Tim Allen Criticizes Disney’s Lightyear For Not Connecting With It’s Audience

Jacob Smith |

Jul 4, 2022

Lightyear is currently on pace to be a massive box office failure for Disney and Pixar this year. Going into its third week at the box office, the film has yet to recoup it’s $200 million dollar production budget, making it poised to lose well over $100 million dollars for the company.

Tim Allen, who was replaced as the voice of Buzz Lightyear by MCU actor Chris Evans, has finally shared his thoughts of the film, and why he did not return to voice the character in the first place. During an interview with Extra, Allen said the Toy Story prequel film is completely different from the original films that he voiced.

“The short answer is I’ve stayed out of this because it has nothing to do with my character,” he said.

“We talked about this many years ago but the brass that did the first four movies is not this. This is a whole new team that really had nothing to do with the first movies.” Allen continued. He would go on to explain how despite being a Lightyear solo film, there wasn’t any audience connection to the character in his own movie.

“There’s really no ‘Toy Story’ Buzz without Woody. It just doesn’t seem to have any connection to the toy. It has no relationship to Buzz. It’s just no connection. I wish there was a better connection.” Allen commented at one point he thought that the film was going to be a live action movie, but plans changed in development.

Disney made a series of mistakes that led to a majority of it’s family friendly audience staying away from movie theaters to see the film. Activists surrounding the movie’s release focused the majority of their marketing on the same sex lesbian kiss scene in a kids movie that led to online backlash, and the film being banned in multiple countries including Saudi Arabia and China.

Lightyear director Angus MacLane confirmed that the character in question wasn’t even intended to be in the film in early development. MacLane revealed the character of Buzz Lightyear was supposed to be paired with a fellow female Space Ranger, whom he was going to share a romantic relationship with. However, MacLane opted to go the route of LGBTQ representation after deciding that Lightyear wouldn’t work with a romantic lead.

Radical Left-wing employees at Disney then proceeded to pressure the company to take a stance on Florida’s Parental Rights in Education bill, which bans the teaching of sexuality and transgenderism to children between kindergarten and third grade, and the studio decided to add the kiss scene back in the movie to avoid further backlash.

Chris Evans then proceeded to call anyone who had a problem with the same-sex kiss is an “idiot” who will “die off like the dinosaurs,” indirectly slamming every Muslim in the middle east.

“The real truth is those people are idiots. There’s always going to be people who are afraid and unaware and trying to hold on to what was before. But those people die off like dinosaurs.” Evans said in an interview with Reuters.

“I think the goal is to pay them no mind, march forward and embrace the growth that makes us human.” he added. Evans continued his frustration with those upset about the scene, citing that it bothers him that same-sex relationships are still a problem in the first place.

With an initial production budget of $200 million, Lightyear is looking at the same budget that 2019’s Toy Story 4 had, which needed $700 million to break even. Toy Story 4 went on to make over a billion dollars, while Lightyear has yet to top the $200 million mark as of this writing.

With the failure of Lightyear at it’s feet, Disney will be looking heavily next week at Thor: Love and Thunder to make an impact, and save Disney’s box office profits.

Lightyear is in it’s third week at the box office and will now being competing with Universal Pictures Minions: The Rise of Gru, which has so far grossed $221 million worldwide, easily eclipsing its Disney competitor by leaps and bounds.

What are your thoughts on Tim Allen’s comments about Lightyear?

NEXT: Disney’s Lightyear Flops At The Box Office Following Chris Evans Comments On Same Sex Kiss Scene