Toy Story 2

I watched Toy Story 2 on BBC One last night. Years ago I caught a few minutes of the film and logged in my brain to watch the whole thing at some point. I remember the first Toy Story being released in 1996 in the UK. Toy Story 2 was released in 2000, over 7 years ago - it really doesn't seem that long ago - and the film is miles better than the majority of animated films that I've seen more recently. A lot like old games consoles didn't need the powerful graphics to make great games, a lot of the good animated films were made earlier on, almost exclusively by Pixar. I haven't seen the more recent Cars, but I've seen just about every other Pixar film, and I'm amazed at the high quality of pieces such as Finding Nemo. It's a shame Pixar have now been bought by the evil empire of Disney. Hopefully they'll still carry on making great films. Toy Story 3 is actually down for a release in 2010. I hope they don't sequelise and ruin Toy Story here.

The Toy Story 2 storyline is quite clever, involving a toy collector who steals Woody to sell him as part of a collection to a museum. The difference between owning toys for fun or for a collection is interesting to watch (I guess the latter is for adults who still wish they could do the former). There are nice humorous references to this kind of behaviour and "toy culture" - one of the toys is left in his original packaging, and as a result is constantly bitter.

I believe one of the reasons for the success of the Toy Story franchise is that the whole concept is just so much fun, and really captures the imagination. Toys, an obviously childish theme, are taken and given personalities and character. This attracts kids who want to see their toys come to life, and adults who wished their toys would have come to life. It's great to imagine that all the toys in the world have their own secret world when they're not being played with. This is one of the most interesting features - seeing real toys such as Mr. Potato Head or a cowboy figure come to life and interact with the real world. It's quite ironic how the characters of Toy Story went on to become high-selling toys outside of the films.

Toy Story 2 is filled with great humour and one liners (it's probably the most genuinely funny kids' film I've ever seen), there are Star Wars references and I love the animation style too - really vivid and smooth with a slight 50s tinge. There's just so much going on in this film, so many parallels and clever situations.

I personally enjoy anything with bright colours and memories of childhood and so I really enjoyed Toy Story 2. Definitely recommended viewing if you haven't seen it already.

Toy Story 2 official webpage