Toy Story 5 (2026) Movie Review
About this episode
Toy Story 5 is an animated adventure comedy-drama film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. Directed by Andrew Stanton, and written by Stanton and Kenna Harris, it is the fifth main installment in Pixar's Toy Story film series and the sequel to Toy Story 4 (2019). Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Joan Cusack, Tony Hale, John Ratzenberger, Wallace Shawn, Blake Clark, Annie Potts, Bonnie Hunt, Melissa Villaseñor, Kristen Schaal, and Keanu Reeves reprise their roles from the previous films, and are joined by new additions Greta Lee, Conan O'Brien, Craig Robinson, Shelby Rabara, Scarlett Spears, Mykal-Michelle Harris, Matty Matheson, Jeff Bergman, Anna Vocino, John Hopkins, Ernie Hudson, and Alan Cumming. After Woody left Bonnie to stay with Bo Peep and help abandoned toys find owners, Jessie becomes the leader of Bonnie's room, with Buzz Lightyear as her second-in-command. However, a now-eight-year-old Bonnie has become enamored of her new favorite plaything, a frog-like tablet named Lilypad
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hello everyone and welcome to the concession stand here on the kb radio network i am your host kevin reed and this is the review of the disney pixar film toy
story 5 the fifth film obviously in this franchise and once again we have tom hanks returning uh tim allen john kusak returning you
uh additions to this cast we have conan o'brien scarlet spears greta lee uh craig robertson and this is set two years after the events of the fourth film in the franchise and it follows jesse woody
and buzz as they and other toys deal with the presence of lily pad a tablet and a new favorite play thing for
Barney. The Toast
Story
franchise is i don't know how can you describe it one of the most universally loved franchises in movie history not too many people poo-poo on the toy story franchise i mean it it's
a it's a beloved franchise all around i don't care the age your race your nationality your sexuality
I don't care what it is.
If you're a Republican Democrat,
it doesn't matter.
I think everybody loves Toy Story.
And rightfully so.
It is a well put together franchise.
It's always beautifully written,
emotional,
funny.
It appeals to children and adults alike.
It does it in a smart way that a lot of live action movies don't even do right.
But when it comes to...
animated films a lot of animated films can't do it right but toy story always got it right and so we're a five movies in and i think we've drained all the emotion that you can at least you thought you could out
of this franchise i remember watching toy story 3 and i was like why are we getting another one and why why and then by the end of that movie i was a just a blubbering
fool like everybody else crying at the end of that movie and we get to the fifth film today and it's the i pretty much had the same sentiments i'm like okay do we really need another toy story and well i
will say i enjoy toy story 5 i mean it's still toy story nothing nothing new here we didn't really reinvent the wheel other than the fact okay we're going in another direction
we're introducing electronics into the picture which you know i remember as a father and my girls growing up and they grew up or came up around the time when electronics
started playing a big part of childhood you know toys and barbie dolls and all that other good stuff that that pretty much that was the end of it when my girls got of playing
age and it was it shifted to iphones and ipads and uh xboxes and you know nintendo switch and all this other good stuff that just
destroyed my pocketbook and bank account so i can relate to this uh to this premise very very well and i felt okay if we're gonna do another toy story if we're getting another
Toy Story and we're going to introduce this tablet and electronics and all that other good stuff that kids are accustomed to now all right this will be the perfect opportunity to make that make that transition and
the film once again does a great job of doing that it's not much you can say about the voice cast here I mean it's it's perfect man number one Tom Hanks
As soon as you have Tom Hanks,
that's it.
It lights out.
We know that we're getting a good cast here.
Tim Allen returning.
All of the returning cast members are perfect.
We've heard them portray these characters for four movies already.
So there's no reason to doubt that they wouldn't deliver.
And they did deliver.
Our new additions here with Greta Lee.
She's playing.
lily pad here the the tablet that comes into the play uh or the antagonist of this film and i say that loosely and but i think she did a pretty decent job as well
But the one who stole this movie was Conan O'Brien.
Conan O'Brien was my favorite part of this movie.
He voices
Smarty Pants,
I think that's the name of the character,
and stole every scene that he was in,
he stole it.
It just took over the movie in my eyes.
I wanted more of Smarty Pants in this film.
I'll say this much about
Toy Story 5.
I think...
this should be it i think we've milked this cow dry it is no there's no more milk left in the teats of that cow we we're good because we're tiptoeing into jumping the shark territory when we come to uh toy story six or stuff like that i think we need to we need to stop at this point because we've seen it all.
There's really no other direction this film could go.
And the film seemed to struggle at times to try to incorporate everybody into the story.
Woody takes a back seat in this film.
And
I'm not mad at that.
It's fine because this is more of a Jesse story as we follow her character throughout the film.
And that was the right decision to make.
You know,
everybody gets their turn.
I think we've got the Woody story.
we've gotten the buzz story so to get the jesse led story it was long overdue i liked her as the lead of this film i like the uh uh buzz storyline throughout the
buzz light year part of the part of this i think it makes up for the light year movie that i think just like this franchise is storied or
or historically loved,
I should say.
The Lightyear film,
not so much.
That movie did not appeal to anybody.
And this movie,
Toy Story 5,
finds a cute,
funny way to poo-poo on Lightyear.
It directly references Lightyear in a smart,
funny way that just had me cracking up.
It was the funniest part to me.
my major takeaway from toy story five this is the first time i walked away from a toy story film and emotionally i i didn't feel anything i i didn't feel any dread i didn't feel like this was the end at
the every toy story film basically is them fighting for their survival fighting to stay relevant to their children you know to to the ones
playing with them and uh showing the need for the toys for these children you know and i didn't feel that in this movie it it happens the moment it happens but
it was no emotional weight behind it like it did in let's say a toy story 3 or even in toy story 4 which wasn't up to the quality of the first three films,
but it was still...
a respectable addition to this franchise this movie here even though it wasn't bad i think it fits into this franchise pretty well but it just didn't have the same oomph that
the previous four films have whereas you're emotionally connected to our characters and one of the main reasons for that was the antagonist.
there was no antagonist you know uh lily pad yes for the majority of the film or i would say half of the film that that was the villain this tablet was the villain and doing some very villainous things and
does make a turn does make a change and sees the errors of their ways but it wasn't from our protagonist this.
you know there was no direct conflict between the protagonist and the antagonist or the hero and the villain to put it plainly it was more of a self-realization type thing you know it was like oh wait wait
i'm wrong i'm doing something wrong here it just changed you know our hero's actions didn't dictate the change in our antagonist and it kind of made
the heroes here being Jesse and Woody and Buzz all their actions were kind of pointless you know throughout the film because their actions didn't
dictate the change and that's where i'm kind of like oh man they missed the mark here you know they kind of missed the mark on that um the jokes the jokes were funny i think uh they did mix in some adult
humor i like the woody getting old thing uh i like all that but aside from that it really wasn't too much you know nothing that really balanced the scales as far as kids and adult humor
And I didn't,
and I'm not saying adult humor like crude,
you know,
little in the windows and sexual in the windows and stuff like that.
No,
I'm not talking about that.
I just mean like something that will kind of go over a kid's head because they don't know what you're talking about type thing,
but the parents get it.
You know,
those type of jokes.
There weren't too many of those.
With all that being said.
do the chook will a chow enjoy toy story 5 absolutely it's absolutely your kids will have the time of their life with toy story 5 is that the main demographic that they're aiming for in this absolutely
yeah this is a kid's it's a cartoon so in that regard hey thumbs up they they did what they were supposed to do but for the parents they have to take them here
I didn't really see anything that would keep the parents engaged in this movie throughout.
Now,
you will get engaged,
you know,
but it took a while to get there.
It took a while for it to really pick up.
I'll say about 45 minutes into this movie before
I really got invested into what was going on.
Prior to that,
it was more just.
spinning our wheels you know it was a little we were wasting time just to fill in enough time to make this a theatrical runtime other than that you know after well i should say after that it really started to pick up and i started to enjoy myself but they
didn't solely sit down and make this movie for kevin reed they made it for everybody and i think that everybody can't Enjoy it.
I did enjoy it.
You know,
is it?
the you know up there with some of the best toy story films no it sits right where it's sitting at right now with me as far as toy story films at number five but it was still decent enough to enjoy
i give toy story 5 a letter grade of a b minus yeah it was it was fine it was fine i i think that
if you're a parent of of small children and want to take them to a movie this is the perfect movie to take them to i highly recommend it in that regard but just be prepared to kind of doze
doze off maybe a couple of moments but the movie does pick up and uh make it a little exciting for the children and adults alike as the film goes along i would like to know what
did you think of toy story 5 and do you think that maybe they ought to pump the brakes on the toy story franchise for a while let me know dkbradionetwork.com you can subscribe and comment
on all my reviews over there you can also subscribe like and comment on youtube subscribe to the kb radio network channel on youtube as well
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Everybody,
thank you for joining me for this review of Toy Story 5.
I want you all to know that I love you.
Continue to love everyone.
And until we speak again,
you all be blessed.
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