Along with Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Jurassic Park and The Mask, Pixar’s original Toy Story (1995) did more to accelerate the CGI revolution than any other movie. And yet the on-screen universe of the film and its sequels is devoid of any trace of the digital realm and its benefits. Andy uses a laptop in Toy Story 3, from 2010, though by that point he was in his teens and could hardly have been shown whiling away the hours on an abacus. Most reception-age schoolchildren are conversant with the workings of computers but this hasn’t impinged on Toy Story 4, which takes place mainly in locations suspended in time: a fun fair, an antiques store. It’s as if the animation studio knows that for all the wonderment it has generated, it may have done its bit to erode the playroom tactility it holds in such high esteem. To watch a Toy Story movie is to enter an idealised alternate reality untouched by Pixar and its progress.
In the first film, the cowboy Woody (voiced by Tom Hanks) came close to being rendered obsolete by the spaceman Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen), and had to learn the value of solidarity. Toy Story 4 partly reprises this idea with the arrival of Forky (Tony Hale), a plaything that four-year-old Bonnie (who inherited Andy’s old toys in the last film) has bodged together at kindergarten from a plastic utensil, a pipe-cleaner, a broken lolly stick and some googly eyes. It feels like a small kindness to cash-strapped parents for Pixar to include a character who can be easily improvised at home. No need to fork out for Forky.
Content from our partners
