Let me take you back to 1995 for a second. When the first Toy Story came out, I was barely three years old. Despite this, I watched the movie and instantly fell in love with it. It immediately became my favorite animated movie of all time, and it has retained that award since then for me. Then, in 1999, I was given even more to love with Toy Story 2. Now, flash forward to the summer of 2010. I was 17 years old, living my life as a high school student, when Toy Story 3 was released. That was a truly special experience for me, because the ending to the movie was all about saying goodbye, and it provided some closure for me on a series that I cherished so dearly. It was, in my mind, a perfect trilogy (I consider all three to be perfect 10s), and it ended on the perfect note. So, I wanted it to remain untouched as the perfect thing that it was.

All of this is leading up to me saying that I was really disappointed when Toy Story 4 was announced. To me, it felt like making another movie would tarnish that perfect ending to Toy Story 3, and that the whole thing would just be a greedy cash grab to make more money off of a beloved franchise. I was worried that Toy Story 4 could never be as good as the first three, and I really thought that this might be the one that ruined the perfect streak of the franchise. After all, you can’t capture lightning in a bottle four times in a row, right?

Well, I’m happy to say that Toy Story 4 proved me dead wrong. While I entered the theater with skepticism, I came out feeling like a fool. I couldn’t believe that I doubted that this movie could be special, and I was mad at myself for not wanting the movie to be made out of fear of ruining something. Toy Story 4 is so good that I think the franchise is much better off for having the movie be a part of it. Now that I’ve seen it, I never want this series to exist without the fourth movie. We’ve now arrived at a fourth perfect 10 in a row, and I’m so thankful that it’s as good as it is.

I think the reason why I felt foolish about not thinking that the movie could be good is because I wrongly assumed that there was no good story left to tell. After all, Andy said goodbye to his toys and passed them on to a new child. However, now you have to ask yourself…so without Andy, what’s next for these toys? And what a great question this is.

I’m not going to sugarcoat this: one potential disappointment some might have with this movie is that it doesn’t feature a lot of the toys we’ve grown to love in the previous entries. Characters like Rex, Slinky, or Mr. Potato Head are in the movie, but barely. This movie is very much centered on Woody. I was perfectly okay with this, but if you’re not, then this might be disappointing for you. Either way, Toy Story 4 largely revolves around Woody’s journey of adjusting to a life with a new kid. He definitely cares about Bonnie’s best interests and will do anything to make her happy, but it’s clear that he’s not even close to being Bonnie’s favorite toy. Woody goes from being the child’s favorite toy to being sidelined, and this makes him question his role. All of this starts to change when Bonnie makes a new toy called Forky out of a spork and some discarded trash. Forky becomes Bonnie’s new favorite toy, but he has trouble accepting his new role as a toy. Woody steps up to the plate to try to show Forky the importance of being a toy, and finding his own path in the process.

If you’ve seen any trailers for this movie, you’ll know that there’s another major story element thrown in here. Bo Peep was written out of Toy Story 3, but we never really got a reason as to what happened to her. Toy Story 4 delves deeply into this, as we see that she was sold to another kid a long time ago, and has since become a “lost toy” (a toy that doesn’t have an owner) in the time since. Woody and Bo are definitely the two biggest characters of the movie, and a large focus is put on their relationship.

All of this is to show that I was dead wrong about there not being another meaningful story to tell in the franchise after the toys were given away. The story in Toy Story 4 is every bit as fun and touching as the previous three movies. In particular, I was obviously worried about how the movie would end the franchise again, and Toy Story 4’s ending honestly gave me that whole bittersweet goodbye that I got from Toy Story 3 all over again (obviously executed differently though). I cried at the end of Toy Story 4 just as much as I did at the end of Toy Story 3, and so I was definitely dead wrong about this movie ruining the ending to its predecessor.

I also just feel the need to say that I was really impressed with how many new ideas this movie brought to the table. Aside from the aforementioned Forky toy that was created from nothing, the movie also features some carnival toys and antique shop toys. It plays with these settings in really interesting ways, and this was once again an example of how I’m so glad we ended up getting this movie, because otherwise we would have never seen the fresh new ideas that Pixar came up with for the franchise.

Toy Story 4 is a nice blend of old and new, but mostly new. It brings back elements that we love from the first three movies, but throws them into totally new environments and challenges. I was obviously in love with all of these old things that I cherish about the series, but luckily I was just as charmed by the new additions to the series. Forky was a really fun character, so I’m happy to have him in the gang. There are also a few other new characters that make for really interesting additions as well.

In the end, I just simply loved Toy Story 4. It has everything that I love about the Toy Story movies, and so Pixar was able to capture that same magic once again. While I don’t think my skepticism was entirely unwarranted, I’m certainly glad that it was unfounded, because the movie definitely doesn’t tarnish the franchise. If anything, it makes it even stronger. If you were like me, give Toy Story 4 a shot, because the movie is just wonderful. I’m not sure how to rank the Toy Story movies, but as of right now I definitely wouldn’t call it my least favorite. Toy Story 4 is every bit as good as the other Toy Story movies, if not better.

5/5