10 Movie Mysteries FINALLY Explained

The Toy Story franchise has kept the mechanics of its living toys intentionally vague because, honestly, there's never going to be an answer that makes complete sense and pleases everybody, right?

All the same, back in the summer of 2020, Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich answered one of the fandom's most enduring questions - can the toys die, or are they effectively immortal?

Toy Story 3 of course flirted with the idea of confirming this one way or another with its iconic incinerator scene, though thankfully stopped short of showing what would happen if Woody (Tom Hanks) and co. were melted by the fire of a thousand suns.

All the same, Unkrich replied to a fan who asked about the toys' mortality, telling them:

"They live as long as they exist. But if they were to be utterly destroyed? Say, in an incinerator? Game over."

So it appears that while the toys can't ever die of old age, their existence is limited by the durability of their material. Given that plastic can take hundreds of years to decompose, the prospect of the toys slowly wasting away is actually quite horrifying.