Popcorn Perspectives with Danny Minton
Week of June 15, 2026
Toy Story 5
Rated PG for some thematic elements and rude humor
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 93%
In Theaters
Back for another sequel is the gang from Toy Story. If you remember from the last film (and I kinda forgot), the new kid is Bonnie and her favorite toys are Jessie and her horse Bulls-eye. But when her parents try to help her make friends by buying her a tablet to make her fit in, she quickly forgets about all of her physical toys and Jessie ends up dejected and back at her original home with potentially a new owner. But she desperately wants to get back to Bonnie and get her off her tablet. As you can probably tell here, this is a Jessie movie and not a Woody and Buzz movie. They are both in it, but as side players. The thing I’ve always loved about the Toy Story franchise is the buddy element. It’s always worked for me, and I’ve really enjoyed all of the movies to date. This latest story seems to be an inevitable direction as electronics have taken over. I would think that phones and console games are a more dangerous enemy, but the tablet is at least a toy-sized device that can house a Toy Story character easily enough. The film is well-enough made with some clever turns and a good message for kids. But what I loved about the first four films (and the Buzz Lightyear spinoff) doesn’t exist here. Those films weren’t just tolerated by adults to keep their kids happy but rather enjoyed by adults. This one, unfortunately, seems like a kid’s film that won’t irritate the parents too much while they are in the theater with them. In this regard, it feels like they are out of stories to tell and leaning in on the cash grab, taking advantage of the fact that Toy Story is still a massive franchise worth exploiting, but not exploring. Perhaps the biggest disappointment here is that the director is long-time Pixar fixture Andrew Stanton (A Bug’s Life, Finding Nemo) who traditionally brings his A game. But this one doesn’t feel like a Stanton project at all. It’s like they still have a pretty car, but it has run out of gas. C+