Ruminations On Toy Story
I think Toy Story 3 was the perfect way to end a series, but apparently Toy Story 4 is going to be a thing. If I were to make it, I’d make it a prequel, or at least a story that explores the background and mythology of the toy community. This would allow the answering of some extremely pressing questions. I don’t mean that one about why Buzz Lightyear never comes to life when humans are around — that one is unanswerable. There is no answer besides narrative convenience combined with the fact the writers overlooked it, and there’s no point trying to answer it. We just have to accept that one of the best movies of all time has the biggest plot hole in the history of stories, and despite being an utter triumph on ever level, it doesn’t make sense.
But the questions a Toy Story 4 COULD address include that of exactly what qualifies as a toy? In the first Toy Story, the toys all fear Andy being given another toy, which might replace one of them. They’re then all relieved when Andy gets Battleship. But, leaving aside the question of why they’re not afraid Andy might discard them in favour of a non-toy activity, what makes Battleship NOT a toy, and, say, the Etch-A-Sketch a toy? Or the individual ships in Battleship? The Army Men is sentient, and so is the remote control car — why not the Battleships? Is a toy gun a toy? Do toy weapons come to life too? This is a disturbing thought.
Then there’s the issue of pain, and why Woody is the only toy who seems to feel it to any great extent. When his forehead is burnt, he screams in pain. When his hand is trapped by Buzz’s helmet, he yells in agony. He seems to be suffering pain when a hockey puck hits him in the mouth, and when rocketing down the street at high speed with a powerful wind gusting in his face. But Buzz loses a whole arm and doesn’t so much as say “Ow”. Dismembered toys in Sid’s room suffer their fate with quiet equanimity. Is Woddy the only toy to feel pain, or is he just a massive wuss compared to the incredibly stoic other toys? The claw machine alien getting mauled by Spud is a scene of nightmarish horror in toy terms, but not so much as a whimper. Of course, maybe he’s staying silent, because of “the rules”, which brings us to the biggest question of all:
What are the rules? Woody mentions them when planning the assault on Sid’s sanity, and we know the main rule is “never let on that you’re alive” (which incidentally makes the first movie’s attitude to Sid incredibly unfair — we’re supposed to think the kid is a psychopath because he treats inanimate objects like inanimate objects? Andy is seen making his toys fight, eat each other, shoot each other with lasers, and so on — but somehow he’s kind and Sid is cruel, just because Sid is more creative with his games? The toys are being kind of dickish by refusing to ever tell Sid that he’s torturing sentient beings, but then judging him for doing it. Anyway.)
But we don’t know what the other “rules” are, how complex or strict they are, or — most importantly — who laid them down. Where did the rules come from, and what keeps all the toys in line? In Toy Story, a Combat Carl is strapped to an explosive and blown up on Sid’s lawn. He is so committed to “the rules” that he stays put and lets himself be obliterated rather than break them and run for it. Woody is the same when Sid finds them at Pizza Planet. He refuses to come to life in Sid’s sight despite being convinced that capture by Sid means certain death. Presumably all the other toys that Sid has tortured, dismembered and blown up were the same.
Furthermore, every other toy in the history of the world has been every bit as committed to the rules as these ones. Prior to Toy Story, no toy has broken them, and we know this because it is set in a universe where humans still believe toys are just toys. So since toys were invented, thousands of years ago, not a single one has ever revealed its sentience to a human, no matter how endangered they were, no matter how imminent their destruction, no matter how desperate their situation. They haven’t even done it by accident. Maybe we could be generous and suppose that a few have done it, like Woody, and the result has simply been mentally scarred children who don’t reveal their experience. Still, the number has to be vanishingly small, and there have to be billions of toys that have met terrible fates without flinching rather than break the rules.
So…what authority is enforcing these rules? What entity is so terrifying to them that they’d rather be killed in any horrible way rather than risk breaking the rules? What punishment is so awful that every toy ever has been so hyper-vigilant as to not even inadvertently show itself to humans? We know that the consequences of breaking the rules are not inevitable, because Woody gets away with it — but the implied threat must be hideous if nobody else is willing to risk it for anything.
We will never have an answer as to why Buzz Lightyear, a toy totally unaware of the rules, would want to avoid moving and talking in front of people, but another sequel just might tell us where the rules come from and what’s so damn important about them. Sadly I doubt that it will.
But what Toy Story 4 apparently WILL do is answer at least one burning question of the series: whatever happened to Bo Peep? And that’ll be good.
I can’t guarantee that this show will include any Toy Story material, but you’ll never know for sure unless you turn up! Buy tickets here.
