Toy Story 3 (with added D)

The final (probably) installation in PIXAR‘s initial franchise closes the lid on the adventures of Buzz and Woody.

“The claaaaaaaw!”

I’m assuming anyone reading this is familiar with the first two films and therefore the characters. Some have vanished over time – Andy is after all now 17 years old and about to go to college. He has to choose what to do with his toys – throw them, chuck them in the attic or donate them to a day care centre.

And thus the adventure begins. As usual, Woody is the leader and knows the situation – but the others don’t believe him. This plot line is getting a little thin. You’d have thought the rest of the group would have figured out that he’s on the ball by now.

Visually, the film’s superb. It also has a decent story which really picks up towards the end with some scenes that are really tense as the toys face near certain doom. By tense, I mean near-horrific. Seriously, it’ll scare the youngest kids.

There are some nice harks back to the original film and the cast are on form as ever. John Lasseter has been replaced as director by Lee Unkrich who edited the previous two instalments and he’s done an admirable job.

Still, given the choice, I’d recommend Shrek Forever After over this. Cartoons are meant to be funny and the big green ogre’s final shout has far more laughs than TS3.