In a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, timed to the Toy Story 30th anniversary celebrations, three-time Oscar-winning Pixar writer-director (and the studio’s current Chief Creative Officer) Pete Docter shared his memories of the game changing film’s creation, discussed its legacy and addressed key issues facing the animation industry today.
Among the conversation points were the impact of generative artificial intelligence (AI) on the future of Toon Town. Docter took a pragmatic approach to the question, acknowledging the tech’s utility but asserting that true creativity remains — at least for now — solely within the reach of human wetware.
Docter told THR:
“I think we are at in so many ways, right? We’re at this weird crossroads or a new horizon, a lot like streaming. It’s not new anymore, but I think it’s still a little bit of the Wild West of what exactly the types of shows people are looking for and the delivery mechanism, the storytelling. I think we are at a place now where two, three generations have grown up on Toy Story specifically. And so what’s going to be new and surprising to them, I think we’re always trying to reach for that. We’ve got some cool stuff in the works that is an attempt to answer that question in our way, but I think it’ll be really interesting.
And the technology, the same thing. Toy Story was a real game changer for a lot of my peers that studied hand-drawn animation. That’s how we thought. I pictured, I’d be sitting at a desk drawing Mickey Mouse and instead I’m with a mouse and I’m moving a puppet virtually in screen. And people were like, ‘What?’ at that time. And now that’s become a commonplace. And I think the latest is AI that just makes people go, What? I type in polar bear in the city having a Coca-Cola and it happens. So how useful is that? I think the answer is that in the end, why do we watch these things? It’s to feel something, to speak to our own experience as human beings. And AI can do that somewhat. And I think it’s a great tool for people who know how to use it to say something about the human experience. And so I think it will be a game changer, but still most effective and most powerful in the hands of artists and storytellers.
My experience so far in a lot of different ways, it’s kind of like it takes something and sands the edges down, so it makes the blob average. And that could be very useful in a lot of ways. But if you really want to do something brand new and really insightful and speak from a personal angle, that’s not going to come from AI fully. It only ever create what’s been fed into it. It doesn’t create anything new, it creates a weird amalgam of stuff that’s been poured into it.”
Read the full interview on THR‘s website.
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