Movie Review: Lightyear

 

Note: There was no short film before Lightyear and you are darn right I am upset at that. 

Michael's Movie Grade: B

This may not be up to par with the Toy Story films, but it is still a lot of fun. 

This is not one of Pixar's most daring movies, nor one of their most touching, but not every Pixar film needs to be Inside Out, The Incredibles or Toy Story. This movie sets out simply to be a fun adventure film and it does a really good job being just that. That is not to say there are none of the touching moments that Pixar is known for. In fact there is one death that hits pretty hard. Still this is not in anyway the focus, which is instead the adventure. Buzz himself is handled quite well. This is not the same Buzz we have seen in the Toy Story movies, instead this is a real space ranger and that Buzz was a toy. This movie manages to make this character feel real and differentiate him from the toy, while still keeping enough of the Buzz we love. This Buzz is also headstrong and has a hard time listening to anyone else, but still deep down has a kind heart and cares for those in his life. In other words even if this is still not the same character, he captures the essence of who Buzz Lightyear is. However the show is stolen by Sox the cat. While the previews made me think this character would be a forced in and annoying comedy relief, he was anything but. For one thing his comedy is quite funny. He made me and the audience I saw this with laugh out loud multiple times. Plus Peter Sohn's voice acting was fantastic. Yet he also works great into the adventure part of the film and works as a great ally for the team. Yet the heart of the film lies in Buzz's teammate Izzy Hawthrone, who counterbalances with Buzz perfectly. You can feel a real connection with these two growing over the course of the film. The scenes between these two have a real feeling of authenticity behind them that does a great job grounding the adventure in reality. The adventure itself is conventional but it works quite well. It captures the feeling of simple Sci-fi fun and if it lacks the complexities of most Pixar movies, there is still a real charm to it. 

On the downside Buzz has two other team members he works with here. They simply seem to serve as comedy reliefs, and although they get a few moments they never really justify their existence when we already have Sox the cat here. They also have very one note personalities. There is also the fact that this movie's message is very easy to get, even for the smallest of kids, yet they have to keep stating it over and over. The reveal of the villain also didn't fully work for me but may work for others. 

Chris Evans did a good job voicing Buzz here and I got so caught up in believing in who this character is that I didn't think about how the voice sounds different. Still I am not sure replacing Tim Allen was necessary (I am a fan of Tim Allen). True this is technically a different Buzz, but I think he would have felt just as much like a different Buzz. And Tim Allen may be a comedian but he handled the more serious scenes of the Toy Story films well and could have handled a less overtly silly version of the character. At the same time, I can't deny that Chris Evans did a really good job with this and having a diffrent voice actor proved to not be distracting at all. 

This may not be Toy Story but it is a lot of fun.