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| “ | Do you ever look at someone and wonder... "what is going on inside their head?" Well, I know. Well, I know Riley's head. | „ |
| ~ Joy's first words in the first film, as she is slowly being evolved in baby Riley's mind. |
| “ | I don't know how we can stop Anxiety... Maybe this is what happens when you grow up... You feel less joy... | „ |
| ~ Joy as she knows of what happens when growing up. |
Joy is the main protagonist of Pixar's Inside Out franchise.
She is the yellow emotion of happiness and one of the five primary emotions inside the mind of Riley Andersen. As her name implies, she is eternally optimistic and appears to be happy all the time and thus could be the leader or enthusiast of the group.
She is voiced by Amy Poehler, who also portrayed Leslie Knope in Parks and Recreation and did the voice of Snow White in Shrek the Third, Bessie Higgenbottom in The Mighty B, Eleanor in Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel and Chipwrecked, Jenny in Free Birds, and Duncan Harris in Duncanville, and by Kate Higgins in all other media appearances.
Physical Appearance[]
Joy has a rather slim figure and is the tallest out of the main emotions, as well as being the most human-like in appearance. Her design is based off a star, thus explaining her light yellow skin-tone and her being bioluminescent, emitting a bright blue light from her body and a pure yellow glow around her feet, regardless of where she is or how she feels. The particles that make up her body tend to fly off her like magic in some way. Her bioluminescence symbolizes her trademark emotion and how she seems to "glow" with happiness.
She has shimmering azure-blue hair kept into a pixie cut with bangs that silk down the left side of her face, and a small tuft sticking up at the top near the reciting hairline, large oval-shaped azure eyes outlined in a dark navy-blue, faint rosy cheeks and thin, salmon-pink colored lips. She is the only emotion who lacks an overbite and has perfectly aligned teeth.
The only choice of clothing she wears is that of a sleeveless, knee-length, light chartreuse dress that resembles either a skater or summer dress. The dress includes thin, silverish lines crisscrossed all over, and it is topped off with several light blue shapes, resembling either flowers or sparks of energy. In the sequel, it is revealed that Joy wears shorts that match the color of her dress underneath. She is also barefoot, revealing her toe-less feet.
Joy is also seen wearing her sleepwear which consists of pajamas that also matches the color of her dress.
Personality[]
As her name states, Joy is the very essence of happiness, perkiness, warm feelings, and positive feelings in general, as such, she loves to look on the bright side of things. She is by far the most optimistic, confident, peppy, determined, and loving out of all of the emotions, wishing and wanting nothing but the best out of everyone and everything. She is very smart, opportunistic, and often wants to bring pleasure and positivity in most of the situations she is in, wanting things to be more lighthearted and desirable for Riley, since her main purpose is to make Riley happy overall.
In the first film, she was so obsessed with her purpose and valued Riley's happiness to the point where she does not want any other emotions to influence Riley. She did not want Riley to be sad at all, even when she needs to be. Because of this, Joy was the least flexible and most controlling of the five emotions. She mistreated Sadness (albeit unintentionally) because she did not understand why Sadness was a necessary emotion due to nobody else knowing what her purpose for Riley is, and the fact that Joy wants Riley to be happy all the time. When Bing Bong lost his wagon and was grieving, she wanted him to not be sad when he had to be and tried doing childish and silly things to get him to stop without understanding that cheerfulness and positivity are not always what a sad person needs.
When the islands were falling apart, there was an escape tube back to HQ, and when Sadness was about to go in, Joy pushed her out of the tube and left her behind, because Sadness was influencing the core memories that Joy held, and Joy wanted Riley to be happy. She ends up falling into the Memory Dump when the escape tube falls apart.
During her time in the Memory Dump, Joy realized that Sadness is very important to Riley's life and that she went way overboard with keeping her happy. After reuniting with the other emotions, she decides to let them do their jobs and stop being so bossy all the time since Riley needs all of them to properly function and be truly happy.
Biography[]
Inside Out[]
Joy firslty appears in the film as one of the five emotions in Riley Andersen's mind, the group which she is the leader of.
When Riley is first born, Joy is the first ever emotion to appear. She then walks towards the control panel, which at the time consists of only one button. The instant she presses it, infant Riley begins smiling. However, thirty-three seconds later, she notices (by looking at the screen) Riley is now crying. Joy soon realizes that Sadness (the second emotion to come to Riley's mind) has arrived and has pressed the button.
When Joy looks at her, Sadness introduces herself, and Joy awkwardly moves her aside, trying to fix the situation. She, Sadness, and the other emotions, Anger, Fear, and Disgust, control Riley through her thoughts and mind. Joy seems to want to keep Riley happy and joyful, and always has an important task for every emotion ― except Sadness, whom Joy has no idea as to what she does exactly. Riley enjoys a happy, joyous life in Minnesota, until her father gets a brand-new job in San Francisco, which causes Riley to become depressed and sentimental. To make things worse, everything has gone horribly wrong; the house is terrible (and gross), the food is weird, and the moving van will not arrive for another couple of days.
Joy sees that Riley is becoming sad, depressed, and sentimental, and wants her to still be happy and jolly. So, she does all she can to keep her as cheerful and joyous as she was back in Minnesota. It is here when Joy discovers, that Sadness is able to turn Riley's happy core memories into sad ones. This prompts Joy to confine Sadness away from the console and the core memories.
On Riley's first day of school, her first impression is horrible, because, during Riley's introduction, Sadness causes Riley to cry and made a sad core memory. Since Joy does not want Riley to be sad, she tries getting rid of the sadness-infused memory. Sadness tries to put the new memory in, but Joy fights her for it, and this causes the two and all the core memories to accidentally end up getting vacuumed out of Headquarters and into Riley's Long Term Memory, falling into a memory pit. Joy decides to have Sadness navigate her back to Headquarters since she read all the mind manuals earlier. They then run into Riley's old imaginary friend, Bing Bong, and Joy is more than happy to meet him, and the feeling is mutual.
Rather than having Sadness guide her back, she decides to have Bing Bong be the navigator instead. Bing Bong tells them that the Train of Thought is the quickest way to Headquarters and that there is a station in Imagination Land. He takes them to a "shortcut", which turns out to be Abstract Thought, which is actually a dangerous place to go into. Sadness tries to warn them, but the others do not listen and go in anyway. Inside, they start losing their depth and complexity, but Sadness gets them out.
Outside, they find Imagination Land, which is full of imaginative things Riley has dreamed of. They find out that Mind Workers are tearing it down because Riley has lost her imagination. The Forgetters then toss down Bing Bong's old wagon, which is the only thing he has left of his fun with Riley, into the Memory Dump. Bing Bong falls into deep despair, so Joy tries to cheer him up by doing many childish things, but they do not help at all. Sadness decides to empathize with him and lets him show his true feelings, which makes him feel better.
Joy is shocked that Sadness made him feel better without cheering him up. The trio then get on the train, but Riley falls asleep, causing the train to stop moving, so they go to Dream Productions to wake Riley up so they can get home faster. Joy and Bing Bong decide to meddle with Riley's dream, by making her dream happy, in hopes that it will wake her up (which clearly would not). Joy makes herself and Sadness dress up like a dog and play in Riley's dream, just as Bing Bong starts playing in it as well and their costume goes in half and the dog is chasing the other half. Of course, this does not work at all. Bing Bong gets arrested and taken to the Subconscious.
Both Joy and Sadness go into the Subconscious to rescue Bing Bong and meet Riley's worst fear, Jangles the Clown, who follows them back to Dream Productions, and he successfully wakes up Riley. The three then jump back onto the train.
On the way, the train gets destroyed, and Joy, Sadness, and Bing Bong find out that Riley is running away. Joy, Sadness, and Bing Bong find a recall tube back to Headquarters and go inside, but Joy finds out that Sadness, being near the core memories, starts turning them sad, and pushes her out because "Riley needs to be happy", which really hurts Sadness' feelings. As Joy ascends the tube, she looks down at her friends remorsefully as she leaves them behind. Unfortunately, the tube breaks, and Joy falls into the Memory Dump. Bing Bong attempts to save Joy but also falls down into the chasm. Joy reminisces and cries about the happy moments that she remembers, stating, "I just wanted Riley to be happy." Not feeling joyful at all and realizing her selfishness, Joy starts shedding tears, and one drips onto one of the happy memories. When she wipes the tear from the memory, she unknowingly rewinds it, and it turns sad. Upon further inspection, Joy finds out that this is the day Sadness spoke of earlier and realized it was made happy because Sadness helped Riley call for help, support, and comfort (possibly why this was Sadness' favorite). After realizing the presence of Bing Bong's rocket, Joy becomes happy once again, and the duo starts attempting to escape the pit. They try two times, and then Bing Bong realizes that the wagon is too heavy with the two of them in it. Deciding to sacrifice himself for Joy and Riley, Bing Bong cheers Joy on while uttering his last words while he fades into oblivion - "Take her to the moon for me. Okay?" Joy sorrowfully watches Bing Bong fade away as she tears up. She promises that she'll try to fulfill Bing Bong's wish.
Joy finally arrives back up in Long Term Memory and attempts to find Sadness. When she finds Sadness, she chases her through Imagination Land. She then sees her flying on a cloud and continues chasing after her. She finds that Sadness is close to HQ, and flings herself to Sadness, and they finally arrive back home. The others tell Joy to fix Riley's problem, but Joy gives the job to Sadness instead, much to the other emotions' dismay until she explains they need her to help Riley. Sadness successfully removes the idea of running away from Riley's mind, and Riley starts heading back home. Joy hands the core memories to Sadness, and they turn into sad ones. Sadness helps Riley remember all of these memories one by one, and takes control of the panel, and Riley finally reveals her true feelings to her parents - she's not used to San Francisco, misses the good old days in Minnesota, and that she was pretending to be happy, and was afraid of making them mad because she has always been their "happy girl". Riley's parents admit they feel the same way, and a brand new core memory is made; it is a mix of happiness and sadness. The melancholy memory renews Family Island, with a San Francisco setting expansion featuring the Golden Gate Bridge.
Sometime later, Joy and the other emotions create new, combined core memories, recreating some of the old islands as well as some new ones. As Riley arrives at the hockey rink and later becomes embarrassed by her parents putting on face paint, Joy admits that her parents love them very much, though Disgust says they cannot show it. As the game started, Joy worked alongside her fellow emotions as they play the game.
Riley's First Date?[]
Riley's new friend Jordan arrives to pick her up for their ice skating excursion with their friends, but her parents fear that they may be going on a date. Riley's mom attempts to subtly probe Riley with pop words and ebonics, to Riley's emotions' confusion. Fear then realized that Jordan was left alone with their dad. Rushing downstairs, Riley finds her dad and Jordan playing air guitar to AC/DC's "Back in Black". Embarrassed, she drags Jordan out the door.
Mind Candy[]
Joy tried to keep the other emotions cheerful, especially Sadness. She tried to change Sadness's expression, offered her a flower, and pulled her to flip around on a trampoline. She threw marshmallows at Anger to get flames to shoot out of his head, which she and the other emotions used to roast marshmallows.
Joy then stood on Fear, who stood on Anger, so she could reach a high shelf and place a memory. Then Sadness pulled a string, revealing the shape of a Christmas tree.
Inside Out 2[]
Joy appears in the sequel where she and the other emotions meet a new set of emotions, including Anxiety when Riley becomes a teenager. As still the leader, she reintroduces herself (and the other emotions from the original film as their faces are shown for the first time in the sequel).
After Riley is sent to the penalty box, she does a quick recap on what happened after the short. Joy continued to work with the other emotions to protect Riley and enrich her life. She worked to respect the role of other emotions in Riley's life. She and the other emotions had also learned that Riley's memories were not only creating Islands, but they were also creating beliefs, which formed a Belief System, which grew Riley's Sense of Self, centered on Riley's belief that she is a good person.
Joy was excited when Riley was invited to Coach Roberts' hockey skills camp, and she said it was a chance for Riley, Grace, and Bree to impress Coach Roberts and all three of them to join the team. When Riley had the idea of doing something wrong at camp, Joy put a stop to it and then sent the penalty memory to the Back of the Mind using the Riley Protection System she had created to protect Riley from negative things. The other emotions helped find negative emotions to send away and the remaining memories were sent to Long-Term Memory. Joy then took the championship memory and added it to the Belief System.
The next morning, Joy and the other emotions woke up to the puberty alarm flashing on the console. Joy removed the alarm from the Console and threw it into the Back of the Mind, but the Mind Workers began working on updating the Console to make room for the others, which had not yet arrived. When Riley woke up, they quickly realized that she was more reactive and that her emotions were stronger, so Joy decides that they will not touch the console until they had resolved the problem.
Everyone was surprised when Riley found out on the way to hockey camp that Bree and Grace are going to a different high school. When they arrived at camp, Sadness touched the console, allowing Riley to cry. Joy celebrated it, saying that Riley needed it. When Riley met Val Ortiz, a senior who had heard of Riley, Joy wanted Riley to make friends with her. During this interaction, Riley pretended to be from Michigan under the influence of Anxiety, one of Riley's new emotions. Anxiety introduced herself and also introduced the other new emotions: Envy, Embarrassment and Ennui. Joy happily welcomed everyone, but she and Anxiety clashed when Anxiety made Riley choose Val and her friends over Grace and Bree. When Riley enters her locker room, Val introduces her to the rest of the Firehawks and offers her to sit with them. Anxiety sees this as her chance to get Riley to be with the popular girls, but Joy is steady about spending time with Grace and Bree, so Riley politely declines Val's invitation. Shortly after, Grace and Bree enter the locker room and hug Riley, and the three take silly selfies, motivated by Joy. But Coach Roberts confiscates all the players' phones and sends them laps around the rink.
When Riley overhears Val's friends talking about how immature she acted, Anxiety inserts an idea for Riley to apologize to Val, this in approval of Joy, who gave her space to operate the Console. All the Emotions applauded some of Anxiety's work, and Joy congratulates her for doing her part, but when she decides to take up the mantle again, Anxiety said that she was not finished, that her plan had many parts and Joy had to wait on the sidelines while Anxiety made them. When Riley's Sense of Self intervened with Anxiety's plan, Anxiety took it off and launched it to the Back of the Mind. This caused a disagreement between Joy and Anxiety, and when she and the core emotions objected, Anxiety had Embarrassment take them and put them in a jar, and send them to the Vault, where they met Bloofy, Lance Slashblade, and Riley's Deep Dark Secret.
Reluctantly, Riley's secrets helped the Emotions come out and they set out to follow the Stream of Consciousness to the Back of Riley's Mind to regain her Sense of Self. Due to the changes in Riley's mind, they encountered a dead end in Long Term Memory and had to find another path to the Steam. When they arrived, they realized that without someone to call them to Headquarters, they would be stranded in the Back of the Mind, so Joy decided to send Sadness to crawl back to Headquarters with a walkie talkie to be ready to recall them. Once she was gone, they set off down the stream. Their path was interrupted when, thanks to Ennui, a Sar-Chasm opened, separating the Stream of Consciousness. This forced them to go the long way around.
While returning to Long-Term Memory Joy tries to cheer up the other emotions, while Disgust and Anger argue, believing that she is leading them on the wrong path and doesn't know where she is taking them, and think about giving up and, and going back to the Headquarters considering the Sense of Self lost. Joy tries to use a platform lift but struggles to use the correct commands, while Anger, Fear, and Disgust start to complain even more, with Fear expressing his frustration at being bottled up, and Anger and Disgust voice their displeasure over how Riley's mind isn't the same anymore since the puberty alarm went off, culminating in Anger declaring that Joy doesn't notice and is delusional. In that, Joy snaps and admits that she does not know what to do and feels hopeless and pushed to her limit over constantly having an upbeat attitude. The others apologize and proceed to venture further.
As they cut through Imagination Land, Joy was startled at all the changes. The Fort Pillowton was still there, but bigger and oranger. So they investigated and found several Mind Workers inside drawing possible negative scenarios for Riley in the game so she could prepare for them. Determined to stop Anxiety, Joy ound an empty station and drew a happy outcome, then encouraged the Mind Workers to do the same. Anxiety soon realized Joy was in there, but it was too late and the mind workers rebelled, starting a pillow fight.
Then, a group of Mind Police officers arrive to capture the Emotions, so they headed to the Parade of Future Careers and took a balloon of Riley as a Supreme Court judge, escaping once again from the police officers and heading to the Back of the Mind. Mind. They stuck with it until they got caught in a brainstorm and had to let go of the balloon. Using a big idea to get out of the storm, the Emotions used Fear's parachute to reach the ground safely. Then they continued their journey to the Back of the Mind. When they arrived, they found more memories than Joy remembered sending there along with Riley's old Sense of Self. Once they had it, Joy called Sadness to bring them back, but due to Anxiety's interference, the Riley Protection System broke, preventing Sadness from calling them back. Completely downcast, Joy looked over the memories around her and wondered if it was just a part of getting older that started to feel less joy. Anger finally had the idea to call for Pouchy, Bloofy's partner, and see what items he had that they could use. Anger dug around inside him and found dynamite, which gave Joy the idea to use it to create an avalanche of memories that would send them back to Headquarters through the Belief System. Disgust wondered how Joy would stop the bad memories from forming beliefs and she admitted she didn't know.
Once in the Belief System, the memories immediately began to form beliefs, some negative and some positive. Then they returned to the Headquarters, but they could not get rid of the new Sense of Self to put the old one back in its place. Joy looked over at the Console and saw Anxiety frantically hovering over it, trying to solve the problems she had caused Riley. Joy approached Anxiety and told her that she needs to let her go, that she couldn't decide who Riley was. Anxiety released the Console, Joy pulled it out of the storm, and Emotions were able to remove the new Sense of Self. Joy restored the old Sense of Self, but the storm did not stop. Anxiety apologized to Joy, saying that she only wanted to protect Riley and that she was right about not being able to choose what Riley is. At that, Joy quickly realized that she was preventing a new Sense of Self from emerging; she then removes the old Sense of Self, allowing a new, more complex Sense of Self to emerge. Contemplating the new Sense of Self, Joy hugs him and Riley begins to calm down. Then Sadness joins in, along with the other main emotions, then the new ones, and finally Anxiety joins the group hug, causing the anxiety attack to stop and Riley finally calms down.
Riley then apologizes to Bree and Grace and, inside her mind, voluntarily calls Joy to the Console; Sadness tells her that Riley wants and needs her right now. Joy walked over to the console and helped Riley rejoin her hockey game.
In the end, emotions learned to coexist peacefully. When Riley was waiting for Coach Roberts' message about whether or not she made the team, Anxiety started to worry about Riley not making the team, so Joy took her to sit in her special chair and encouraged her to focus on something Riley could control. Anxiety reminded them that Riley had to study for an Spanish test, so all the emotions celebrated that she remembered because no one else did. When Riley finally received the message, she smiled.
In the after credits scene, Joy returned to the Vault to bring out the Deep Dark Secret and ask him what Riley's darkest secret was. He reveals to Joy the secret about "burn a hole in the rug", while she was waiting for another secret related to the pool. Hearing that, the Deep Dark Secret snuck back into his cell and closed the door.
Other Media[]
Disney Infinity[]
Joy appears in Disney Infinity's third installment as a playable character. However, just like Mindy Kaling, Amy Poehler did not reprise the role, as John Vignocchi explained that her agent said she was too busy.[1] Therefore, Kate Higgins took over her part to perform the voice of Joy in that game.
Disney Heroes: Battle Mode[]
Joy is a playable character in Disney Heroes: Battle Mode. Joy is a Back-Line Support role hero. Joy supports her allies by healing them and increasing their Reality, she also shields allies, and increase Max HP if allies are healed above their Max HP. She also has unique ability which prevents enemies from removing buffs from Joy and her allies. Joy also has unique buff called "Happiness!" which allows her skills to become more powerful.
Joy has friendship campaigns with Anger and Olaf. Joy also has friendship campaigns with Bo Peep, Kim Possible, Sadness, Huey, Dewey, and Louie, and 22.
Disney Parks[]
After the film Inside Out debuted, Joy and other emotions appeared as Audio-Animatronics in an Inside Out pre-parade that performed 10 minutes before the Pixar Play Parade started in Disney California Adventure. After the parade's move to Disneyland in 2018 for the Pixar Fest event, Joy and Sadness appear on the Inside Out float where they're seen riding Bing Bong's rocket.
During the finale of World of Color Celebrate in Disney California Adventure and part of the Disneyland Diamond Celebration, Joy is juggling Riley's memory orbs on California Screamin'. However, she can hardly be seen by the visitors because the fountains are too tall and block the view of the Incredicoaster. She and Sadness also make a cameo appearance during the Happily Ever After fireworks show, and scenes from the movie appear during Together Forever: A Pixar Nighttime Spectacular.
Joy and Sadness had a meet and greet area in the Art of Animation exhibition building (Opera House) at Hong Kong Disneyland for a limited time during the Coolest Summer Ever event in 2015 until September 14. Afterward, the sets and props from the area were moved to Epcot where they are currently meeting guests. They are currently the only Inside Out characters to appear at Disney Parks.
Following an advanced screening of the film at Downtown Disney in Orlando, a private meet and greet with Joy and Sadness was set up. The event was exclusive to Disney journal/blog members.
Quotes[]
Inside Out[]
| “ | And there she was... | „ |
| ~ Joy after stimulating Riley's first feelings. |
| “ | It was amazing. Just Riley and me. Forever. | „ |
| ~ Joy before Sadness starts manifesting in baby Riley's mind. |
| “ | Who puts broccoli on pizza? | „ |
| ~ Joy after seeing a broccoli-topped pizza after suggesting lunch. |
| “ | Joy: Wait, I know you. Bing Bong: No, you don't. I get that a lot. (Exhausts.) I look like a lot of people. Joy: No, no, no. I do. (Gasps.) Bing Bong! Riley's imaginart friend! |
„ |
| ~ Joy after seeing Bing Bong again for a long time. |
| “ | I just... I just wanted Riley to be happy! | „ |
| ~ Joy's heroic breakdown, as she breaks down crying while she is trapped in the Memory Dump. |
| “ | Joy: Woo-hoo! Bing Bong! We did it! We- Bing Bong? Bing Bong! Bing Bong: YA-HA-HA! You made it! HA-HA-HA-HA! Go! Go save Riley! Ha, ha, ha! (Sobs.) Take her to the moon for me. Okay? (Fades away from existence.) Joy: (Sobs.) I'll try, Bing Bong. I'll promise. |
„ |
| ~ Joy after she got out of the Memory Dump once Bing Bong willingly sacrificed his existence. |
| “ | We've been through a lot lately, that's for sure. But we still love our girl. She has great new friends, a great new house, things couldn't be better! After all, Riley's 12 now. What could happen? | „ |
| ~ Joy's emotional epilogue in the first film. |
Inside Out 2[]
| “ | LET'S! PLAY! SOOOME HOCKEY! | „ |
| ~ Joy's first lines in the second film, when Riley's about to play hockey. |
| “ | Wow, you have a lot of energy. Maybe you could just stay in one place. | „ |
| ~ Joy to Anxiety after they first met each other. |
| “ | Delusional...? OF COURSE, I'M DELUSIONAL!!! Do you know how hard it is to stay positive all the time when all you folks do is complain, complain, complain?! Jiminy, mother-lovin', toaster strudel! Do you think I have all the answers?! OF COURSE I DON'T! We can't even find the back of our own minds. Anxiety is right. Riley doesn't need us as much as she needs them. And that hurts. It really hurts. | „ |
| ~ Joy's dramatic breakdown in Inside Out 2. |
| “ | Anxiety, STOP! You don't get to choose Riley. Anxiety... You need to let her go. | „ |
| ~ Joy guiding Anxiety about the dangers of shaping Riley all by oneself. |
| “ | Sometimes, she can be too hard on herself. But, every bit of Riley makes her who she is. And, we love... all of our girl. Every messy, beautiful piece of her. | „ |
| ~ Joy's closing lines about Riley in Inside Out 2. |
Trivia[]
- According to Pete Docter, Joy's design is based off a star.
- Joy is the second Pixar movie female protagonist, the first one being Princess Merida in Brave.
- Joy is the only emotion to glow and have a different hair and eye color.
- In Inside Out 2, the leader of the new emotions, Anxiety, acts as a foil to Joy.
- Both are control freaks.
- Both disregard and even try to suppress/banish emotions they don't believe will help Riley.
- Both have a genuine desire to protect Riley, but end up sabotaging her until they realise the value of other emotions.
- Both are hyperactive.
- She is the first Disney and Pixar character to be born onscreen, since the previous ones were born offscreen.
- Joy is the first and last character to speak in both films, not counting the first film's mid credits scenes. And even though Joy didn't appear in the first film's mid credits scenes, she did appear in the second film's after credits scene. Because of this, she was still the last character to speak in the latter film.
- Much of Joy's personality was inspired by Pollyanna, the protagonist of the novel of the same name. In fact, the Pixar team originally had Hayley Mills, who played the character in the adaptation of the same name, in mind for the role of Joy.[2] In the end, Amy Poehler was incorporated into the casting to ensure that the character would not upset audiences.[3]
- There are several things that make Joy stand out from the other Emotions:
- Before Anxiety is introduced, she was the only Emotion whose hair and eye color did not match her theme color.
- Before Nostalgia is introduced, Joy was the only Emotion who has a human skin color.
- She is the only female Emotion who does not have an overbite.
- She wears the least amount of clothing of all the Emotions, wearing only a sleeveless yellow dress.
- Before Ennui and Envy are introduced, Joy and Disgust were the most humanoid in appearance out of all the Emotions.
- She is the only Emotion who is completely barefoot, not counting Ennui, who wears only socks.
- She is the only Emotion who does not generate a shadow.
- She is the only Emotion to have a name used by humans. This is because, during the development of the film, all the Emotions were going to have human names, and Joy was the only one who retained her human name.
- In her final design, Joy's costume originally consisted of blue overalls (and that can be seen in early versions of the film in deleted scenes and concept art).[4][5] But with the change of the version and the story, her attire became the characteristic lime-colored summer dress that she wears in the film.
- This is because the creative team sought to steer clear of stereotypical "girly" interests, such as the color pink or dresses. Ironically, she ended up wearing said garment in the final version.[6]
- Joy is born out of pure light — no parents, no upbringing, she just appears (as all the other Emotions do), although they were unseen when doing so.
- Joy emits four light beams of different colors: blue, purple, white, and gold, unlike other emotions, which emit only one. Interestingly, these colors are used as "good colors" worn by traditional Disney Heroes in the Disney Classics.
- Joy was the most complex character to write as she illustrates a wide range of "happy feelings," and the creators had a hard time getting the tone right for the movie.[6]
- In early stages of development, Joy was going to be the main source of narrative tension as she would not let Riley grow up.
- Kevin Nolting said they changed the character arc as "the essence of the problem was, Joy was not likable, she was putting Riley in embarrassing situations; Riley was in middle school, but Joy was making her act like a child. As an audience member, you were not rooting for Joy."[7]
- When Riley was born, Joy said that she and Riley were alone for 33 seconds (although they were actually a minute and a little longer).
- Joy has a habit of talking to herself, as seen when she told herself that she has a nice dress and when she was mimicking Sadness in order to find her.
- Joy and Fear were originally supposed to get lost in Long Term Memory, but Fear was later replaced by Sadness.
- Her personal favorite island is Goofball Island.
- Joy's appearance takes inspiration from the famous actress Audrey Hepburn.[8]
- In the trailer, Joy says, "Come on, group hug!", a reference to Anchor's quote from Finding Nemo.
- Throughout the movie, Joy experiences all five basic emotions; joy being her main demeanor, anger toward Sadness' actions and the gum commercial, disgust toward the imaginary boyfriend, fear in the Subconscious, and finally sadness in the Memory Dump.
- She also experiences all the secondary emotions even before they were introduced; embarrassment toward Mrs. Andersen's teenage slang on Riley's First Date?, envy when she is compared to Anxiety (since Fear said that she has better plans for the future than her), nostalgia when she meet Bloofy in the Vault, ennui when she said she never saw the appeal in Lance, and finally anxiety in the Back of the Mind.
- During gameplay on Disney Infinity 3.0, she is shown to have the ability to perform a gentle descend similar to Princess Peach's floating ability and Yoshi's Flutter Jump of Nintendo's Super Mario and Yoshi's Island franchises.
- In Elemental, Joy's name is implied in one of the snack brands sold at The Fireplace. This brand is called "SparkJoy", a pastiche both of "Wrigley's Spearmint" as "Almond Joy", at first glance. The reason for this double reference is because Inside Out 2 was the next film to be released.
- Before the introduction of Embarrassment, Joy was originally the tallest among Riley's Emotions. Even then, she still remains as the tallest of the five original Emotions in Riley's mind (with the others being Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust).
- Given that emotions are realistically abstract and intangible (despite their functions for any living being), this technically makes Joy the fifth Pixar protagonist who is non-biological herself after Woody, Lightning McQueen, WALL-E, and Mater, and is followed by Ember Lumen.
External Links[]
- Joy on the Disney Wiki
- Joy on the Pixar Wiki
- Joy on Wikipedia
- Joy on the Inside Out Wiki
- Joy on the Pure Good Wiki
- Joy on the Heroes Wiki
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Toy Story franchise Lightyear A Bug's Life Monsters, Inc. franchise Finding Nemo franchise The Incredibles franchise Cars franchise Ratatouille Up Luca Onward Elemental See Also | ||
 Heroes
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1.0 2.0 3.0 | ||
 Heroes
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Playable Characters Disney Animated Television Pixar Disney Live-Action Films Disney Shorts | |||||||||||
 Heroes
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Emotions Others | ||
- ↑ John Vignocchi Twitter (10:52 AM - 6 Jun 2015 Tweet)
- ↑ https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-y6xjtJF9604/VZ2AH6l6LXI/AAAAAAAAZOA/jUcjZ32dwZI/s1600/IObrainstorm02.jpg
- ↑ https://www.vulture.com/2015/06/how-great-was-amy-poehler-in-inside-out.html
- ↑ https://characterdesignreferences.com/art-of-animation-7/art-of-inside-out
- ↑ https://static1.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/inside-out-09-ALozano-2011-10-19-008.jpg
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Wikipedia:Inside Out (2015 film)
- ↑ https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-features/making-inside-emotions-didnt-make-848249/
- ↑ Pixar Team Reveals 'Inside Out' Character Inspirations at Siggraph