Every film — at least, every decent film — comes with a message. In children’s movies, this message is often simple and sweet: Family is important (Frozen), racism is bad (Zootopia), everyone deserves a second chance (Despicable Me), there’s no place like home (The Wizard of Oz).

Then there’s Toy Story.

In 1995, Toy Story was the first film from a little studio called Pixar. Like many children’s movies before it, Toy Story preached a sunny message of friendship and tolerance.

But even as Woody embraced Buzz in the final frame, a smile on his face, there was a hint of something more nuanced and uncomfortable in the film’s underlying philosophy.

With each passing sequel over the next two and a half decades, that dark current became more and more pronounced.

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Now, with the benefit of hindsight, I’ve realised a movie franchise I fell in love with as a child is so excellent because it’s a 24-year-old long therapy session to help cope with the painful truths of existence.

At my screening of Toy Story 4 the adults far outnumbered the children, and by the end of the film, we were all crying.

Toy Story 4 — and all of the Toy Story films — have always been about Woody getting older. And whether you’re a boomer, Gen X-er, or millennial projecting onto Woody’s journey, we can all agree that getting older sucks.

But, as Woody comes to realise with each passing sequel, you kinda just have to learn to deal.

TOY STORY: WOODY FALLS FROM HIS THRONE

The first Toy Story finds Woody (voiced by the wonderful Tom Hanks) in the prime of his life. He’s at the height of his toy career. His face is on the bedspread. His picture is on the wall. He’s the leader of the gang. He always, always, always gets picked to be played with. He’s Andy’s favourite. He believes, naively, that this is how it always will be.

As you likely remember, that doesn’t last. In fact, never again in this now-four-film franchise will Woody be as successful at being a toy as he was in the first 15 minutes of Toy Story. That’s thanks, at first, to Buzz Lightyear (voiced by Tim Allen), Andy’s birthday gift. Buzz

is Andy’s new favourite toy, and Woody’s worldview is shattered. Desperate to return to the status quo, he attempts to get rid of Buzz and regain his crown. There’s a subplot in there about Buzz facing reality and learning his own limitations (“You! are! a! toy!”), but the real lesson is learned by Woody when he gives a pep talk to Buzz: Woody’s not the most important person in the room anymore, at least, not to Andy. Buzz is.

That’s the lesson the first Toy Story has for us: You will, eventually, be knocked down a peg in life; whether in your career, your relationships, your social life, or something else. Unless you’re Meryl Streep, there will always be someone newer, better and more buzzed (pun intended) about than you. You must accept this fall gracefully.

Of course, as soon as Woody learns this lesson — as soon as he accepts the possibility that Andy may love him a little bit less than he once did — he is rewarded with Andy’s continued devotion and a new best friend. As it turns out, the spotlight is less lonely when it’s shared. But, as the next three films illustrate, life will also never be the same.

TOY STORY 2: WOODY RECKONS WITH MORTALITY

Toy Story 2 — the 1999 sequel to the first film that many consider better than the original — asks: What lesson must we learn after we accept our fall from grace?

The answer: The inevitability of our deterioration and eventual death! (Don’t look at me — I didn’t write the movie!) The inciting incident of the first film — Buzz’s arrival — sparks Woody’s fear that he may not always be Andy’s favourite toy.

The inciting incident of the second — a rip in Woody’s arm — sparks his fear that he may not always be Andy’s toy, period. That arm rip is the toy equivalent of discovering a grey hair or any bodily defect that reminds us of our own fragility.

Woody dreams of Andy throwing him in the garbage and sees himself in Wheezy, a broken toy that Andy’s mum decides is garage sale material.

Mortality is a scary thought, and Woody briefly allows fear to control him. When two toys he was previously in a collection with, Stinky Pete and Jessie, present him with an alternative to decay and disposal — life in a museum, never to see Andy or be played again — he takes the opportunity. Briefly.

Then Buzz talks some sense into him, teaching Woody the lesson of Toy Story 2: Fear of abandonment, ageing, and yes, death, cannot keep us from living. He returns to his life with Andy, and says he ready to face whatever the future brings, as long as Buzz is at his side.

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TOY STORY 3: WOODY ACCEPTS HIS DEATH

I think a lot of us were understandably taken aback when our favourite anthropomorphic toys were stoically prepared to die via inferno in 2010’s Toy Story 3. But after your hero has accepted his mortality, what else is there to do than put that lesson to the test? As promised in Toy Story 2, when Woody and his friends are out of options, betrayed by villainous bear Lotso and inching toward a trash incinerator and death, Woody accepts his fate, with Buzz at his side.

Of course, given that this is still technically a children’s movie, Woody does not die. Instead, he is again rewarded for learning his lesson. He’s saved by “The Claw,” and given a second chance with a new child named Bonnie.

Left at that, the Toy Story franchise is still clinging to a sugar-coated lesson: If you’re patient and gracious about ageing, eventually you’ll get another shot. But that’s where Toy Story 4 comes in.

TOY STORY 4: WOODY FINALLY LETS GO OF THE PAST

Warning: Spoilers for Toy Story 4 past this point.

Toy Story 4 reveals that Woody did not, in fact, relive his glory days with Bonnie. Woody is not Bonnie’s favourite.

He rarely gets picked to play. His sheriff badge is literally plucked from him and put on Jessie instead. It’s a hit to his ego, clearly, but Woody thinks he’s fine because he’s found a way to cling to his past importance: By training his replacement, Forky (voiced by Tony Hale).

Forky, like Woody, has lost his purpose and is desperate to get it back — it just so happens that Forky feels his purpose is being in the trash.

Forky can’t understand why Woody insists Forky be there for Bonnie as her favourite toy, and Woody can’t understand why Forky doesn’t see that as a position of success and honour.

Enter Bo Peep, who, unlike Woody, doesn’t mourn the good ol’ days. Instead of trying to recapture her old purpose after her child gave her away, Bo Peep found a new purpose.

And this is the lesson Toy Story 4 has for us, and Woody: At some point, you must let go of the past. You must realign your view of yourself to fit who you are right now, not who you used to be, or who you think you should be.

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As Bo Beep tells Duke Caboom, a new character voiced by Keanu Reeves who laments that he can’t live up to the stunts in his commercial, “Be the Duke you are right now.” So Woody leaves his old life behind. He finally stops trying to get back those 15 minutes we saw in 1995, and that’s where the Toy Story franchise leaves us.

Pixar has no official plan for Toy Story 5 yet, and I honestly hope it stays that way. Toy Story 4 manages to justify its existence — against all odds — but if we are to take the lessons of this latest film to heart, then the proper thing to do is to say goodbye to this franchise.

Toy Story will never again be the revelation it was in 1995, and that’s OK. And really, after you learn to accept failure, accept mortality, accept death, and let go of the past, what else is left?

This story first appeared on Decider and has been republished here with permission