Toy Story 5

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Victoria's Statewide Mornings program on June 24, 2026.

(G) ★★★★

Director: Andrew Stanton.

Cast: (voices of) Joan Cusack, Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Scarlett Spears, Greta Lee, Conan O'Brien, Shelby Rabara, Mykal-Michelle Harris, Craig Robinson. 

Ghosts were more hi-tech these days.

It's been 31 years since Toy Story changed everything.

While someone else would have made a fully computer-animated feature film eventually if Pixar hadn't in 1995, Toy Story's true legacy is that it's a genuinely fantastic movie, regardless of its status as a CGI first. This meant that the bar was set incredibly for all computer-animated films right from the get-go,  while simultaneously legitimising it as an artform from day one.

Then came the sequels, and each has been just as fantastic as the original. #2 upped the game massively with an even more compelling story and better animation even though only four years had passed, #3 is the peak of the series, taking the action, humour and pathos to new heights, and #4 is an hilarious but surprisingly compelling footnote to the series.

#5 is easily the worst film of the series, but when we're talking about Toy Story, that's not necessarily a putdown. The Toy Story franchise sets such a tough pass mark that #5 can be a genuinely great and enjoyable film, while still being the worst in the series. It's a four-star film in a five-star series, and that's nothing to be sneezed at.

The story centres on Bonnie (Spears) getting her first piece of tech - an iPad-like tablet called Lilypad, which throws the eight-year-old into a new world of online friends, cyber-bullying, and trying to fit in. As she ditches her toys for tech, cowgirl Jessie (Cusack) decides to fight back, unwilling to be left behind by another child.

With its central theme of "tech is ruining children", Toy Story 5 has a level of pontificating in its first half that none of the other films in the franchise have, making it feel like a belaboured after-school special initially. The lecturing sucks some of the humour out of proceedings, and it makes you fear you're in for the worst.

But the Pixar boffins are better than that and soon enough something more interesting emerges from the black-and-white tech-is-bad story. It means the film is a bit more of a slog in the first half, but it gets better from there, spreading its wings and soaring as the story becomes more nuanced.

The voice acting is brilliant as always, with Cusack's Jessie getting a bigger role, and O'Brien a welcome addition. It's interesting to see Woody (Hanks) and Buzz (Allen) as side characters somewhat, as it gives the film a slightly different feel. The old favourites are there such as Rex and Mr Potatohead, but the film is happy to move into new territory, with new characters, and it's not a bad thing.

Toy Story 5 offers everything you expect from the series. There are good laughs, interesting new characters, a surprisingly complex villain, some fun action set pieces, plenty of inventiveness, and the whole thing looks incredible. 

You could argue that the whole thing should have ended with #3, and that it would be folly to make #6, but the fact remains Toy Story has the best strike rate of any film franchise, and #5 manages to keep that streak alive.