Mixed Reviews for Toy Story 5 but Critics Agree Tech-Reliance Warning Important
Jessie leads the sequel as Bonnie’s toy world is disrupted by a frog-shaped tablet that sidelines imaginative play and friendship.
- Hitting theaters on Friday, June 19, 2026, Toy Story 5 centers on cowgirl Jessie as she struggles to protect eight-year-old owner Bonnie from a sentient, frog-shaped tablet named Lilypad.
- Pixar director Andrew Stanton's latest installment explores a "cautionary tale about online childhoods" by depicting Jessie's struggle against Lilypad, an AI-voiced tablet threatening to sever Bonnie's connection to real-world play.
- Mixed reviews have greeted the installment, with some praising the "promotion to lead" for Jessie, while others argue the 30-year-old franchise has "started to show its age."
- Reviewers noted the film's timing is "certainly topical," arriving days after Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer announced a social media ban for under-16s earlier this week.
- Beyond the tech debate, the film emphasizes the value of "imaginative play," portraying it as a crucial dimension for children to extend their internal universe into the real world.
25 Articles
25 Articles
Georgia Public Broadcasting
npr'Toy Story 5' surges into the digital age -- while also peering lovingly backward
In this delightful sequel, Jessie the cowgirl teams up with Buzz Lightyear and Woody to fend off the rise of digital devices, which are taking over the minds and attention spans of kids everywhere.
<em>Toy Story 5</em>: Jessie’s Girl
Cast your mind back to 1999, when Toy Story 2 conjured up Pixar’s most crushing moment in its history thus far. That film was about the toys facing their mortality of a sort, and it came to a head in the story of Jessie the Cowgirl (voiced by Joan Cusack), whose owner Emily grew up and left her behind. That scene was made all the more wrenching by maybe the saddest song Randy Newman ever wrote, “When She Loved Me.” Toy Story 5 brings Jessie back…
In Toy Story 5, the problem really is these damn phones (and tablets)
The Toy Story franchise began with a story about a vintage doll feeling threatened by the arrival of an electronic action figure. Woody and Buzz's rivalry embodied a shift that was happening in the '90s as children's toys were becoming more technologically sophisticated, and while toys have gotten even more tech-focused in the years since, there's also an entirely new world of smart gadgets and digital platforms that now shape kids' playtime. Th…
Evening Standard
Belfast TelegraphMixed reviews for Toy Story 5 but critics agree tech-reliance warning important
Toy Story first began in 1995 and is an animated comedy about a group of toys.
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