We’re quickly approaching the wrap-up phase of the story, where all but the most major problems facing the toys will be solved in a quick yet satisfying way. As in Toy Story 2, the seemingly impossible task of getting the toys home in turns out to be far less difficult than it looks. Sid’s earlier cameo pays off by allowing the toys to identify the garbage truck that will take them back to Andy. Even if we don’t realize that the garbageman is Sid, we and the toys both remember his penchant for rocking out. Why the garbage truck is visiting Andy’s home for the second time in less than a week is never explained, but it’s a minor detail and again, the movie provides solid answers to most other questions we might have, so I’m okay with letting one or two slide. The toys return to Andy’s house and hose themselves off, keeping Andy’s happiness at discovering his old toys weren’t thrown away from being tempered by puzzlement over why they’re covered in grim and non-toxic finger paints and smell like a dump. Since Andy’s room is nearly empty, Mrs. Potato Head can easily locate her missing eye. The only issue that isn’t yet resolved is the one that has been plaguing the toys since the start of the movie: where do they belong now that Andy has outgrown them?

Where the toys belong.

We know almost right away that Mr. Potato Head’s attempted escape is part of the plan. Even before the tortilla comes into play, we see that it’s a diversion to keep the cymbal monkey occupied so that Slinky can escape. What Barbie is up to is a little less clear. There’s no acknowledgement from either Barbie or the other characters that her plea for Ken to take her back is also part of the plan. We still don’t know Barbie quite as well as we know the rest of the toys, so it’s not beyond thinking that she really has broken down under the stress of incarceration in the Butterfly Room. She has started to prove her loyalty to the toys by choosing to share their fate rather than stay with her new boyfriend. But when we learn what she’s really doing at Ken’s Dream House, her status as part of the toys’ family is confirmed.

Ken\’s fashion show under the cut.

The reveal of Lotso’s true nature comes slowly. We might suspect that he knew more than he let on about the kind of playtime the toys could expect in the Caterpillar Room. As the toy in charge at Sunnyside, how could he not? But when Buzz breaks out of the Caterpillar Room and discovers the Butterfly Room elite gambling in the top of a vending machine, it raises the possibility that something is going on behind Lotso’s back. These are the toys that we and Buzz hear dismissing the newcomers as “toddler fodder” unlikely to last very long. And when Lotso discovers that the other toys have tied Buzz up to interrogate him, his concern seems genuine. Even his explanation for the way Sunnyside is run doesn’t sound unreasonable to either Buzz or the audience. It’s not possible for all of the toys to stay in the Butterfly Room; some of them would inevitably be moved back into the Caterpillar Room by Sunnyside’s human staff. And the idea of putting the newest toys in with the toddlers, with the promise of someday moving up to the Butterfly Room, sounds like a fair system. But the other toys’ suggestions from earlier that Buzz and his friends are unlikely to last a week at Sunnyside hints at how the system is completely stacked against any new toy. Buzz doesn’t know this yet. He gets on Lotso’s bad side not by figuring out that the Caterpillar Room toys don’t stand a chance, but by turning down Lotso’s offer to move into the Butterfly Room while his friends remain where they are,

Lotso as a villain, behind the cut.

Andy’s mom pulls into the parking lot and the toys get their first look at their possible new home: Sunnyside Daycare. Woody is still trying to maintain order. All he wants is to get everyone back to Andy’s house and that’s not going to happen if the other toys start to see daycare as a viable alternative to the attic. But that’s exactly what’s happening. I particularly love Rex’s line here. All of the other toys are excited by glimpses of the playground and the promise of happy children who will play with them, but Rex concludes that daycare must be a nice place solely because they have a rainbow on the door.

Inside Sunnyside, under the cut