Toy Story we found, sorta by accident, because we didnt know what we were doing, the idea of being replaced by somebody. Everybody has that fear, or encounters this jealousy at some point.

Well, the film initially - we had decided to pair joy with fear because I don't know about you - for me fear was a major motivator in junior high. So we thought there's probably some good stuff there... As the film went on, we had developed all these great scenes that were really funny, but in the third act, it wasn't adding up to anything.

Well, what if we did this in the mind as opposed to the brain? So instead of blood vessels and dendrites, what if it was consciousness and dream production? And that would allow us to have characters that represent emotions. And that felt like, man, that's exactly what animation does best - strong, opinionated, caricatured personalities. And that just got me excited.

A lot of the issues I faced in junior high was what got me into animation. It was easier to sit on the side and draw cartoons than to engage with people.

Sometimes suffering is a weird attraction.

And so not only did I have all new friends and all new surroundings, I didn't even understand what they were talking about, which was very difficult and kind of started me, I think, on my path to animation. It was a lot easier to draw people than to talk and interact with them.

There's something really emotional about not having any sound. That allows, I think, the audience to participate more actively and kind of imagine what are they talking about there?