The Toy Story character was inspired by an episode of The Twilight Zone.

In Josh Cooley’s Toy Story 4, Woody (Tom Hanks) falls out of the family van during a road trip and ends up with a group of lost toys. As viewers of the previous Toy Story movies know, toys are only happy when children play with them, and lost toys find a way to travel around the neighborhood’s many public parks, burrowing into sandboxes just as some preschools are ending. . Lost toys live in a strange state of chaotic bliss.

Toys that are not played with, meanwhile, become bitter and angry. That was true of old prospector Stinky Pete (Kelsey Grammer) in 1999’s Toy Story 2, and it’s certainly true of Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks) in Toy Story 4. Gabi is a decades-old talking doll who ended up in an antique shop in a small town. However, no one will buy Gabby because her inner voice broke years ago. Gabby has become the owner of the antique shop and is willing to keep any toys in captivity. Only after Woody offers up his inner voice box will she free his friend Forky (Tony Hale).

Gabby Gabby, as many may recognize, was just the latest in a long line of creepy talking dolls to appear in movies or on television. Scary dolls have appeared in movies like The Reds, The Magic, Barbarella, Trilogy of Terror, Poltergeist, The Dolls, Demonic Toys, Child’s Play, Saw, Annabelle, Dead Silence and “M3GAN” to name a few. Scary dolls have long been a part of horror movies, and Toy Story 4 just tapped into the deep undercurrent of natural fear that audiences hold for creepy, immobile porcelain faces.

In 2019, director Cooley admitted in an interview with EW that Gabby was inspired by the leader of all creepy screen dolls, Taki Tina, the seemingly intelligent toy from the Twilight Zone episode “The Living Doll.”

In The Living Doll (November 1, 1963), a young girl, Christy (Tracy Stratford), is given an expensive talking doll (voiced by June Foray) by her mother Annabelle (Mary La Roche), much to the girl’s horror. new stepfather Erich (Telly Savalas). The doll named Talky Tina only says warm phrases like “I love you very much.” Erich hates the doll, but it is an obvious outlet for his frustration at not being able to have children with Annabelle herself; he is barren.

Erich spends time alone with Tina and she starts to say that he doesn’t like her. He then begins to respond directly to what he says. At first, Erich assumes that Annabelle or Christy are playing a prank on him, but by the end of the episode, Erich is convinced that Tina is alive. Revenge is planned. Tina’s last line in the episode is “My name is Taki Tina and you better be good to me.” Cooling.

Cooley said Talky Tina was a pretty direct inspiration for Gabby Gabby. He said the world of Toy Story had yet to experience the cinematic legacy of creepy toy dolls, and Gabby was the perfect opportunity. He noted:

“I always liked The Twilight Zone and things like Talky Tina. We’ve never seen such creepy old dolls in Toy Story, and this was an opportunity to do so. (… ) Gabby has been at this antique shop for over 60 years. Gabby is the perfect toy, except for the fact that one thing was broken that prevented me from buying it. loved forever.”

Unfortunately, due to CBS owning “The Twilight Zone,” it wouldn’t be easy to do legally factual Talkative Tina the villain in Toy Story 4. But then when Talky Tina had being the villain would open up a whole can about all the living dolls in horror movies and how they can all live in the same universe as Toy Story. And that would bother too many kids.