To the tablet and beyond: does Toy Story 5 go hard enough on technology? | Toy Story 5
To the tablet and beyond: does Toy Story 5 go hard enough on technology? | Toy Story 5
https://www.theguardian.com/news/ng-interactive/2026/jun/21/toy-story-5-go-hard-enough-on-technology
Publish Date: 2026-06-21 01:00:00
Source Domain: www.theguardian.com
For more than 30 years, Pixar’s signature Toy Story series has been entertaining children while giving voice to their parents’ anxieties. This is especially pronounced in the film’s sequels, as the living toys who dedicate their lives to the happiness of their owner/child experience all different sorts of potential and parent-paralleled obsolescence, from physical wear-and-tear and a child reaching young adulthood to the toy equivalent of empty-nesting (still hanging around the playroom but no longer anyone’s favourite). It’s only natural – maybe even a little belated – that Toy Story 5 would address the encroachment of technology, which continues to make its way to children earlier and earlier. So many years after the tech breakthroughs that allowed Toy Story to become the first computer-animated feature, and Pixar to become a household name in family entertainment, has the formerly Steve Jobs-owned company turned against the kind of innovation that built its success?
The movie arrives at a conspicuous juncture in the sometimes-uneasy relationship between humans, their children and their tech. According to Pew Research, the majority of kids under 12 are using tablets and/or smartphones, even as links between screen time and mental health difficulties continue to be studied. More school districts in the US are tightening rules on devices. Parenting in 2026 involves making a series of difficult, imperfect decisions about how to further regulate screen time. It’s only natural that Toy Story 5 would reflect this, even if it’s not entirely clear when the movie itself is taking place. (The human characters have clearly not aged seven full years since 2019’s Toy Story 4.)
For the non-human characters in the movie, tech – personified by a child-friendly “Lilypad” tablet nicknamed Lily – threatens to supplant their role as a child’s go-to plaything. This is a particularly traumatic experience for Jessie (Joan Cusack), the seemingly inanimate,…
