Angry Man Fumes on Social Media Because ‘Toy Story 5’ …Features a Child?
Toy Story 5 has one dude unbelievably mad at a child. In the latest look at the Pixar movie, there’s one brown horse girl, and this guy absolutely lost it.
On social media, Max Memes took issue with a picture from EW’s Summer Preview. A young girl named Blaze is one of Bonnie’s new friends in Toy Story 5. She’s a “spunky, funky, equestrian horse girl.” And, apparently that was too far for this man.
He typed, “Remember when Toy Story was about the toys and not the multicultural diversity tokens that own them?” Frankly, no. Because the first movie is largely about identity as it’s created through the work we do. Well that, and how you should probably keep an eye on the strange neighbor next door.
A lot of people noted that Bonnie, Andy’s successor in this series, is also brown. Andy left Woody, Buzz, Jessie and the toys to her a while ago. It’s just funny that this “issue” comes now. And that’s largely because it’s not an issue.
As with most things that get tweeted into the abyss, this is just complaining and trying to work the refs. As of right now, there is no real popular youth culture artifact that is completely and utterly white. Even properties funded by outright bigots aren’t completely dominant culture focused. And, that’s because most of the money is in diversity. Those are the cold, hard facts.
Toy Story 5 and changing times
Spending any time at all in social media spaces opens you up to this kind of reactionary thinking. It’s important to point out that the commenter in question is not completely alone. But, the people at Pixar know that they’re making stories for all kinds of different audiences.
We’re on two different generations of kids that have seen themselves grow alongside the larger Toy Story franchise. And, there were viewers from different cultures watching back in the 90s when this thing kicked off too.
Toy Story 5 director Andrew Stanton thought about this a lot when he worked on the previous entries. The tent gets bigger by the day. Andy might be off in adulthood now, but Bonnie has picked up the torch. Stanton gave his thoughts on how the series has evolved over time with The Hartford Courant.
“What if it went farther? What if it was a trilogy with one kid, closed that up, handed it off to another kid and started another one?” Stanton pondered. “That seemed really exciting to me because that’s the way life really goes with toys and mementos. They get passed down as hand-me-downs; they go from one kid to another.”
This is a kind of inventive thinking that keeps Toy Story relevant with the times. As we learn from Woody Buzz and their friends, being a toy is a unique experience. It changes with meaning over time. In fact that very lesson seems to underpin the entirety of Toy Story 5. It’s not too much to ask the audience to follow them along on that journey.
(featured image: Pixar)
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