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Thank God for Barbie. I had read a few reviews of “Toy Story 3” before seeing it, and had two main worries going in. First, that it nfl throwback jerseys
was some sort of anti-daycare (and, by extension, anti-working mother) screed; and that it might over-fetishize the relationship between a toy and a particular child, to the extent of moralizing about the need to sustain that relationship well past the point of playability. To express that second concern differently, I was afraid that I would never be able to get rid of a toy again without drama, and in a New York apartment that really is a problem. There is no “attic mode” in this town.

Happily, in addition to proving that you can look great in an astronaut suit and high heels, Barbie saves the movie (though she doesn’t do it alone; one of nfl jerseys
the points, in fact, is that most things worth doing are worth doing with others). (And I will insert a general spoiler alert here.) She, and not Buzz, or Woody, or the damaged Jessie, is the moral center of the movie. Barbie delivers the bottom-line indictment of Lots-O’-Huggin’ Bear,

Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not from the threat of force!

No truer words have been spoken, and certainly not with such pony-tailed frankness. But Barbie is not simply a vessel for others’ ideas—she’s not just a Press Secretary, or even Political Theory Professor Barbie. She acts. When she walks away from Ken and his Dreamhouse to join her friends behind bars in the Caterpillar room, with her head held high, she shows that she already knows what Woody struggles the whole movie to figure out. Buzz’s reaction to the horde of football jersey
toddlers is that more “age-appropriate” toys should be sent into their room—his cohort doesn’t belong in such a rough neighborhood. Under Barbie’s thoughtful leadership, as seen in the montage during the closing credits, a Buzz-like toy does go in, but, thanks to tag-team burden sharing and a support network—Cheerleader Barbie knows how to use a bully pulpit—makes it out in one piece. Daycare can be groovy. (On this point, I disagree with my colleague Richard Brody about the film’s message.)