Pete Docter discusses Toy Story 4 challenges & addresses Monsters 3 rumors

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

How many times can toys get lost, and then find their way back home again? You'd think after awhile they would learn it's okay to just stay inside and play with themselves (because they're toys, you pervs!). But the folks at Pixar agree, and that if the upcoming TOY STORY 4 is to truly feel fresh (and necessary) it's going to have to tell a unique story, which according to one Pixar insider is exactly what they're aiming to do.

While talking with EW, MONSTERS, INC. and INSIDE OUT director Pete Docter spoke about the highly-anticipated fourth outing, and how in bringing the new movie to life they have to do something totally different from the original trilogy, which has been a bigger challenge than they thought:

“It’s hard, because as we get in there, we realize you don’t want this to just be another regurgitation of something we’ve seen. We’ve really plumbed the depths of these characters with Woody and Buzz, so to find something new that hasn’t been done, I feel like we’re onto it now. But it’s taken some real deep investigative work.”

News has gone around that the fourth entry in the series would take the route of a rom-com, something that diverts from the “search and rescue” angle of the previous films. According to Docter, the script by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack is still very much going down that route.

“The last I saw, those were still elements that they’re playing with. Again, it brings it to something that you haven’t seen before, which I think is what people want. On the one hand, you like the familiarity, you like these characters, you want to see them again — but if it was the same movie or it felt like, ‘Eh, it was a little bit like Toy Story 2,’ then we’re kind of sunk.”

TOY STORY 4 was recently pushed back, and in its place now is INCREDIBLES 2, a movie that probably has more sequel-friendly content available to it. Such content is not readily available to STORY, so the necessity to do something different than the first three movies, and the hard work it’s taken to get a story like that just right, could be a contributing factor to the delay.

However hard at work the Pixar team is on the new TOY STORY movie, there’s one movie that's not at all in the works—despite the desires of fans: MONSTERS, INC. 3. Fans have been begging for a sequel that dives into the continued relationship of Boo and Sully (John Goodman), to the point where it's caused rumors of a third movie's development. But at the moment there are no plans for a third movie, and a story about Boo and Sully is exactly what they were trying to avoid with MONSTERS UNIVERSITY:

“We purposely went with a prequel for Monsters University because we didn’t want to answer some of the questions about what happens to Boo, and how does she grow up, and things like that. It would have to be really compelling, which is hopefully the benchmark for all of our sequels, anyway.”

But if they did do a sequel, it could actually go back to an original, yet scrapped, idea they had for the first MONSTERS movie:

“Part of that idea was like a Peter Pan-type thing, where [Wendy] had been visited by Peter Pan as a kid and had sort of half-forgotten who he was.”

That being said, and looking at what Pixar is doing with their current slate of films, Docter isn't putting a definite stamp on anything:

“You never say never — who knows what will happen?”

I’m glad Docter and his team, including Jones and McCormack, are trying to think outside the box for STORY 4 seeing as how the tale of the toys and their owner, Andy, has been told in satisfying, grown-man-tear-inducing fashion. Doing something completely unexpected could make the sequel feel entirely fresh, a feeling that was lacking in this year’s FINDING DORY. Though I could care less regarding the MONSTERS series, I think a third movie is a definite possibility given the fact that we’re getting STORY 4, INCREDIBLES 2 and CARS 3. If those are hits, they’ll start looking for other movies to continue from. Just stay away from UP, please. The first is so perfect as it is. In the words of Billy Madison, “For the love of God…cherish it!”

TOY STORY 4 is set for June 2019, preceded by THE INCREDIBLES 2 in June 2018.