Now that the next installment in the Toy Story franchise is about to hit theaters, Patricia Heaton has a few things to say about it. In a tweet she shared this week, Patricia slammed Disney for replacing Tim Allen as Buzz Lightyear in Lightyear, which comes out on June 17. She’s not afraid to defend her friend!
‘Lightyear’ tells the backstory of one of Andy’s most beloved toys.
Starring Chris Evans in the title role, we’ll get to watch the movie that, in the Toy Story universe, preceded the release of the Buzz Lightyear toy from the movies. Until now, the character — as a toy — has always been voiced by Tim Allen, but because the movie is about his origin story, Chris is supplying his take on the character.
Yes, it’s a little confusing — but basically, think of Lightyear as the movie Andy watched before getting the Buzz Lightyear toy for his birthday.
Now, Patricia is speaking out.
The former Everybody Loves Raymond star is good friends with her fellow sitcom actor Tim, who is known for starring in Home Improvement in the ’90s, and she’s not taking this casting lying down.
“Tim Allen in the role that he originated, the role that he owns. Tim IS Buzz! Why would they completely castrate this iconic, beloved character?” she wrote.
She doubled down on her opinion in a follow-up tweet.
After Patricia realized that Buzz Lightyear, the character in the new movie, and Buzz Lightyear, the toy, are two separate entities, she kind of understood where the casting was coming from … but she still stood her ground that Tim is the best man for the job.
“Ok so the current Buzz Lightyear movie is an origin story — but the reason the character became so beloved is because of what @ofctimallen created. Why remove the one element that makes us want to see it?” she added.
So far, Tim hasn’t responded to her tweets.
There is a good reason why he wasn’t brought on to reprise his role, though.
“Tim Allen is Buzz Lightyear the toy,” Lightyear producer Galyn Sussman said in a press conference, via Consequence of Film. “We weren’t making a Toy Story movie. We’re making Buzz Lightyear’s movie. And so first and foremost, we just needed a different person playing that Lightyear, separate from the toy.”
There’s absolutely no denying the impact that Buzz and the original ‘Toy Story’ characters have had.
After all, if Tim hadn’t made the role so iconic, the new Lightyear movie probably wouldn’t even be happening. And of course, when we hear the words “to infinity and beyond,” we’ll always hear them in Tim’s voice first — especially those of us who have watched the movies over and over with our own kids.
But it’s going to be fun to see what Chris can do with the role. Bring it on!