Okay we need to talk about this because it is genuinely one of the most delightful things to happen in entertainment news this week and it involves one of our favorite Disney franchises.
Tom Hanks has been the voice of Woody in the Toy Story films since 1995. Five films. Thirty years. He voiced this character through some of the most emotionally devastating animated moments in Pixar history and through a fifth installment that just had one of the biggest animated opening weekends ever recorded.
He did not know Woody’s last name.
Film critic Ali Plumb asked him about it during a BBC Radio 1 interview and the whole thing is wonderful. “By the way, I only recently discovered that Woody has a surname. Are you aware that Woody has a surname?” Hanks’ response: “I had no idea.” He then guessed, and this is very Tom Hanks of him, that the last name might just literally be “The Sheriff.”
It is not. Woody’s full name is Woody Pride. It has been since the earliest development of the original Toy Story.
But then it got better.
Plumb kept going: “Double twist. Jessie’s full name is Jessica Jane Pride.” Before he could even finish the implication, Tim Allen, who voices Buzz Lightyear and was in the same interview, jumped in: “I’d heard this, that they might be related.”
Plumb was clearly about to suggest that Woody and Jessie might be siblings. Hanks, Tom Hanks who has played this man for thirty years, responded with: “No! Distant cousins, please. Please!”
We love him.
The Name Has Actually Always Been There
Here is the thing about Woody Pride. It is not a recent addition to the lore. The name goes all the way back to the earliest days of developing the original film. Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich confirmed it publicly in 2009 with a post on the platform then known as X: “Woody’s actual full name is ‘Woody Pride,’ and has been since the earliest days of developing the original Toy Story.”
Official Disney merchandise has carried the Woody Pride name. Commentary tracks and home video releases have referenced it. Fans who looked for it have been able to find it for years. It just never made it to the man playing the character.
The Jessie connection, her full name being Jessica Jane Pride as established in the same shared universe, has been a source of fan speculation for years. Jessie, voiced by Joan Cusack, and Woody are linked through the fictional cowboy show Woody’s Roundup, and whether the shared last name is an intentional familial detail or a creative coincidence has never been officially resolved. Hanks’ passionate plea for “distant cousins, please” is the closest thing to a performer’s take on the question we are likely to get.
“How did they find this out? I play the guy [and] didn’t realize I had a surname,” Hanks said in the interview. And honestly, that energy of genuine surprised delight is part of why people have loved these films for thirty years.
Toy Story 5 Just Had a Historic Opening Weekend
The timing of this wonderful news is that Toy Story 5 is currently in theaters and it is doing extraordinary numbers.
The film opened to $160 million domestically from 4,425 North American theaters. That is the biggest domestic debut of the year, edging out Universal’s Super Mario Galaxy Movie which had opened to $131.7 million. It is also the biggest opening weekend in Toy Story franchise history on a non-inflation-adjusted basis, clearing Toy Story 4‘s previous franchise record of $120 million from 2019. Globally, the film opened to $152 million overseas for a combined $312 million first weekend against a $250 million production budget.
Reviews are sterling. The film holds 94 percent on Rotten Tomatoes and earned an A grade from CinemaScore exit polls. Andrew Stanton, a Pixar veteran who directed WALL-E and Finding Nemo, helms the fifth installment. The story picks up with Woody, Buzz Lightyear, Jessie, and the rest of Bonnie’s toys as their owner becomes increasingly distracted by a kiddie smart tablet called Lilypad. Taylor Swift wrote a new song for the soundtrack called “I Knew It, I Knew You.”
David A. Gross of the FranchiseRe box office newsletter put the numbers in context: “Family moviegoing has been leading the industry since it came roaring back from the pandemic in 2023. A lot of the genre’s success is coming from sequels and live-action remakes. Pixar and Disney are particularly good at growing their series from episode to episode. It’s extremely impressive.”
For what those opening numbers might mean for the long run: Inside Out 2 finished with $1.6 billion and Zootopia 2 closed at $1.8 billion. Both carried similar critical profiles to what Toy Story 5 is currently holding. If the trajectory is comparable, this film is positioned to become the highest-grossing Toy Story of all time, clearing Toy Story 4‘s $1.07 billion final total.
The Part Where Tom Hanks Addresses Woody’s Bald Spot
We would be remiss not to include this because it is too good.
Earlier this year a photo of Woody with a new bald patch went viral. Hanks was asked about it in an April interview with Entertainment Weekly and handled it with the exact energy we would hope for from a man who has been voicing a plastic cowboy for thirty years.
Five films. A bald spot. A last name he just learned from a BBC journalist. And a fifth movie that is breaking franchise records.
That is the Toy Story we love.
If you have seen Toy Story 5 or if the Woody Pride reveal got you in the feelings the way it got us, drop something in the comments. This franchise has meant a lot to a lot of people for a long time and this felt like a week worth talking about.
