The Brave Little Toaster: Retro Review
I really don’t remember this movie being anywhere this dark. I mean holy crap, appliances die! I mean that’s no big deal in real life, but considering appliances are apparently sentient here that’s pretty grim. The Jack Nicholson air conditioner seems to give himself a stroke out of frustration, cars are mashed and then they go to the salvage shop… There’s a frankenstein lamp shaver can-opener thing (that acts like Joan Rivers for some reason) and the heroes of the movie literally watch the shop owner murder/mutilate a blender for its motor. The movie even goes as far as to show the blender (which the disloyal shop owner just used a second ago) dripping fluid.
I suppose things have to be at least kind of dark when dealing with the subject matter that this movie is dealing with. There are very few movies that are willing to deal with mortality the way this one does. This goes double for movies directed at children. The only one I can actually think of at the moment is the Toy Story trilogy, especially Toy Story 3. This being a Disney movie and all (which I don’t think I even realized as a child), it acts a pretty spot on precursor to those movies. It makes me actually wonder if the creators of Toy Story got some inspiration from this movie.
I feel like they would have had to. Owner gets older, leaves old possessions behind, possessions make it their mission to get back in touch with the owner, they reunite elsewhere. The whole time, they have to deal with being afraid of no longer being useful and being abandoned for the newer possessions (a la Woody and Buzz). The whole salvage shop scene screams to be compared to Sid’s backyard and there are tons of Lotso Huggin’ Bear parallels, particularly the cars at the junk yard. The appliances even interact with animals and go inert in front of humans!
Speaking of which, I wonder what happened to the appliances that escaped the salvage shop. They literally all ran away. How do they know people aren’t outside? Do they just stop and drop when people pass by? For that matter, why did Toaster and gang run into virtually no humans on their entire trip. They kind of just appear in moments that the main cast can’t otherwise survive. There are quite a few inconsistencies in this movie. I don’t know if the writing process was lazy or just inattentive.
From a storytelling perspective, I’ve always felt that the best stories come about when rules are established and followed. One example of the opposite that’s crazy to me here is that Kirby (a name i think is more than perfect for the vacuum cleaner… who is actually the only one with a name) can’t move without power when the group first departs. This leads one to believe that these appliances all rely on power. This thought is further enforced by the fact that Radio (who’s either caught up in news stories that he apparently makes up instead of receives or has an extremely storied past) mentions his back up batteries.
The only problem is the fact this need doesn’t apply anywhere else. Kirby just starts to roam around unaided. And if electricity really is a factor, why didn’t they all instantly die when they fell into a freakin’ river? Speaking of that scene, Toaster definitely exhibits a paralytic fear of heights, yet he was the one at the beginning who tied blanket around his neck and tried to fly from the counter. There are so many moments where the journey should have ended abruptly, but they only seem to take on injury in certain instances. Luckily repair apparently means resurrection, which is evidenced when “The Master” repairs Toaster at the end. Now that I think about it, maybe the motor that the aforementioned blender was murdered for resurrected another blender or something. Who knows?
It was made for children though, so I’m probably thinking way too hard. Everything else about the movie is pretty great. The most shining feature is the fantastic cast of characters. The main five are all very consistent as far as their personalities are concerned. There could be more arcing, but the diversity and interactions with each other are fantastic. They frequently argue and disagree with a fair amount of insults involved, but they all treat each other like family and take care of each other as such. Even grumpy Kirby shows an immense amount of love for the others. It’s all so strangely human, possibly due to the fantastic voice work from heavyweights like Jon Lovitz, Phil Hartman and Mindy Sterling. I’m not even sure why the title is “The Brave Little Toaster,” because they stick together and they all pretty much get equal screen treatment. I don’t even think there’s a clear leader to the group (I just know it’s not stupid Lampy or childish Blanky). Maybe it should’ve been called “Appliance Adventures” or something.
Jonathan Thomas Jones is a speculative fiction author and founder of geekhavenreviews.com. He has been passionate about all things geek for his entire life. See more about him at jonathanthomasjones.com and follow him on twitter @jtgloryjones.
