Lightyear

Legendary Space Ranger Buzz Lightyear embarks on an intergalactic adventure alongside a group of ambitious recruits and his robot companion Sox.

Critics landed all over the map on this Toy Story spinoff, with the central tension being whether the premise — actually depicting the in-universe movie that made Andy want a Buzz Lightyear toy — was clever or self-defeating. Supporters found it a handsomely animated, breezy throwback to classic sci-fi adventure; detractors thought the story repetitive and underwritten, and that translating Buzz from joke-toy to genuine Space Ranger somehow made him less interesting rather than more. Even mixed reviewers tended to single out Michael Giacchino's score and the animation itself as genuine highlights in an otherwise safe, padded film.