Toy Story 5which premiered in Los Angeles on Tuesday night, is almost guaranteed to be a critical and commercial success. However, there’s one fan who still needs to win: Quentin Tarantino.
During numerous interviews over the past few years, the director has revealed that he is a devoted fan of the film toy story Privilege and counting Toy Story 3 As one of his favorite films of all time. During a 2024 conversation with Bill Maher, Tarantino said he had no interest in watching after the third film, as “you’ve literally finished the story as best you can, so no, I don’t care if it’s good. I’m done.”
So what does the team behind Toy Story 5 I have to say to Tarantino and his ilk, who might have fallen along the way?
“I would say that Pixar’s simple presentation doesn’t bring up bad things,” Tony Hale – who voices Forky, a character Taranento had not yet met when he was introduced in toy story 4 – He said Hollywood Reporter On the carpet. “The thing about Pixar is they’re not going to tell another story if there’s no story to tell. Look at this — this marriage of technology and games, I want to hear that story. So I’d like to have him rely on his trust in Pixar.”
Pete Docter, Pixar’s chief creative officer, joked that “I’ve always thought Quentin Tarantino has really good taste” when it comes to his love of the franchise and admitted, “I like that he’s sticking to his guns” when he said he was done with film No. 3. Pixar president Jim Morris commented, “He’s got to stick to his guns but I don’t think he’ll be disappointed if he gets a sneak peek at this movie.”
Director Andrew Stanton, who wrote on all five films, also shared, “It’s his choice – it’s the end of Andy’s years and he can end it with Andy, but we have another trilogy with Bonnie,” the child at the heart of the film. toy story 4 and 5. He added: “It’s too late for him to miss it.” Producer Lindsay Collins went further, asking: “Don’t you want to see the little girl’s room, Quentin?”
Toy Story 5 It sees Buzz, Woody, Jessie and the rest of the gang facing an existential threat when Bonnie gets a tablet called the Lilypad, and starts spending all her time on a screen instead of playing with toys.
“It’s something that’s not going away — it’s like television was for my parents when they described it coming into homes in the ’50s, and they were still wrestling with it 15 years later when I was born,” Stanton said of choosing to focus this film on the technology versus gaming battle. “I feel like it was like, we’ll deal with it for a while until we figure out how to balance it. It’s a chaotic thing that’s perfect for drama.”
Joan Cusack, who returns as the voice of Jesse and finds herself the film’s main character this time around, said she was “amazed that they handled this. The first thing I said when I saw the movie was, ‘I can’t believe they handled technology!'” Like how did they do that?” And I think they did it in a beautiful way because at the end of the day, there’s nothing better than laughing with a friend who really gets you and you understand. There’s no technology in the world that can beat that feeling and it’s amazing that they were able to capture that.
The Lilypad voices were performed by Greta Lee, who revealed that she took Siri and Alexa voices into account in her work but “in the end when my kids saw the trailer they were like, ‘Mom! It’s you!” And I was like, ‘What?! They’re like, ‘Mom, it sounds just like you.'” I was like, ‘What! You’ve done some deep character work, what are you talking about?’
With Tom Hanks and Tim Allen returning as the iconic Woody and Buzz, and Conan O’Brien, Craig Robinson and Shelby Rabara also voicing new additions, it’s a star-studded line-up – all the more so with Taylor Swift providing the original song “I Knew It, I Knew You” for the film.
Swift appeared at the premiere — even taking the stage to sing the new tune and “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” alongside Randy Newman — with Docter revealing the song “all happened secretly and out of the blue.” [it was] Wow, what’s going on?” Morris added that a Swift feature “wasn’t in the original plan” for the film.
With the song being a tribute to Jesse in particular, Cusack noted, “It’s a beautiful song, and I think it’s a really good one. Hopefully it means more people come to the movie because it’s a good movie.”
Toy Story 5 It hits theaters June 19.
