Disney is looking to curb its spending and start delivering bigger profits to shareholders, hence why returning CEO Bob Iger recently confirmed plans to revisit the Frozen and Toy Story franchises in theaters.
Frozen 3 and Toy Story 5 are guaranteed $1 billion hits, so the studio returning to those wells is hardly surprising. There has been something of a mixed response about the latter, though, especially when both Toy Story 3 and 4 ended on a definitive note that felt like the right place to end the franchise.
In a recent interview with The Wrap, Pixar Chief Creative Officer Pete Docter chose his words carefully when asked about the decision to make another Toy Story movie.
"The thing we’ve been really trying to do, and this has been the case for a while, is we’ve been looking at them a little bit like, 'Okay, we're not planning for the future.' When we made the first 'Toy Story,' we had no idea there would be a 'Toy Story 2.' We’re just trying to make this movie."
"But that in making the movie, it takes you places, unexpected places, which is what I love about the creative process," Docter continues. "If I knew exactly what I was doing when I started making a movie, there’d kind of be no point in making it. I discover so much along the way."
That doesn't really feel like an answer to the question, and when Docter was pushed for details on the upcoming fifth instalment, he teased: "I think it’ll be surprising. It’s got some really cool stuff that you haven’t seen before."
How the movie will surprise us remains to be seen, though we're sure Woody and Buzz will be reunited. Toy Story 5 doesn't have a release date, but production on the movie is clearly well underway.