Lamplight on the Ball Project: Toy Story 2 1999

 The Obvious Sequel

Almost immediately after the first movie premiered, conversation began about a Toy Story sequel. A few days after Toy Story's release, John Lasseter was traveling with his family and found a young boy clutching a Woody doll at an airport. Lasseter described how the boy's excitement to show it to his father touched him deeply. Lasseter realized that his character no longer belonged to him only, but rather it belonged to others, as well. The memory was a defining factor in the production of Toy Story 2, with Lasseter moved to create a great film for that child and for everyone else who loved the characters.

Ed Catmull, Lasseter, and Ralph Guggenheim visited Joe Roth, successor to recently ousted Katzenberg as chairman of Walt Disney Studios, shortly afterward. Roth was pleased and embraced the idea of a sequel. Disney had recently begun making their now infamous direct - to - video sequels to its successful features, and Roth wanted to handle the Toy Story sequel this way, as well. Prior releases, such as 1994’s Return of Jafar, had returned an estimated $100 million in profits.

Initially, everything regarding Toy Story 2 was uncertain: whether Tom Hanks and Tim Allen would be available and affordable, what the story premise would be, and even whether the film would be computer-animated at Pixar or traditionally hand-drawn at Walt Disney Feature Animation. Lasseter regarded the project as a chance to groom new directing talent, since top choices were already immersed in other projects (Andrew Stanton as co-director of A Bug’s Life and Pete Docter as director of what would eventually become Monsters Inc). Ash Brannon, a young animator who was previously animation director on Toy Story, was selected by Lasseter to direct after admiring his work on the first film. Brannon, a CalArts graduate, joined the Toy Story team in 1993. Disney and Pixar officially announced the sequel in a press release on March 12, 1997

THE PLOT

Woody and Buzz Lightyear have become co-leaders of Andy's toys. Andy plans to take Woody to Cowboy Camp, but accidentally rips his arm. Andy's mother places Woody on a shelf, and Woody begins to fear that Andy will throw him away. The following day, Woody finds Wheezy, a penguin toy with a broken squeaker, who has also been shelved. After saving Wheezy from being sold at a yard sale, Woody is found and stolen by a greedy toy collector. Buzz fails to foil the theft, but finds clues identifying the collector as Al McWhiggin, the owner of the Al's Toy Barn store. Buzz, Mr. Potato Head, Slinky Dog, Rex, and Hamm all set out to rescue Woody…

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Disney became unhappy with the pace of work on the film and demanded in June 1997 that Guggenheim be replaced as producer; Pixar complied, resulting in associate producers Karen Jackson and Helene Plotkin being promoted to co-producers.

In November 1997, Roth and Peter Schneider, the head of Walt Disney Feature Animation, viewed the film's story reels, featuring some finished animation, in a screening room at Pixar. They were impressed with the quality of work and became interested in releasing Toy Story 2 in theaters. In addition to the unexpected artistic caliber, there were other reasons that made the case for a theatrical release more compelling. The economics of a direct-to-video Pixar release were lackluster due to the higher salaries of the crew. After negotiations, Jobs and Roth agreed that the split of costs and profits for Toy Story 2 would follow the model of a newly created five-film deal, but Toy Story 2 would not count as one of the five films. Disney had bargained in the contract for five original features, not sequels, thus assuring five sets of new characters for its theme parks and merchandise. Jobs gathered the crew and announced the change in plans for the film on February 5, 1998.

The work done on the film to date was nearly lost in 1998 when one of the animators, while routinely clearing some files, accidentally entered the deletion command code on the root folder of the Toy Story 2 assets on Pixar's internal servers. Associate technical director Oren Jacob was one of the first to notice as character models disappeared from their works in progress. They shut down the file servers, but had already lost 90% of the work from the last two years. Additionally, it was discovered that the backups had not been functioning for approximately a month. The film was saved when technical director Galyn Susman, who had been working remotely to care for her newborn child, revealed that she had a backup copy of the film on her home computer. The Pixar team was able to recover nearly all of the lost assets save for a few recent days of work, allowing the film to proceed.

Many of the creative staff at Pixar were unhappy with how the sequel was progressing. Upon returning from the European promotional tour of A Bug's Life, Lasseter watched the development reels and agreed that it was not working. Pixar met with Disney, informing them that the film would need to be reworked. Disney disagreed, and noted that Pixar did not have enough time to remake the film before its established release date. Pixar decided that they simply could not allow the film to be released in its existing state and asked Lasseter to take over the production. Lasseter agreed, recruiting the first film's creative team, including Stanton and Docter, to redevelop the story and taking over as director from Brannon, who would remain on the project as co-director alongside Lee Unkrich, who was also fresh from A Bug's Life, having served as supervising editor. To meet Disney's deadline, Pixar had to complete the entire film in nine months. Unkrich, concerned with the dwindling amount of time remaining, asked Jobs whether the release date could be pushed back. Jobs explained that there was no choice, presumably in reference to the film's licensees and marketing partners, who were getting toys and promotions ready.

MY VERDICT

I was nine when I saw this in the cinema and I remember enjoying it just as much as the first one, which is still the case. I will say though, that this movie is the first in which I ever experienced the “surprise villain” trope that Disney has now adopted, and like you all I imagine, I’m getting pretty tired of that particular trope by now. But that aside, this film is a very good sequel to an equally good film.

Is Toy Story 2 a Pixar Classic? I think most Toy Story films will be called classics now and forever.