Toy Story 4 (2019)

Elevator Pitch: The toys’ new owner Bonnie, is beginning to lose interest in Woody, but he is still protective of her and goes to her pre-school orientation day where, left alone, she creates her own toy, Forky. It becomes Woody’s task to keep Forky on track, with the help of the others, resulting in adventures on a road trip, and his being reunited with Bo-Peep now a “lost toy”. They are forced to take on the evil ventriloquist’s dummies in Second Chance Antiques who have kidnapped Forky. Can they rescue him and renuite him with Bonnie before her parents’ RV leaves for home?

Content: Numerous set pieces as Woody carries out various rescues, mainly of Forky, often using the special skills of the other toys.  Most of the action takes place in Second Chance Antiques where the toys are confronted by Gabby Gabby a doll who coverts Woody’s voice box, with her helpers the ventriloquist’s dummies. Also a lot of action in the carnival, often involving the shooting stall where children can win prizes. Bo-Peep has become something of a female warrior and leads many of the rescue attempts.

A View: We quite liked this outing, which has received an overwhelming 97% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. What it missed in my view were the sly jokes made in the previous films about other movies, left out in favour of an extraordinary level of political correctness. I can only imagine the script meetings, where they must have started off with a requirement for a strong female character, “What! We’ve only got Bo-Peep”, and that’s only the start of it. But worth the ticket price particularly if you have seen the other three.

Additional Info: I usually read through the IMDb trivia for something interesting to say here. Well, the interesting thing is that there is more trivia for TS4 at 319 items, than for any other film I have reviewed. I have not bothered to read them all. Won Best Animated Feature at the 2020 Oscars.