Adventure
Animation
Review: ‘Toy Story 5’ is Endearing, Hilarious, and Quite Possibly the Best in the Franchise
June 16, 2026Ben MK
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When you think of Pixar, it's impossible not to think of the original Toy Story and how it revolutionized animated movies. Fast forward three decades, and although countless other animated features have come and gone since, the characters from that beloved film still hold a special place in moviegoers' hearts. Whether it's Tom Hanks' trusty cowboy, Woody, Tim Allen's intrepid astronaut, Buzz Lightyear, or the colorful cast of other toys that inhabit the world of Pixar's most successful franchise, Toy Story and its three sequels have remained family favorites. And now, with Toy Story 5, the gang is back for an all-new big screen adventure, as they go up against an invasion of kid-friendly technology that threatens to bring an end to the era of analog toys once and for all. It’s been three years since Woody passed his Sheriff's badge onto cowgirl Jessie (Joan Cusack), bidding a tearful farewell to his old friends and leaving them behind to help Bo Peep (Annie Potts) rescue lost toys and pair them with new owners. However, when Bonnie's parents (Lori Allan and Jay Hernandez) try to help their now-eight-year-old daughter make friends by buying her a children's tablet called a Lilypad (Greta Lee), Woody soon finds himself beckoned back to Bonnie's house, as Jessie, a newly deputized Buzz, and the rest of their pals attempt to strategize a way to deal with Bonnie's sassy new smart toy. Pre-installed right out of the box with a host of social apps and games, Lilypad is an all-in-one device with the capability of mesmerizing Bonnie for hours on end. Still, despite the good intentions of Bonnie's parents, Jessie has her doubts about just how good for Bonnie Lilypad truly is, especially since she’s seen firsthand how technology has managed to infiltrate the homes of all the children in their neighborhood, turning kids who were once happy to use their own imagination and play with their toys into sedentary couch potatoes with their eyes and fingers fixated on a screen. It's a situation so worrisome that Jessie and her trusty steed, Bullseye, even attempt to follow Bonnie to her first ever sleepover, just to make sure that the friends Lilypad is helping her make are the right ones. But when their risky side-mission ends up going awry and the pair become stranded at the farm house where Jessie's first owner — a young girl named Emily — lived a few decades earlier, it's up to Woody and Buzz to make the journey outside of city limits to rescue their pals. Now the home of another eight-year-old girl named Blaze (Mylar-Michelle Harris), Jessie's former home also happens to be where she'll encounter a trio of other kid-themed smart devices — namely a potty-training aid called Smarty Pants (Conan O'Brien), a talking GPS hippopotamus named Atlas (Craig Robinson), and a children's smart camera named Snappy (Shelby Rabara). If Jessie is to have any hope of ever seeing Bonnie again, though, she'll have to find a way to not only overcome the differences between her and her electronic counterparts, but also to work together with them, as they all set out to stave off obsolescence and prove not only to themselves, but to each other, that they're still useful and worth playing with. Written and directed by Andrew Stanton and McKenna Harris, what follows may well be the second best — if not the best — entry in the entire series, balancing the exciting set pieces of a fun animated adventure with the more nuanced dramatic moments of a relatable and heartstring-tugging tale about growing up and making friends. What older viewers and those who actually grew up with this franchise will take away most from this movie, however, isn't the themes it has geared for its younger audience, but rather the message it has about parenting and what it really means to be there for one’s own children. Make no mistake, kids of all ages will most certainly delight in seeing their favorite characters back on screen and engaging in all sorts of hilarious shenanigans. Ultimately, though, what makes Toy Story 5 as endearing as it is is the way it ties in Jessie's arc with the life journey of viewers who were themselves children when the first film came out. Suffice to say, despite the lukewarm reception received by the spin-off movie Lightyear, Pixar fans won't be disappointed with the result, as it brings back everything that audiences remember and love about the franchise — most importantly, the sincere emotion and characters that viewers will actually care about. After all, given the apparent finality of Toy Story 4's ending, resurrecting the series for a fifth installment and making it not seem like a money grab is no small feat. Yet, that's exactly what Toy Story 5 has done, proving once again that Pixar is still the king when it comes to jaw-dropping visuals and heartfelt storytelling. Toy Story 5 releases June 19th, 2026 from Walt Disney Studios. The film has an MPAA rating of PG for some thematic elements and rude humor. Its runtime is 1 hr. 42 min. |
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