Bringing back all the feels!

Rating: 8/10 (20 February 2020)

My expectations for Toy Story 4 were low considering how the previous installment had gone. So I was super stoked throughout the whole movie when I realised how much more of a success this one was going to be.
Toy Story 4 is the perfect blend of nostalgia for its original audience ('You've got a friend in me' goes without saying), combined with different settings and characters for its newer audience, as well as great character development and emotional investment. It wasn't trying too hard to bring back all the jokes and tip offs to previous movies, yet it still felt really familiar, being in a child's room at the start, flying out the windows, all the characters together. It still felt modern too, with new characters and significantly better animation when compared to the first Toy Story.
Tom Hanks and Tim Allen were a class act as well. Great one liners as usual. Buzz's inner voices jokes esepecially. The emotion at the end of Buzz and Woody having to say goodbye was excellent, it felt like watching the finale of Friends. Saying goodbye to old friends (So much history).
Bo Peep's reintroduction and character development was clever and kept it exciting. Her scene in the atinques store showing Woody up on many occassions was necssary as Woody had just gone too long on being the one in charge and showing everyone else what to do. Her almost bar like scene reminded me of Star Wars with the trumpets and all the aliens in the bar. Great chance to show off a variety of funny toys.
Although, poor old Buzz was definitely side-lined in this movie and was much more of a side character, and that goes for the whole gang actually, they felt like they were not even part of the movie to be honest. Maybe it was for lack of time, but a few extra scenes of these characters doing something funny would've added extra roundedness to the whole series. They just felt a bit forgotten when compared to the first two movies.
The new characters were mostly successful I'd say. Ducky and Bunny had some great scenes together and we're an easy win for the younger audience who no doubt would have went away recalling some of their scenes. Gabby was creepy enough with her minions (perfect choice of creepy dolls, who doesn't hate those things), her purposes were made clear and were pretty rationale. The build up to her being reunited with her child was made to be quite brutal when her child just threw her away. This was quite effective and hopefully got children thinking about not just wanting the newest and coolest toy to only use once or twice before throwing it away.
Forky though was a bit of a hit and miss for me. It doesn't quite make sense that the human capabilities of the toys can be passed onto anything that is made and crafted. What about all the other things that are made in arts and crafts? It seemed to push the past the limits of what was reasonable in this world. Lastly, Duke was great fun, and hilarious at times., had to rate his jump when he surprsingly hit his head going for his 40 foot jump.
Overall I found myself cracking up at the jokes, being quite invested in the story and satisfied with the finish at the end. Woody did have that annoying Batman quality to him where he always had to do the right thing. But it makes sense with his character. This movie for me was well worth putting the time and effort into and will be one I'll look forward to watching again in a few years time.