After re-watching the original Toy Story, I realize that the only reason Sid is seen as the villain is for the audience to empathize with Woody and Buzz when they end up in his room. In reality, he is just a ten-year-old who uses his toys (and Hannah’s toys) as his form of playing with them. This is the reason why he develops scenarios for the toys before he destroys them (The “Surgery” with Janie and Buzz’s “Liftoff”).
I can honestly relate to Sid’s way of playing with toys since I use to have 3 Buzz Lightyears from the Burger King promotion. I remember mimicking an interrogation with one of them which ended with a part of his helmet being melted off. While Buzz may feel differently, I honestly thought it was just may way of playing, albeit rougher.
So what do you think: Villain or misunderstood ten-year-old?
I generally include him under the banner of “Pixar Villain”, but agree that he doesn’t really do anything particularly wrong towards the toys.
But the movie does at least cement him as a jerk pretty well, with taking Hannah’s toys, lying about it, jumping on the Pizza Planet games, and him purposefully playing with things he knows are dangerous, so he’s got that going for him at least. It works a bit better if you kind of ignore Woody’s little speech and just presume they’re getting him for stuff like that.
The great thing about Pixar Villains is that they are often misunderstood. Sid isn’t “evil” in any way shape or form, just a kid who enjoys destructive behavior. So I don’t see him as a “villain”, but he definitely is one of the antagonists in the movie.
Well, the movie puts forth that Sid has other issues going for him, not just playing with his toys rough. The juvenile delinquent scenario was put forth, and he’s often been described as the neighborhood bully. The Pixar staff made it clear that a lot of them played like Sid, but beyond that, doubt they were hyperactive kids being kicked out of school and stealing stuff.
While I applaud his creativity, I don’t think the audience was supposed to really feel a connection with Sid. From the toys’ perspectives, he was simply a villain. From a human perspective, he’s just a messed up kid.
A minor league villian maybe.
And not for very long.
Once he gets his “reality check”, he turns it around.
If you pay close attention to the garbageman who comes to Andy’s house, this is Sid.
And since he is much more upbeat and cheerful, I’m assuming he became more well adjusted as he matured.
I wouldn’t say he’s a villain, but more an antagonist. He might be a villain from the toys’ point of view, though.
The focus was much more on Woody and Buzz’s relationship throughout the movie, and Sid’s actions were mostly there to be an obstacle in their character development, which eventually helped in forming their eventual friendship.
It’s a definitely interesting Pixarish concept I don’t see often in other kinds of animated films…
Now that’s interesting… I honestly never thought of the idea, but back in the day, I definitely pondered how Sid would have changed in response to Woody’s performance. I always thought he went back and fixed his toys… one of my more far-out theories back as a kid was that Geri did the task (hey, he had all those doll parts).
I thought Sid’s short appearance showed just enough of what we needed to see. Him singing along to heavy metal music was exactly how we saw him heading home from Pizza Planet. Essentially, he was still the tough guy he used to be (complete with skull shirt), but we can assume he stopped harming toys.
I think the extent of Sid as a garbage man was a gag by Pixar to show that Sid hadn’t gone very far (as the OP mentioned). I highly doubt that the “toy savior” idea was intended. Though it’s still an interesting thought.