Coming to a Toy Story Near You

If you’ve ever had to pry a tablet out of your kid’s hands when it’s time for dinner, you already know the underlying conflict of Toy Story 5. Jessie, Woody, Buzz, and the gang are facing their biggest rival yet: technology. It’s the ultimate showdown between classic, imagination-driven play and the magnetic pull of screens.

But Pixar didn’t just want to make a movie that wags a finger and says “technology is bad.” They wanted to capture the very real, everyday struggle families are facing. To help make sure they got this critical conversation right, they brought in Jim Festante, Executive Director of Health-e-Habits, as a creative consultant.

Pixar cared deeply about authenticity. They didn't want to just villainize iPads, but to accurately reflect the intense tug-of-war kids feel between the physical world of imagination and the highly engineered pull of their favorite games and apps. Jim helped the creative team look beyond the standard "screen time" arguments to deconstruct what kids are actually experiencing in those digital spaces, and what it costs them socially to log off.

We’ve been using stories to connect with each other for thousands of years, and a movie with the massive cultural footprint of Toy Story has a unique kind of magic. It creates a shared baseline for society.

By tackling a topic that hits so close to home, Toy Story 5 builds a bridge between generations. It cuts through our anxieties and gives families a shared language to talk about technology. Instead of lecturing out of fear, it opens up a space where parents and kids can actually sit down, listen to each other, and figure out this digital world together.