Toy Story: The Struggle of an Anti-Social Slightly Schitzo Sociopath

• Lori Palminteri
• Uncategorized
• February 24, 2014

Toy Story is just one of the much beloved Pixar films, which I enjoy as much (probably more so) than a child with all the action figures.  When the first Toy Story came out, I was six.  And when the third came out, I was in college, so I essentially “grew up” with Andy.  I think all the movies are about Andy.  Let’s start from the beginning.

Andy Davis is moving.  He has a bunch of toys, all with their own personalities projected from Andy’s developing mind.  Woody is his favorite.  Because he is Woody.  Woody is funny, smart, and the leader of all the other toys.  However, he is self aware.  He knows he’s a toy.  He knows he’s only cool to these other toys that look up to him, and no one else outside of his bedroom.

Andy is satisfied with this.  He is his true self as Woody.  But he’s getting older, and this cowboy that plays with dinosaurs/pigs/little bo-peep thing is not so cool anymore.  What is cool?  Buzz Lightyear.  Buzz Lightyear is what Andy aspires to be.  Fresh, strong, and popular.  But Buzz is not self aware.  Buzz is delusional.  This represents Andy’s desire to be beloved by his peers being trumped by the fact that he’s not being true to himself.  And that’s why there’s turmoil between Woody and Buzz.  The true self versus who he thinks he wants to be.  Buzz can do whatever he wants, he can even fly, but Woody knows he can’t.

Andy is also Sid Phillips (they even look alike).  The troubled neighbor, who likes to blow up shit.  And Sid represents testosterone.  He’s violent.  Dismembering his toys, attaching them to rockets.  He does not understand where all of this is coming from.  Destroying his toys is his form of release (one of his creations is actually a hooker).

He is only able to defeat this version of himself when he realizes that the need to be cool will never make him happy unless he is true to himself (Buzz accepts he cannot fly).  And that’s okay.  It’s okay if his best friends are toys and not real, because that’s where he’s the most comfortable and happiest.

Toy Story 2

The second film is all about how growing up scares Andy because adults pretty much suck.  In the beginning of Toy Story 2, Woody’s arm gets torn.  Change is coming.  Andy is getting older, and is craving some sort of guidance.  The man who actually fixes Woody’s arm, Al, is a rotten human and a thief, and Stinky Pete turns out to be a psycho.  Both Al and stinky Pete think that toys (or Andy’s true self) should be put behind glass.  Stinky Pete warns Woody that Andy will discard of Woody.  Since Woody is Andy, Andy’s inner fear is that he will become one of these two-faced adults who’ve conformed with social norms, abandoning what he loves most about himself, like his imagination.

Jessie represents his new discovery for girls.  Yes, he always had Bo-Peep, but she was really more of a “damsel in distress” for Woody to be the hero.  Jessie is actually more like the kind of girl Andy would like, and that’s why she likes Buzz, because remember, Buzz is still the cool one.

This movie is all about his fear that adulthood will change him.  Woody becomes unsure of where he belongs.  Buzz’s father, Zurg, is trying to destroy him.  But, the ending is happy (of course) and he will cross that bridge when he gets to it, which happens in…

Toy Story 3

Andy is off to college.  Much too old for toys.  He’s gotten rid of most, but held on to a select few.  He intends to take Woody with him to college.  Because that’s who he is, and wants remain.  He feels bad about the others.  Having projected parts of himself on each of them.  Andy’s mother, by mistake, takes the rest of the toys to the curb.  Andy, no doubt, has trouble with his mother at this stage in his life.  She wants him to grow up, he’s 17, but this would mean discarding of parts of himself that he still loves.

The toys end up at a day care.  Buzz loses his memory.  This is Andy repressing his true emotions.  Because, at the surface, it seems great.  But deep down, there’s trouble stirring.  Lotso (the purple bear) is the represser.  He literally puts Andy’s toys in jail.  Lotso, in the film, had an owner and was abandoned.  That’s why he’s so angry.  Because he’s afraid to get hurt.  Lotso is Andy’s fear.

The saddest part of the movie is when the toys are heading towards certain death, drifting closer and closer into an incinerator.  They accept their fate, holding hands, believing it’s the end for them (I almost cried at this point in the movie).  That’s when they are (somewhat miraculously) saved by the Aliens.

The Aliens rescue is Andy’s discovery of drugs.  Drugs, like the Aliens, are the very unlikely heroes of the story.  I deduce, that Andy smoked a fat one and realized that it’s okay not to grow up completely.  It’s okay to let yourself just be yourself.  The world is going to change you, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have a say in who you become.

Ultimately, he gives his much beloved toys to a little girl.  He doesn’t need Woody and the gang because he is woody and the gang.  Also, he just discovered sex and drugs.

Or maybe it’s just me projecting here.