"It's evil Dr. Porkchop!" "That's MISTER Evil Dr. Porkchop to you!"

Last night, I went out with my brother and my friend to see Toy Story 3. Oh. My. God. I was completely blown away.

Let me begin by explaining my relationship with Toy Story. I've always loved Pixar movies, although I've never been much of a Disney fan. Toy Story and A Bug's Life were the only two we actually owned (on VHS, of course!) so they were the ones I watched, and watched, and watched over and over again. In general, I was the kind of kid who reread her favorite books countless times and re-watched her favorite movies until every line was memorized. For those of you who read my English essay yesterday, I love being passionate about things, and this is something I've done since forever. I was acting out the entire Alvin and the Chipmunks movie as an eight year old (and I'm pretty sure we have this on tape somewhere...). Toy Story in particular was always one of my all-time favorites. I watched if for the first time in years while babysitting last year and while I didn't know every line, I knew the nuance of every word. I could expect every single sound effect, the tone of the words, everything except for the actual words which I probably didn't fully understand as a child (because they are so incredibly intelligent and hilarious, as I appreciated during this viewing). I remembered how much I loved this movie, and even more so that I realized how hilarious it truly was (remember when Woody and Buzz first meet? "You are a toy. T. O. Y. Toy." "I think the word you're looking for is 'space ranger'" "The word I'm looking for... I can't say, because there are preschool toys here." DEFINITELY did not catch that as a six year old).

Part of the reason I probably love Toy Story is that I've always been fascinated by the idea that things out there are happening once you turn your back. Like, the idea that my toys could come to life when I left the room used to thrill me. I was the kind of kid who would have set up a video camera to try to catch them in the act. This is similar to how I used to (coughandstilldocough) think there were wizards and witches in the world, but they were just hiding from the muggles. I accepted it, and whenever I thought I heard something move in an empty room, I almost took it as a secret, like, "of course I won't tell the adults that you all are really alive." It's not something I was scared of, or something I pretended to believe, it was just something I always knew deep down and considered the truth.

Now let's talk about the movie. I know not everyone has seen it yet, so I'm not going to spoil it too much. I mean, it's fairly predictable in that it's a G rated Pixar film, so the goal isn't to be unpredictable and crazy, it's just a pleasure to see your favorite characters again, laugh at fresh jokes, and have another crazy escape mission that is the most epic yet. Just from the opening short, I knew it would be amazing. The short was so incredibly creative and absolutely adorable that I remember sitting there with the hugest smile on my face, bigger than I can remember having in a long time (junior year is almost over, thank goodness).
The movie was FUNNY. I literally remembering parts where I was laughing so hard I was falling out of my seat. There were scary moments too, and I felt it was almost borderline PG.
I think as a whole the movie wasn't as good as the first, but the high points stood out as the best of any movie I've ever seen. Every Pixar movie can make you cry, but this one in particular got me like none before. The ending scene was so perfect, I felt it rivaled the end of Deathly Hallows in its affect on me. It wasn't cheesy, it was just... perfect. It was one of those endings where you never want to see a sequel, because you don't want to see how things go wrong. You just want it all to close perfectly and move on, because that's what the movie is about- moving on and saying goodbye to your childhood.

There are a bunch of reasons why I think it affected me so much personally. First of all, as you may know if you've read this blog enough, I'm a sucker for nostalgia and reflecting on the past. It's not that I always want to live in my memories, because I know how important it is to enjoy the moment. I just love seeing how things change, and how they don't, and I love the loyalty of your memories to always be there in every moment of your life. I'm thinking a lot about the end of Harry Potter, so this came out in a perfect time in my life, just as thoughts of goodbyes to my childhood are rampant in my mind.
Another reason is that I know what it's like to be Andy and to have best friends as a child who aren't real. For me, it was books. The characters in my favorite books as a kid were my toys, as I spent hours daydreaming stories for them. They would continue on in the sequel in my mind, aided by their friends who would be characters from different books. I had some difficulty making friends as a kid, and these were my reliable best friends who would always be there for me, no matter what. Eventually, Harry Potter took center stage, so I lucked out in that I never had to grow out of it because it's mature enough that you can enjoy it at any age. However, I can imagine what it would be like if it I grew out of the books, forgot about them, only to remember them as I prepared to leave for college and dealt with saying goodbye to those who once meant so much to you.
Normally, there are two kinds of kids movies. There are the stupid kinds that have no redeeming factors and are simply food fights, fart jokes, talking animals, and kids outsmarting adults. Then there are the ones with witty jokes for the parents, role models for the kids, and an emotional conclusion. I felt Toy Story 3 had a category on its own. This movie was neither created for kids or parents, but people my age. Kids who grew up on Toy Story are now battling high school, thinking about college and being adults. We are moving on, saying goodbye to our innocence and hello to bigger and scarier problems. It's an exciting time and I personally am loving it, but there definitely is a sense of loss I know will come for me in a year from now. The jokes in the movie will keep the parents entertained, the adventure will keep the kids on the edge of their seats, but the ending was for us. No one can appreciate it like those of us going through it right now, and it brings tears to my eyes even now as I'm remembering it. Parents don't remember what it was like to be where we are now, and little kids were simply happy to see the toys happy at the conclusion. It wasn't cheesy, and it truthfully wasn't very predictable. The only word I can find to describe it is "perfect." It was a perfect ending to one of the greatest children's stories of all time.

Sequels normally suck, and the third is always excruciatingly painful. I couldn't even watch Shrek 3 after adoring the first two and reading terrible reviews for the third. To have three perfect films, one after the other, is completely unprecedented. This movie stayed in my head hours after I got home last night and was the first thing I thought about this morning. The only way to make life not suck when you have a physics final and teacher recs and college visits and interviews is to be able to escape to better times. If we can't let ourselves do that, then we turn into boring, stuffy adults who feel important but deep down are completely miserable. It seems that this generation seems even more adamant about preventing that than normal, what with nerdy being cool (MLIA, anyone?) and I think it will provide for a happier world in the future.
So what I'm really trying to say is that if you had any sort of happy childhood, you need to see this movie. We all walked out, speechless, saying how we would totally pay to see it again. It was that good.