Toy Story Fangirl

I’ve got a few new tidbits of Toy Story 4 info to share today!  We finally have the long-awaited “First Look” feature in Entertainment Weekly magazine, as well as a new voice for a returning character.

New Voice Actor for Bonnie

A couple days ago, the entertainment site Deadline shared the news that Madeleine McGraw would be voicing Bonnie in Toy Story 4.  This isn’t that surprising, considering it’s been nine years since Toy Story 3 (and probably ten since her previous voice actor, Emily Hahn, started recorded her lines).  I recall there being remarks back when Toy Story That Time Forgot aired that Bonnie sounded older, so it was likely time to find her a new voice that would match the kindergarten-age character.  Madeleine McGraw, who is best known for playing young Hope (Evangeline Lilly) in Ant Man and the Wasp, also voiced a character in Cars 3, and I’m looking forward to hearing her as Bonnie!

One other great little detail came out of this announcement, though.  The agency who represents Madeleine posted about the news on Instagram, and in the background we can see some fantastic concept art on the studio wall at Pixar.

Here’s a closer look:

The lower left shows Bonnie in her class, as well as another scene of the toys in her room.  We’ve also got some new concept images of the toys, including most of the cast lined up for scale, as well as Woody and Bo in the lower right and a shocked pose of Gabby Gabby in the center.

I always love seeing concept art of the films, and gaining some insight into what went on behind the scenes in the creation of the characters and their story.  Hopefully we’ll get a closer look at some of these images when The Art of Toy Story 4 hits bookstores in May.

New Movie Still Shows Duke Caboom

In the most recent issue of Entertainment Weekly magazine, we finally got the “First Look” still that they always share for new Pixar movies – albeit much later than past films.  Here’s the article as it appeared in the publication, with the new screencap at the top:

In the article, Keanu Reeves talked a bit about creating his character, Duke Caboom:

“I wanted to make sure that I didn’t go into Tim Allen’s space as Buzz Lightyear, so I made Duke a little more gravelly but still tried to give him energy and a big personality.  Duke should love what he does.  He’s the greatest stuntman in Canada!  But I definitely wanted him to be in the chorus and not the lead.”

You gotta respect that Reeves didn’t want to take away from the other stars.  Director Josh Cooley also spoke about the film:

“I really wanted to see toys from different eras, and we were also excited to see just how big this world could be – if we’re going to make a fourth film, it needs to be bigger.  We couldn’t have picked a bigger person to voice our villain than Christina.  She can play such sweet innocence, and then at the flip of a switch go cold and terrifying.  And once Keanu came to the table, he asked all these great questions and started doing different voices and actually jumped up on the table in the middle of Pixar to act out his great ideas.”

According to EW, the core theme of the film is coping with transition.  Cooley elaborated on this idea:

“The whole of Toy Story is based on the idea that everything has a purpose in life, and for Woody, now that he’s been given to a new kid, what’s his purpose?  Toy Story 3 is the end of Woody’s arc with Andy, but it’s not the end of Woody’s story.”

It looks as if the action in the new movie image takes place in the same scene shown in the trailer, where we see Bo Peep press the coin-op button on a pinball machine (you can see the pull knob for the ball to the right of the panel)…

… and then open the coin panel so that she and Woody can climb inside.

The party within – with its wires and panels on the top and sides of the space,  and the wooden walls – matches the lighting in the image provided by EW.

Is this the scene where we will first get to meet Duke Caboom?  By Woody’s confused appearance and the way Bo is stooped down to talk to him, that might be the case.

I am really excited to learn more about Duke Caboom – he sounds like an awesome character.  With only 87 days left to go (can you believe it?) until Toy Story 4 hits theaters, it won’t be long now until we know more about the movie.  Stay tuned!

Images © Disney/Pixar and Entertainment Weekly.  Photo of Madeleine McGraw sourced from the Deadline site.  Many thanks to @bloodypegasusfantasy44 on Tumblr who tipped me off to the Entertainment Weekly article, originally shared on that site by @nerd-utopia.