How Toy Story 4's Bo Peep Went From Damsel In Distress To 'Dame In Charge'

For 24 years, Toy Story fans have grown accustomed to a Bo Peep who exists to lift Woody up any time as soon as he needs a boost. "She's habitually been this sort of quietly strong character,” producer Jonas Rivera told MTV News. “Every time Woody gets sort of turned upside down a little in the story, she's the one to mention, no, look at your boot and remember who you are."


She fulfills that role that females are so often given — the one that solidifies the idea that a woman’s duty is to be there for her man, the one that implies a woman needs a male. We visualize it from the very first time we meet her, in Toy Story’s first scene: Bo Peep was caught in the middle of a stick-up. Mr. Potato Head was maniacal, holding all of the toys hostage as he plotted to create it out of the bank with a sack full of loot. Bo pleaded for someone to support them — she definitely wasn’t equipped to save the day with her fragile porcelain skin and completely puffed frock. And right on cue, Sheriff Woody arrived on the scene to play the hero. Bo was, at least in this early iteration of Andy’s fantasy, the epitome of a damsel in distress.


Any time playtime ended and Andy left the room, the toys regained their sense of autonomy. Bo wasn’t as seemingly helpless, however she wasn’t a main player in Toy Story and Toy Story 2. She didn’t even show up in Toy Story 3; her only say was a brief throwaway line that explained she had been separated from the group.


Toy Story 4 answers the glaring question Toy Story 3 abandoned us with: What happened to Bo? She was given away to a new owner several years prior and never really noticed a permanent residence. She spent some time in an antique shop before busting out and living the rugged life of a lost toy — and that’s any time her life really began.


It's clear that through that experience Bo gets that very specific kind of confidence that comes once a woman helps stop attempting to be who she’s learned to be, and embraces all of the opportunities of who she can be. “Toy Story has mostly been a gentlemen club,” Annie Potts, who voices Bo Peep, mentioned. “Bo just busted that club wide open.” For the opening time since we’ve known her, Bo is the one in control and making the plan.


No longer quietly strong, right now Bo is assertive, capable, and required. “Our aim is that, in case you took her out of the movie, the movie would fall apart,” Rivera mentioned. In the movie, Bo and Woody reunite right after Woody happens upon her old antique shop, gets caught in a situation with the toys in charge, and loses Forky — new owner Bonnie’s preference toy — in a hostage situation. Bo is instrumental to Woody getting Forky back and making sure Woody’s ragdoll frame doesn’t just be destroyed by the shop cat. Even more importantly, it’s Bo who delivers the lesson of the movie, widening Woody’s narrow worldview of the meaning of (a toy’s) life.


Not only is Bo’s attitude different, although she has a new look to go with it. Bo’s skirt and bonnet weren’t feasible for her new lifestyle living indoor a remote control vehicle and operating a body shop for toys in need of little fixes, so she got thrifty, refashioning her clothes into a look that permits her to be more active. Her pantaloons became pants, the frills on her top have flattened and disappeared; her bonnet functions more as a headband right now, and her skirt is really whichever she needs it to be — a cape, a parachute, a bag, or, yes, still a skirt. Her porcelain won’t hold her back anymore. It turns out, actually, it can’t. A damaged arm is made completely functional again with a bandage.


Bo went from being a genuine lady to a woman who works with what she’s got. “I think she's been through some rough spells. You have choices in that. You could sink under the weight of that, or you could summon every cell of courage you have and push it off and move on,” Potts mentioned. “I think that that's, naturally, the choice that she's made.” It took Bo exploring life on her own before she really noticed her identity as a woman who could create space for herself in the world. “She isn't a damsel in distress,” Potts mentioned definitively. “She's a dame in charge now.”


Seeing Bo act as a leader is empowering. Bo has a level of self-assurance that Woody could never have, because males — even toy males — like Woody don’t need that self-assurance to survive once they have females like Bo to give it to them. Whereas a gentleman is expected to get things done, a woman’s role is to look pretty, tidy messes, and soothe emotions.


That’s been seen in Disney movies over the decades. Early iterations of the Princesses all looked a certain way, were expected to act a certain way, and weren’t whole up until a male came to save them. Take Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty’s Aurora as examples. Later, Disney inched toward female autonomy with The Little Mermaid’s Ariel and added diversity with Aladdin’s Jasmine, Pocahontas, and Mulan.


Eventually, Disney gave us Lilo & Stitch, for the initial time leading with a girl who looks like a typical girl. Lilo isn’t willowy or with flawlessly blown-out hair. She’s a girl who relates more to an alien than other females her age. Then we got female protagonists like Brave’s Merida, who specifically didn’t want a suitor. We got Frozen’s Elsa and Anna, who put sisterly love above all else. We got Moana, who is destined to rule her island and still ventures into the ocean alone because she understands that there’s something out there for her.


Because Bo Peep has been around for almost two as well as 1/2 decades, we visualize a similar progress in her — and that’s in no small part because of the dedication of the sort lovingly dubbed “Team Bo.” Made up of people from story, art, animation, characters, and cloth, Team Bo was an interdepartmental team-up that was unlike anything the producers had ever seen before.


Among the 300-or-so people working beyond the scenes on Toy Story 4 were a crowd of young adults and females who grew up watching Toy Story, issuing a sense of connection that isn’t common of most movies. Not unlike Bo herself, they weren’t afraid to take the reins any time as soon as they were on a roll. “They'd kick us out of there. They'd go, ‘No, no, no we're going to take her,’” Rivera mentioned. “And they'd throw flags on the field. They would even mention things like, ‘That's what a dude would think a girl would say.’”


In the end, Bo became a woman who learned that she doesn’t have to prescribe to a certain vision of herself just because that’s what she’s told to be. She isn’t there to just mention “Aw, Woody,” tap his hat, and brush his cheek; she’s there heard.


to be able to see this change in a character who you knew way back while she was a damsel in distress is inspiring; it means that we are all capable of finding ourselves, even once things challenge us and rip us away from what we know, love, and think we need. “I think females overall are making those choices right now. Not waiting for anybody, and we're taking our transformations seriously,” Potts mentioned. “I believe that everybody else will be taking our transformations very seriously, also, because transformation is just growth. And in case you aren't growing, ain't nothing happening and also you aren't going anywhere.”