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According to Craig L Good, Pixar Camera Artist, human characters were too expensive to design back then. So since a dad was not necessary for the story, Andy didn't get one.

According to Craig L Good, Pixar Camera Artist, human characters were too expensive to design back then. So since a dad was not necessary for the story, Andy didn't get one.

I'm often highly entertained by the deep analyses and psychological guesswork about this. The real answer is that we couldn't afford a dad. Human characters were just hideously expensive and difficult to do in those days [...]

According to Craig L Good, Pixar Camera Artist, human characters were too expensive to design back then. So since a dad was not necessary for the story, Andy didn't get one.

I did want the backstory, though: Is dad dead? A deadbeat? So I posed the question to Lee Unkrich, who directed solo on this film after co-directing with Ash Brannon and John Lasseter on "Toy Story 2" (Lasseter directed the original "Toy Story").

"It's an oft asked question, but there is no concrete answer," Unkrich said. "We don't mean to be mysterious about it; it's just never been relevant to the story."

It's just always been that way, Unkrich said. "The decision was made really early on in 'Toy Story' to have Andy's dad not be around," he said. "We've never addressed it directly, nor have we given any explanation for where he is or why he's absent."

According to Craig L Good, Pixar Camera Artist, human characters were too expensive to design back then. So since a dad was not necessary for the story, Andy didn't get one.

According to Craig L Good, Pixar Camera Artist, human characters were too expensive to design back then. So since a dad was not necessary for the story, Andy didn't get one.

According to Craig L Good, Pixar Camera Artist, human characters were too expensive to design back then. So since a dad was not necessary for the story, Andy didn't get one.

I did want the backstory, though: Is dad dead? A deadbeat? So I posed the question to Lee Unkrich, who directed solo on this film after co-directing with Ash Brannon and John Lasseter on "Toy Story 2" (Lasseter directed the original "Toy Story").

"It's an oft asked question, but there is no concrete answer," Unkrich said. "We don't mean to be mysterious about it; it's just never been relevant to the story."

It's just always been that way, Unkrich said. "The decision was made really early on in 'Toy Story' to have Andy's dad not be around," he said. "We've never addressed it directly, nor have we given any explanation for where he is or why he's absent."