The Bensons are the secondary antagonists of the 2019 Disney•Pixar animated film Toy Story 4, acting as loyal servants to Gabby Gabby and serve her in her goal to retrieve Woody's voice box to replace her broken one.
Background
Development
- “The dummies are, by far, some of the creepiest characters we've ever created. Our animators really leaned into the truth in materials for how our ventriloquist dummies move. Dummies' bodies are soft with no structure, so our dummies' arms just dangle and their legs bend backwards. Throw in their fixed expressions with their wide eyes and big hinged jaws and they're nightmare material—in the best way possible.”
- ―Producer Mark Nielsen on the Bensons' creation
Role in the film
The Bensons are a group of ventriloquist dummies who live at the Second Chance Antiques, led by a dummy who wears a red bow tie and work as loyal servants for the talking doll Gabby Gabby, obeying her every command without question.
The red-tied dummy is first seen taking Gabby Gabby in her stroller while Woody and Forky were looking for Bo Peep in the store. Then, Woody meets Gabby Gabby and Benson and when the doll sees that Woody has a voice box, they coerce Woody and Forky into joining them. Sensing an ulterior motive from Gabby Gabby, Woody flees the shop. Gabby Gabby then sends her dummies to chase them and they manage to capture Forky. The Bensons are then later seen patrolling the shelf, turning their heads around as they guard Gabby Gabby and their captive Forky from intruders.
While Woody with the help of Bo Peep, Buzz Lightyear, Giggle McDimples, Ducky and Bunny, Duke Caboom, and Billy, Goat, and Gruff are trying to recover Forky, the dummies surprise them and Woody nearly got his voice box stolen. The group fails their mission and after an argument with his friends, with Bo Peep being indirectly insulted by Woody's remarks, Woody decides to return to find Forky alone. He then confronts Gabby Gabby and she convinces him to give her his voice box in exchange for Forky, Woody having been moved by Gabby Gabby's backstory. Gabby Gabby, happy to have a new voice box, keeps his word and makes Forky go to Woody. Forky then greets Gabby Gabby and Benson and points out that he scares him. However, when Harmony, the girl Gabby Gabby dreamed of playing so much, did not like her, the doll loses hope and tells Woody (who came back to comfort her) that it was over for her. With Bo Peep, Woody manages to convince her to be with Bonnie. Everyone then leaves the antique shop and the first Benson pushes the stroller with Woody, Gabby Gabby, and Bo Peep in it to give it a boost before he hops into it. However, the stroller bangs into a fairground barrier and falls to the ground. A lady then runs to it, thinking that a baby was in there, raises it up, and sees Benson inside, which makes her scream in horror.
The Bensons then are not seen or heard from again for the remainder of the film afterwards. After everyone crowds by to see the Benson in the stroller, they will discover that it is just a dummy and is not real. Benson becomes an outsider himself by being departed out of the antique shop while his clones with black bow ties remain in the shop and while the whole gang goes through the carnival to return to Bonnie after he helped them.
Gallery
Screencaps
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Trivia
- It's possible that the reason for which the Bensons can't talk is because they are ventriloquist dummies and thus can only talk if a ventriloquist uses them to speak "'through" them, aside that there are other toys in the Toy Story universe which can't talk, despite not being ventriloquist dummies.
- Though they are not able to talk, they are able to make some grunting sounds.
- The idea of a ventriloquist dummy character was inspired by the original concept of Woody, who was originally designed to be a dummy before being changed to a pull-string cowboy doll by the suggestion of Bud Luckey.
- They resemble Slappy the Dummy from the Goosebumps franchise, specifically the movie version of the character.
- The Bensons walk irregularly due to dummies requiring a human hand to keep them upright.
- For unknown reasons, the red-tied dummy skin in the official Toy Story content pack for Minecraft is referred to as "Fredric".
- When one of the Bensons is sitting atop of Gabby's cabinet, his head spins fully around, similarly to how Woody turned his around in the first movie.
- Their faces are modeled off of official Paul Winchell "Jerry Mahoney" dolls that were released in the 1950s, more specifically the 32 Inch figure in that product line. This isn't really a surprise considering many Toy Story characters are already based on pre-existing toys.
- The end credits of the fourth film list them as "The Dummies", which is what they're occasionally referred to as by other toys.
- They share the same name as with Jodi Benson, the Barbie dolls' voice actress. Ironically, Benson herself did not return to voice any of them for the fourth film, despite one of them making a flashback cameo there.
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