Tag: Disney Pixar

[EXPRESSO] Lightyear (2022) | Space Mediocrity

Ok, let’s leave aside the whole “identity crisis debacle”, despite Pixar being outright silly in starting the movie with the premise that THIS is the movie that in 1995 spawned the Buzz Lightyear toy Andy from Toy Story got. Also ignoring the 90’s animated TV series that served as a backstory to the character, because it’s clear this is a different interpretation-canon.

WHATEVER, who cares, let’s move on from this non-sense.

Though i can understand it’s quite tempting to do so since the ludicrous meta footnote is ripe for lampooning, and the actual movie leaves very little to say for itself.

But first, the plot.

I has been described by many as a sort of rip-off of Interstellar for children, and i agree, as we see Buzz and company investigate a newly scanned planet that the ship flew by during their voyage.

This alien world immediatly reveals to be rife with hostile fauna and flora, and in attempt to escape, the ship gets damaged, forcing Buzz and all the other people on board to camp and live there, while they find a way to create the specific fuel need for lightspeed space travel in order to contact base and leave the planet. They do manage to create the special fuel, but things turn for the weird as Buzz keeps failing the lightspeed flight test and returns to learn that his minutes long voyages translate to years of time passing in his absence….

I’ll say that this ain’t bad. I didn’t expect much from the trailer, but sadly despite the plot having some potential to be better, it all comes off as a generic “origin story” through and through, from the action to the characters, everything it’s pretty mild, predictable and – again – generic.

Enjoyable, but sadly quite middling overall.

[EXPRESSO] Toy Story 4 (2019) | Stories Of Old

Toy Story 4 2019 cover poster.jpg

Let’s get the obvious out right away: Toy Story 4 didn’t need to exist, especially with the perfect closure given by the third one. And we didn’t expect “The Toys Room” quality, we didn’t.

The plot this time centers around Debbie, the little girl that Andy gifted his old toys to at the end Of Toy Story 3 (which was 10 years ago), anxious about going to the kindergarden, and on the first day (with the help of an apprehensive Woody) she makes a toy out of a plastic fork and craft materials, naming him Forky, and basically bestowing sentience and life unto it. Forky is confused by being alive, a toy, and he keeps trying to hurl himself in the bin, from which he literally came.

Woody, who is feeling pretty useless and forgotten, continuously undoes the endless “suicide” attemps of the newborn toy, and wants Forky to understand how important he is for Debbie, etc. But things get a bit hairy when the family goes on a road trip, and Woody encounters an old acquaintance, meeting new, weird toys….

You know what, this is quite good in itself, with funny new characters (including a canadian Evil Kenivel knock-off toy), some interesting resolutions for Woody, the animation is top notch as you’d expect…. but it feels like there is just so much you can do with this idea, the writers are trying to keep it interesting, but it retreads more old ground than expected (Woody’s character arc, in particular), some jokes are hammered in the viewer a bit too much, and the new songs… kinda meh.

It’s good, as you’d expect, but this fourth installment just feel unnecessary and doesn’t add much to the series. Still worth seeing, without a doubt, but i worry about the future of the franchise. Mh.

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