Pixar designer updates Buzz Lightyear, gives Woody a bald spot for Toy Story 5

Pixar's original Buzz Lightyear designer has given Woody a bald spot and introduced 50 new high-tech space ranger toy models as the studio prepares to release Toy Story 5 on June 19.

The redesigns reflect both Pixar's advancing animation technology and the passage of time within the story, as the film pits 50 newly designed high-tech space ranger toys against the franchise's classic characters.

Bob Pauley, the production designer credited with first creating Buzz Lightyear, said Pixar's rendering and animation tools have advanced so substantially between films that every character must be rebuilt from scratch for each new installment.

"Every time we start a 'Toy Story' the technology has been racing ahead with those other movies," Pauley told On The Red Carpet. "And so we have to rebuild them or change them or allow them to work with the new programs."

For Toy Story 5, that rebuild includes 50 new high-tech space ranger toy models designed to accompany the revamped Buzz. The new toys drive the film's central conflict: Bonnie, the young girl who owns the classic characters, receives a tablet and a fresh generation of playthings that threaten to eclipse her beloved toys, according to ABC7.

Woody has not escaped the passage of time either. Pauley confirmed the cowboy now sports a bald spot — a deliberate design choice reflecting the character's years away from home.

"We're all getting older and Woody has, you know, he's been off with Bo out on the road and maybe let himself go a little bit," Pauley said.

The changes reinforce Pixar's broader philosophy: its characters are living figures rebuilt anew with every technological leap, not frozen icons.

Toy Story 5, a Pixar production distributed by the Walt Disney Company, opens in theaters June 19.