Bo Peep is not so sheepish after her film makeover
Toy Story character sheds her flouncy skirts and passive attitude to become a modern feminist heroine
IN THE classic nursery rhyme, she is generally depicted as a pretty yet passive young shepherdess, waiting for her sheep to come home.
But as she makes her return to popular culture in Toy Story 4, Bo Peep has been given a feminist makeover, with an athletic body and practical trousers to seize “control of her own destiny”.
The film’s makers claim their modern Bo Peep will be “independent and comfortable” in the latest instalment of the franchise .
Bo Beep was missing from the last film in the series. The character found herself sick of gathering dust and “took it upon herself to head out into the world” and make her return, according to the director, Josh Cooley.
Wearing trousers instead of her pink-spotted, full-length shepherdess dress and bonnet, the new version of Bo Peep is simply the “right way to tell the story”, he added.
She now wears a blue jump suit and purple cape, and wields her crook as a weapon.
The animated series has come under scrutiny in the past year after the departure of John Lasseter, the Toy Story director. He left his role at Disney Animation after allegations about his behaviour, including “unwanted hugs”.
But the Toy Story 4 creators insisted that changes to female roles were not the direct result of a postmetoo philosophy.
“It never came up in a meeting,” said Mr Cooley. “Like, ‘We need to make a stand on feminism.’ It was more a question of what the right way to tell the story was, and we wanted to make Bo stronger than before.
“When Woody is insecure in the old films, she gets him back on track, and we decided to elevate that.
“Things like that came naturally, and we started five years ago, so had no idea how times might change.” Actress Annie Potts, who voices Bo Peep, said: “She’s gotten all wise and courageous. She is a fierce warrior.”
The Sunday Times reported that a team of six women had been appointed to update the “stuffy character” and ensure she was fit for the cinema of 2019.
Inspirations for the new Bo included Rey from Star Wars, Olympic gymnast Aly Raisman, and Geena Davis’s character Dottie Hinson in the baseball film A League Of Their Own.
While the dress-wearing Bo Peep was seen as “feminine and reserved”, it said, the modern version should be “independent and comfortable”.
“Bo’s taken control of her own destiny,” Mr Cooley said in a press release.
He added: “While Woody was watching Andy grow up, Bo gathered dust until she took it upon herself to head out into the world. And when Woody shows up, they can’t believe that they’ve found each other again.”
Robbie Collin, film critic for The Daily Telegraph, who awarded Toy Story 4 five stars, described the character as “unceremoniously written out of the series between instalments two and three but here revived as a free spirit in retirement, sunnily embracing her newfound childlessness”.
The European premiere of Toy Story 4 was held at the Odeon Luxe in Leicester Square yesterday afternoon, with Tom Hanks, who has voiced Woody since work first began on the franchise in 1991, saying the emotional denouement left him experiencing a “transcendental moment”. Speaking on the red carpet, the 62-year-old said: “I got a text from Tim Allen [who plays Buzz Lightyear], who said: ‘Have you seen these last few pages?’ And I had not.
“He was still recovering from the process of recording them. I wasn’t sure what the last page was going to be.
“I actually had a transcendental moment of going back to 1991 when we started all of this. I was in the same room with the same engineers with some of the same people. I had to take a moment to collect myself.”
Toy Story 4 is released in UK cinemas on June 21