Toy Story 4 and the End of Meaning

"Those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'."

~Viktor Frankl

When Toy Story 4 was announced the question on everyone’s mind was, “will this ruin one of the greatest film trilogies of all time?” After all, the original trilogy managed to accomplish the nearly impossible feat of making three perfect entries in the franchise. So, when I saw Toy Story 4, my guard was up. This is my childhood, after all. 

Upon my first viewing of Toy Story 4 I was left with a sinking, hollow feeling. It was technically astounding, featuring the new peak of computer-generated animation. But, thematically, I felt very little. The previous entry in the saga came out during my senior year of high school, and I was left in a puddle of tears after Woody wistfully said, “So-long, cowboy.” It was my right of passage into adulthood, the animated reminder that high school and adolescents were over, and a new season of adulthood laid before me. And it would require a willingness in me to set aside some of my childish things. Even stepping outside of the Toy Story universe, the last Pixar movie I watched, Coco, caused an embarrassing amount of liquid to leak from my eyes. So, I was let initially let down by Toy Story 4.

Then I talked with my best friend about it. He saw it, and loved it, and was coy about why he thought I might not have liked it. “It’s interesting you didn’t like it,” he said without a smirk but he might as well have had one. “Why?” I asked with a tone that didn’t feel like asking. 

“It just seemed to speak to where you’re at in life, right now.”

The words hung over my head as annoyance and fear built up inside of me. Annoyance because he is usually right about these things, fear because I don’t like to feel exposed, and movies have a way of doing that. 

So, I re-watched it. 

And then I took a half hour to cry in my car afterwards. 

Here’s what I learned on a second viewing and, if you haven’t seen the movie, SPOILERS: 

Toy Story 4 picks up shortly after Toy Story 3 drops off. Woody, Buzz, and the gang are now Bonnie’s toys. Woody is no longer the favorite toy, and this clearly stings to his depth’s. He has been relegated to the task of making sure Bonnie’s favorite toys are consistently showing up for her, because a toy who doesn’t have a kid might as well not exist. One day, Bonnie creates a toy of her own. Using a spork, pipe cleaner, a popsicle stick, and some googly eyes, Bonnie creates Forky. Forky, maybe the most bizarre character in the Toy Story universe, now has the coveted job of being Bonnie’s favorite toy. But Forky believes he is trash, and longs only to live in trash cans. He doesn’t believe he is a toy, and thus runs away. Causing Woody to leave Bonnie and the group to try and get Forky back to home.

Toy Story 4 is not dissimilar to the first three entries in that the toys are merely the authors chosen vehicle to explore the big questions in life. It seems that nearly every character in this movie is dealing with the dilemma of existence, purpose, and meaning. Aside from Woody trying to figure out how to make sense of his life since he is no longer the center of a kid’s world, and Forky struggling with knowing where he’s from and being told where he should be going, there are a plethora of other characters struggling through this similar theme. Buzz is trying to figure out how to think autonomously, without having to rely on Woody to be his moral guide. New characters Ducky and Bunny have spent years hanging on the prize wall of a carnival game, dreaming of the day they can go home with a kid and discover the feeling of purpose. Duke Caboom hides in shame and isolation because his sense of self was stripped from him when he was rejected by his first owner. And, Gabby Gabby longs for the day she can get her voice box repaired so as to go home with a young girl who frequents the antique shop Gabby occupies. Amongst this crew of existentialist toys stands Bo-Peep, seemingly the only toy in the crew with an established sense of self. She isn’t angst-y or insecure, she has found meaning and purpose outside the play-room of a kid, and she insists on never going back.

Bo-Peep stands as a challenge to the rhetoric Woody has been preaching for the previous three movies: Toys can and should have purpose and meaning, whether or not they are the center of a kid’s world. And the movies ends in an unexpected way, at least for me. The movie sets you up to think that Bo-Peep will come to her senses and go with Woody and the gang to return to Bonnie. Instead, we see Woody acknowledge that he longer has meaning in his old life, and he joins Bo-Peep on a new journey. It turns out that this old toy still has a few new tricks to learn. Bo-Peep and Woody are shown in an epilogue to be helping toys find kids to get connected to. Their season of being loved by a kid is over, now they get to teach new toys how to do their job well.

 The reason my friend’s comments to me were so incisive was because Woody and I were on the same boat. I was deep in grief when I watched Toy Story 4, and was struggling to find a new way forward after losing a sense of meaning. And I think this turmoil is something a lot of us can relate to. Many of us have faced the traumatic moment where the things that used to fill our lives with meaning are no longer there, and we’re left to pick up the pieces and figure out what life is supposed to look like now. Whether it is new empty nesters whose kids have moved out and no longer need them to meet their needs, or someone facing the end of a relationship, or the loss of a job, retirement, the death of a loved one… many of us have faced moments which cause us to question whether or not life has meaning anymore. And those of us who haven’t faced this yet will, probably more than once. It is a sort of human right of passage.

So, what do we do when we experience what seems like the end of meaning? Many of us attempt to hang on to the fragments of what used to give us meaning, but we do so at the cost of our inner lives. We see this in the ways Woody scrambles to keep Forky and the other toys showing up for Bonnie, only to leave him feeling empty in the end. When we experience these sad endings, the much braver choice would be to see what is left in life for us to experience. I believe we are all created on purpose. None of us are accidents to God. We are given the gift of life, and sustained by forces animated by the Divine. In our lives, we will experience a thousand deaths, but we will also experience a thousand resurrections. 

If Toy Story 4 has any wisdom to offer those of us who are suffering with a deep sense of loss, and I believe it does, it is to encourage us toward openness. Many of us feel born with certain purposes. “I was born to be a mom,” “I was born to be a leader,” “If I don’t do what I love I’ll go crazy.” These dreams and ambitions are good, and I believe within us for a reason. But we can lose an openness to the adventures God may have for us if we limit our purpose to the things we are already aware of. Being a King was not on David’s radar. Liberating slaves was not the thing Moses dreamt of doing as a child. Leading the greatest spiritual movement in human history probably wasn’t the thing Peter was expecting to happen when he took over his father’s fishing business. 

If you are experiencing the end of meaning, the loss of purpose, all I can say is have hope and be open. There is still time to be surprised.