Chris Evans’ Buzz and his robot cat go on a space mission in the Lightyear trailer
We learn more about the human Buzz Lightyear in this first official trailer for the Disney/Pixar film
Aux News Chris Evans
When Lightyear was announced back in 2020, Chris Evans’ description of the forthcoming film was a bit of a word salad. He explained that Lightyear isn’t about Buzz Lightyear the toy, but rather it’s about “the origin story of the human Buzz Lightyear that the toy is based on.” At the time, it made no sense. Buzz is already based on a real-life astronaut Buzz Aldrin, so what did he mean by “human Buzz Lightyear”?
The teaser released back in October cleared some of that up, showing that it’s actually a very meta movie that zeroes in and focuses on the astronaut Buzz Lightyear and his adventures in space. Now, we get to learn even more about the “real” Buzz in the first official trailer.
“A year of work for a four-minute flight. Isn’t that something?” says human Buzz, suited up for his space flight. In the trailer, we learn that Buzz has been stationed in a planet for a year, and now it’s time to go back home.
Unfortunately those plans don’t go too smoothly, as he encounters Emperor Zurg (whom he refers to as a “just a massive robot”) and his robot army. He also has a cute robotic cat companion named Sox (voiced by Peter Sohn), who’s apparently a cross between Captain Marvel’s Goose and C-3PO.
In case you’re still confused about how this movie fits into the Toy Story universe, director Angus MacLane attempts to clear that up in a statement, saying, “In Toy Story, there seemed to be this incredible backstory to him being a Space Ranger that’s only touched upon, and I always wanted to explore that world further. So my Lighytear pitch was, ‘What was the movie that Andy saw that made him want a Buzz Lightyear toy?’ I wanted to see that movie. And now I’m lucky enough to get to make it.”
In addition to Evans and Sohn, the voice cast also includes Keke Palmer, Dale Soules, Taika Waititi, Uzo Aduba, Mary McDonald-Lewis, Efren Ramirez, Isiah Whitlock Jr., and Josh Brolin.
Lightyear goes to infinity and beyond on June 17, 2022.
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In case you’re still confused about how this movie fits into the Toy Story universe, director Angus MacLane attempts to clear that up in a statement, saying, “In Toy Story, there seemed to be this incredible backstory to him being a Space Ranger that’s only touched upon, and I always wanted to explore that world further. So my Lighytear pitch was, ‘What was the movie that Andy saw that made him want a Buzz Lightyear toy?’ I wanted to see that movie. And now I’m lucky enough to get to make it.”Haven’t we known this for a long time? I can understand the confusion upon first hearing “Pixar’s doing a movie based on Buzz Lightyear, only he’s not a toy”, but that explanation seems pretty straightforward to me.Now, if only they can actually deliver the type of grand, kinetic space opera that would result in such toys as seen in the Toy Story series…
When the first trailer came out, someone from cast or crew mis-explained it as “A movie about the real astronaut that the Buzz Lightyear toys are based on” which created much confusion.
It’s weird because this trailer shows that humanity has interstellar travel and ray guns, and that hostile, militaristic, technologically-advanced aliens exist, none of which is in evidence in the Toy Story movies.
They clearly have interstellar travel, since there are immigrants from Pizza Planet living and working on Earth.
Toy Story is a movie in our (the real(?)) universe.Lightyear is a movie in the Toy Story universe.Hopefully Buzz will watch a movie in Lightyear that inspires him to become an astronaut, and then Disney/Pixar can turn that into a movie for us, etc. etc.
This is some John Barth shit
Maybe I’m missing some sarcasm here, but, I don’t think this is supposed to be suggesting that Andy actually lived in some sort of advanced, futuristic world with crazy technology and aliens. Rather, Andy watched a movie about futuristic worlds and technology and aliens and bought a toy from that movie. Now this movie that’s coming out is the movie Andy originally saw. I believe it’s still supposed to be a fictional work – a Hollywood film – not a fake biopic or telling of true events about the Toy Story world or anything.
It could be, but Evans’s quote that it’s “the origin story of the human Buzz Lightyear that the toy is based on” is an odd phrasing if it’s just an in-universe story. Saying “the human” implies that Buzz Lightyear was a real human in that universe, and the toy was based on this real human, rather than that Buzz Lightyear is a fictional character in Toy Story and the Buzz toy(s) we see in the movies are just toys of that character. But it could just be odd phrasing.
Yeah, I agree that the wording he used was misleading, though I think from the trailer and the director’s comments, we have to assume he misstated things a bit. If this were the true story of a man walking around the same world as Andy, that’d be quite odd indeed. I mean, I don’t remember fawning over Neil Armstrong or Buzz Aldrin action figures as a kid, do you? Even just for that reason, I have to believe it’s the fictitious person that toy was based on.
It’s based on the entertainment of the Toy Story world, not their reality.By comparison, our world doesn’t have laser swords and dragons, even though our entertainment does.
Well, they’re in evidence in how Buzz Lightyear reacts to his surroundings in the first movie, and his encounter with the toy Zurg in the second movie.
Not every toy was based on a movie.
The director, Angus MacLane, said his pitch for the movie was “What was the movie that Andy saw that made him want a Buzz Lightyear toy?” Obviously no such movie existed at that time, but MacLane and Pixar are making it now.
Yes, I understood the article.
I refuse to believe that Buzz Lightyear is supposed to be a movie tie-in. He’s a generic astronaut equivalent of G.I. Joe.
Exactly. That was clearly the original intent. This seems dumb to me.
I keep thinking/hoping they’ll be a MST3K style scene of Buzz Lightyear and the toys watching the film/complaining during the end credits about how much they got wrong.
Hasn’t it been a while since Pixar’s done anything like that? Lightyear would indeed be a perfect chance to revisit that tradition.
No mention whatsoever of the Disney cartoon show that covered this same exact territory?
“No mention whatsoever of the Disney cartoon show that covered this same exact territory?”
Why would they mention it?
Not gonna lie, having Patrick Warburton do the voice of Buzz again would have been the easiest way for this movie to garnish some form of excitement out of me
My gut tells me Warburton is going to have a cameo as either a senior director at Star Command or as the voice of Buzz’s father on a saved voicemail from Earth. Or those cameos will go to Tim Allen. Who knows.
Glad to know I’m not the only one wondering about how this show is constantly omitted in articles like this. Especially because the show was very enjoyable and the supporting cast was great.
I like to think that this is the cartoon that came out based on the Lightyear movie, and the toys were based on this cartoon’s style, like what happened with Ghostbusters and a bunch of other things.
I mean, popular movies get cartoon spin offs all the time. Such as men in black, the mummy and ghostbusters. In Andy’s world, the Warburton cartoon is probably a spin off of the Evans movie.
A big-budget Star Command is what Ive wanted since this project was announced.
Guys if we play this juuuuuust right, no one will notice the robot cat is just Dug from ‘Up’ – Pixar
Why are you pretending this was confusing? A few googles would’ve sorted you out fine.
A few googles would’ve sorted you out fine.- The AV Club
“why do research when a handful of losers can yell the answers at me in the comments and generate clicks” – The new and improved AV Club with 90% less Chicago
wouldn’t you google it because you’re confused?
It was confusing at first. They initially made it sound like this human Buzz Lightyear lived in the same continuity with Andy and his mom. It did need further clarification.
I applaud their restraint for not scoring the trailer to a slow, pensive rendition of “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” played out one note at a time on a grand piano.
Or with a choir.
By a singer who still has their entire mouth on anesthesia after a visit to the dentist.
very funny that the most mercenary-looking production pixar has made in years will be their first fully back in theatres.
Probably the dumbest brand extension yet! Disney keeps topping itself.
Will there also be a version of this movie but with every character played by a car? Or would Lightning McQueen see this version?
Lightyear Tires exist in the Cars universe, so there might be some trademark issues to sort out before they could get that into production.
That’s a shame. The all-car version of Inside Out was really good
We already have that answer.
And if this one goes well, Clint Eastwood is signed on to direct the gritty revisionist Western Woody’s Last Roundup.
When I heard the cat I was pleased for Paul F. Tompkins – and then bummed when I discovered it isn’t him.
Spoiler alert-At the climax with the villain, that vine plant creature saves the day.
You lost me at co-opting anything David Bowie.
Andy watched a movie / cartoon about a spaceman. The spaceman movie had a toy line. Andy was given one of the spaceman toys for his birthday. Unbeknownst to Andy, the spaceman toy comes to life and secretly has adventures with other toys. What’s being made and advertised here is the in-universe spaceman movie that Andy watched in sentence one. This really isn’t as complicated or confusing as people make it out to be.
Say what you will about the cliche of the remixed pop song in the trailer, I still love that version of “Starman”. Though the one from the teaser was slightly better.
“So my Lighytear pitch was, ‘What was the movie that Andy saw that made him want a Buzz Lightyear toy?’”“Wow, mommy, this movie is great! The characters are so much better rendered than you or me!”