Tom Hanks imagines his voice recreated by AI in Toy Story 6: “It’s a scary thought”

The 69-year-old actor believes that Disney could recreate Woody’s voice using artificial intelligence, if he was not available for a possible sixth film.

With a global startup of $312 million, Toy Story 5 signed the best launch in the history of the franchise. A success which already pushes some fans to wonder if Toy Story 6 is inevitable.

But Tom Hanks, the voice of Woody for more than thirty years, believes in Entertainment Weekly that a possible sequel should only exist under one condition:

“If you’re going to make another Toy Story, it has to be worth it. It has to be great. You have to explore a theme that isn’t just about extending the franchise because people like the title.“

The actor, who will soon be 70 years old, is not unaware of the economic reality of the saga. But he doesn’t want to come back at all costs:

“I obviously know that we are in a huge industrial machine, I am not going to deny it. But if it’s not good and new and fresh, there’s no reason to make another sequel.“

The Oscar-winning actor goes even further and evokes another possibility, much more worrying in his eyes: even if he said no, Disney could today continue to bring Woody to life without him, thanks to artificial intelligence.

“The passage of time is stronger than all of us. The question is whether they could recreate a version of me. Every word we recorded for Toy Story exists in digital form somewhere. They could put together anything they wanted.“

After thirty-one years spent lending his voice to the famous cowboy, Tom Hanks knows that advances in AI now make this hypothesis credible.

A prospect which clearly leaves him thinking. “It’s a scary thought“, concludes Tom Hanks, even if it is difficult to imagine the studio engaging in a huge controversy by bringing back Woody without his interpreter…