Lightyear Blasts Off In New Trailer

Reportedly, the last thing Toy Story creator John Lasseter greenit before he left Disney in disgrace was something called “Lightyear.” We’re just now seeing what that is. It’s not another Toy Story sequel, it’s something else entirely…and kind of confusing.

According to the trailer, Buzz Lightyear is not a toy, but a hapless astronaut who is stranded on a space colony with a bunch of other explorers. He’s leading the mission to find a way off the planet, but ends up in even worse trouble. He is voiced here by Chris Evans, not Tim Allen.

We still don’t understand what this all means. The Buzz Lightyear toy in the Toy Story movies was implied to be based on a popular cartoon show, and then Disney actually made the show for syndication. That show annoyingly can’t be found on Disney+ and now Pixar appears to be retconning its existence. Was Buzz ACTUALLY based on this movie now? Was the cartoon based on the movie? Or was space travel possible the entire time in Andy’s universe and Buzz was based on a real man? The Buzz toy and cartoon version was overconfident and a perfectionist to the Nth degree; this Buzz is inexperienced, clumsy and in way over his head. It feels very different from what we know. And where’d the robot cat come from? There was no toy cat!

One more thing to note: this trailer doesn’t mention whether Lightyear is going to show up in theaters, or on Disney+ like the past three Pixar films. It’s typical these days for a trailer to specify “IN THEATERS” by its release date so people know where to expect it. There’s no such indicator here. Hmm.

Lightyear will be out this June.