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"Through every yard sale, every spring cleaning, Andy held on to us! He must care about us or we wouldn't be here."
Woody

Toy Story 3 is the 2010 sequel to Toy Story 2. Andy—now almost 18—is getting ready for college, and the plot follows the adventures of Andy's childhood toys as they're accidentally donated to a preschool/daycare center for a new generation of kids to enjoy, much to the toys' dismay. It is in this film that the Myth Arc of the series - which concerns the life of a toy - comes to a close, and the characters accept that their time as Andy's toys has come to an end, but it also paves the way for their future.

The film was known for a staggering amount of time spent in Development Hell during the 2000s, and for a time, it looked like this film would never materialize. Disney attempted to produce a third Toy Story film with an in-house studio as opposed to Pixar,note  but it all worked out after Disney's acquisition of Pixar. Toy Story 3 would be released almost eleven years after the second film, and fifteen years following the original.

Toy Story 3 is notable for being considerably Darker and Edgier than the previous two films. The main cast of the films was largely reunited, bar the late Jim Varney and Joe Ranft. Varney was replaced by his old friend Blake Clark, while Ranft's characters and numerous others were written out of the story. Toy Story 3 also has the honor of being the third animated film to be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards, after Beauty and the Beast and Pixar predecessor film Up, and was the first animated film to exceed the one billion dollar mark at the worldwide box office.

The film was followed by several shorts, Toy Story of Terror, Toy Story That Time Forgot and Toy Story Toons. In late 2014, Pixar announced Toy Story 4, which was eventually released in Summer 2019.

This film played in theaters along with the Pixar short Day & Night.


Trope Story 3:

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    #-B 
  • 555: The number that the toys dial in the opening scene to attract Andy's attention is 555-0112.
  • Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder: When Lotso returned to Daisy, he discovers that she had replaced him with an identical toy in the meantime. Justified, as there was no way that Daisy could have expected Lotso to return home by himself.
  • Accent Adaptation: Given the very clear nature of Spanish Buzz's flamenco dance moves and musical cues, the Spanish dubs of the film keep him Spanish but handle the situation slightly differently. the Latin Spanish version gives him a slightly more pronounced Spanish accent while the European Spanish version gives him a very thick Andalusian accent, of the "huge lisp" variety (like the one that Puss in Boots has).
  • Achievements in Ignorance: Early in the film, Woody manages to successfully escape from Sunnyside Daycare all on his own without a hitch and minimal planning. It isn't until he comes back and talks to the Chatter Telephone that he finds out that doing such a feat is almost impossible for most toys trapped in the daycare, requiring Woody to come up with a much more complex scheme to get everyone out safely. Although it could be justified in that Woody left Sunnyside during the day, whereas Lotso's security is much tighter after dark.
  • Actionized Sequel: With this being number 3 in a trilogy fifteen years in the making, character introductions are an almost moot point, with even more dramatic escape sequences taking place in comparison to its predecessors.
  • Actor Allusion: It cannot be a coincidence that Rex speaks about the dump a couple times - his voice actor, Wallace Shawn, does ads for a discount furniture outlet chain called "The Dump."
  • Advertised Extra: Stretch the octopus is displayed prominently on the DVD cover, despite having about ten minutes of screen time.
  • Affectionate Gesture to the Head: Bonnie's mother gently strokes her daughter's hair before she steps up to Andy to accept his toys.
  • Affirmative Action Girl: This installment gives Mrs. Potato Head a larger role, and also adds Barbie, though Bo Peep was actually cut entirely. In Barbie's case, it was also the fact that the movies had permission to use the character for the first time. Originally, Bo Peep (the aforementioned only female character in the first movie) was supposed to be a Barbie, but Mattel refused. It wasn't until they saw how the movies caused sales of Mr. Potato Head toys to spikeinvoked that they agreed.
  • After-Action Villain Analysis: Chuckles the Clown does this to explain Lotso's turn to evil.
  • The Alcatraz: In essence, Sunnyside Daycare Center is a toy version of Alcatraz or ADX Florence, or a Stalag ala The Great Escape, with Lotso as its warden. And it takes an unusually dark turn when Lotso refuses to let the toys escape back to Andy, and has them jailed in the daycare's storage crates. Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique and Big Brother Is Watching all apply here.
  • Anachronism Stew: The opening scene. There's Woody and Jessie, the cowboy and cowgirl, chasing Potato Head on a 19th-century-style steam train. Then a pink sports car turns up, then spaceman Buzz Lightyear and later Slinky Dog is some sort of high-tech forcefield dog contraption. Hamm has a pig-shaped spaceship, with a cockpit filled with computers, lights and a teleporter and a Wave-Motion Gun in the snout. Finally, there's Rex, the dinosaur. Justified in that this is all a story made up by a six-year-old (and, incidentally, a retelling of the first two movies' opening sequences blended together) and the ludicrous nature of it is clearly powered by his sense of Rule of Cool.
  • And I Must Scream: Lotso ends up crucified on the front grille of a garbage truck. Driven home by the comment of one of the other toys on the grille: "Hey, buddy. You might wanna keep your mouth shut."
  • And the Adventure Continues: When Andy leaves his toys in the care of their new kid Bonnie.
  • Ankle Drag: Lotso catches Woody's ankle and pulls him into the garbage container at Sunnyside.
  • Answer Cut: On at least three occasions.
    • When Andy's toys are trapped in the Caterpillar room and Buzz points up to the transom, Rex asks: "Oh, great. How do we get up there?" Cut to the next scene where they have built a Rube Goldberg Device.
    • As a Tempting Fate, when Lotso orders Andy's toys to stay at Sunnyside and Jessie asks who is gonna stop them from leaving. Cue brainwashed Buzz Emerging from the Shadows.
    • After the climax, when the group of toys wants to get back to Andy's place, Rex concludes "We'll never get there in time". Then the camera pans over to a shot of the garbage truck.
  • Anything but That!: When Barbie interrogates Ken in order to rescue a Brainwashed and Crazy Buzz, Ken breaks when she starts tearing up his favorite outfit.
    Ken: Not the Nehru jacket!
  • Armor-Piercing Question: Lotso begins his Villainous Breakdown when Woody asks him about Daisy.
  • Ascended Extra:
    • Mrs. Potato Head. She went from a background character in the second movie to having a crucial role in the plot by having the ability to see through a missing eye.
    • Barbie is bumped up to lead character, instead of having a few cameos as in 2.
  • Aspect Ratio Switch: The format changes from 16:9 to 4:3 for the home video footage captured by the mother early on.
  • Ass Shove: Done in the epilogue when Mr. Potato Head discovers the Peas-in-a-Pod popping out of his rear hatch.
    "I told you kids, stay out of my butt!"
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: During the Happier Home Movie, we see Andy's little sister stumbling into his room. He immediately spins a story around this situation and calls Molly a "50-foot baby from outer space on a rampage".
  • Audience Shift: As detailed more on Darker and Edgier below, while not kid-unfriendly the movie is certainly more targeted towards audiences who grew up with the first two and will resonate with the themes of losing childhood innocence and entering the adult world.
  • Baffled by Own Biology: When Buzz Lightyear dances to the European Spanish version of "You've Got a Friend in Me", he doesn't know why he's doing it.
  • Bathroom Break-Out: Woody breaks out of the daycare center through a bathroom window.
  • Bear Hug: Lots-O'-Huggin' Bear keeps up his namesake by doing this to several toys. It's all a part of an act.
  • Bears Are Bad News: Lotso Bear plays this straight by being the Big Bad of the story, keeping an iron fist on the daycare toys and not being above letting Woody and the gang perish out of spite. Which averts Beary Friendly, so don't let his appearance or name fool you.
  • Be Careful What You Wish For: At the beginning, the toys want nothing more than to be played with again. When they get to Sunnyside, they get what they want. Boy howdy, do they get it. And considering how disgruntled they were at the prospect of being stuck in the attic, by the end of the adventure attitudes seem to have changed somewhat in-between courtesy of Sunnyside and the Dump:
    Mr. Potato Head: You know all that bad stuff I said about Andy's attic? I take it all back.
    Slinky: Darn tootin'.
    Hamm: You said it.
  • Between My Legs: In the Western prologue when Woody confronts the Potato Heads (as One-Eyed Bart and One-Eyed Betty, respectively), the camera is focused on his legs as he steps into view.
  • Beware the Nice Ones: Barbie is really friendly and easy going, but do not threaten her friends if you know what's good for you.
  • Big Bad: Lotso. The ringleader of a daycare dictatorship, he breaks toys, brainwashes them, and tries to have Woody and his friends thrown away in the course of the movie, ultimately leaving them to burn in the garbage dump's incinerator even though they saved his life a minute earlier.
  • Big Brother Instinct: At the end of the movie, Andy gives all of his toys to Bonnie, with the prompting of Woody writing her address on a sticky note which he put on top of the box of toys initially meant for the attic. When Bonnie is initially scared of the strange older boy approaching her, Andy kneels down at her eye level to introduce himself and describe all of his toys to Bonnie. The scene ends with Andy and Bonnie playing with all of their toys in Bonnie's front yard before Andy drives off to college. Also with his own sister. After some light back-and-forth bickering, when Andy sees Molly having trouble with a heavy box he helps her out at once, dropping the trash bag the toys are in.
  • Big Damn Heroes:
    • Buzz, catching the train from crashing down the canyon in the Fake Action Prologue.
    • "The claaaawww!" When all is lost, the Little Green Men show up and fish Woody and the gang out of the incinerator.
  • Big "NO!":
    • Jessie, upon seeing Woody crashing down with the train in the Fake Action Prologue.
    • Buzz, when he is captured by the baddies and again when he's being switched to Demo mode.
    • Barbie, when she sees the other toys being carried away inside the garbage truck.
    • Woody, when they fall down the Conveyor Belt of Doom straight towards the furnace.
  • Big Red Button:
    • Several big red push buttons can be seen during the Fake Action Prologue. One on Mr. Potato Head's remote control that he presses to blow up the bridge. Two more are seen on the bridge of Evil Dr. Pork-Chop's airship, one for releasing the monkeys and another one for a death canon.
    • Two more during the actual story: The monkey's mic activates by pressing a square red button. Later, the incinerator's emergency kill switch, as is the case in real life.
  • Big, Thin, Short Trio: Daisy's toys consisted of Lotso (Big), Big Baby (Thin), and Chuckles (Short).
  • Big Word Shout: Woody yells "RUN!" when he and the toys realize they are heading for the incinerator.
  • Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Lotso. Despite his caring facade, he harbors a very deep hatred for any new toys venturing into Sunnyside.
  • Bittersweet Ending: The toys have lost many of their friends over the years and they'll probably never see Andy again, but they have a new owner who loves them just as much Andy himself did.
  • Black-and-White Morality: Lotso is the first purely evil villain in the franchise, completely devoid of any compassion or decency, especially at the end where he leaves all the other toys to die just to save himself. His only "excuses" would be his dark backstory (as explained by Chuckles: "something snapped inside Lotso..."), and a lot of Pragmatic Villainy when he isn't suffering a Villainous Breakdown. His constant humiliation of other toys is mainly so that everyone sticks to the place he's assigned them, to secure his position.
  • Black Comedy: Buster's reintroduction as an old, tired dog. It's funny, yes, but it also really hits home how much things have changed.
  • Blowing a Raspberry: Big Baby sticks out his tongue and blows a raspberry at Lotso.
  • Bodyguard Betrayal: Lotso's bodyguard Big Baby pulls a Heel–Face Turn on him and disposes of him in the dumpster.
  • Boléro Effect: Used in the music of the incinerator scene.
  • Bookends: The film begins with a shot of a blue sky with uniquely shaped clouds (the one of Andy's old wallpaper). It ends with a shot into the blue sky with the same uniquely shaped clouds. (Also, the first Toy Story begins with the same sky, making this a series-wide Book Ends).
  • Both Sides Have a Point: Woody versus the rest of the toys on whether to return to Andy after they've arrived at Sunnyside. On one hand, Woody witnessed that it was a complete accident that the toys were thrown out by Andy's mom and argues that they should remain loyal to him no matter what. The toys, meanwhile, understandably find Woody's claim shaky, as the fact remains that Andy will likely never play with them again and outright called them "junk". Buzz believes Woody, but still argues that the best decision for the family is to begin new lives at Sunnyside as Andy's childhood is over.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy: Buzz, after Lotso forcibly switches him to "Demo" mode.
  • Brick Joke:
    • Sarge and the army men.
    • "The CLAAAAAAAAW..." A Brick Joke that takes two movies and fifteen years to set up and deliver on. For once, They got to use a claw and fish something out of a machine.
    • The triceratops is one as well; at the end of the first movie, Rex was talking about how he would love for Andy to get an herbivore so he could play the dominant predator. Look who he ends up paling around with during the credits of the third movie?
  • Bringing Running Shoes to a Car Chase: Woody attempts to chase after a train on foot at the beginning. It works as well as one would expect a toy cowboy to. He's not truly able to catch up to the train until he gets access to Barbie's car.
  • British Stuffiness: Mr. Pricklepants, who even quotes Shakespeare.
  • Bus Full of Innocents: Parodied in the opening sequence, where Mr. Potato Head gives Woody a choice between catching him and saving a trainful of 'orphans' (Troll dolls with their heads sticking out the train windows).

    C 
  • Call-Back: God bless the poor soul who watched this movie before the first two. Some references to the previous films are quick and may not even make sense without that context. A partial list:
    1. To the first movie:
      • Many lines in the film's opening are taken directly from the original film's opening, including One-Eyed Bart, his "ha ha ha, money money money!" line, his "attack dog with built-in force field", and the opposing "dinosaur who eats force field dogs."
      • Andy looks over Woody and Buzz, picks them up, and chooses one. The framing echoes when he was putting toys into the chest during the "Strange Things" sequence. This time he chooses Woody for college.
      • Woody's "It doesn't matter how much we're played with, what matters is that we're here for Andy when he needs us." is invoked in the beginning.
      • Woody hosts a staff meeting and asks Slinky to gather everyone (only this time Slinky doesn't have nearly as many toys to gather).
      • The Army Men (or what's left of them) go on recon missions for the other toys, this time getting Andy's cell phone.
      • Andy's mom finds stuff that Andy left lying around, and gets upset: the army men in the first movie (though he didn't do it) and a trash bag in the third.
      • Trixie reminds us about how Rex wanted a plant-eating dinosaur to be one of Andy's presents.
      • A little girl (Bonnie instead of Sid's sister Hannah) inserts a main character (this time Woody instead of Buzz) into a tea party she's having with other toys.
      • When Bonnie hugs Woody and the toys after playing with them after the imaginary spaceship, Buttercup winking at Woody is a callback in the first movie when Andy picks up Woody and Buzz when they land in the car and Woody and Buzz wink at each other.
      • The garbageman with headphones? Sid, all grown up. You can tell by his shirt. Also, he's the same voice actor.
      • The truck Lotso, Big Baby, and Chuckles ride on the back of is the Pizza Planet delivery truck.
      • Buzz's dialogue after Woody and the others attempt to reset him is the exact same as his dialogue when he first came out of his box... except in Spanish. Also, he aims his laser right at the center of Woody's forehead... which is exactly what he did upon meeting Woody for the first time in the first movie. You can also see that the sticker that represents the radio he has on his wrist is no longer there because Buzz himself peeled it off in the first movie.
      • One scene during Andy and Bonnie's playtime is Andy carrying Woody on his shoulders, which he did at the start of the title sequence for the first movie.
      • The last shot we see at the end of the film is a bright blue sky with clouds, the exact same as Andy's wallpaper which introduced Toy Story.
      • The wing section of the Buzz Lightyear manual ends with "NOT A FLYING TOY", a warning flashed in a Buzz Lightyear toy commercial that caused Buzz's Heroic BSoD.
      • The last toy Woody holds hands with during the Incinerator Scene is not Buzz, but Slinky, Woody's friend before Buzz showed up.
      • "THE CLAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWW!" was originally mentioned by the aliens in the first movie.
    2. To the second movie:
      • Evil Doctor Porkchop and Death by Monkeys in the opening.
      • Jessie commenting, "It's Emily all over again!"
      • Jessie yodels multiple times and calls for animals, which is mildly confusing without knowing those were her character traits on the show within the movie Woody's Roundup.
      • Woody tries to ride Buster to yet another rescue mission, but Buster has gotten too old and chubby to do this anymore.
      • Woody attempts to slide down the drainpipe in order to save the rest of the toys. He fails. Epically.
      • While Woody and Buzz are looking at a young picture of Andy, Woody comments that they'll be together "For infinity and beyond".
      • "You have saved our lives. We are eternally grateful" and the Little Green Men being the adopted children of the Potato Heads.
      • Hamm claims dibs on Barbie's Corvette car when she's thrown into the Sunnyside box. He enjoyed driving the car around the aisles of Al's Toy Barn.
      • Using Slinky as a bungee cord: When the toys reach Andy's house again, they climb to the roof of the garage, which leads to his bedroom window. The camera angle is the exact same as when the toys leave to rescue Woody in Toy Story 2.
      • Zurg was referenced in the first movie, but you wouldn't recognize him in his cameo unless you saw Toy Story 2.
      • Jessie's panic attacks at the thought of going into storage, again.
      • A tiny one: Golf clubs are instrumental in the rescue of a toy in both films. With varied results.
      • A Freeze-Frame Bonus in the Buzz Lightyear instruction manual. The Accessories section mentions that the Buzz Lightyear Utility Belt is "coming soon!". The other Buzz from the second film had a utility belt.
      • If you look carefully at Woody's right arm, it's got red stitching different from the left along the shoulder, which is where Andy sewed his arm back on.
      • In The Climax of the second film, Prospector asks Woody if he thinks Andy will take him to college. The opening of this film has Andy preparing to leave for college...guess who he plans on taking with him?
      • Stinky Pete fulfilled his end of the deal to get Barbie a bigger role in Toy Story 3.
    3. To both films:
      • A very good portion of the film's soundtrack is itself a Leitmotif throwback to each of the films. The opening sequence, for example, uses Buzz's theme from Toy Story (Buzz's arrival uses a version of Buzz's theme from when he was "falling with style" in Andy's room near the beginning and the climactic soundtrack from Toy Story), while scenes like where Woody is found alive by his friends are from Andy's return home in 2, and when the toys finally arrive home.
      • Woody mentions that several toys from the previous two films (such as Etch and Bo Peep) have been given away in the time between 2 and 3. (The mentioning of Bo, in particular, appears to mildly dishearten Woody, due to the romantic relationship they shared in the previous two films).
      • The looping orange racetrack Buzz used to "fall with style" in the original and Jessie used to help Buster in the sequel is mentioned to be stored in the attic.
      • Lotso's backstory. Him getting lost on a trip out and having to make his way back home to the owner he is intensely loyal to: That's the plot of the first movie right there. Him being replaced and his If I Can't Have You…: Hey, Woody, remember when you pushed Buzz out the window? His philosophy that all toys are destined to be treated as garbage: Remember when Woody was more willing to go to a museum than to Andy because he was afraid he'd be thrown out eventually? Lotso is Woody from a bad future.
    4. Other Pixar films:
      • The quick series of shots over which Chatter Telephone narrates all the obstacles the toys will face in their escape from Sunnyside recalls a similar sequence detailing the plan to escape the fish tank in Finding Nemo (both are Mission: Impossible parodies and visual shout-outs to the films of David Fincher).
      • Big Baby resembles the creepy baby who fell victim to the Uncanny Valley in the Pixar short Tin Toy. In that short, a number of toys hide from said child. The same toys are also shown hiding from the toddlers of the Caterpillar Room before the kids return from recess.
      • Freeze-Frame Bonus: Andy's board has a postcard from Carl and Ellie of Up; his posters feature the Omnidroid of The Incredibles; fish from Finding Nemo are seen in stickers on his wall and in paintings at the daycare; Sunnyside has toy versions of Nemo's Mister Ray and some of the characters from Cars (non-anthropomorphic Snot Rod on Andy's calendar (August) and Finn Mcmissile from Cars 2 on a poster, also, when the children burst into the room for the first time, one of them is wearing a "95" shirt). Buzz Lightyear is powered by batteries from Buy n Large. Atta's name appears on the wall in Sunnyside.
      • The locomotive at the start of the movie is also numbered "95"; these are references to when the first Toy Story came out.
      • There's a little girl in the Butterfly Room who looks suspiciously like an older version of Boo from Monsters, Inc.. She is playing with a purple and blue kitty. It has since been disproved by Lee Unkrich.
  • The Cameo: A doll of Studio Ghibli's own Totoro is a minor character in the film, and the first Toy Story character to also be a character from another movie. And yes, he still has his trademark Totoro grin.
  • Camp Straight: Ken. From his frilly handwriting, to his many clothes, to his happiness when the army men parachute in the ending. Even dating Barbie doesn't help matters.
    Ken: I'm not a girl's toy! I'm NOT! Why do you guys keep saying that?
    [...]
    Mr. Potato Head: You're not a toy! You're an accessory! You're a purse with legs.
  • Captain Morgan Pose: Woody in the Fake Action Prologue, placing his foot triumphantly on Mr. Potato Head.
  • Captivity Harmonica:
    • Hamm plays one. The brainwashed Buzz kills the moment.
      Buzz: Quiet, musical hog! Knock it off!
    • It's also worth noting that Lotso's theme is played with a harmonica. (Later switched to a bass harmonica when his true intentions are revealed.)
  • Cassandra Truth: Woody spends the first half of the movie continually trying to convince the rest of the toys that Andy was meaning to store them in the attic. However, the circumstances that played out from their P.O.V. really does make it seem like he no longer cared about them and was throwing them away. Thus nobody is willing to believe him. It isn't until Mrs. Potato Head sees Andy fretting over the misunderstanding through her missing eye that they finally realize Woody was right.
  • Casting Gag:
    • R. Lee Ermey was a Marine Corps drill instructor, and gained fame playing Sergeant Hartman in Full Metal Jacket.
    • Pixar didn't realize that they actually cast Javier Fernández-Peña, the voice of the Spanish Buzz toy for Spanish Buzz until after the fact.
    • Richard Kind, Bookworm's voice actor, plays a bug working on the villains' side in another Pixar film.
    • In the Japanese dub, Dolly is voiced by Atsuko Tanaka, who already worked in a famous Cyberpunk franchise with a weird and borderline squicky relationship with dolls.
  • Celibate Hero: Woody in this movie as Bo Peep is said to be one of the many characters that were either sold off at a garage sale, thrown in the trash, or donated between the second movie and this one.
  • Central Theme: Moving on and accepting change.
  • Chekhov's Boomerang: Bonnie, who first plays a part in rescuing Woody from the daycare center. She then comes back into play at the end of the movie when Andy leaves his toys with her rather than locking them up in the attic.
  • Chekhov's Gag: Toy Story includes the claw-game worshiping Little Green Men, who hold "the claaaaaaaw" in high regard because it will choose and deliver them to a better place. Fast forward to Toy Story 3, near the end when the gigantic crane claw, that saves the toys from the furnace, is being controlled by the Little Green Men adopted by the Potato Heads in Toy Story 2.
  • Chekhov's Gun:
    • Prior to the film's events, Mrs. Potato Head lost one of her eyes, though she can still see through it when she covers her other eye, or when both eyes are removed. Later in the film, when the toys are at Sunnyside Daycare, Mrs. Potato Head sees Andy frantically looking for them through her missing eye, convincing the toys to return home.
    • Bonnie can be seen playing with The Monkey during the first scene showing her in the daycare.
    • When Woody falls down the tree, he winds up losing his hat. Lotso later uses this hat to make the other toys think he was punished for escaping.
    • Big Baby's "Daisy" pendant. Chuckles kept it after Lotso threw it away and Woody revealed it to Big Baby during the escape, causing him to reform.
  • Classically-Trained Extra: Mr. Pricklepants, played by none other than Timothy Dalton. He repeatedly shushes Woody and tries to keep as still and quiet as possible even when Bonnie is out of the room, and when the other toys object, he snaps that he's trying to stay in character. He even asks Woody if he was classically trained, in regards to his "performance."
  • Classy Cane: Lotso uses a wooden mallet as a cane.
  • Cliff Stack: Due to a rather hilarious misunderstanding Woody slides down the garbage chute to the escape route, then calls up to the gang, "Come down, but not all at once!". Cue the "What?" "I think he said 'all at once!'".
  • Cold-Blooded Torture: Lotso's cronies do this offscreen to the Chatter Telephone, as Woody and the others find out when they are stopped by Lotso at the dumpster during their escape.
    Chatter Telephone: I'm sorry, cowboy. They broke me.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Blue is safe (Andy's room, the Butterfly Room, the conveyor belt off switch, the light that shines on the toys when they're rescued from the incinerator), red is unsafe (the Caterpillar Room, Lotso, incinerator), and sickly green-yellow is corrupted (the vending machine "gambling parlor", the daycare dumpster). Bonnie's color is bright "happy" green.
  • Company Cross References:
    • One of the kids in the daycare looks like an older version of Boo from Monsters, Inc.. When she first appears, she is reenacting a scene from said film using a couple of toys, specifically the scene where Sully accidentally scares Boo (she even says "Boo! No, no, no! What's the matter?").
    • One of the kids in the Caterpillar Room wears a Lightning McQueen "95" shirt.
    • The fact that Totoro from My Neighbor Totoro appears as a toy in the film might be a bit of a weasel call in regards to his connection to Disney, as he's a Studio Ghibli character, but Disney had the rights to distribute the Studio Ghibli films in the United States when Toy Story 3 came out.
  • Continuity Nod:
    • Woody still has the red stitches on his right arm from Andy's fixing him at the end of Toy Story 2.
    • Buzz is also still missing his arm readout sticker, which he peeled off during his nervous breakdown in the first movie.
  • Convection, Schmonvection: The incinerator is obviously really hot but the plastic toys remain unmelted. Considering how terrifying the scene was already, this is for the best.
  • Conveyor Belt o' Doom: After escaping the shredders (including Lotso, who gets trapped underneath a golf bag), the toys find themselves on a conveyor belt pushing them towards an incinerator. Unfortunately, Lotso refuses to shut it off when he has the opportunity, though thankfully they are saved by the LGMs.
  • Costume-Test Montage: Ken, to Barbie.
  • Crapsaccharine World: Sunnyside Daycare seems like a bright, colorful heaven where there are always children to lovingly play with the toys, but actually it's a brutal dictatorship ruled by Lotso the Bear. Most of the daycare's toys get subjected to rough playtimes with the toddlers rather than the loving playtimes with the older children, and any defiant toys get imprisoned in cubbies, forced to stay the night in the sandbox, interrogated, brainwashed, or thrown into the daycare's dumpster to go to the landfill. Also, Lotso is revealed to be a genuinely monstrous villain, but once he's gone the daycare center becomes a genuinely sweet place under Ken and Barbie.
  • Creator Cameo: The Jack-in-the-Box who yells "New toys!" is voiced by director Lee Unkrich.
  • Creator Thumbprint: Lee Unkrich really likes monkeys. Guess what shows up twice in his directorial debut?
  • Creepy Doll:
  • Crisis Catch And Carry: Spanish Buzz swings Jessie into his arms and runs with her during the conveyor belt scene. It's just one of the many instances of Ship Tease they receive in the movie.
  • Crush the Keepsake: Lotso uses his mallet to crush Big Baby's "Daisy" locket, a Memento MacGuffin of happier times. Big Baby then turns against Lotso and throws him into the dumpster.
  • Cryptic Background Reference: Woody mentions "those guys from the Christmas decorations box", which the toys have apparently met before. Nothing else about them has ever been referenced in any Toy Story media.
  • Cultural Cross-Reference: A Totoro makes an appearance as one of Bonnie's dolls. here.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle: Woody's scuffle with the Cymbal-Banging Monkey lasts a couple seconds before it gets the upper hand and starts smashing his face in, forcing Slinky to restrain the monkey with tape.
  • Cute Giant: Lotso and Big Baby are each considerably larger than most of the other toys in the movie.
  • Cute Is Evil: Lotso.
  • Cymbal-Banging Monkey: When night falls on Sunnyside Daycare, he sits at the front desk, watching all the surveillance screens. If a toy tries to escape, he turns on the center's P.A. system and screeches into it while banging his cymbals. Lotso and crew are on top of the poor toy in moments.

    D-F 
  • Dance of Romance: When Buzz is in Spanish mode, he makes the move on Jessie with a dance. And they do it again in his normal form in the credits.
  • Dance Party Ending: Two separate dance parties in the credits.
    • One is of the Sunnyside daycare toys dancing; it is implied that once they got rid of Lotso, they could all enjoy the place without fear of reprisal from him. In turn, several of the toys, including former minions of Lotso, were having a big dance party, with "We Belong Together" playing. A happy ending indeed.
    • The other is Buzz and Jessie dancing to the European Spanish version of "You Got A Friend In Me."
  • The Dandy: Ken is really, really concerned about fashion and clothes.
  • Dangerously Garish Environment: Downplayed for the daycare known as Sunnyside. Its door has a rainbow painted on it and the walls are decorated with brightly-colored decorations, as is typical of a daycare, but it's not as brightly-colored as many examples of the trope. Also, the daycare is not a bad place for the workers or the kids, only to the Living Toys and even that's only the case for the "Caterpillar Room", which houses the younger kids who play with them in rough ways.
  • Danger Room Cold Open: The action-packed opening sequence showcases some of the toys' particular abilities.
  • Dark and Troubled Past: A Flashback shows how Lotso turned into damaged goods, emotionally and psychologically scarred by his supposed abandonment.
  • Darker and Edgier: Is considered much more intense than the first two, as well as unusually dark for a Pixar movie. This is one of the more justified examples, though, since the concepts introduced earlier in the series leave room for Fridge Horrorinvoked. The third has a more intense feel because it calls attention to a fair bit of said fridge horror. That, and it's a Prison Episode rife with disturbing elements like Lotso, an Ax-Crazy teddy bear, and cymbal banging monkeys. Considering the time gap in between each movie's theatrical release, this seems somewhat appropriate. It's almost as if Pixar directed the film at an older audience who grew up on the first two films. The way Toy Story 3 ended, it felt like Pixar wanted to give the now teen/young adult audience of the first two films some closure on the series they came to love when they were kids.
  • Dark Reprise: Of "You've Got a Friend In Me" at the beginning of the film. The song ends at the line "Our friendship will never die!" The background music stops, and we just hear "never die" echo over and over.
  • Dead Hat Shot: During his escape from the daycare center, Woody loses his hat. When the remaining toys discover it, they briefly believe that he has died. It helps that Lotso actively implies it when giving it to them.
  • Death Glare: Barbie gives Ken one when he tells her she can't make him reveal Lotso switched Buzz to Demo mode.
  • Debate and Switch: The argument the other toys have with Woody over whether to stay at Sunnyside or return to Andy shuts down pretty quickly when the toys not only find out Woody was telling the truth about Andy not trying to throw them away but how much of a nightmare of a place Sunnyside really is.
  • Demoted to Extra: Slinky. His role in this movie is much smaller compared to the previous two and his only real standout scene is helping Woody defeat the Cymbal-Banging Monkey, as well as briefly jumping across the trash chute to the dumpster before being thwarted by Lotso.
  • Den of Iniquity: A humorous example with the 'bad' toys hanging around in a vending machine, betting with Monopoly money and triple A batteries. They use a "See-N-Say" toy instead of a roulette table.
  • Deus ex Machina: The Claw at the end of the film is a literal Deus ex Machina, as the DVD commentary points out, given that the LGMs treat "the claw" as their deity and it is also the machine that saves all of the toys from burning in the garbage furnace. Its arrival is accompanied by a choir of angelic voices on the soundtrack.
  • Diabolus ex Machina: Since it's considered a Deus ex Machina in the first two Toy Story movies, the Pizza Planet truck could definitely qualify as this in Toy Story 3, since it's responsible for taking Lotso, Big Baby and Chuckles to Sunnyside.
  • Dialogue Reversal: "You have saved our lives. We are eternally grateful."
  • Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: Hamm is playing Lotso's Theme on a harmonica while he's in jail with the others, causing Buzz to loudly tell him to be quiet.
  • Ding-Dong-Ditch Distraction: An interesting variant occurs; the toys are inside the box with Rex clutching Andy's phone, and they cause it to ring so Andy can finally open the toy box again. Andy assumes its his sister, Molly, Prank Calling him.
  • Dirty Coward: Lotso. He's The Sociopath and a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing, but still yells for Big Baby not to throw him into the dumpster and yells for help on the dump conveyor belt for the others to save him before being shredded.
  • Disney Death: After finding Jessie in the garbage truck, Buzz pushes her out of the way of a falling television, only to be crushed by it himself. As he lies unconscious and the toys sadly mourn him, he suddenly reboots out of his Spanish mode and wakes up, now back to normal.
  • Distracting Fake Fight: Woody and his friends plan to escape from Sunnyside Daycare. As part of the plan, they need to deal with Buzz, who has been forcibly reset and then tricked onto Lotso's side. On Slinky and Jessie's signal, Rex and Hamm stage a fight with each other, causing Buzz to try to break them up while saying "You can't hit each other, that's my job!" And then suddenly they slam a plastic container over Buzz and sit on it so he can't go anywhere or sound the alarm.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?:
    • When Woody protests angrily that they're Andy's toys during the tour of Sunnyside, Lotso's response (similar to the Roundup gang's in the second film) sounds a lot like someone talking to an abuse victim.
    • Rewatch the scene where Woody tells Big Baby the truth of his and Lotso's past regarding Daisy. Suddenly, Lotso ridiculing Baby for missing his mama, destroying the only keepsake he has from her, and angrily yelling that she never loved him sounds an AWFUL lot like an abusive father toward his distraught child.
    • Ken's Camp Straight behavior is a joke about how he's a girl's toy, but it's played as a straight guy who's sick of being called gay, and it sounds like it happens a lot.
    • When the toys are imprisoned in Sunnyside, an interaction between Hamm and Rex looks a lot like Prison Rape.
      Hamm: (to Rex, while in cell, to distract Buzz) Hey! What do you think you're doing?! (covers his cork) I told you: Keep your hands off my stuff!
      Rex: Make a move, porky!
    • When Buzz gets brainwashed by Lotso and his goons, the scene is eerily reminiscent of Prison Rape with him being forcibly bent over, his battery covering removed and them accessing a normally private part. To further drive home the point, he's screaming in pain, begging his tormenters to stop and finally ending with a Big "NO!".
  • The Dog Bites Back: Big Baby to Lotso after he breaks the last thing reminding them of their former owner.
  • The Door Slams You: At the start of the first playtime session in Sunnyside, the door bursts open and hits Rex as the toddlers run in.
  • Down in the Dumps: The movie's third act is fully devoted to this setting.
  • The Dragon: Big Baby. Heel Face Turns in the end.
  • Dramatic Slip: Lotso falls down on the Conveyor Belt o' Doom when they try to run from the incinerator. It actually enables him to see the stop button.
  • Dramatic Thunder: When Lotso, Chuckles and Big Baby first arrive at Sunnyside on a rainy night, the facility's logo flashes up when lightning strikes and thunder rolls.
  • The Dreaded: Bonnie's toys are shown to be frightened by Lots-O'-Huggin' Bear.
  • Dropped a Bridge on Him: A great number of the toys have been sold, broken or lost in the time period between 2 and 3 making for a Darker and Edgier feel. Especially saddening is the absence of Bo Peep, Woody's love interest - when she is mentioned, Woody looks utterly miserable.
  • The Dulcinea Effect: Happens to "Spanish Buzz" once he sees Jessie.
  • Dumb Blonde: Barbie appears to be this at first, but later delivers a short speech to Lotso that averts it.
    Barbie: Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not from threat of force!
    [Hamm and Potato Head shrug in confusion]
    • She single-handedly subdued Ken, tore his clothes and a confession out of him, then got the Buzz Lightyear instruction manual from Bookworm all via improvisation.
  • Easily Forgiven: Lotso's minions were all but forgiven in the end, seeing as how they agree to be played with by the kids in the Caterpillar Room, doing their part and as penance.
  • El Spanish "-o": Woody refers to Spanish Buzz as "El Buzzo" shortly after he's switched.
  • Emerging from the Shadows: Buzz emerges from the dark when Jessie rhetorically asks who was to stop them from leaving Sunnyside.
  • End of an Age: A small-scale case which leans heavily on the fourth wall. In-story, the toys are moving on from their time with Andy; on a meta-level, the children (and parents) who grew up with the original Toy Story are grown up and leaving behind their childhoods (or seeing their children go). Watching this film at any college ever is a sure Tear Jerker.
  • Enemy Rising Behind: Parodied by Bonnie when she plays Hide and Seek with Woody in a chest and Dolly is rising up behind her menacingly. Then we see that Bonnie was actually operating that doll herself.
  • Establishing Shot: Played with: rather than being used to establish the location, it's used to establish the amount of time that has passed since Toy Story 2. The toys initiate "Operation Playtime" consisting of obtaining someone's cell phone, and calling it, drawing that person's attention to the toy box. Right as the person opens the box, we get a shot that clearly shows them as evidence of a Time Skip: teenage Andy.
  • "Eureka!" Moment: When the toys are in the trash bag, Mr. Potato Head says "What's the point?" Buzz sees Rex's tail poking the bag and says "Point... point... point!" and realizes they can use Rex's tail to puncture the bag.
  • Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Big Baby regards his previous owner Daisy as his mom. You really shouldn't have broken that tag, Lotso...
  • Everyone Can See It: Buzz and Jessie. Well, everybody can see Buzz likes her. He even admits it twice. Too bad he is in demo and Spanish mode at the times.
  • Everyone Owns a Mac: There's an iMac at Bonnie's house. Andy owns a laptop that looks like a Titanium iBook. And his sister has an iPod nano. On the other hand, for Pixar being the only studio in the world where this trope is truly justified (seeing that Toy Story as a whole—hell, Pixar itself—owes a massive debt to Steve Jobs), they actually avert it with the computer at Sunnyside running Windows XP.
  • Everything Makes a Mushroom: In Andy's opening playtime imagination, Evil Doctor Porkchop drops his "Death by Monkeys" bomb from his airship. It's filled with little red monkeys who form a mushroom cloud on detonation.
  • Everything's Better with Sparkles: Barbie and Ken and also Stretch the octopus.
  • Everything Sounds Sexier in French: Or in Spanish. Buzz's Spanish mode makes his invitation to Jessie to join him on his universe-saving exploits sound much more appealing to her.
  • Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Lotso cannot fathom Ken's loyalty to Barbie or Woody and Buzz's loyalty to their friends after the latter declined Lotso's offer to join the Butterfly Room without his friends.
  • Evil Counterpart: Lotso's resentment over being replaced and his extremely possessive feelings toward his owner (if he can't have her, no one can), mirror Woody's character arc in the first movie. Like Woody, he also becomes a leader of a "family" of toys, only kept in line through threats and bullying instead of friendship and love. Whereas Woody decides he wants what's best for Andy, Lotso has grown to hate children for their constant destruction and abandonment of toys. Like Woody, he also faced the prospect of being replaced (Lotso with a replacement Lotso, Woody with Buzz), but where Woody eventually found an accord with Buzz, Lotso sank into bitterness and maliciously took his rejection out on the world around him.
  • Evil Laugh: Mr. Potato Head towards the end of the opening sequence, when he is about to press the death button and kill the heroes.
  • Exact Words: Mr. Potato Head when it turns out Woody was telling the truth about Andy caring for them.
    Jessie: Woody, we were wrong to leave Andy. I-I was wrong.
    Mr. Potato Head: Jessie's right, Woody. She was wrong.
  • Extremely Short Timespan: Not counting the prologue and the Time Skip, the events of the film take place around three days.
  • Eye-Obscuring Hat: Woody, in his Establishing Character Moment during the Fake Action Prologue, approaches villainous Mr. Potato Head with his eyes not showing under his hat.
  • Eye Spy: Mrs. Potato Head is missing one of her eyes for most of the movie. However, whenever she covers up her one eye she can see plot-important events from her missing eye's location such as Andy getting upset with his mom for throwing the toys away, since he meant to put them in the attic instead, contrary to what all the toys except Woody believe.
  • Face Death with Dignity: Literal death does come into play when Andy's toys hold hands when they're approaching the furnace of the recycling factory.
  • Face–Heel Turn: After Buzz refuses to join Lotso's gang due to Lotso not allowing his friends out of the Caterpillar Room, Lotso still believes that he will be useful to him, and has his thugs reset him to Demo Mode, causing him to believe that he is once again a space ranger rather than a toy. He then proceeds to tell him that his former friends are in cahoots with Emperor Zurg and that they should thus be locked away. He gets better, though he's reverted to Spanish Mode.
  • The Faceless: Daisy's face is never seen; usually it is off camera or blocked by Lotso.
  • Face Palm:
    • Andy when he thinks his mother threw out his toys.
    • Woody when the rest of the toys tell him that Buzz is back in his deluded state.
  • Fake Action Prologue: The movie starts with a Calvinesque Fantasy Sequence that calls back to the playtime scenario in the original Toy Story.
  • Fake-Out Opening: See Fake Action Prologue.
  • Fake Video Camera View: The mother's Happier Home Movie footage early on of Andy playing in his room has Raster Vision, a REC icon in the corner and uses a letterbox format.
  • False Utopia: Sunnyside. By day, it's a fun little day-care, but at night, it turns into a prison hold.
  • The Farmer and the Viper: For a moment, it looked like saving Lotso would pay off. No such luck.
  • Fate Worse than Death: Lotso ends up crucified to the front of a dumpster truck working the landfill, implying he will be stuck that way for the rest of his existence. Even if he frees himself, he's still in that landfill with no way of getting back to 'his' daycare.
  • Faux Affably Evil: Lotso. He may act affable at first, but it's really just a front to get you to trust him. He's agreeable enough when you're on his good side. Disagree with him, however, and he smirks as he has you set to Demo Mode or sends said Demo-Mode'd buddy to lock you up. Lampshaded by Buttercup when he talks about Lotso: "The guy may seem plush and huggable on the outside, but inside, he's a monster."
  • Femme Fatale Spy: Barbie.
  • Fiery Redhead: Jessie.
  • Fingerless Hands: Dolly has thumbless hands like The Powerpuff Girls, but she has two lines of stitching on each hand that indicate fingers. Justified in that she is a ragdoll.
  • Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Woody and Slinky are swinging behind the monkey's back whilst attempting to neutralize him, the monkey turns his eyes in their direction, preparing the audience for the upcoming Jump Scare.
  • Flashback Effect: The Happy Flashback sequence showing Lotso's backstory with the little girl is overexposed, treated with a vignette effect and tinted in yellow color.
  • Foreshadowing: When we first see Lotso, he's riding in the back of a toy dump truck — and he's seen doing this several more times in the film. He later causes the toys to get trapped inside a dump truck during the climax. His ultimate fate is to be tied to the front of a dump truck for the rest of his days.
    • Buzz says to one of the toys "Buzz Lightyear at your service" as a greeting. Guess what happens later?
    • "Death by monkeys?"
    • In the playtime scene, Buzz, Woody and Jessie being trapped and closing their eyes for the inevitable end.
    • Stinky Pete had warned and raved that if they continued on with Andy, the toys might end up at the landfill... Like that'll ever happen!
    • At the poker night, the veteran toys predict the new toys (Andy's) are headed for the "landfill", and are "toddler fodder". Obviously the former proved correct, and you could interpret the latter as the toys eventually joining Bonnie.
    • Chatter Telephone's first appearance is when he bumps on Woody's legs several times, trying to talk to him (realizing Woody is the Only Sane Man among the group of Andy's toys). But he cannot talk to Woody directly because Lotso was there (and he does glance at Lotso in this scene). Two of his later lines to Woody also set up later events: "There's only one way toys leave this place" (the trash chute) and then "Trash truck comes at dawn, then it's off to the dump." The trash chute is what the toys use to get out of Sunnyside, and the climax takes place at the dump.
  • Freeze-Frame Bonus:
    • The usual A113 reference is on the license plate of Andy's mom's car, a Continuity Nod from the first movie. For others, see Call-Back.
    • If you pay close attention, you can see that one of the two garbage men is Sid from the first movie.
    • Watch the Cymbal-Banging Monkey very carefully during the escape scene and you'll notice that the monkey's eyes flick to the left a moment before it whirls around and screeches at Woody and Slinky.
  • Fun with Homophones: Barbie says to Ken, "Nice ass-cot."
  • Furry Confusion: Buttercup talks and Bullseye doesn't? Lee Unkrich acknowledged this on his Twitter account, saying "Goofy can talk, but Pluto cannot. Discuss."
  • Futile Hand Reach:
    • Woody reaches out for his fellow toys when he sees them getting crushed in the garbage truck early on. Cut to them having escaped behind him.
    • Similarly, Barbie figuratively reaches out to the toys and screams "No" when they fall into the garbage truck after failing to escape Sunnyside.

    G-I 
  • Genius Ditz: Aside from her various awesomeness, Barbie gives a rather verbose and sophisticated critique of dictatorships, which weirds everyone else out. People might be forgetting that there's been a few President Barbie dolls over the years, so she'd know political science topics.
  • A God Am I: In the first movie the aliens all worshiped the claw. By the third movie, they control the claw. And have become their own god, which is only fitting. See Deus ex Machina above.
  • Golem: Chunk.
  • Gone Horribly Right: Once they get to the daycare center, the toys DO get to be played with again. By very... very... "special" children.
  • Goofy Print Underwear: Ken wears boxers with little hearts on them.
  • Gosh Dang It to Heck!: "What the heck?"
  • Gratuitous Spanish: After Buzz's reset button is hit, he turns into a flamenco-dancing version of his Space Ranger Persona. ¡Buzz Lightyear al rescate!
  • Gray Rain of Depression: The moment Lotso discovers Daisy has replaced him it starts to rain.
  • Great Escape: The entire plot, though it ends up in a Thwarted Escape. The movie (not counting the credits) is about 90 minutes long. The escape scene itself takes up 30 minutes. One of the posters for the movie included the tag line, "The Break-Out Comedy of the Year". The movie's Italian subtitle is even "The Great Escape".
  • Green-Eyed Monster: Spanish-mode Buzz, after seeing Jessie hug Woody, becomes pretty jealous of him, and tries (successfully) to one-up him later. Immediately followed by a great aversion. Having been so thoroughly upstaged, Woody cheers on his buddy's awesome stunt, showing just how far he's come from the jealously insecure toy of the first movie.
  • Gross-Up Close-Up: The bit where the little kids are playing rough with the toys and we see a shot of a kid sticking her tongue on Buzz's helmet from his point of view. Yuck.
  • Growing with the Audience:
    • The series has been growing with its initial audience throughout the entire trilogy, most notable here where main-character Andy is set to go to college. No points for anyone who can guess where most of the original Toy Story fans are or getting ready to go to.
    • The Toy Story movies are also aimed as much at the parents of the kids in the audience as the kids themselves. The stories are told from the viewpoint of the toys that are being left not from the viewpoint of the kid who is leaving them. And that viewpoint is closer to what a parent experiences as their child grows up, develops interests outside the family, and eventually leaves home.
  • The Guards Must Be Crazy: Barbie and Ken prove the need for the Evil Overlord List's warning to never have captives of one sex guarded by members of the opposite sex. That rule and this trope are averted by Demo Mode Buzz, who, though placed in charge of guarding Jessie, refuses to listen to her pleas of "Buzz, we're your friends" and tells her that he will not be swayed by her "bewitching good looks."
  • Hammerspace: Woody somehow manages to pull Daisy's heart necklace out of nowhere when confronting Lotso.
  • Handbag of Hurt: In the prologue, Mrs. Potato Head uses her purse to punch Woody off the train.
  • Handshake Refusal: Buzz holds out his hand for Woody to shake as the latter is leaving Sunnyside. For a moment, it looks like Woody is going to return the handshake, but he so stead adjusts his hat, then leaves.
  • Hand Signals: Mr. Tortilla-Head uses baseball signals during the escape sequence.
  • Hannibal Lecture: Lotso gives one in the middle of a Villainous Breakdown. It comes with a Shut Up, Hannibal!.
  • Happier Home Movie: The beginning of the film presents us with a non-death yet nostalgically reminiscent of the events after Toy Story 2.
  • Happily Married:
  • Heel–Face Turn:
  • Held Gaze:
    • One happens between Buzz and Woody after Woody is climbing back up through the trash and sees the others holding each other to give one another strength. Buzz meets his eyes and then extends his hand and then they hold the scene for a moment before Woody reaches out to grasp Buzz's hand and join the others.
    • Between Buzz and Jessie, when he carries her out of the rubble at the dump. They get interrupted by a big TV set crashing down on them.
    • Parodied when this is how Barbie and Ken meet and the music swells and they gaze at each other before Lotso steps in with a Record Needle Scratch.
  • Help, I'm Stuck!: Employed at least three times.
    • One of the three aliens gets stuck under the hatch of the garbage container when they want to get away from Sunnyside. Woody sees and returns to help. Cue the Ankle Drag by Lotso.
    • Jessie gets stuck between pieces of trash when the toys are in the garbage truck. Buzz comes to save her.
    • Lotso gets stuck under a heavy piece of junk on the Conveyor Belt o' Doom and cries out for help. Woody and Buzz come to his aid before Lotso could get shredded.
  • Helping Hands: The detached hand of Mr. Potato Head, fetching the tortilla during the breakout.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: Buzz finds and rescues Jessie in the junk of the garbage truck. When a television set overhead is about to crush them, Buzz tosses Jessie to safety and takes the blow. It actually works for him, as he returns to being himself afterwards.
  • Hey, Wait!:
    • During Woody's first escape from Sunnyside, as he is about to sneak out of the bathroom window, the camera pans to the janitor looking at the mirror — in which Woody is plainly visible — and commenting in surprise. Woody gasps. Then a Rack Focus reveals a patch of scum on the mirror just big enough to obscure him, as the janitor reaches up to wipe it off. By the time his hand comes down, Woody is already out the window.
    • Subverted when Barbie masquerades as Ken (in his face-obscuring "Mission to Mars" spacesuit) to get back Buzz's instruction manual. The Bookworm notices her high heels as she turns away... but rolls his eyes and sighs at "Ken's" effeminate fashion sense.
  • Hidden Depths: Barbie, she has them. Yes, this Barbie.
  • High-Speed Hijack: In the prologue, Woody jumps from his horse onto the speeding locomotive.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: Towards the film's ending, Lotso leaves the main toys to die in a garbage incinerator after Woody and Buzz saved him from the shredder. For a moment, it looks like he is going to be Karma Houdini as Woody tells the others "he's not worth it" upon escaping. But then, Lotso is found by a Cloudcuckoolander garbageman, who straps him to the front of his truck and drives off with him, ironically condemning himself to a Fate Worse than Death.
  • Holding Hands: In the climactic scene, the toys are trapped in the incinerator pit and facing certain death. Instead of panicking, they join hands and choose to meet their fate together.
  • Hooked Up Afterwards: The Creative Closing Credits show Rex and Trixie, another dinosaur toy, playing video games together.
  • Hope Spot:
  • Humans Are Cthulhu: The kids on Caterpillar Room. Or did everyone miss one of them trying to swallow Buzz, while the others treated the rest just like the Eldritch Abominations in Lovecraft's stories treat humanity?! The only thing needed to turn Toy Story 3 into Lovecraft-Kids Version was them going mad from the revelation. Cue to Lotso resetting Buzz to his first film persona and making him his puppet.
  • Hypocritical Humor: Chunk's line about Buzz not being "the sharpest knife in the place where they keep the knives", upon which Sparks points out to Chunk that he is neither.
  • If I Can't Have You…: Woody says this almost word-for-word as a Shut Up, Hannibal!:
    Lotso: She replaced us!
    Woody: She replaced you! And if you couldn't have her, then no one could!
  • If You Die, I Call Your Stuff: When the toys see Molly throw Barbie in the donation box, Hamm says he gets her Corvette.
  • "I Know What We Can Do" Cut: Happens when Buzz wants to talk to Lotso about moving to Butterfly Room, but all doors and windows in the Caterpillar Room are seemingly locked.
    Mrs. Potato Head: We're trapped!
    Buzz: Wait, doesn't anyone notice the upper window?
    [cut to Buzz, with the help of Andy's other toys, using catapult-car-like toy to toss him to the window above the door]
  • Implicit Prison: Sunnyside Daycare, in that toys donated there are locked up, required to stay, and security is tight to deter inmates from escaping.
  • Inexplicable Cornered Escape: During the Great Escape from Sunnyside Daycare, Woody and the three aliens try to sneak behind Big Baby in the yard. They almost passed it but then one of the aliens falls and make and squeaky noise, which catches Big Baby's attention. The camera then takes the perspective of Big Baby and approached the spot where the toys were last seen, only to find it empty. The next shot shows Woody and the aliens hiding under a bucket close by.
  • Interrogation by Vandalism: Barbie's way of interrogating Ken is by ripping each of his sets of clothes until he speaks, which he does when Barbie starts to rip his Nehru jacket.
  • Involuntary Dance: In the end credits, Jessie has the European Spanish adaptation of the Theme Tune played, so that Buzz's split personality shows up and starts dancing paso doble with her.
    Buzz: I don't know what came over me.
    Jessie: Just go with it, Buzz.
  • Ironic Hell: "Face it, we're just trash", Lotso says at one point — and his ultimate fate is to spend his remaining days tied to the grill of a garbage truck.
  • Irony: Lotso's Laser-Guided Karma is fitting because it has given him two things he had been asking for:
    • The true meaning of love, which he got from the Cloudcuckoolander garbage man, who remembered having another Lotso as a kid.
    • Ironically condemning himself to a Fate Worse than Death and a brutal end to a considerably miserable life after his attempt to become Karma Houdini failed, which he would face from the filth and mud; or from eventually being thrown away again.
  • It Has Been an Honor:
    • Sarge says this at the beginning of the movie before leaving Andy's house.
    • Buzz tries to do this by shaking hands with Woody before Woody left Sunnyside for the first time. Woody refuses him.
    • There's a silent example of this at the end when all the other toys Buzz takes Woody's hand and looks at him before he and all the other toys grab hold of one another and wait for the incinerator to take them.
  • I Want Grandkids: Keeping with the toys-as-parents metaphor, Woody is initially optimistic about waiting in the attic until "someday, if we're lucky, Andy may have kids of his own."

    J-M 
  • Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: Barbie does this to Ken to get out of him what Lotso did to Buzz and where the manual is to set Buzz right.
  • Jump Scare: Woody tries to swing over to the monkey from behind its back. Poor Woody gets a particularly traumatizing scare when the monkey suddenly whip-turns around and screeches at him.
  • Kick the Dog: Lotso has several of these moments.
  • Kids Are Cruel: Justified. The toddlers in the Caterpillar room don't mean to damage the toys they play with. They're simply too young to understand how to properly play without causing significant amounts of damage and wear, and Andy's toys specifically aren't built to be played with by dozens of hyperactive children at once.
  • Killer Rabbit: Lotso, an adorable pink teddy bear smelling of Strawberry.
  • Kite Riding: Woody gets out of Sunnyside Daycare by riding a kite.
  • Knight of Cerebus: Lots-O'-Huggin' Bear, who is anything but what his name implies and represents the first truly evil villain in a Toy Story film. Sid, depending on your view, was an Obliviously Evil kid who is implied to be growing up in a broken home and wasn't aware that the toys he tortured were sentient. Stinky Pete was more of a Tragic Villain. Al... Well, he was a greedy jerk, but calling him evil outright is a stretch. Zurg was a buffoonish Harmless Villain who never posed any genuine threat. But Lotso is pure evil with no redeeming traits or excuse for his actions.
  • Kubrick Stare: In the commentary, Lee Unkrich describes using this expression for Buzz while in demo mode to indicate that this particular trip to Delusion-ville would have a darker turn.
  • Land in the Saddle: When Woody falls off the train during the Fake Action Prologue, he lands on Bulls-Eye and he and Jessie continue chasing after the train.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: For Lotso. He leaves the toys to die in a garbage incinerator after Woody and Buzz saved him from the shredder. For a moment, it looks like he's going to be a Karma Houdini, as Woody tells the others "he's not worth it" upon escaping. But then Lotso is found by a Cloudcuckoolander garbageman, who straps him to the front of his truck and drives off with him.
  • Latin Lover: Buzz Lightyear's Spanish mode. In the Latin American Spanish dub of the movie, he literally speaks with a European Spanish accent. And in the European Spanish dub, he speaks with a heavy Andalusian accent.
  • Left for Dead: After Lotso is saved by Woody and Buzz, he rewards them by leaving them to roast at an incinerator instead of saving them by shutting off the conveyer belt.
  • Left Hanging: Bo Peep is briefly mentioned in the beginning as one of the toys that have since been sold off, and Woody's reaction indicates that he's still very saddened by her absence. However, it doesn't get brought up again or resolved through the rest of the movie. This would eventually pave the way for a fourth film centered on Woody and Bo's reunion.
  • Left the Background Music On: When we hear the harmonica tune, it seems like it comes from the soundtrack until we see Hamm playing the instrument in his prison cell. Then Buzz bangs on the cell bars telling him to knock it off.
  • Light Is Not Good:
    • A light at the end of the tunnel at the dumping site. It turns out to be a Hellfire.
    • When we first see the Caterpillar Room, it looks warm and inviting, especially with sunlight streaming in through the window.
  • Living Emotional Crutch: Daisy might have been this to Lotso, seeing how badly he handled being replaced by her.
  • The Load: One could interpret the Squeeze Toy Aliens in this role, as they exist either as superlatives or hindrances to the toys escaping from Sunnyside. From almost alerting Big Baby to getting stuck in the dumpster and (indirectly) causing the toys to get sent to the dump. Inverted in the incinerator scene, in which the Aliens save all of the toys via the claw.
  • Long Last Look: At the end, Andy's mom takes a long last look at his room before he leaves for college.
  • Lost in Translation: Nice asssss...cot. The French dub skirts around this by making Barbie say "Quel petit curieux!" (basically, "Curious, aren't you?") and linger on the first syllable so that it sounds like "Quel petit cul" (complimenting him on his small/firm buttocks).
  • Love at First Sight: Ken and Barbie - it seems crazy, but it's like they were made for each other! Though this is subverted when Barbie realizes that Ken has been mistreating other toys.
  • Love Makes You Dumb: Ken, exploited by Barbie. She fakes a breakdown in her prison cell and urges Ken to take her to his playhouse, which he does.
  • Love Makes You Evil: Lotso's backstory. He and Daisy used to love each other. Daisy lost him by accident, and Lotso determinedly set out to find her again. When he finally found her and discovered that he'd been replaced, his heart was broken and he turned evil.
  • Love Redeems: Played with for Buzz: Buzz rejoins the team because of being physically reset by Rex. However, Ken's love for Barbie was key to getting the instruction manual. Buzz did eventually get back to his regular self through his love for Jessie: the television hit Buzz, giving him reverse amnesia because he was more worried about Jessie's safety than his own.
  • Low Count Gag: A depressing variant when we see that Andy's immediate toy family are all the toys he has left.
    Woody: Slink, gather everyone up.
    Slinky: Uh... we are gathered, Woody.
  • Madden Into Misanthropy: Lotso is so mad over being replaced, he turns his back on bonding with kids.
  • Make an Example of Them: When Andy's toys are imprisoned at Sunnyside, Mr. Potato Head is singled out on Lotso's command and put into the Punishment Box, so all could witness what happened if they did not obey.
  • Mass "Oh, Crap!": Three of these at the landfill. The first is when the toys see they're heading for the shredder. The second is when Woody, and then the others, realize it's not daylight at the end of the tunnel, it's the incinerator. The third one comes when Lotso abandons them, just before they're swept into the incinerator.
  • Match Cut: When Chuckles talks about how Lotso became evil, the scene cuts from him looking sad to him looking happy in the Happy Flashback.
  • Meaningful Echo:
    • When the toys escape into the garage after accidentally being left on the side of the road as trash, Buzz tries calming everyone down by saying "This is no time to be hysterical", to which Hamm snaps "It's the perfect time to be hysterical!" This is likely a callback to the scene in the first Toy Story where Buzz and Woody are stranded at the gas station; Buzz says "Sheriff, this is no time to panic", and Woody replies "This is the perfect time to panic!".
    • Twice when the aliens save the toys from the incinerator; they first say "the claaaaaw" in unison, originally played for humor in the first movie but now the catalyst for the toys barely making it out, and shortly after Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head thank them by saying "You saved our lives! And we are eternally grateful," a line also originally Played for Laughs in the second movie.
  • Melancholy Moon: Both Big Baby and Chuckles have a scene where they stare at the moon in melancholy. Which is pretty darn appropriate considering their shared backstory.
  • Memento MacGuffin: Daisy's locket that Big Baby is clinging to.
  • Mighty Roar: In Andy's imagination in the opening sequence, Rex is depicted as a giant toy dinosaur and unlike it's toy counterpart, is much more ruthless with a spine-chilling roar in contrast to being more sheepish and the lack of being frightening.
  • "Mission: Impossible" Cable Drop: When Woody drops from the tree, he is temporarily suspended inches from the ground.
  • Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Big Baby undergoes a Heel–Face Turn after getting hit by Lotso, who also crushes the "Daisy" locket with his cane.
  • Moment Killer: Lotso interrupts Barbie and Ken's Love at First Sight moment underscored by a Record Needle Scratch.
  • Mood Whiplash: Perhaps the first Toy Story 3 trailer uses this. It starts out sentimental, the middle is semi-serious, and then it ends with humor.
    • In a trailer, how a very heartfelt scene where Andy is praising Woody is suddenly cut short with Woody hearing a threatening voice from a telephone.
    • In the movie, the toys have joined hands, accepting that they are about to die a terrible, painful death, burning alive in a fiery pit, and then the claw saves them.
    • This scene really takes the cake for this trope: Any time where a scene from Bonnie's playtime is interspersed with scenes with the daycare. Examples: The Toys being utterly destroyed while Woody is having a nice tea time with Bonnie; Bonnie asleep and Woody looks up Andy's address while Buzz is being Demo-moded. Jeez, are we supposed to be heartfelt or seriously freaked out?
    • Happens unintentionally when Woody meets Chuckles. The mood was serious and sombre (Woody finding out his friends are living in a nightmare), and then the audience saw this morose little clown sitting on the windowsill and everybody cracked up. During Chuckles' flashback:
      Lotso: She replaced us.
      Chuckles: No, she just replaced you.
    • The ending is kind of like this. It's very much a Bittersweet Ending, followed by a breather in the thankfully very cheerful closing credits.
  • Motive Rant: Lotso rants about how toys are nothing but trash as he throws the heroes into the dumpster.
  • Moving-Away Ending: The movie ends with Andy leaving home and heading off to college, with the toys changing ownership from Andy to a new kid named Bonnie.
  • Multiple Head Case: Chunk from Toy Story 3 has a face that can flip between a smiling one and a frowning one by pressing a button on top of his head.
  • Murder by Inaction: Rather than save the toys from being roasted by the incinerator by pressing the emergency stop button to shut off the conveyer belt, Lotso instead decides to abandon the toys even after they risked their lives to save him.
  • Musical Nod: During the scene leading up to the incinerator, one of the themes from Monsters, Inc. is heard. Other music themes from the first two Toy Story films are also heard throughout the film.
  • Musical Spoiler: And as the years go by / Our friendship will never die...note 
  • Mysterious Informant: Chatter Telephone helps Woody out when things turned sour.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • The LGMs are portrayed as One-Eyed Bart's (and his wife One-Eyed Betty) accomplices during Andy's playtime.
    • Potato Head attaches his pieces to a tortilla and then a cucumber. The original Mr. Potato Head toy was just the pieces meant to be attached to actual potatoes and other produce. After realizing how short-lived produce was, they packed him with a plastic potato.

    N-P 
  • Named After the Injury: Discussed. Andy names two villains in his imaginary game (who he portrays with the Potato Heads) "One-Eyed Bart" and "One-Eyed Betty" because both are missing an eye.
  • A Nazi by Any Other Name: The toys that are working with Lotso at Sunnyside Daycare. Bonnie's toys treat Sunnyside as a sort of concentration camp. Lotso himself is fairly similar to Josef Stalin.
  • Near-Villain Victory: At the dump, Lotso abandons Woody and the gang after pretending to help them so they can face their imminent death in the incinerator, but are rescued by the aliens at the last minute by the loader they found. Had the aliens not wandered away from the gang and discovered the loader that would eventually rescue them, Lotso would have won.
  • Neck Snap: Barbie quickly twists Ken's neck when overpowering him, but being a plastic toy with his head on a swivel joint, it doesn't do him any harm.
  • Negated Moment of Awesome: We don't get to see how Woody, Buzz and Jessie would have escaped the monkeys and defeated Evil Dr. Porkchop during Andy's imagination sequence at the beginning of the movie since his mom interrupts him before it can play out on-screen. The only hint given is that Buzz would have used Woody's badge to deflect his laser into Dr. Porkchop's ship.
  • Never My Fault:
    • Jessie admits to Woody that the toys were wrong not to believe him. When she says that she was wrong specifically, Mr. Potato Head adds, "Jessie's right, Woody. She was wrong!"
    • Earlier, when the other toys find out that, no, Andy did NOT throw them out intentionally, Hamm calls out Mr. Potato Head for not believing Woody... even though he didn't believe Woody either.
  • Never Trust a Trailer:
    • Most of the trailers and TV spots heavily imply that Buzz malfunctions and goes into his Spanish mode after getting broken or injured, showing shots of him hitting a window or wall or a toddler using him like a hammer on the wooden hammer-peg playset. This actually happens because Buzz is forcefully reset by Lotso.
    • The trailers frequently use footage of the opening scene - which is only an Imagine Spot where an younger Andy is playing with his toys - implying that these action sequences actually take place in the real setting.
    • One of the trailers edits the opening scene to look like Buzz is attacking the bridge, followed by the shot of Woody and the train falling into the canyon, with the shots Rex emerging from the ground and Woody being pursued by plastic monkeys (both present in most trailers) making it look like Woody is having a nightmare similar to Toy Story 2 where every other toy is trying to kill him. In the actual film, this is actually Andy's imagination, and Buzz saves Woody and the train from falling.
    • While the prison break aspect was a major selling point of the film, the majority of trailers and marketing implied that it was the daycare's actual, human-installed security systems that Andy's toys had to avoid in order to escape. The fact that it's actually a villainous gang of other toys who are running the daycare like a prison was mostly kept under wraps.
    • One trailer implied that the chatter telephone toy would be a more antagonistic character, with him seemingly bragging to Woody that he and his friends are never making it out of the daycare. In the film, the telephone is actually an ally who ends up advising Woody on how to escape.
    • Lotso's appearances in the trailers and most other marketing present him as a Cool Old Guy and a new ally to Andy's toys, with his line "You've got a play date with destiny" taken out of context as if he's rooting for them to escape the daycare. Lotso is actually the film's main villain, and the one who imprisons the toys in the first place.
  • Nietzsche Wannabe: Lotso comes off as a bit of one when saying how toys "are all just trash" in his Motive Rant.
  • Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Lotso, Big Baby and especially the Cymbal-Banging Monkey.
  • Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Mrs. Potato Head fights alongside her husband and partner in crime wielding a pair of nunchaku.
  • Non-Ironic Clown: Chuckles the clown doll, who shared the same former owner as Lotso Bear and Big Baby, turns out to be the only one of the three toys not to turn villainous from the incident of being accidentally abandoned by their former owner. In a flashback he even tries to console Lotso, but Lotso ignores him and turns evil. In the present, Chuckles is a Sad Clown despite being one of Bonnie's beloved toys. But by the end credits, he begins to smile again.
  • Non-Protagonist Resolver: The day is saved by the Little Green Men and The Claw.
  • Non-Standard Character Design: The toys have a lot of variety in their looks, but Ken and Barbie are noticeably less cartoonish than most of them.
  • No One Gets Left Behind: When Lotso gets trapped under a golf bag and is about to be shredded in the dump, Woody immediately goes to save him despite everything the bear's done to him and his friends.
  • Nose Shove: A toddler puts one of Mr. Potato Head's eyes up his snotty nose.
  • Not What It Looks Like: When the toys believe that Andy threw them out when they find themselves on the curb. Woody even lampshades this as he tries to explain to them that Andy meant to put them in the attic, and that it was Andy's mom, not Andy, who put them on the curb because she mistook them for trash.
  • Now You Tell Me: When Lotso is first giving Woody and his friends a tour of Sunnyside Daycare, the tour passes through the little kids' bathroom and Lotso cautions them to "Watch out for puddles." His warning comes a split-second after Mr. Potato Head has already slipped and splashed.
  • No, You:
    • First during Lotso's story:
      Lotso: She's replaced us! Come on!
      Chuckles: No, no! She only replaced you...!
      Lotso: She replaced ALL of us!
    • And again when Woody confronts Lotso:
      Lotso: She replaced us!
      Woody: She replaced you! And if you couldn't have her, then no one could!
  • Offscreen Teleportation: While trying to sneak past Big Baby, one of the aliens squeaks when hiding near the swingset, which gets Big Baby's attention and he immediately stomps over...only to realize the toys have disappeared.
  • Oh, Crap!:
    • Buzz gets an inkling that things are not all as they seem in the Caterpillar Room when all the resident toys go hide. Once the stampede of preschoolers enters, he immediately deploys his canopy to weather the ensuing roughness.
    • Lotso gets a shrewd one when he realizes that Woody knows the truth about Daisy and is about to expose his spiteful deception to Big Baby. He gets a far more expressive one when Big Baby throws him in the dumpster seconds later.
    • Woody on the conveyor belt at the dump when he realizes it's not daylight at the end of it. It's the incinerator.
    • Woody and Buzz when Lotso abandons them and leaves them and the others to die in the incinerator.
    • Slinky looks horrified when Lotso shows up during the toys' escape.
    • Woody when the Cymbal-Banging Monkey abruptly turns and screams at him. The monkey itself gets one a few seconds later when Slinky's about to trap him with tape.
  • Oh, No... Not Again!: Woody's reaction to the gang telling him that Lotso hit the Reset Button on Buzz, reverting him back to how he acted in the first film: thinking he's a real space ranger.
    Woody: Oh, no...
    Hamm: Oh, yes. Return of the astro-nut!
  • The Old Convict: Chatter Telephone has been at Sunnyside Daycare Center even before Lotso Bear took it over. To help Woody and his friends escape the daycare center, Chatter Telephone detailedly describes the layout of the daycare center and warns Woody that the only way for a toy to escape is to neutralize the Cymbal Monkey's surveillance system.
  • Old Dog: Because of the 10-year gap between this and the previous film, the formerly frisky Buster is now fat, gray, sluggish and very tired.
  • Ominous Floating Spaceship: Spoofed with Evil Dr. Pork-Chop's airship, casting a huge shadow on the ground.
  • Ominous Multiple Screens: The Cymbal-Banging Monkey sits in front of a wall of security monitors.
  • O.O.C. Is Serious Business: All of Bonnie's goofy, cheerful, fun-loving toys become much more somber and serious after Woody brings up Sunnyside. This tips Woody off about the place's true nature.
  • Oscar Bait: Pixar has decided to aim for the Best Picture nom, which includes running an ad campaign that pays homages to previous winners e.g. Lotso as The Godfather and Woody as Forrest Gump. Which, in the latter case, is a HUGE case of Actor Allusion.
  • Our Hero Is Dead: Woody loses his hat during his escape, which is taken to the trapped toys as a threat. Jessie and Bullseye have a split-second tear-jerking moment.
  • Outdated Outfit: Ken has a roomful of them, dating from the late 50s to the early 80s.
  • Out of the Frying Pan: In the dump, when they wind up on the conveyor, the toys escape from the shredder... only to wind up in the incinerator.
  • Palantir Ploy: Let's just say Lex Luthor should have hired whoever installed Sunnyside Daycare's surveillance system.
  • "Pan Up to the Sky" Ending: An epic storybook ending, really.
  • Paper People: Mr. Potato Head is this when using the tortilla.
  • Parental Bonus:
    • Barbie says this to Ken when they first meet:
      Barbie: Nice ascot.
    • "Have fun at college, Woody!" "Yeah, but not too much fun!"
    • Mr. Potato Head: Hey! Nobody takes my wife's mouth except me!
  • Percussive Maintenance: Apparently the best way to get Buzz Lightyear back to normal after a hard reset is to drop a TV on his head.
  • Perp Sweating: When Buzz is being interrogated by the mob, they place him under a big bright light.
  • Perspective Reversal: Earlier on, Woody and Buzz try to encourage the rest of the toys to get ready to go into the attic. Towards the end of the movie, Woody is more skeptical of the attic idea, while the rest of the toys are more open to it; though Buzz's attitude seems relatively unchanged. As things turn out, none of them end up in the attic anyway.
  • Pet the Dog: Pretty minor in the grand scheme of things, but Lotso untied Buzz from being interrogated by his minions and was happily willing to let him move to the safe Butterfly Room...or at least, until the latter said he was gonna bring his friends too.
  • Pictorial Letter Substitution: Ken turns out to have very stereotypically girly handwriting, including drawing hearts in place of "O"s at one point.
  • Poster-Gallery Bedroom: The walls of Andy's room are full of posters, strengthening the idea as a teenager he now has other interests than playing with toys.
  • Post-Kiss Catatonia: A hilarious moment in Toy Story 3 when Spanish Buzz kisses Woody twice on the cheeks.
  • Potty Dance: Bonnie does this during playtime with Woody at her house.
  • The Power of Love: The scene where Spanish Buzz saved Jessie from the garbage, got hit with the TV, and reverted to being normal Buzz by Jessie pulling him to the side of the truck and crying in his chest.
  • Prison Episode: Toy Story 3 itself, or at least a significant portion of it, has this with Sunnyside being portrayed as essentially a prison. It leads to a shock value for having a prison episode in a G-rated Pixar series.
  • Prized Possession Giveaway: In the movie's finale, Andy intends to donate all of his toys except Woody (his favorite) to Bonnie. When he realizes that Woody is also in the donation box (Woody himself entered there secretly) and Bonnie attempts to grab it, he initially hesitates to give it away to her, but soon changes his mind and entrusts it to her. The two humans play together with all toys for a brief time, and then Andy bids a final farewell to Bonnie and the toys before driving to the whereabouts of his college.
    Andy: Now, Woody. He's been my pal as long as I can remember. He's brave, like a cowboy should be. And kind, and smart. But the thing that makes Woody special? Is he'll never give up on you — ever. He'll be there for you, no matter what. Y'think you can take care of him for me? [Bonnie nods in assurance] Okay, then.
  • Pun: After the toddlers are done with the toys at the Caterpillar room, Hamm tosses the detached arm of Mr. Potato Head back to him, asking "Someone need a hand?"
  • Punch-Clock Villain: Lotso's minions are mainly following his orders because they're scared of him and the fact he told them that they were all going to be thrown away by their owners sooner or later. Once Lotso is deposed from Sunnyside, they perform a mass Heel–Face Turn.
  • Punishment Box: The sandbox at Sunnyside, which Lotso uses on Mr. Potato Head once he disrespects him. Modeled after the box in Cool Hand Luke.
  • Put on a Bus: It's established that Bo Peep, Wheezy, Lenny, RC, and many of Andy's other childhood toys have been sold or given away. This is an interesting variation of the trope in that it would be very hard for any of them to ever come back. That is, except for Bo Peep in the following installment.

    Q-S 
  • Raised Hand of Survival: Lotso on the Conveyor Belt o' Doom lifts his arm and yells "Help, I'm Stuck!", upon which Woody and Buzz come to free him.
  • Rapid-Fire "No!": Woody when the rest of the gang comes down the garbage chute all at once.
  • Real Men Wear Pink: Lotso is a dark magenta teddy bear who runs Sunnyside like a prison warden with an iron fist, and the clothing-obsessed Camp Straight Ken is one of the toughest guards.
  • Record Needle Scratch: Ken and Barbie are just meeting each other. "Dream Weaver" is playing, and then Lotso comes in [insert scratch] and says "Come on, Ken. Recess don't last forever."
  • Recycled Soundtrack: Some music pieces from the first two Toy Story movies are heard throughout the film.
  • Redemption Demotion: Inverted with Buzz who, once reset to Demo Mode, serves Lotso well when locking away Andy's toys.
  • Redemption Rejection: When Lotso is about to be crushed by landfill machinery, Andy's toys go out of their way to save him. He repays them by trapping them in a certain-death situation, which they're only saved from by the timely intervention of the Little Green Men. Needless to say, this costs him.
  • Red Herring: When Andy goes to deliver the toys to Bonnie, there are a few close-up shots of the box Andy is taking to college with him. Initially, this suggests that Woody is hiding inside and is watching his friends from afar before he leaves with Andy. Later on, it's shown that Woody snuck into the box with the rest of Andy's toys so he can be given away to Bonnie.
  • Red Right Hand: Big Baby's lazy eye is an early indicator that it and the daycare as a whole are not as wholesome as they appear to be.
  • Rejection Projection: Lotso, Big Baby and Chuckles used to belong to a girl named Daisy, who lost them during a road trip. After making a trek all the way back to her house, Lotso found that she had replaced him with another Lotso-Huggin' Bear doll. Feeling betrayed, Lotso snapped and convinced his friends that Daisy intentionally replaced them all and never really loved them. Woody calls him out on this.
    Woody: Wait! What about Daisy?
    Lotso: [beat] I don't know what you're talkin' about.
    Woody: Daisy? You used to do everything together, remember?
    Lotso: Yeah... Then, she threw us out.
    Woody: No! She lost you.
    Lotso: She replaced us!
    Woody: She replaced YOU! And if you couldn't have her, then no one could!
  • Reluctant Gift: When Andy is giving away his toys to Bonnie, introducing each and handing them to her. But when he gets to Woody, he grows hesitant and even pulls him back from her outreached hands. He does finally give it to her.
  • Replacement Goldfish: When Lotso returns to the little girl, he is shocked to discover that her parents bought her an identical Lots-O'-Huggin' Bear.
  • Reset Button:
    • Woody and the gang make it back to Andy's house with no toy left behind.
    • Played figuratively and literally with Buzz Lightyear, even though it's a falling television rather than his reset button that restores his memory.
  • Right for the Wrong Reasons: As the gang heads towards Sunnyside, Woody claims that daycare is a sad and lonely place (for toys that have no owners). His claim may not apply to daycares in general, but unfortunately, he's right in the worst ways possible about Sunnyside.
  • Romantic False Lead: Spanish Buzz briefly viewed Woody as this when he sees Jessie hugging him.
  • Rube Goldberg Device: When the toys try to escape from the Caterpillar room, they employ a complicated sequence of events to get Buzz up on the transom.
  • Runaway Train: In the opening action sequence, Woody tries to stop the driverless train but fails. Cue for Buzz doing a Trainstopping.
  • Sad Clown: Chuckles.
  • Sadistic Choice: In the opening with Sheriff Woody and One-Eyed Bart (Mr. Potato Head). One-Eyed Bart sets off some dynamite. "It's me or the kiddies, sheriff. Take your pick."
  • Same Clothes, Different Year: The garbage man featured is actually Sid Phillips (you can easily tell it is him because of the skull on his shirt).
  • Save the Villain: Woody and Buzz save Lotso from a shredder without hesitation, even though it was Lotso's fault in the first place that any of them were in a life-threatening situation. Lotso doesn't return the favor.
  • Scary Librarian: Bookworm.
  • Scenery Gorn: The dump, the conveyor belt and finally the incinerator.
  • Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The last three Army Men (including Sarge) leave Andy's room in a hurry, knowing their fate will inevitably be the garbage. They end up at Sunnyside Daycare instead.
  • Security Cling: Done wordlessly as the toys all slowly fall toward certain doom. In the face of annihilation, they don't scream or shout, they just hold each other.
  • Series Fauxnale: Toy Story 4 was released in 2019, even though this film made it seem like the conclusion of the franchise.
  • Shame If Something Happened: While Woody did manage to slip out of Sunnyside, Lotso took advantage of his misplaced hat to make it clear to the rest of the toys that they should think twice about trying to leave:
    Lotso: Listen up, folks. We got a way of doin' things here at Sunnyside. If you start at the bottom, pay your dues, life here can be a dream come true! But if you break our rules, step outta line, try to... check out early... [is handed Woody's hat] well... you're just hurtin' yourselves. [tosses Woody's hat onto the ground]
  • Shoo Out the Clowns:
    • Spanish Buzz, who was primarily comic relief during the daycare escape, is reset back into normal Buzz upon arriving at the dump. Since things get even darker at that point, Spanish Buzz's continued presence would have resulted in some severe Mood Whiplash.
    • The Little Green Men being taken out (and apparently killed) early in the dump sequence. When they return, they save the day and things get much lighter and fluffier.
    • Also done with Barbie, when Ken keeps her from joining the others on the garbage truck.
  • Shoo the Dog: When Woody decides to leave Sunnyside and go back to Andy, Bullseye is the only other toy willing to go back with him. However, Woody tells Bullseye to stay with the others because he doesn't want Bullseye being alone in the attic with nobody else.
  • Shout-Out:
    • Bonnie has a Totoro doll. See here.
    • Bonnie wearing a tutu at the end references the original Brave Little Toaster where the appliances are adopted by a Ballerina at the end of the story.
    • The bee on Bonnie's backpack is Wally B. from the very first Pixar Short, "The Adventures of André & Wally B."
    • The scene where brainwashed and reprogrammed Buzz is bossing around all the toys being held captive at Sunnyside Daycare is a clear reference to Cool Hand Luke. The film has a scene where any infraction (losing a spoon, wearing dirty pants, messing up laundry cycle) is punished with "A night in the box." The toys meet the same fate, except in this case "the box" is filled with sand. Befitting for a Great Escape movie.
    • Big Baby threw Lotso into the dumpster in a similar way to how Darth Vader killed Palpatine. Interestingly, in the Brazilian dub, Lotso's voice actor Silvio Navas also provided the voice for Vader.
    • Woody being dragged into the dumpster by Lotso is a shout-out to a similar scene during the climax of Aliens.
    • Much of the film takes its inspiration from The Brave Little Toaster, which had many future Pixar employees working on it, including John Lasseter, Joe Ranft, and others. It even had the usual A113 moniker in it.
    • Mr. Potato Head: "And I would've gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for you meddling toys!"
    • The Cymbal-Banging Monkey, is based on the Stephen King story "The Monkey".
    • Barbie and Ken's outfits during the dance sequence at the end is a reference to Saturday Night Fever.
    • When Mr. Potato Head was first invented, he was, indeed, just a set of eyeballs and hands and things that kids could stick into real vegetables. The company introduced the plastic potato a few decades later when parents became worried that the poles needed to stick into a real potato were too pointy and sharp.
    • Lotso Huggin' Bear himself is a Shout-Out. Between the name, nature, appearance, and the Viral Commercial for the toy, he's obviously meant to be one of the Care Bears gone horribly, horribly wrong. And he's paraphrasing a quote from The Bridge on the River Kwai.
    • Also from the opening sequence, Rex's roar is taken straight out of Jurassic Park. A natural move, considering his appearance on the car's mirror during a scene in Al's Toy Barn from the previous film.
    • The scene where Barbie and Ken see each other for the first time, and the song Dream Weaver is playing is highly reminiscent of the scene where Wayne sees Cassandra for the first time in Wayne's World.
    • After Woody's escape from Sunnyside via a kite causes him to fall a great height from the sky, he winds up crashing into a tree and performing the "Mission: Impossible" Cable Drop from a branch.
  • Shown Their Work:
    • All of Ken's outfits (with the exception of the Nehru Jacket) are actual outfits released for the doll over the years.
    • Buzz and Jessie's pasodoble over the end credits was choreographed by Dancing with the Stars veterans Tony Dovolani and Cheryl Burke.
  • Shrinking Violet: Bonnie. Her toys and later Andy are the only people she opens up to.
  • Shut Up, Hannibal!: Woody gives Lotso pointing out how he's motivated partially by selfishness.
  • Sickeningly Sweethearts: Ken and Barbie ("I..." "...love..." "...you!" "See? That time I said love!")
  • Silence, You Fool!: Demo Mode Buzz says this to Jessie when he captured the toys.
  • Sleeping Dummy: The heroes use a real potato to fool Buzz into thinking Mr. Potato Head was still in his cell while he is actually out aiding the Great Escape.
  • Slow-Motion Fall: When Bonnie tosses her dolls in the air, for a short moment, we see Woody falling in slow motion.
  • Smarter Than You Look:
    • The Squeeze Toy Aliens. For all their times yelling "Ooohh!!!" and "The Claw" it turns out they are actually fairly intelligent. Not only can they learn how to operate heavy machinery within a matter of minutes, find and locate a small group of toys within a trash compound, but they actually do know that the "Claw" has to be manually controlled and is not self-choosing.
    • Also Barbie — political philosophy out of nowhere.
  • The Sociopath: Lotso.
  • So Long, Suckers!: Lotso pulls this on Woody and the others when he refuses to save them after they saved him, and instead leaves them for dead at the incinerator and shouts, "Where's your kid now, Sheriff?!"
  • Something We Forgot: Double Subverted in the climax. When Woody, Buzz and the gang are tossed into the dump, Barbie gets left behind. The toys are nearly roasted in the furnace of the dump and are saved by the Green-Alien Men at the last possible second, then return home and donate themselves to Bonnie. Throughout all of this, none of the toys notice that Barbie is no longer with them until they receive a post-card from Barbie in Sunnyside, where where she decided to stay.
  • So Much for Stealth: During the Great Escape from Sunnyside Daycare, Woody and the three aliens try to sneak behind Big Baby in the yard. They almost passed it but then one of the aliens falls and make and squeaky noise, which catches Big Baby's attention.
  • Spanner in the Works: Woody, Chatter Telephone and Chuckles turn out to be the keys to dissolving Lotso's reign over Sunnyside. With Chatter's help, Woody breaks out all of his friends and escapes with them out the trash chute (a feat rarely done without being broken), sends Lotso into a Villainous Breakdown by presenting him with Daisy's locket (which Chuckles saved) and ultimately gets him banished to the dump, freeing Sunnyside from his corruptive influence.
  • Speak in Unison: During their Love at First Sight encounter, Barbie and Ken finish the sentence "...made for each other." together which they take as a confirmation of that line.
  • Speak of the Devil: Lotso uses this line when the garbage truck arrives.
  • Split Personality: Buzz's "Spanish Mode", activated by pressing a reset button hidden in his back for more than five seconds, could be an example of this.
  • Spotting the Thread: Subverted. Barbie uses an astronaut suit to disguise herself as Ken to talk with the Bookworm. The suit covers her head and face, and almost her whole body...except her feet, and she forgot to change her high heels, which the Bookworm sees as she walks away. Fortunately, the Bookworm dismisses the high heels as one of Ken's idiosyncrasies.
  • Start of Darkness: Chuckles the Clown's Flashback segment outlines exactly why Lotso turns out to be the cruel despot of Sunnyside: "Something changed inside him that day. Something snapped." That's when Lotso lost all trust in humans and started his path on the dark side.
  • Stealth Pun:
    • All of the toys when in Toy Mode.
    • The preschooler believed to be Boo is playing with a blue "Kitty."
    • The aliens rescue the toys from the incinerator with the crane, an example of a Deus ex Machina. The actual term means "god out of a machine", and the aliens believe "the Claw" to be their god.
  • Stepford Smiler:
    • Lotso bear turns out to be Type C, as he is the film's villain.
    • Chatter Telephone. His "mouth" sticker is with a constant smile, despite the fact that he is shown to be a very depressed toy.
  • Stock Money Bag: In the opening action sequence, Mr. Potato Head is swiping several such bags from a train car.
  • The Stool Pigeon: Chatter Telephone is of the Lacerated Larry type: he truly did want Andy's toys to escape. Lotso and his mob just ruthlessly beat the information out of him.
  • Stopped Dead in Their Tracks:
    • As Woody decides to leave Sunnyside, he abruptly stops and looks behind him when he realises Buzz isn't coming with him, much to his dismay. Despite this, he carries on, leaving the rest of the toys behind.
    • Later, Lotso does the same, halting when Woody mentions Daisy. He claims he "doesn't know what he's talking about".
  • Strawberry Shorthand: Lotso smells like strawberries, which makes him appear more likable than he really is.
  • Suddenly Shouting: "He was putting you IN THE ATTIC!"
  • Suddenly Speaking: Big Baby, who normally communicates through coos and cries, utters an audible "Mama!" when he looks at Daisy's name tag, prompting him to turn against Lotso.
  • Surveillance Station Slacker: Defied by the Cymbal-Banging Monkey, never taking his eyes of the monitors.

    T-Z 
  • Take a Third Option: The toys face two likely options for their fate with Andy going to college - the preferred option is storage in the attic, where they may not get played with, but they'll be safe and secure. The other option is being sold or worse being thrown out. After believing Andy has thrown them away, the group elects to move to Sunnyside. After a harrowing adventure and narrowly avoiding death, the group is content to live in the attic as Andy intended. However, when Woody witnesses Andy assuring his mother that she'll always be with him, Woody decides to take this trope to its ultimate conclusion and arrange for Andy to give them all away to Bonnie.
  • Taking You with Me: Lotso's Ankle Drag on Woody from inside the dumpster.
  • Team Parents: Barbie and Ken to the toys of Sunnyside in the epilogue.
  • Tears of Remorse: Mrs. Davis when she sees Andy's empty bedroom and begins crying over the thought of missing him and wishing she would always be with him. Woody sees this as Andy consoles her, which gives him the idea to donate all the toys — including himself — to Bonnie.
  • Tempting Fate:
    • During his discussion with Woody, Chatter Telephone boasts that "they'll never break [him]". Fast-forward to Lotso stopping the toys' escape:
      Chatter Telephone: I'm sorry, cowboy. They broke me.
    • When Lotso rants that the toys are just "trash waiting to be thrown away", that's when Big Baby, having enough with Lotso's bullying, throws him into the dumpster while the cowardly bear pathetically calls for help.
    • Woody in the trash collectors: "We will be okay if we stick together." Cue Slinky Dog being pulled to the ceiling by the magnet.
  • Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Subverted by Buttercup, who by all appearances should be female, but Jeff Garlin's voice is about as masculine as you can get.
  • They Call Me MISTER Tibbs!:
    • Mr. Potato Head when he purposefully tries to get sent to the Box: "That's Mr. Potato Head to you, smoothie."
    • Hamm in opening sequence: "That's Mister Evil Doctor Porkchop to you!"
  • Third Is 3D: An interesting case, because unlike other movies Toy Stoy 3 doesn't specifically market 3-D as its defining selling point, despite being released in both viewing formats. It's hugely indicated by the marketer's decision not to call it "Toy Story 3-D".
  • This Is Gonna Suck: A nonverbal instance of this, started when the toys in the Caterpillar Room hide when recess ends, but cemented when Buzz cottons on to the incoming suckage and flips his helmet up as the kids burst into the room.
  • This Is No Time to Panic: Could also be seen as a Call-Back to the first film.
    Buzz: Hold on. This is no time to be hysterical.
    Hamm: This is the perfect time to be hysterical.
    Rex: [hysterically] Should we be HYSTERICAL?!?
    Slinky: No!
    Mr. Potato Head: Yes!
    Buzz: Maybe! But not right now!
  • Thwarted Escape: The Great Escape from Sunnyside comes to an abrupt end when Lotso steps in, right before Andy's toys are in safe territory.
  • Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: Buzz is noticeably shorter than Jessie.
  • Together in Death: Expected in-universe but narrowly averted.
    "The most important thing is that we stick together. No matter what happens, we stick together."
  • Toilet Humor:
    • When Lotso is first giving Woody and his friends a tour of Sunnyside Daycare, the tour passes through the little kids' bathroom and Lotso cautions them to "Watch out for puddles." Given that at least some of the kids in the daycare are somewhere around toilet-training age, it's probably safe to assume that not all the puddles are made of water.
    • After Mr. Potato Head is thrown in the box:
    Mr. Potato Head: It was cold and dark! Nothing but sand and a couple of Lincoln Logs.
    Hamm: Ehh, I don't think those were Lincoln Logs.
  • Too Dumb to Live: The LGMs are dumped in a landfill and the first thing they do is run towards what looks like the claw. Immediately they get swept up with the garbage. Then subverted when they turn up later in the incinerator scene, none the worse for wear.
  • Town with a Dark Secret: Sunnyside Daycare. First it looks like paradise. The toys are all friendly, there are always lots of kids to play with them so that none of the toys ever get outgrown, and there's a repair ward that keeps the playthings in tip-top shape. However, their dark secret is that, in order to stay in the older kids' playroom, the ruling toys regularly sacrifice new toys to the toddler's playroom, where too-young children bash and beat toys until they are destroyed and thrown out.
  • Toy-Based Characterization: Bonnie is a Cheerful Child who treasures each of her toys and is shown to be quite imaginative in her play. As Andy is about to leave for college, this is what makes him decide to give Woody to her, knowing that she'll take good care of him.
  • Track Trouble: The beginning of the skit involves One-Eyed Bart (Mr. Potato Head) destroying the train track and making his escape with Woody having to save the train full of orphans.
  • Tragic Abandoned Toy:
    • The movie begins with the toys complaining that the now-teenaged Andy no longer plays with them.
    • Lotso, Chuckles, and Big Baby had a happy life with their owner Daisy, until one day they were accidentally left behind by her parents on a road trip. They managed to make it back to her house, but by the time they got there, they saw that Daisy's parents had gotten her a new Lotso. In the present day, Chuckles and Big Baby are straight examples of the trope, but Lotso subverts it; his rage at being abandoned turns him into an evil dictator who rules over Sunnyside Daycare with an iron paw, having slid all the way from tragic into purely vengeful.
  • Trailers Always Spoil:
    • If Buzz's Spanish mode really was supposed to be a comedic twist, it was sure spoiled well ahead of time in many of the previews.
    • One TV spot even showed a clip of the epilogue, loosely spoiling the fact that the toys (or at least Buzz and Jessie) don't die in the incinerator. That scene of their brief dance together during the escape sequence, instead, likely would've worked just fine.
    • On the Disney channel's trailer for the premiere of the movie on their channel they show Lotso being evil by removing Mrs. Potato's mouth.
  • Train Job: Mr Potato Head is robbing money from the train in the opening Action Prologue.
  • Trainstopping: In the opening sequence, Woody fails to save the Runaway Train filled with orphan trolls before it falls over a destroyed bridge... cue the Big Damn Heroes moment for Buzz as he catches the train in midair and saves the day.
  • Traintop Battle: Between Woody and Mr. and Ms. Potato Head in the Fake Action Prologue.
  • Translated Cover Version: The movie ends with the Gipsy Kings performing a cover of the European Spanish-language adaptation of "You've Got a Friend in Me".
  • Trauma Swing: Big Baby sitting upon the playground swing staring at the moon.
  • True Companions: An overacting theme.
    • Buzz refuses to join Lotso and the older toys in the more pleasant Butterfly Room if the rest of his friends can't join him... though, less heartwarmingly, Lotso and the other toys just pop open Buzz's battery case and reset him so that he'll be their enforcer instead instead. Buzz even says that he and the rest of Andy's toys are "a family".
    • At the end of the film Woody decides not to go to college with Andy; he decides to join his friends with Bonnie as their new owner instead.
  • Two Girls to a Team: Jessie and Mrs. Potato Head among Andy's (and later Bonnie's) toys.
  • Unconventional Food Usage: Mr. Potato Head uses a tortilla and (when a bird eats the tortilla) a cucumber as temporary bodies.
  • Underside Ride: During Woody's first escape from the Sunnyside daycare center, he crosses floors by riding underneath the janitor's trolley.
  • Unfortunate Names: Dolly considered "Woody" to be one, Lampshaded questioning Woody's decision in keeping his name.
    Dolly: Of course, this is coming from a doll named Dolly, so...
  • Ungrateful Bastard: Towards the end of the film, Woody and Buzz push Lotso up a ladder so he can press a button that would stop the conveyor belt they were on, allowing Andy's toys and Lotso to avoid the incinerator. Lotso makes it to the button but does not press it, only giving the gang a cold look, telling Woody "Where's your kid now, Sheriff?" and leaving the gang to die.
  • Unicorn: Buttercup, who is surprisingly sarcastic.
  • Unresolved Sexual Tension: Between Buzz and Jessie. Surprisingly no Relationship Upgrade happens.
  • Unspoken Plan Guarantee: The only detail we get to hear of the Great Escape plan is that they will use the garbage chutes to escape, and of course, everything works perfectly up until that stage of the escape.
  • Unwitting Instigator of Doom: By accidentally leaving Lotso behind and replacing him with an identical bear, Daisy and her parents caused Lotso to undergo a Start of Darkness. This in turn allowed him to take over Sunnyside and rule over it like a tyrannical dictator, resulting in a lot of suffering and broken toys.
  • Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Lotso used to be a sweet toy, according to Chuckles; never was there a stronger bond between child and toy than between Daisy and Lotso. Then Lotso, Big Baby, and Chuckles were accidentally left behind on a family picnic, and by the time they made it back home, Daisy had a new Lots-O-Huggin Bear...
  • Vengeful Abandoned Toy: Lotso is a sociopathic teddy bear who hates all humans and toys due to being accidentally abandoned by his owner and replaced. He believes that no child has ever genuinely loved a toy and that all toys are just trash waiting to be thrown away.
  • Villainous Breakdown: Lotso is cheerfully calm until Woody mentions Daisy, Lotso's previous owner. After that, he slowly becomes less charming and more furious, to the point where he rants that children and toys are incapable of loving each other until he goes too far and pushes Big Baby's Berserk Button.
  • Villains Out Shopping: Some of Lotso's gang are seen gambling in the vending machine before they capture Buzz.
  • Villains Want Mercy: Lotso begs Woody and Buzz to help him survive at the trash dump even after he had been screwing them over for most of the film as well as being the reason why they all ended up in the dump in the first place.
  • Visual Pun: In the Western prologue, Buzz shouts out, "Glad I could catch the train!" as he literally catches the train and flies it out of the gorge.
  • The Voiceless: Totoro can make growls and roaring sounds in his original appearance, but he's completely silent in this movie.
  • Weapon Specialization: In the intro, Woody is shown to be quite adept with a whip.
  • We Can Rule Together: To Buzz and, to a lesser extent, Barbie. To their credit, the bad guys make an effort to be as nice as possible while doing this. You don't even realize that Lotso is a villain until Buzz rejects his offer.
  • We Need a Distraction: During the break-out, Mr. Potato Head fakes an escape to distract Buzz and the Cymbal-Banging Monkey, so that Woody and Slinky Dog can slip out unnoticed.
  • Wham Episode: Andy gives away his toys to Bonnie.
  • Wham Line:
    • When Slink reveals that all the other toys are gone:
      Woody: Guys, hey, hold up! We need a staff meeting! Everyone? A staff meeting!
      [everyone else groans in boredom]
      Hamm: Not again...!
      Woody: Oh, come on! Slink? Gather everyone up!
      Slinky: Uh... We are gathered, Woody!
    • The moment we learn about Lotso's true nature?
      Lotso: [to Buzz] Family man, huh? I understand. Put him back in the timeout chair.
      ** Woody, when asking Bonnie's toys to greet his fellows if they ever get to Sunnyside Daycare.
      Dolly: You came from Sunnyside?
      Trixie: But how'd you escape?
      Woody: Well, it wasn't easy but I... [beat] What do you mean "escape"?
    • Two more in rapid succession: "I don't think that's daylight..." and "Where's your kid now, Sheriff?!"
  • Wham Shot: Three in rapid succession in the climax.
    • The toys have escaped the giant shredder, and Rex believes he can see daylight at the end of the shaft they're being carried towards. Woody realizes it's not daylight, and the camera zooms ahead to reveal the toys are heading for a raging inferno of an incinerator.
    • Shortly afterwards, Lotso has Woody and Buzz help him up a step to climb a ladder to shut off the shaft and save them all. He finally reaches the top, just as the others are dangerously close to falling in. Then he begins frowning as Woody and Buzz frantically beg him to push the button, and then sneers. "Where's your kid now, Sheriff?!" And he runs off. The toys have been betrayed and are dumped into the fiery hell.
    • After a few minutes of futilely trying to scramble up the slope, it's clear that it's not working. Jessie asks Buzz what to do. Buzz just looks at her for a moment... and gently takes her hand.
  • "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The Creative Closing Credits.
  • Where Is Your X Now?: When Lotso abandons the toys to die in the incinerator, he shouts at them, "Where's your kid now, Sheriff?!". Also counts as a Wham Line.
  • Wimp Fight: Between Hamm and Rex during the escape plan. Understandable since only one of them actually has arms.
  • Wipe That Smile Off Your Face: Mrs. Potato Head gets her mouth pulled off when she starts complaining, but her husband snatches it back for her.
  • Women Prefer Strong Men: Played for laughs when Mrs. Potato head meets Twitch.
  • World of Ham: The Fake-Out Opening. Imagine lines like "Well, I brought My DINOSAUR, WHO EATS FORCE FIELD DOGS!" and "That's MR. Evil Dr. Pork Chop to you!" taken perfectly seriously.
  • Would Hurt a Child: To show how horrible is Lotso, he shoves Big Baby (a toy, mentally a baby) in the stomach during his Motive Rant.
  • You Have to Believe Me!: Woody tries to convince the other toys that Andy indeed wanted to move them to the attic and not in the garbage truck. They don't believe him until much later, when Ms. Potato Head uses her Eye Spy to reveal the truth.
  • You Wouldn't Believe Me If I Told You: When Mr. Potato Head walks up to the group with a cucumber for a body.
    Mr. Potato Head: You would not believe what I've been through tonight!


Whatever happens, we'll always be together.
For infinity and beyond.
Woody and Buzz

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Woody and Buzz save Lotso

Woody and Buzz save Lotso from a shredder without hesitation, even though it was Lotso's fault in the first place that any of them were in a life-threatening situation. Unfortunately, Lotso wouldn't return the favor soon after.

How well does it match the trope?

4.94 (17 votes)

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