Oscars 2020: Toy Story 4 becomes Disney-Pixar's first franchise to win two Academy Awards

Talk about having a friend: Toy Story 4 has become the first franchise to earn two animated film Oscars. The Disney and Pixar collaboration won the Academy Award on Sunday for the Best-Animated Feature. The franchise’s third instalment Toy Story 3 took home the trophy in 2011. Toy Story 4 continued to tell the story of Buzz Lightyear, voiced by Tim Allen, and Woody, voiced by Tom Hanks, who this time unexpectedly reunites with his longtime friend Bo Peep. Woody is ultimately faced with the decision of how he wants to live his life as a toy. It also introduced the new character Forky. The film has made more than $1 billion worldwide. Accepting the award, director Josh Cooley said, “We hope your adventures with Woody and Buzz made growing up a little easier.”

#Oscars Moment: See the winner for Best Animated Film: @Pixar's @ToyStory 4. pic.twitter.com/2xyTHyP0Yo

— The Academy (@TheAcademy) February 10, 2020

Its signature song ‘I Can’t Let You Throw Yourself Away’ by Randy Newman is nominated in the Best Original Song category. He also wrote the song ‘You’ve Got a Friend in Me’ for the first instalment and ‘We Belong Together’ for the third. The series — which started off as the first feature-length film to be fully computer-animated — is credited with changing the ways animated films are made, spawning other creative endeavours at Pixar that would later lead to Monsters Inc., The Incredibles and Ratatouille. Toy Story 4 beat out Missing Link, I Lost My Body, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World and Klaus. [caption id=“attachment_8024001” align=“alignnone” width=“1200”]  Still from Toy Story 4. Image via Twitter[/caption] According to a report by Variety, Toy Story 4 was the biggest grosser among the nominees with box-office collections of $434 million in North America and $1.07 billion worldwide. The first instalment of the Toy Story franchise was released in 1995 and Toy Story 2 hit the theatres in 1999. Since 1995, technological advancements in the field of animation has made the Toy Story franchise a pathbreaking model in the genre. Speaking to Agence France-Presse in 2019, Toy Story 4 director said, “Pixar’s foundation is Toy Story,” describing Woody, Buzz and Rex as the studio’s “Mickey, Donald and Goofy.” “I felt a great pressure, I could not sleep. But at the same time it was an honour because I love these characters very much,” he added. (With inputs from The Associated Press)