Disney Pixar released the first teaser trailer for the upcoming “Toy Story 4” as an unexpected follow-up to the 3rd movie in the series. The latest installment is slated to follow the toy gang, which includes the likes of Woody, Jessi, Buzz and Mr. and Mrs. Potatohead as they help new friend, Forky, adjust to life with their human, Bonnie. There’s only one complication—Forky is not and does not want to be a toy.
Forky seems to have been unwillingly endowed with sentience, presumably after Bonnie fashioned arms out of pipe cleaners, formed legs out of popsicle sticks and Play-Doh, and attached googly eyes to a plastic fork. Given his newfound consciousness, Forky begins to question his existence and his purpose in life and does so in a panicked “I-don’t-belong-here-let-me-out” kind of way. It is up to Woody and the gang to take care of Forky as they adventure out into the world on a road trip, learning more about the true nature of life as a toy along the way.
As one of the most beloved childhood movie series, Toy Story has never failed to amaze, entertain and make viewers cry. “Toy Story 3,” in particular, had an especially emotional plot in which the toys experience rejection, abandonment, love and joy after they are mistakenly donated by Andy to a chaotic, and questionably sadistic, daycare. It’s in daycare that the toys are treated like prisoners, forced to entertain the masochistic toddlers in the caterpillar room, enduring what must be equated to torture. Meanwhile, Lotso, the evil bear that smells of strawberries, rules the veteran, privileged toys in the calmer butterfly room. The toys try to escape the hell that awaits them in the caterpillar room by fleeing the daycare, yet they are caught by Lotso and his goons. In one of the most climatic scenes in movie history, all of the toys end up in a waste management plant, swept away in a river of trash towards a fiery inferno of sure death. Lotso manages to climb up the rafters, reaching the switch that can save the toys from sure death; they plead and cry for him to push the button… yet he betrays them and condemns them to burn. The toys fall farther towards the fire pit and lock arms and eyes as they accept their fate in a tear-jerking, heart-wrenching moment. It looks as if the end is near when suddenly the three little green aliens save the toys using the claw!
After such a climactic scene comes a truly beautiful and perfect ending in which the toys reunite with Andy, who lovingly gives them to the caring and gentle little girl next door, Bonnie. We leave the toys with Bonnie, where they are cared for, loved and played with—just as toys should be. A perfect ending to a delightful trilogy.
So why is Disney Pixar releasing the 4th movie in the summer of 2019? Will this be simply a money grab, banking on the popularity of the first three movies? Will the plot of the 4th movie be as impactful and meaningful as those of the first three? Will Disney Pixar move on and come up with more original stories?
The answers to these questions remain to be seen, but one thing is for sure: the idea of a fork-being brought to life by a little girl’s imagination questioning its own sentience is awfully intriguing.
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