Jessie

Jessie the Yodeling Cowgirl, better known as Jessie, is one of the Toy Story characters introduced in Toy Story 2. She is the tritagonist of both Toy Story 2 and Toy Story 3 and the main protagonist of Toy Story of Terror!.

She is a pull string cowgirl who was one of Woody's friends on Woody's Roundup (along with Bullseye and Stinky Pete). She later becomes Buzz Lightyear's girlfriend.

Toy Story 2
In Toy Story 2, she is the second toy that Woody meets in Al McWhiggin's apartment after Bullseye and before Stinky Pete the Prospector. She is energetic, sweet, cute, athletic and has a habit of yodeling when happy or excited. However, when Woody reveals that he still has an owner and has no intention of going to the Konishi Toy Museum in Tokyo, Japan, with the Roundup Gang, Jessie begins to hyperventilate for fear that she'll go back into storage again. She then begins to mock Woody for still having an owner.

That night, after Woody's attempt to retrieve his ripped-off arm has been sabotaged, Woody, having spotted the remote in front of Jessie's case, accuses Jessie for turning on the TV, to which Jessie responds by fighting Woody. The Prospector breaks the fight, and Jessie still feels bitter about Woody caring only about Andy. The next day, after Woody's arm has been fixed, Jessie sarcastically lets Woody leave, but the Prospector convinces Woody to speak with Jessie to make amends. When Woody talks to Jessie, she tells him the story about Emily (seen during the "When She Loved Me" musical sequence), a little girl that had been her owner. Throughout her years as Emily's toy, Jessie has enjoyed being played with, such as being taken for a horseback riding, a drive in her car, and a swing on a tire. However, years have passed, and Emily has found more mature activities to do, forgetting about Jessie until finding her under the bed one day. Jessie had spent one more time in the car with Emily, only for Emily to place her in a charity box, leaving her shocked and heartbroken that she has been given away. Being in a box for a long period of time, Jessie has developed claustrophobia and autophobia. After hearing that story, Woody initially decides to leave, but with more of the Prospector's convincing, Woody, thinking that the same fate will happen to him as Andy grows up, warms up to the idea of going to the museum, and Jessie's feelings of bitterness and sadness brightens up to happiness and excitement.

However, when Woody offers to take the Roundup gang with him back to Andy's house after having a change of heart and deciding to go back to Andy's room with Buzz and the other toys, Jessie initially feels uncertain. But Stinky Pete, now showing his true colors, locks them in Al's apartment. Jessie betrays Prospector for his previous actions, but Prospector told her that he has never been sold to anyone from a dime store shelf, which makes him feel more determined get himself and the others to Japan, where he believes he will finally be appreciated.

At the airport, after Buzz and the toys extricate Woody and get rid of the evil Prospector, they are unable to free Jessie from the case, despite Bullseye being able to escape, as the case gets loaded into a plane bound for Japan. Determined to rescue Jessie, Woody whistles for Bullseye, whom he and Buzz mount and gallop across the airfield to rescue Jessie.

Woody, after being separated from Buzz again, follows the case into the plane's cargo hold. There, Woody again offers to take Jessie back to Andy's house. She initially fears that Andy will not like her, but Woody tells her that it will not be so bad because Andy has a baby sister. The two were still became trapped in the plane. Finding another escape route, they exit the plane  just seconds before the plane takes off. As they celebrate their success, Jessie describes Woody rescuing her as "Woody's finest hour."

Back at Andy's room, when Andy comes home from Cowboy Camp, he is pleased to see Jessie and Bullseye (along with 3 Pizza Planet Aliens) added into his toy collection, calling them Bazooka Jane and her jet-propelled horse. With Andy's name printed on the bottom of her boot, Jessie is overjoyed to feel appreciated again. Buzz clearly, but nervously, develops a crush on her and the two enter a relationship somewhat similar to the way Woody and Bo Peep have done. The two couples are seen standing together as they enjoy watching a newly-fixed Wheezy sing "You've Got a Friend in Me."

Toy Story 3


In Toy Story 3, she is first shown in an opening sequence taking place in the Wild West. When Woody is knocked off the train by bandits One-Eyed Bart and Betty (Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head's characters, respectively), Woody is seen riding on Bullseye behind Jessie as they chase after the train. After Bart explodes a railroad bridge and escapes with One-Eyed Betty and their stolen loot on a Corvette that the Aliens are driving, Jessie and Woody rush over to stop the train to save the orphans aboard. Woody jumps into the locomotive and pulls on the brakes, but the train goes off the bridge and into a ravine, leaving Jessie to assume that Woody has died, along with the orphans. But then, to Jessie's surprise, the train shoots out of the ravine, lifted up by Buzz. Woody, Buzz and Jessie then attempt to stop the criminals, but they are interrupted by a spaceship controlled by Evil Dr. Porkchop (Hamm's character), who warps the criminals back into the spaceship and executes Death by Monkeys to capture the three heroes. As One-Eyed Bart prepares to finish them off, the scene cuts to Andy's room, revealing that the sequence has actually taken place in Andy's imagination.

During the main events of the film, Jessie continues to have fond affections toward Buzz. When Andy puts her in the trash bag with the other toys aside Woody and Andy's mom, mistaking the bag as trash, puts it on the curb outside the house next to the driveway, Jessie refuses to relive the trauma she felt years ago when she is given away by Emily, so she convinces the other toys to go to Sunnyside Daycare. However, Woody, having seen what has happened, yells at Jessie that Andy has intended to put them in the attic, only for Jessie to yell back to him that Andy has left her and the others on the curb.

Jessie is thrilled to learn from Lotso that when the children at Sunnyside are replaced with new children when they grow old, meaning the toys will never be outgrown. She tries to persuade Woody to join the others in beginning their lives anew at the daycare, but Woody persistently tries to convince her and the others that Andy still cares about his toys and that they return home with him. Upon hearing Jessie's belief that Andy has moved on and that she and the others must do the same, Woody calls them selfish and decides to leave to return to Andy by himself, leaving Jessie hurt and saddened. Shortly after, she and the other toys discover they have been placed in a room with very young children, who roughly yet innocently abuse them. After Buzz decides that he will go and see Lotso to request a transfer of him and his friends to the Butterfly Room, Jessie and the others help launch Buzz upwards so that he leaves the Caterpillar Room by the open window above the locked door leading to a hallway.

While Buzz is gone, Mrs. Potato Head sees Andy searching for his missing toys through her eye that she has left in his room, making Jessie and the others realize that they have been wrong about Andy. Feeling guilty about not listening to Woody, they decide to return home, but are instead imprisoned in the daycare by Lotso and his gang, who have reprogrammed Buzz into thinking he is a space ranger again and turned him against them. When Lotso warns the toys about escaping Sunnyside, he tosses Woody's hat, which has been left behind during his escape, towards them, fearing that Lotso had killed Woody, Jessie is left in her cell feeling incredibly guilty.

Following another rough play date with the young children, Woody, who has returned to Sunnyside to rescue his friends, calls to them, and Jessie and the others are overjoyed to see him again. Jessie apologizes for not listening to Woody, who apologizes in return for leaving. Remembering that Andy is leaving for college the next day, Jessie becomes eager to help Woody return home to Andy, and Woody formulates a plan to escape Sunnyside. On the night the toys carry out their breakout plan, after receiving a signal from Woody and Slinky (who have subdued the Monkey who monitors the security cameras at night), Jessie signals to Hamm and Rex to make their move, which they do by staging a small fight to distract Buzz. With Buzz preoccupied with trying to break up the fight, Jessie and Bullseye emerge out from their cells, grab a plastic storage bin, and slam it top of Buzz, trapping him with help from Hamm and Rex. Jessie then gets a tortilla for Mr. Potato Head's parts that have left his plastic potato body, allowing him to change himself into "Mr. Tortilla Head" by attaching his parts onto the tortilla. After catching the key that Woody and Slinky have fired from the office, Jessie passes it to Mrs. Potato Head, who unlocks the door upon receiving a signal from "Mr. Tortilla Head". Jessie, Bullseye, Mrs. Potato Head, and the Aliens then get a head start. Later, after Woody and the others catch up at the playground outside the building, Jessie is reunited with Buzz, who has been reset to a Spanish version of his deluded space ranger self. Jessie is initially uncomfortable with this change, but is quickly won over by his charms all over again.

When Lotso corners the toys at the dumpster with his gang and coaxes the toys into returning to the Caterpillar Room and join his family again, Jessie retorts by claiming that Sunnyside is a prison, labeling Lotso as a liar and a bully, and declaring that she and her friends do not intend to rejoin Lotso's family. After Lotso's gang become aware of their leader's ulterior motives and throw Lotso into the dumpster, Jessie and the others escape, but Woody gets pulled into the dumpster by Lotso, prompting Jessie and the others to come to his rescue, just as a garbage truck arrives. Inside the garbage truck, Jessie is rescued from being buried in trash by Buzz. Then, a television falls on Buzz, and Jessie despairs over his apparent death, but he reawakens to his normal self. Jessie is overjoyed to see that Buzz has returned, and kisses him numerous times on his cheek while thanking him for saving her.

The toys are then dumped in a landfill and pushed into a trench leading into a dark tunnel. Jessie is the first to realize the magnetic ceiling where Slinky and other metal objects are being pulled up to. Seeing a set of shredders that looms ahead, the toys, under Buzz's command, take a metal object to hang from the ceiling, safe from the shredders. But then Lotso calls for help from under the golf bag, prompting Woody and Buzz to drop down to his rescue, as Jessie watches horrifiedly. After Woody, Buzz, and Lotso clear the shredders, Jessie calls to them so that they catch up with the others. However, the conveyor belt they are on is taking them to an incinerator. And because of Lotso's betrayal, the toys are dropped into a furnace. Jessie asks Buzz what they are going to do next, and he takes hold of her hand. After realizing that she and Buzz have both been deprived of any escape chance, Jessie takes hold of one of Bullseye's hooves, and the other toys to do just the same. Just as the toys accept their seemingly inevitable doom, they are all saved by the Aliens controlling a giant "Claw". Outside, Jessie and Buzz find themselves still holding hands as they smile at one another. They tell Woody that they still need to get him home. But when Woody expresses worry about how the toys will handle their lives in the attic, Buzz and Jessie remind Woody that they are Andy's toys and that their job is to be there for him.

The toys hitch a ride in Sid's garbage truck to return to Andy's house and say their farewell words to Woody. Jessie tells Woody that she still knows about Buzz's Spanish mode, which briefly makes Buzz suspicious. However, with Woody's intervention, the toys are donated to Bonnie Anderson instead of being stored in the attic. Jessie is played with by Andy one last time, giving her the closure to lovingly see her old owner off to college.

In the end credits, Jessie quickly adapts to her new life as one of Bonnie's toys. She pinpoints to Buzz about the message from the revolutionized Sunnyside that Ken is the one who has written the message. Finally, she decides to take advantage of Buzz's Spanish side so they can dance together to "Hay Un Amigo En Mi," the Spanish version of "You've Got a Friend in Me," to amusement of Woody and the others. As the two dance, Jessie catches a rose, thrown by Woody, in her mouth by its stem.

Buzz Lightyear of Star Command
Jessie made silent cameos during the intros of Buzz Lightyear of Star Command.

Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins
In the show's pilot, Jessie made a silent intro cameo appearance in the film's opening sequence, walking alongside Buzz as they inspect the recently arrived VHS copy of the video. Despite not speaking, she makes a quiet giggle.

Hawaiian Vacation
In the first episode of Toy Story Toons, after the toys come up with an idea of recreating Hawaii for Barbie and Ken, who have unexpectedly revealed themselves in Bonnie's room, Jessie acts as one of the Aloha Spirits, greeting Ken with an enthusiastic "ALOHA!" When Barbie and Ken are having their "dinner," she plays the role of an assistant waitress.

Small Fry
In the second episode of Toy Story Toons, Jessie and the others want to know what happened to Buzz after Mini Buzz arrives. She is seen looking pretty impressed with Mini Buzz's tricks as he skates around the room, but is quickly annnoyed after he takes Woody's hat and annoys the others. Later in the episode, Mini Buzz attempts to flirt with Jessie with no luck. She is overjoyed when Buzz returns to the room, she rushes over to him to give him a big hug.

Partysaurus Rex
In the third episode of Toy Story Toons, she is seen holding the toy fan that made Mrs. Potato Head's bubble bigger, and shields herself with it when Rex bursts the bubble. She then joins the other toys (except Woody, Buzz, Bullseye, Hamm, Dolly and Mr. Pricklepants) in calling Rex "Partypooper Rex", and runs away with them when Bonnie comes. Later, Jessie is seen with Woody, Buzz, Mr. Potato Head, Hamm and Mr. Pricklepants as they walk towards the bathroom door, wondering if Rex was okay, only to be hit by the overflowing bathwater bursting the door open. At the end, she was using the same toy fan to dry Mr. Pricklepants being held by Buzz, and sighs when Rex says that he was a "Partysaurus". She then watches with the other toys as Rex helps to turn on the outside faucet for the pool toys to have them party after hearing of Rex's exploits from the bath toys.

Toy Story of Terror!
Jessie returns in the Halloween special as the protagonist. She rescued Woody from being shipped to his buyer after Sleep Well hotel manager Ron put him on sale on an online bidding website.

Toy Story That Time Forgot
Jessie only appears twice in this Christmas special. She appears at the beginning and later at the end.

Personality
Jessie is a friendly, excitable and smart cowgirl doll. She likes being loved by any other child and has the power to yodel. She hates being in storage -- as it makes her claustrophobic -- and not having someone to love her, also called Autophobia. A girl named Emily had once loved her until she gave her up and put her in a charity box, which scarred her for life.

Woody
Woody and Jessie share a sibling-like relationship. Since meeting each other in Al's penthouse, the two share a close bond. The two are shown to have pretty heated arguments from time to time, but they deeply care for each other nonetheless.

Bullseye
Both Bullseye and Jessie bonded when they were in storage for an unknown number of years. Jessie would ask Bullseye yes or no questions, and he would tap once for yes and twice for no. Since then, the two have been inseparable.

Buzz Lightyear
Her relationship with Buzz was only hinted at the end of Toy Story 2  when Buzz became instantly lovestruck with her looks and her adventurous personality. In Toy Story 3, their relationship hadn't evolved much since Toy Story 2, but it's shown that Jessie is fond of Buzz, and he is protective of her. After their "Operation: Playtime" plan failed, Buzz gives an exceptionally sad look to Jessie as she climbs out of the box, and also gives her sympathetic looks when she has panic attacks and when they argue about going to Sunnyside. Before getting taken to Sunnyside, Buzz is shown being a little more concerned over Jessie when she goes into a panic attack and says "We're being abandoned!" Even later, in the demo mode which he is put in by Lotso and his minions, he remains attracted to Jessie, calling her a "temptress" with "bewitching good looks". Then again, after being reset into Spanish Mode, Buzz is shown to be even more attracted and open towards her, calling her "my desert flower", dancing around her and asking her to join him in his adventures exploring the galaxy, shielding her from Mr. Potato Head when he saw him as a threat, getting jealous when she hugged Woody, and saving her from not only being pinned under the trash, but from a falling TV set. Jessie first shows signs of strong feelings for Buzz during this rescue, and when he is first thought to have perished after the TV set falls on him, she is clearly in despair. But it is actually during the incinerator scene when they truly realize their feelings for each other. And after the group is rescued, only Buzz and Jessie continue to be holding hands after the claw delivers them all to safety. At the end of Toy Story 3, the two finally seal their relationship, with Jessie taking the initiative for the two to dance an exciting paso doble that closes the trilogy.

Stinky Pete
Jessie was originally good friends with Stinky Pete the Prospector during their time at Al's Penthouse. However Jessie later became mad with the Prospector after his betrayal.

Toy Description
From Official Website:

"Jessie is an exuberant, rough-and-tumble cowgirl doll who's always up for a daring adventure to help critters in need. With Andy's imminent departure hanging over the toys, Jessie is afraid of being abandoned by her owner once again. She takes charge, insisting that the toys take control of their own destinies. But is it a decision they'll later regret?"

Trivia

 * Jessie seems to be scared of going inside cases. In Toy Story of Terror!, it is revealed she has claustrophobia, a fear of which she gets over in the short.
 * When Jessie first meets Woody, she exclaims, "Sweet mother of Abraham Lincoln!" Abraham Lincoln's mother was Nancy Hanks, a blood relative of Tom Hanks. Tom Hanks is a direct descendant of an uncle of Nancy Hanks.
 * It is unknown how many sayings Jessie has by pulling her pull string, but in the series it can be assumed she can say nine like Woody and Stinky Pete, including her trademark yodel.
 * When Jessie fights Woody after he accuses her for turning on the TV, Jessie's position (pinning Woody on the ground, foot on his back, pulling his arms back) is the same as Buzz's when he fights Woody underneath Andy's car at the gas station in Toy Story.
 * John Lasseter's wife Nancy suggested that in Toy Story 2 that there should be a strong female character, which soon led to the creation of Jessie.
 * In Toy Story 2's original storyline, the character in place of Jessie in Woody's Roundup was a cactus toy named Señorita Cactus, but after the original storyline was scrapped, Jessie's character was created, replacing Señorita Cactus' place in the Roundup Gang.
 * Another Jessie doll makes a cameo in Monsters, Inc. as one of the toys that Boo gives to Sulley after she returns to her room.
 * Notably, in the Monsters, Inc. comic mini-series Laugh Factory, Boo's Jessie doll is prominently featured in the third installment, "Toy Worry." In that story, Sid Phillips, the toy-killing boy Woody and Buzz faced in the first film, uses the monsters' door-traveling technology and steals Jessie from Boo while she isn't looking, as he is trying to "save" other kids from being terrorized by living toys like he was. After Mike and Sulley return Boo's Jessie doll to her at the end, they scoff at the idea of toys coming to life, but Boo's Jessie doll gives a knowing wink to the reader.
 * She is a female counterpart to Woody (just like Mrs. Potato Head is to Mr. Potato Head), but has a different personality.
 * While all the other toys have brown, blue, and black eyes, Jessie is the only one with green eyes. Also, she is the only toy with red hair.
 * She has red hair, and a red hat. Meanwhile, Woody has brown hair and a brown hat. It is unknown if this was done on purpose or just a coincidence.
 * Even though he is Woody's horse, Bullseye seems to be more attached to Jessie. Whenever Bullseye is around, she usually has an arm around him. Other times during dramatic situations, he hides behind her, or Jessie holds him close.
 * In 2000, Jessie was honored with the Patsy Montana Entertainer Award from the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame. Her acceptance speech has been partially recovered in Victor Navone's Pixar Training video.
 * Buzz and Jessie's dance moves during the end credits of Toy Story 3 are choreographed by Tony Dovolani and Cheryl Burke of Dancing with the Stars.
 * In Toy Story 2, Andy names Jessie "Bazooka Jane". But in Toy Story 3, when Andy introduces Bonnie to her, he calls her by her real name. It is unknown how Andy learned her real name, but it is possible that he found out about Woody's Roundup and learned her name. It is also possible that, like real Jessie dolls, one of her pullstring quotes does include her saying her name.
 * Jessie is similar to Lilo from Lilo & Stitch, as both are dealing with loss (for Jessie, abandonment by Emily; for Lilo, death of parents), but meet someone who changes their lives (for Jessie, Woody; for Lilo, Stitch) and extend their families through them.