Toy Story star Tim Allen shared new details about the upcoming fifth installment in the franchise, which is set to hit theatres in 2026.
Tim Allen is paging Star Command one more time.
Nearly three decades after first bringing Buzz Lightyear to life in 1995’s Toy Story, the actor offered details about his first voice session for the upcoming Toy Story 5, set to hit theatres in June 2026.
“It’s really, really weird to get back in it,” the 71-year-old admitted to Collider in an interview published Dec. 27. “It was really a struggle to get, and then maybe two hours in, I was doing Buzz.”
The Santa Clause actor—who starred opposite Tom Hanks’ Sheriff Woody in all four previous Toy Story movies—teased that the latest installment in the beloved animated franchise is “very, very clever,” stressing that the filmmakers at Disney and Pixar aren’t just chasing box office glory.
“I don’t really believe it’s about the money,” he insisted. “I’m sure they want it to be a success, but that’s not why they did it. Had they not come up with a brilliant script, they wouldn’t have done it and they wouldn’t have called me and Tom.”
Tim added, “I’m so blessed to be Buzz Lightyear, to be honest.”
While the sitcom star is happy to be back in the voiceover booth, he previously spoke out about being replaced by Chris Evans in the 2022 spinoff movie Lightyear, which told the tale of the fictional astronaut who inspired the action figure in the Toy Story universe.
“The brass that did the first four movies is not this,” Tim told Extra at the time. “It’s a whole new team that really had nothing to do with the first movies.”
Emphasizing that there’s “no Toy Story Buzz without Woody,” the Home Improvement alum questioned the spinoff’s link to the Oscar-winning film series.
“I’m a plot guy,” he went on. “It would seem to be a big adventure story, and as I see, it’s not a big adventure story. It’s a wonderful story, it just doesn’t seem to have any connection to the toy. It has no relationship to Buzz.”
As for Chris, he had nothing but respect for the original Space Ranger.
“It’s a tough legacy to try and touch what Tim Allen did,” the Captain America star told E! News, “so you have to honor that and use it as a blueprint, but still try and find a way to add your own interpretation.”
While you wait for Buzz and the gang to make their big-screen comeback, read on for more fun facts about the Toy Story movies.
1. Toy Story was initially based on the Oscar-winning animated short Tin Toy, which was about a toy named Tinny who reluctantly allowed a baby to play with him so he won’t cry.
2. While Tinny was initially supposed to be the protagonist, the filmmakers thought the toy was “too antiquated,” eventually making the character a military action figure before adding the astronaut element as well.
The character’s name also evolved, going from Tinny to Lunar Larry to Tempus From Morph before the team eventually landed on Buzz Lightyear, inspired by famed astronaut Buzz Aldrin, according to The Pixar Touch, a 2008 book by David A. Price.
3. It might be hard to believe, but in the initial script Woody was actually the villain of the story, a ventriloquist dummy that abused the other toys. As screenwriter Joss Whedon put it to EW, “The original Woody was a thundering a–hole.”
4. Tom Hanks was the first (and really only) choice to serve as Woody’s voice. (His brother Jim Hanks voiced the character for video games and Woody-themed merchandise.)
5. For Buzz Lightyear, Billy Crystal was the first actor the filmmakers had in mind, but the comedy star passed, a decision he later said was “the only regret I have in the business of something I passed on.”
6. After Crystal bowed out, stars like Bill Murray, Chevy Chase and Jim Carrey were also considered before Tim Allen, famous for his hit TV series Home Improvement, took on the role, partially because Chase was one of his inspirations.
7. Because neither of them had previously done voice work, Hanks and Allen chose to record Woody and Buzz’s scenes together.
8. Brought in to punch up the underwhelming script, The Avengers director Whedon ended up adding essential elements, including the creation of Rex and changing Buzz’s entire personality, making the previously self-aware and cheerful toy completely ignorant to the fact that he was actually a toy.
9. Known for his strong female characters (He did create Buffy the Vampire Slayer after all), Whedon tried to get Barbie in the movie as a savior for the two male lead toys, but Mattel ultimately did not give permission, according to Entertainment Weekly.
10. Oh, and Pixar debated whether or not to make the animated feature a musical. “It would have been a really bad musical, because it’s a buddy movie,” the writer explained. “It’s about people who won’t admit what they want, much less sing about it. Woody can’t do an ‘I want’ number. He’s cynical and selfish, he doesn’t know himself. Buddy movies are about sublimating, punching an arm, ‘I hate you.’ It’s not about open emotion.”
11. When the studio initially started planning for a sequel, they envisioned a direct-to-DVD follow-up for Toy Story 2, as a majority of the animators were working on A Bug’s Life. It would go on to score a rare 100 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
12. During production of the sequel, the entire film was nearly destroyed in 1998 when a staffer accidentally hit a button that would erase all the files. When another employee noticed it in the nick of time, 90 percent of the film was still erased and the back-up files were nowhere to be found. Fortunately, Galyn Susman, supervising technical director, had back-up files at her home as she had recently given birth and had been working from home more often.
13. The making of Toy Story 2, especially due to a late overhaul of almost the entire film, was so intense that many animators developed carpal tunnel syndrome, suffered strains and “by the time the film was complete, a full third of the staff would have some kind of repetitive stress injury,” Ed Catmull, the president of Pixar, revealed to the Los Angeles Times.
14. Before Disney acquired Pixar, an animation studio, Circle 7, had come up with a drastically different storyline for Toy Story 3. After Buzz began malfunctioning, Andy’s mom was set to send the toy back to Taiwan so he could be repaired. After learning it was actually a recall, Woody and the gang travel to Taiwan to save Buzz, who was interacting with other recalled toys from around the world. But after Disney bought Pixar in 2006 and disbanded Circle 7, the movie completely changed.
15. Jim Varney died shortly after the release of Toy Story 2, leading Blake Clark to take over the voice role of Slinky Dog in Toy Story 3, with producers later saying they were “really excited” when they learned the two actors were close friends.
“They knew each other from way back,’ director Lee Unkrich said in a statement. “When I’m in recording sessions with Blake, [he] just channels the spirit of his friend, Jim Varney, and he’s done a really awesome job keeping that character alive.”
Source: www.eonline.com