“Sid, look,” Andy says as he scrolls through Luxo Jr., “They have Lightyear!”
“Really” says Sid as he sits next to Andy on the couch, a bowl of popcorn in his hand, “That movie must be, what, 20-25 years old?”
Andy grabs a handful of popcorn. “I used to love this movie when I was younger.”
“Your 5-slash-6-year-old butt loved a semi-realistic space movie?”
“Hey!” Andy throws popcorn at Sid. “What kid wouldn’t love going into space? Besides, I was a very sophisticated 5-slash-6 year old.”
“Uh huh” responds Sid through a mouth full of popcorn.
“It’s true,” says Andy aloud, then mumbling “but I liked Buzz Lightyear of Star Command better when I was younger.”
Sid snorts. “Ha! I knew it.”
“Well,Star Command had all of those colorful aliens, a lot of action, and a lot of jokes. It was a little boy’s dream, even a sophisticated one. I started to appreciate Lightyear more as I got older.”
“Well, since I was older when both of them came out, I liked how down-to-Earth Lightyear was. It was like…something I could achieve if I became an astronaut. Star Command was a bit cartoony for me, but ironically I like it more as I got older. I appreciated the interesting story arcs they had.”
“In that case, how about we watch Lightyear now, and some Star Commandafterward.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Andy’s lips curve in a half-smile. “And later, we can watch Woody’s Roudup. They had the-”
Sid’s face goes pale. “No, no, no, no, no. If you’re watching Woody’s Roundup later, you’re watching that by yourself.”
Andy laughs. “You fear of everything Woody is adorable. Are you ever going to tell me why?”
“That, Davis” Sid says as he presses play on the movie, “Is a secret I’ll take to my grave.”
XR appears in the show Buzz Lightyear of Star Command and it’s movie Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins. His name (or rather initials) stands for Experimental Ranger. He is a robot Space Ranger created purely to be expendable and a partner to Buzz Lightyear. He has been put back together after his very first mission. He has an evil older brother, XL (who has since reformed), and regards Commander Nebula, the leader of Star Command, as his father.
XR used to appear in the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin attraction in Walt Disney World, though due to increasing obscurity and a desire on the part of Disney to be closer in thematic design to the Toy Story films, he was taken out.
TITLE: Buzz Lightyear Instruction Manual AUTHOR:Unknown ORIGIN: Toy Story 3 (movie, 2010, directed by Lee Unkrich)
The instruction manual for the original Buzz Lightyear action figure, released in 1995, when short-sighted retailers did not order enough dolls to meet demand. The toy was based on the character from the cartoon series Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, a spinoff of the popular Lightyear movie trilogy from the 1980s. The manual covers basic operation of the toy: how to retract the visor, extend the wings, replace the batteries, the functions of the various buttons, and so on. Certain things are not explained especially well, however. For instance, contrary to what the manual states, “demo mode” does not reset the doll to its factory settings — a meaningless act in a toy with no customizable settings — but presumably limits its available actions to slow battery drain when on display. Similarly, the reset button serves no obvious purpose, though disobeying the manual’s unexplained warning to not hold it down for more than five seconds does switch the doll’s language settings to Spanish, a helpful feature that the manual perhaps should have mentioned.
I. Handbooks and manuals — Toys and games — Action figures II. Handbooks and manuals — Pseudo-living creatures — Robots, AIs, and golems III. Plot obstacles — Mental tampering — Troubling existential questions
For such a comparatively simple book, I spent an INORDINATELY LONG TIME making this one. I couldn’t find any images that were high-res and/or clear enough to suit me, either from screencaps or from the official replica that came with the extremely expensive Buzz figure from Chogokin, so I ended up making my own by painstakingly tracing over a low-res image. Of course, for full verisimilitude I printed it out and made my own booklet which I then took a picture of. What is wrong with me.
