The idea that John Lasseter pitched was called “Toy Story.” It sprang from a belief, which he and Jobs shared, that products have an essence to them, a purpose for which they were made. If the object were to have feelings, these would be based on its desire to fulfill its essence. The purpose of a glass, for example, is to hold water; if it had feelings, it would be happy when full and sad when empty. The essence of a computer screen is to interface with a human. The essence of a unicycle is to be ridden in a circus. As for toys, their purpose is to be played with by kids, and thus their existential fear is of being discarded or upstaged by newer toys. So a buddy movie pairing an old favorite toy with a shiny new one would have an essential drama to it, especially when the action revolved around the toys’ being separated from their kid. The original treatment began, “Everyone has had the traumatic childhood experience of losing a toy. Our story takes the toy’s point of view as he loses and tries to regain the single thing most important to him: to be played with by children. This is the reason for the existence of all toys. It is the emotional foundation of their existence.”

约翰·拉塞特的创意称为“玩具总动员”（ToyStory），灵感来自他和乔布斯共有的一个信念：产品是有灵魂的，是为了一个使命才被生产出来的。如果一个物体是有情感的，它的情感应该是基于它想实现自己价值的渴望。例如，杯子的使命是盛水；如果它有情感，它会在满的时候高兴，空的时候悲哀。计算机屏幕的使命是跟人互动。独轮车的使命是在马戏团被人骑行。而玩具，它们的使命就是供孩子们玩耍，因此它们的恐惧就是被抛弃或被新的玩具取代。所以，一个最受喜爱的旧玩具和一个闪闪发亮的新玩具搭档出演的兄弟电影，是极富戏剧效果的，尤其是所有活动都围绕着一些跟主人分开的玩具所展开。如原脚本开篇时所说：“每个人都有在童年时失去玩具的痛苦经历。我们的故事从玩具的视角展开，他一度失去并努力重新得到对他来说最重要的事情：跟孩子们玩。这是所有玩具存在的原因。这是他们存在的情感基础。”

The two main characters went through many iterations before they ended up as Buzz Lightyear and Woody. Every couple of weeks, Lasseter and his team would put together their latest set of storyboards or footage to show the folks at Disney. In early screen tests, Pixar showed off its amazing technology by, for example, producing a scene of Woody rustling around on top of a dresser while the light rippling in through a Venetian blind cast shadows on his plaid shirt—an effect that would have been almost impossible to render by hand. Impressing Disney with the plot, however, was more difficult. At each presentation by Pixar, Katzenberg would tear much of it up, barking out his detailed comments and notes. And a cadre of clipboard-carrying flunkies was on hand to make sure every suggestion and whim uttered by Katzenberg received follow-up treatment.

经过反复讨论，两个主角的名字最终定为“巴斯光年”（BuzzLightyear）和“胡迪”（Woody）。每隔两周，拉塞特和他的团队就会把最新的脚本或片段给迪士尼的合作伙伴看。在早期试镜时，皮克斯制作的动画显示了惊人的技术水平，例如有一幕，胡迪在一个梳妆台上，光透过百叶窗洒进来，影子投在他的格子衬衫上——这个效果几乎是不可能通过手工渲染来实现的。但是，要让迪士尼对情节方面满意，就难上加难了。每次皮克斯作演示，卡曾伯格都会推翻大部分情节，大声道出他的具体评论和意见。旁边总有一群手捧记事本的随从，确保卡曾伯格说的每个建议和奇思怪想都能得到后续落实。

Katzenberg’s big push was to add more edginess to the two main characters. It may be an animated movie called Toy Story, he said, but it should not be aimed only at children. “At first there was no drama, no real story, and no conflict,” Katzenberg recalled. He suggested that Lasseter watch some classic buddy movies, such as The Defiant Ones and 48 Hours, in which two characters with different attitudes are thrown together and have to bond. In addition, he kept pushing for what he called “edge,” and that meant making Woody’s character more jealous, mean, and belligerent toward Buzz, the new interloper in the toy box. “It’s a toy-eat-toy world,” Woody says at one point, after pushing Buzz out of a window.

卡曾伯格着力推动的一点，是要让两个主角的个性更尖锐。他说，虽然这是部叫“玩具总动员”的动画电影，但是它不应该只以儿童为目标观众。“一开始它没有情节，没有真正的故事，没有矛盾冲突，”卡曾伯格回忆说，“故事没有真正的驱动力。”他建议拉塞特看一些经典的兄弟电影，例如《逃狱惊魂》（TheDefiantOnes）或《48小时》（48Hours）,其中都有两个迥然不同的角色不得不同舟共济的故事。另外，他一直强调他所说的“尖锐”，这意味着胡迪这个角色要更有嫉妒心、更尖刻，挑衅巴斯这个游戏箱里新来的入侵者。“这是个玩具吃玩具的世界。”一处情节中，胡迪把巴斯推出窗外后说。

After many rounds of notes from Katzenberg and other Disney execs, Woody had been stripped of almost all charm. In one scene he throws the other toys off the bed and orders Slinky to come help. When Slinky hesitates, Woody barks, “Who said your job was to think, spring-wiener?” Slinky then asks a question that the Pixar team members would soon be asking themselves: “Why is the cowboy so scary?” As Tom Hanks, who had signed up to be Woody’s voice, exclaimed at one point, “This guy’s a real jerk!”

经过卡曾伯格和其他迪士尼负责人的多轮修改，胡迪几乎被去掉了所有的魅力。有一幕，他把其他玩具扔下床，还命令弹簧狗（Slinky）来帮忙。正当弹簧狗犹豫不决的时候，胡迪吼道：“谁说你的工作是思考了，弹簧香肠？”然后弹簧狗问了一个不久以后皮克斯团队总会自问的问题：“这牛仔为什么这么可怕！”正如给胡迪配音的汤姆·汉克斯有一次感叹的，“这家伙实在太讨厌了！”