Monday, June 24, 2019

‘Toy Story 4’ A Great Sequel, But Only A Really Good ‘Toy Story’ Movie


     Toy Story is one of the most iconic and well acclaimed movie series of all time, especially in the animation world. After a 3rd movie that supposedly ended the franchise, most said that there’s no way there could be another film. Shockingly, Pixar has now made an attempt to continue what many thought had a perfect ending with Toy Story 4. With all the doubts and how good the end of the trilogy was, would this possibly unneeded 4th installment live up to the stands of what the other films were? The answer is both yes and no. Toy Story 4 does stand its own as a great sequel, properly expanding upon its characters and world, however in comparison to the other film, it doesn’t quite reach the highs emotionally that the other three films met.
A Better Epilogue than a Continuation of Three
     The Fourth Toy Story has the toys dealing with Bonnie starting Kindergarten, where they end up meeting a new friend she created known as Forky. When a road trip with her family gets a bit chaotic with Forky becoming missing, it’s up to Woody to find him and along the way; he ends up encountering both familiar and new faces on his new journey. In many ways, Toy Story 4 continues the franchise in a lot of clever ways in terms of what the world of Toy Story is like, giving some very unique ideas and morals the franchise. This is mostly dealing with the characters as we see a lot of growth for most of the major ones and some of the new ones introduced bring in a lot of charm, emotion and depth that every single Toy Story movie had to offer. It still continues that trend of being very charming movies that hit the emotional punch at the right places, but there is a downside. The biggest obstacle Toy Story 4 has to face is following up an ending that was so wrapped tight and perfectly told with the Third movie. Unfortunately the way it wraps up in this movie, while is a great idea and does have a lot of emotional weight to it, doesn’t quite hold a candle to how the third movie concluded its story. Without revealing too much, it does contains emotional weight, but also feels a bit rushed in a sense when it concluded as maybe there could have been more of a built up to this ending. As it stands, it’s a great way to conclude the series, but the way getting there and how quickly it felt when we got to this ending, it doesn’t feel as earned as it probably should. Not to say the ending or the movie itself is poorly written, because there’s still a lot done excellently here, and as sequels go, it doesn’t loses its steam as much as one would initially expect. As it stands, while 3 is a more satisfying and proper conclusion to Toy Story, 4 serves as a very good epilogue for the series, as it ties up more loose ends and character conclusion that was refreshing to see in this film. This makes for a great movie that isn’t as good as its predecessors, but still well written and a good expansion on the franchise.
Great Additions to the Cast both Old and New Faces
     With every Toy Story feature, there is a lot ways to witness both old faces back on the big screen while meeting new ones with each installment. The Forth film definitely adds in terms of characters both old and new, but some missed opportunities have occurred in this department. Easily the best character in the film that is a fundamental to Toy Story is the legendary cowboy himself, Woody. Woody definitely has the most growth as a character in this film, having more maturity in his personality compared to all of the other films. Not only that but the character ends up learning more so in this film than he has in even the other installment, which adds a lot of mature theming to this film as a whole giving it so much more depth making its lead real last hurrah in the franchise. As for the other returning characters, they are still fun and add a lot of humor to this film, however they’re not given a whole lot to do in this movie story wise compared to other films. Side characters like Jessie, Ham, Trixie, and Rex do have some fun moments and lines but they never amount to too much in regards to plot. The only character that gets a little more time is of course everyone’s favorite Space Ranger, Buzz Lightyear. He joins the adventure a lot, and has a new gag in the film which, while pretty funny as a whole, seems a bit odd considering that it makes Buzz a lot less intelligent than one would initially think. The other older toys mostly do not have much to do since this film introduces a ton of new characters and luckily they actually are very well done in this feature. Forky being the main new addition to the team is a pretty funny character being one that adds a whole new concept for the series with toys being made and becoming sentient and this particular toy questioning his existence. A very clever concept, however the downside is, the film doesn’t really expand upon this idea of how toy become sentient beings and Forky himself becomes more of a plot device at points being the one that helps get Woody into this conflict to begin with. He still makes for a funny character, but he would have been stronger if he became more than just that plot device. The other new additions include a Stuntman type action figure named Duke Kaboom played by everyone’s favorite badass Keanu Reeves and a plush duo played by Jordan Peele and Keegan Michael Key, who are easily some of the funniest characters added into the toy story movies. They are ones that really give the film a personality and filled with a ton of fun moments that are downright hilarious, especially with Key and Peele’s characters in particular. The main antagonist in this movie is also done cleverly, without revealing too much, this character starts out as an expected villain but as the film goes on, you see the true nature behind this character, By the end, they become sympathetic and fascinating character to watch that you want to succeed which is very refreshing given Disney’s track record of twist villain reveals in recent films. By far the best new addition to Toy Story 4 isn’t so much a new character as much as it is an old favorite returning for the first time in decades. Bo Peep returns in Toy Story 4 and this time not only is she a better character being more than just a straight up love interest, but she ends up being the one to help Woody through his newfound journey. She adds to the whole theme of moving on, making for a very good dynamic and is also just an all-around enjoyable character to watch and great to see her return after her absence from Toy Story 3. While it is mixed at points, Toy Story 4’s characters definitely help flow the film along as one excellent character piece, especially for Woody himself.

Perfects The Craft this Series Revolutionized
    There is no denying Toy Story influence in the animation industry. The first film is very dated visually by today’s standards in terms of CG, despite looking incredibly impressive for the time. Now that Toy Story 3 came out being a vast improvement over the original visually and looking more on the quality of modern Pixar films, you would think that is when the medium of CGI was perfected for this franchise. Well, it seems like Pixar has done the impossible as Toy Story 4 is jaw dropping beautiful and might be the well-constructed Pixar movie at the moment. Right from the beginning, there’s a shot of a toy car struggling to get out of the mud in the rain and that particular shot looks so impressive from every aspect, you’d almost forget you’re watching an animated movie. Toy Story 4 amazes with its visuals with so many of the textures, shadows and lighting looking almost identical to real life, being incredibly impressive. However, unlike certain films that forget to put the charm and expressiveness with all of their impressive visuals, Toy Story 4 does not forget that it is an animated movie. The characters despite looking more real than ever, still have many expressive faces and movements in terms of how they are animated. Something as simple as a Spork with Googly eyes tends to have so much passion to how they emote and Toy Story 4 captures these animated characters beautifully. Toy Story 4 might be one of the most impressive animated films Pixar has ever made, and it has to be seen to be believed in terms of how masterful the artist’s work on this is.

Not A Perfect Finale, But A Good New Installment
     The question remains, does Toy Story 4 need to exist? After the witnessing this film, not necessarily, the third Toy Story concluded perfectly and in a way doesn’t need to have more movies. But now that a Forth is here, it is at least reassuring that despite not needing to exist, it is a very commendable effort to continue the Toy Story franchise. It’s a flawed piece of work from Pixar not taking full advantage of the opportunities it has, but it still is an incredibly charming movie with so much heart and character to. At the end of the day, that’s what Toy Story is all about, being a franchise that has a lot of heart with some of your favorite characters on a little adventure and the forth movie stands as a good Toy Story movie. It may not be the best in the series, but it still is a quality installment Pixar’s most famous franchise ever.

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