Great fun, but a notch below the sequel. Blame the Star Wars gag.

Rating: Null/10 (11 June 2010)

Toy Story 2 (John Lasseter and Ash Brannon, 1998) is often cited as part of that select band of superior sequels: along with Aliens, X2, Grease 2 and Look Who's Talking Too, but to this reviewer it falls just short. Sure, it builds on the original in a host of ingenious ways, with the arrival of Emperor Zurg a stroke of genius, but the pay-off to that sequence is clunky, stupid and unfunny in a way that Pixar never is, stopping the film in its tracks. And despite the multitude of great running gags (like Rex becoming a computer games nut) and imaginative action sequences (the cones set-piece, that stunning opening scene), the film is never quite as sharp, dark or exciting as the first entry. It's still pretty much fantastic, though - the risible Empire Strikes Back spoof aside - and I enjoyed the film's concessions to heavy sentiment, including Sarah MacLachlan's song When She Loved Me, which soundtracks a moving flashback for Joanna Cusack's cowgirl character Jessie.