of Bonnie’s rotation of favored toys, often relegated to the back of the closet during playtime.
Still, his sense of loyalty remains true when Bonnie goes off to kindergarten and creates a toy of her own from a plastic spork and pipe cleaners. Woody and the gang are surprised when the creature springs to life, raising all sorts of metaphysical questions about the Toy Story universe.
Dubbed Forky (voice of Tony Hale), the new tribe member at first is very confused and self-endangering. Since he was made out of spare parts, he insists that he’s trash and keeps trying to escape to the nearest garbage bin, requiring repeated rescuing from Woody.
At first I thought this was an attempt to introduce a mentally challenged toy, which would’ve been an interesting development. But Forky gets wiser with time, and eventually grows to embrace the toy ethos.
Part of his tutelage comes at the knee of Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks), a vintage toy stuck in an antique shop in the mountain town of Grand Basin. She’s seemingly benevolent, but resents that she’s never had a kid to call her own. She blames it on her malfunctioning voice box, and sets her designs on claiming Woody’s.
Gabby is portrayed as more misguided than evil, though she employs a force of identical ventriloquist dolls who act as her muscle, and are as creepy as all get out.
Other new characters include Duke Caboom (Keanu Reeves), a Canadian motorcycle daredevil who’s lost his nerve; Giggle McDimples (Ally Maki), a pint-sized police officer who acts as Bo’s shoulder-riding sidekick; and Bunny and Ducky (Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key), a pair of long-suffering plush toys stitched together hand-to-hand who’ve spent an eternity as the top prize at a malfunctioning carnival duck hunt arcade.
Directed by Josh Cooley from a screenplay by Andrew Stanton and Stephany Folsom, “Toy Story 4” is easily the weakest of the series, but it’s still a fun ride. It seems the sendoff was not their final bow, and they’re destined to keep collecting nostalgia curtain calls.
When i rewatched 4 the first time this year, I was astonished by how jarring it was compared to the first three films. I don’t have any issue with the Bo Peep character concept, but it was so far beyond what we had previously seen from Bo’s calm demeanor that it didn’t feel like Bo Peep; she might as well have been a new character. Had they acknowledged that this was a departure from her characterization in Toy Story 1-2 and more thoroughly explored what experiences got her to this point, I wouldn’t have had a problem with this. But instead, they suggested that this was the character Bo has always been, as reflected in the flashback scene in the beginning of the film. When Woody climbs onto Molly’s desk to look out the window, she strikes an action pose with her cane and immediately springs into action for the rescue mission, something she never did besides asking Rocky Gibraltar to lower the van ramp in the first film. For a film so otherwise careful about honoring the legacy of its predecessors, this felt like a jarring retcon. Andy’s others toys don’t even do anything; I honestly could not tell you anything most of them contributed to the story. Jessie felt particularly underutilized - she did contribute to the arc of Woody feeling a lack of purpose, but this was when she was in toy mode, and so ultimately this was instigated by Bonnie. She also lacked any notable interactions with Buzz, a big disappointment given how much fun those previously proved to be. Mr. Potato Head’s involvement is excused due to the passing of Don Rickles, but the others really felt tossed aside. The aliens saved the lives of the entire main cast at the end of Toy Story 3. Did they even have a single line of dialogue here? Having Bonnie forget Woody and Woody leaving the gang, I cannot help but feel it detracts from the overarching story of the films as a series. In Toy Story 3, Andy never intends to give Woody away to Bonnie, and only does so when he sees that she is visibly attached to him. He’s reluctant, but ultimately decides that Bonnie is the right kid for Woody, and asks her to take extra special care of him. That entire interaction was so delicately crafted to make us feel comfortable with the toys moving on to a new owner. But in the small amount of time implied to have happened in between Toy Story 3 and 4, Bonnie becomes so disinterested in Woody that he feels comfortable leaving her. In setting up this new character arc for Woody, they effectively take away from the character arc with Andy and Bonnie, which feels dissatisfying when looking at the films as a series.
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