As we know thanks to Chris Evans’ Twitter account, Pixar’s upcoming film Lightyear is “the origin story of the human Buzz Lightyear that the toy is based on” … so why does it look like Emperor Zurg is in the trailer? Is there a human that Zurg is based on? More importantly, who voices Zurg in Lightyear? We don’t know yet, but the mythology of the Toy Story films just gets wilder and wilder.
You’re telling me that not only does Andy play with a toy based on a real person, but that Andy lives in a world where intergalactic space travel, robot cats, aliens, and a real person named Emperor Zurg also exist?! Zurg, the Toy Story-verse antagonist and sworn enemy of Buzz Lightyear who … if memory serves … is also Buzz Lightyear’s father? Sure! Suddenly, I have a lot of questions about Pizza Planet.
Or is Lightyear supposed to be a movie that Andy watched as a child … and the Buzz Lightyear action figure was merchandise for this movie, and therefore Toy Story takes place in 2022? None of this makes sense but I guess we’re going with it anyway. Bring on Buzz. Bring on Zurg.
Everything we do know about the voice cast.
Alright, let’s get into it. Evans is playing Buzz, obvs. Keke Palmer, Dale Soules, and Taika Waititi are playing space rangers named Izzy, Steele, and Morrison respectively according to The Wrap. Also in the stacked cast are Uzo Aduba, who plays the ranger we see in the trailer named Alicia, Mary McDonald-Lewis, former Napoleon Dynamite star Efren Ramirez, Peter Sohn as the robot cat Sox, Isiah Whitlock Jr., and James Brolin. Presumably, one of those actors is playing Zurg.
It has to be Brolin, don’t you think? Mr. Barbra Streisand is the right age. In addition, Brolin’s son Josh played the Marvel villain Thanos opposite Evans as Captain America (and the rest of the Avengers), so that’s a nice little bit of corporate synergy. Besides, a handful of sites are unofficially saying that Whitlock Jr. is playing “Commander Burnside” (cool name) and I doubt that they’d cast Pedro from Napoleon Dynamite as Emperor Zurg … so there’s nobody left.
That said, I’m sure none of us would put it past the House of Mouse to have a surprise celebrity cameo as the Bad Dad. It’s entirely possible that Zurg’s casting will be announced at a later date. Happy falling with style, everyone!
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