Tom Hanks Reveals the Original ‘Toy Story’ Had 80 Minutes of Footage Thrown Out Because It Just “Didn’t Work”

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As a huge movie fan, I still remember when Toy Story came out in 1995 – it genuinely changed everything about animation! It brought us these incredibly funny and lovable computer-generated characters that we still talk about today, and the series is still going strong with Toy Story 5 coming out in 2026. But you know, it wasn’t always a sure thing. Apparently, during production, things weren’t working, and Tom Hanks, who voiced Woody, said they actually had to throw out a whopping 80 minutes of finished footage! It’s amazing to think how close we were to not getting the Toy Story we all know and love.

Tom Hanks was recently on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert to discuss his new play, This World of Tomorrow. During the interview, the Forrest Gump star reminisced about the beginnings of Toy Story, revealing that the very first version of the movie was initially considered a failure. When Colbert noted the film’s 30th anniversary, Hanks clarified that it had actually been longer than 30 years since they started working on it, as the initial cut was scrapped and they had to begin again.

It’s actually been longer than 30 years since we started working on Toy Story. Early on, Tim Allen and the rest of us recorded about 80 minutes of footage for a version that ended up being scrapped. We had storyboards and everything. The studio executives – not the Pixar team, who were fantastic – wanted to make the characters more comedic, encouraging improvisation and insults. We tried that approach for a while, but when they showed it, it just didn’t work. It didn’t feel like the Toy Story we were aiming for.

It’s Hard to Imagine That There Was a Moment When ‘Toy Story’ Wasn’t “Working”

When Toy Story came out in 1995, it became a massive hit, earning over $400 million. This success launched Pixar as a studio known for using innovative technology to create touching films that changed animation forever. But as Tom Hanks explains, the film wasn’t initially well-received. In November 1993, Disney executives saw an early version and disliked it so much they rejected it entirely. This led to significant rewrites and a complete redesign of the characters Buzz and Woody. Hanks remembers getting a call from John Lasseter explaining that the film needed to be completely remade.

We received a call saying John Lasseter, the director of Toy Story, wanted to speak with us. Usually, a call like that means one of two things: either you’re about to be fired, or they have a fantastic new idea and want your input. John called and explained that after reviewing our work, it wasn’t going to work and they wanted to start the entire project over. We’d already been working on the movie for around two years. So, we began the whole process again, which would take another two and a half to three years.

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2025-11-10 04:20