Toy Story 5

Like the magic of being a child, the animated franchise will never be as special again. But it just keeps plugging along with its winning mix of humor, humanism and heart.

You’ll never shake me from this belief: the “Toy Story” should have ended after the third one in 2010, with an absolute perfect finale that captured all the emotional appeal of the animated franchise that kicked off 31 years ago.

But after a long layoff, they made another one. It clearly wasn’t as good as the others, and on some level just felt wrong, like the guest who overstays their welcome. Then it made a billion dollars, so the prospect of a fifth seemed inevitable.

I’m happy to report “Toy Story 5” is a clear step up after the last one. What’s more, having it around on some odd level legitimizes the fourth.

It’s a reminder that life goes on and that, like the magic of being a child, things won’t ever be that special again. But that doesn’t mean the Disney/Pixar crew have lost their touch at finding that winning mix of humor, humanism and heart.

Andrew Stanton, who’s been a writer on all the “Toy Story” movies, is back and also takes on directing duties for the first time. (Co-directed by McKenna Harris, who shares screenwriting credits.) He clearly gets the tone and mission of these movies, which are made for kids but have a way of finding their way deep into the hearts of adults, too.

It seems almost beside the point to say this after three decades, but for those not familiar with these movies, it’s a look into the behind-the-scenes world of toys, who are sentient and come to life when humans are not around. Most are good, a few are bad, but all want to enjoy the love of the child who plays with them.

Not much time has passed since “4.” Bonnie (Scarlett Spears) has aged just a year or two, and is now about 8. She’s a smart, sweet but very shy kid who still loves playing with her favorite toys. Jessie (Joan Cusack), the rootin-tootin’ cowgirl, is firmly ensconced as “head toy,” with reticent boyfriend Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) as her sidekick.

As before, our side players sit very much in the background including Rex, Slinky Dog and the rest. After the passing of Don Rickles and Estelle Harris as Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head, those characters have faded almost to the point of invisibility.

Woody (Tom Hanks), you’ll recall, left the group in Bonnie’s room in the last movie to be with his lady love, Bo Peep (Annie Potts), and they’ve spent their time rescuing other lost toys out in the wild. Everybody seems content.

The “bad guy” this time is represented as Tech, aka devices like cell phones, computers and anything with a screen for people to stare it. The not-at-all-subtle cautionary tale here is about how we’ve become a society where people have their noses buried in screens all day and night, leaving no time or appetite for things like playing with toys, or actual face time with others.

Bonnie’s parents, concerned about her becoming the odd kid out, reluctantly buy her an entry-level computer, a green frog-resembling device called a Lilypad, aka Lily (Greta Lee). Lily can do seemingly magical things like record voice and video, and has a built-in social media function called the Pond. Bonnie quickly connects with some girls in her class and becomes another screen zombie.

Jessie tries to stand up for the toys, but Lily’s a bit snotty and controlling. As a result of her manipulations, most of the toys find themselves shoved into the garage, except for Buzz and Woody (who has returned to help out). Jessie and her horse, Bullseye, find themselves transported out to the country where they come into the possession of Blaze (Mykal-Michelle Harris), another eccentric kid maybe a year older than Bonnie.

Here Jessie meets up with Smarty Pants (Conan O’Brien), along with his pals Atlas and Atlas (Craig Robinson) and Snappy (Shelby Rabara), who are older-generation tech toys who have been languishing for years, their batteries drained. Smarty is a potty-training assistive toy, is rather excitable and a little peevish, but ultimately is willing to help Jessie, who remains suspicious owing to their similarity to Lily.

There’s a parable in here about distrust and xenophobia. Jessie, who still bears emotional scars from being abandoned by her first kid, Emily, many years ago, finds it hard to let go of her anger at the tech toys. You can even argue she verges up on becoming the villain of the piece.

Of course, it’s all going to build to some big action set-pieces, and a ride-to-the-rescue finish where the competing toys learn to get along and remember that their job is to “be there” for their kids… even when they move on to other things.

There’s a fun subplot, which I’ll admit at first I wondered how it was going to tie into the rest of the movie, where a whole shipment of new “Hi Tech” Buzzes crash-land on an island and awake. Following their innate programming to fight for Star Command, they make their way back to the mainland and get into some scrapes. It’s fun watching 50 or so of Buzz acting in dimwitted concert.

There’s also a throwaway gag about Woody getting to be a geriatric toy, seeing as how he was the star of a 1950s TV show. Some of the paint has rubbed off his head, leaving a bald spot that tends to reflect sun rays with the power of a lighthouse. And he’s even getting a little thick in the midsection, which I guess has something to do with his stuffing starting to sag.

(Maybe he needs another glow-up restoration from the toy merchant from the third movie.)

The movie also contains a few new tricks, like some scenes that revert to traditional style animation, which represents the imagination world of Bonnie as seen from the perspective of the toys. For example, there’s an early marriage between some toys that plays out with the cheesy drama of a Mexican soap opera.

Something I’ll sometimes write about a movie is that “it doesn’t need to exist.” I say that not to be snarky — OK, a little bit of it is I enjoy being snarky — but to express that movies are often a business as much as an art form, and you can usually tell when a film is made primarily for financial rather than creative reasons.

If the fourth one felt like that, “Toy Story 5” has enough of the juice that made the first trio of movies so meaningful to offer my blessing for life. Maybe even… another round? Two?