Inside Out / Characters

Characters from Pixar's films Inside Out and Inside Out 2. Beware of unmarked spoilers.

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The Andersen Family

Riley Andersen

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Inside_Out_1.png

Voiced by: Kaitlyn Dias (first film), Lola Cooley (as a toddler), Mary Gibbs (screams and cries recycled from Monsters, Inc.), Kensington Tallman (second film)

One of the protagonists of Inside Out (alongside her emotions), who has to adjust to a new chapter in her life when her family moves from the Midwest to San Francisco.

Afraid of Clowns: She seems to be deeply afraid of clowns, as there is a Monster Clown named Jangles who is locked up in the darkest depths of her subconscious. It's said she sometimes has nightmares about him, and his mere presence is enough to wake her up. It's implied that this fear comes from a particularly traumatizing birthday party, where Jangles is actually a Non-Ironic Clown, but Riley was simply too afraid to realize this.
Break the Cutie: She goes through this when her family leaves Minnesota, culminating in her decision to run away and try to return. Ultimately, she is able to confide in her parents and becomes a stronger person as a result.
Character Development: Riley evolves as a character through the movie, both directly seen and experienced by her emotions. By the end of the film Riley has developed into a more emotionally complex person as a result of her emotional crisis, which is symbolized by the new control panel the emotions use as well as the memory orbs now seen possessing multiple colors.
Cheerful Child: Was this when she was younger. She was always smiling and had boundless energy.
Childhood Friends: Has been best friends with Meg since they were toddlers.
Clothing Reflects Personality: Wears darker clothing as the film progresses, reflecting her emotional state.
The Cutie: Growing up she's portrayed as an adorable, upbeat child with a goofy side.
Daddy's Girl: In the family scenes and a couple of Clorox commercials, it's implied that she is closer to her father. Note also that Mr. Andersen is a key presence in several of the core memories she possesses.
Dating What Daddy Hates: Downplayed. In Riley's First Date?, she brings home a boy named Jordan, who her father is extremely suspicious of (although it's implied that he would disapprove of any boy who came to their house, being a Boyfriend-Blocking Dad and all). Eventually, Riley's dad warms up to Jordan when he finds out that they both like AC/DC
Desperate Plea for Home: After deciding not to run away from her new home, Riley tearfully confesses to her parents that she wants to return to her old home in Minnesota. She expects them not to understand, but they do and comfort her.
Does Not Like Spam: Riley has hated broccoli ever since Disgust first turned her off from it as a toddler.
Emotionless Girl: Becomes this in the film's pre-climax act; losing Joy, Sadness, and her core memories causes her to emotionally shut down. Joy, Fear, Disgust and Anger cannot influence her. Fortunately, it doesn't last.
Family Theme Naming: Notably averted with "Riley". Her parents who are named in the Essential Guide are Bill and Jill.
Girlish Pigtails: As a toddler and young child, she often wears her hair in pigtails.
Hair-Trigger Temper: She has a rather short temper due to the stress of moving, and Joy not being around.
Heroic BSoD: Due to the stress of moving and Joy's absence, Riley is very depressed for much of the movie. Becomes an almost literal BSOD near the end, when the idea of running away has taken over her mind and shut down the console.
Hollywood Genetics: She did not inherit the brown hair and eye colors of her parents, and is somehow a blue-eyed blonde. She does however inherit her mom's ponytail for the second film, showing she will take after her mom's appearance.
Innocent Blue Eyes: They reflect her childlike innocence when she was younger.
Lovable Jock: An active hockey player on her team (in both her former and current hometown) and is a well-behaved, fun-loving girl.
Naked People Are Funny: The Core Memory forming the basis of Goofball Island was one of her running through the house as a toddler without any clothes on.
Nice Girl: Riley is chipper, fun-loving, upbeat, honest, cheerful (but prone to outbursts of anger), optimistic, sensitive, and sentimental.
Passionate Sports Girl: Riley has loved ice hockey ever since she was little, and has a personality island dedicated to it.
The Pollyanna: With her mindset primarily controlled by Joy, Riley tends to look on the bright side.
Princess Phase: She apparently had one when she was younger, but has long since grown out of it, as seen when the mind workers are throwing out her memories of the name of every Cutie Pie Princess doll.
Rage Quit: While in San Francisco, she tries out for a hockey team, but can't focus and ends up falling on the ice. Since Anger is controlling her mind at the time, she gets frustrated and gives up.
The Runaway: Anger puts this idea in her head near the end of the film, reasoning that they can create new core memories by going back to Minnesota. Joy and Sadness show up at the last second to subvert it.
Ship Tease: Jordan is speechless when he first meets her, and a post-film short has Riley's parents worrying they might be going out (except, they're not).
Stepford Smiler: It's eventually revealed this is the real reason Sadness never is assigned a job; Riley believes she should never be sad for her parents' sake.
Stock Audio Clip: As a toddler, some of her babbles, screams, and cries are recycled from Monsters, Inc.
Tomboyish Ponytail: Sports this look as shown in Inside Out 2, which hints she's starting to take more after her mom in terms of appearances.
Tomboy with a Girly Streak: She's a pre-teen girl who plays hockey, which is known for being a very rough sport, and she tends to wear pants rather than skirts or dresses. However, she has butterfly curtains in her room, dreams about rainbow unicorns, and eventually gains an interest in Boy Bands, fashion, and "tragic vampire romance" novels offscreen. As a little girl, she also liked Cutie Pie Princess dolls and could remember the names of each one.
Trademark Favorite Food:
- Pizza; it's literally the first thing she asks for when she moves to San Francisco.
- She seems to like French fries enough that there's an entire section of Imagination Land dedicated to French Fry Forest.
Tritagonist: The plot primarily focuses on her emotional turmoil alongside Joy and Sadness' developing relationship. Technically you can say she's the main protagonist since all the characters within her head are a part of her, but in terms of the depicted personalities, this trope is more fitting.
Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?:
- Riley has coulrophobia (a fear of clowns) since her subconscious part of her mind contains "Jangles the Birthday Clown", which scared her as a child.
- She also has arachnophobia (fear of spiders), something that is used as a "horror nightmare movie" when she's asleep.
- Other things seen in the darkest regions of her subconscious include the stairs to the pitch-dark basement and Grandma's vacuum cleaner.

Bill Andersen

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Father.png

Voiced by: Kyle MacLachlan

Riley's father, who took a job in San Francisco and thus caused the family to move.

All There in the Manual: Though neither of Riley's parents is named in the film, their first names are revealed in the Essential Guide.
Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: He gets the idea to show up to her hockey game in full face paint, which naturally embarrasses Riley to no end. Disgust even notes that while Riley may appreciate it, she can't let Riley show it. His wife appreciates the gesture, though.
Big Ol' Eyebrows: He has the thickest eyebrows of his family.
Boyfriend-Blocking Dad: In Riley's First Date?, he's clearly not happy about a guy trying to hang out with his daughter, and immediately decides that the kid's "not good enough for Riley". He even comes dangerously close to kicking him out of the house before finding some common ground.
Bumbling Dad: Subverted. Despite the trailers playing it up, it's only present in one scene. When Mrs. Andersen tries to get support from her husband on asking Riley how her day was, none of his emotions were paying attention, leading him to simply repeat the question to Riley. Everywhere else in the movie, he's shown to be a perfectly normal, even above average, father.
A Day in the Limelight: He and his emotions are the central focus of the Riley's First Date? short; particularly, how exceptionally displeased he is at the prospect of said first date.
Death Glare: He gives such an effective one that Jordan would've been pissing his pants if he wasn't so mellow. Or paying attention.
Drives Like Crazy: At least in Riley's opinion, if her "Dad's Driving Scares Me!" dream-movie poster shown as promotional material is any indication. Also forgets to use the parking brake, causing the car to roll backwards in one scene.
Good Parents: Despite zoning out at the dinner table, he's shown to be a very loving and caring father to Riley.
Happily Married: Not that they don't experience some friction at times, but he and Mrs. Andersen ultimately have a solid relationship.
Hidden Depths: The Riley's First Date? short reveals that, despite his contemporary working-stiff family man lifestyle, he's a fan of AC/DC and used to play lead guitar in a garage band. A memory from that era shows him in all his long-haired grungy glory.
Nice Guy: True, he may be a tad inattentive to things going on with his daughter, but this seems to be more related to his work schedule and that things were going wrong from the moment they arrived in San Francisco, and what comes about as a result of that business (one could view his not paying attention to Riley at dinner as zoning out after a long day's work). When he interacts with his family, and work doesn't bother him, you can tell that he really cares.
Perma-Stubble: Sports a 5 o'clock shadow throughout the movie.
Unnamed Parent: Riley's parents are never named in the film itself.

Jill Andersen

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/23F35CDF00000578-0-image-a-4_1418242893445.jpg

Voiced by: Diane Lane

Riley's mother. She tries to figure out why Riley seems to be behaving strangely but doesn't have much success.

All There in the Manual: Though neither of Riley's parents is named in the film (though Mrs. Andersen's name does appear on her credit card), their first names are revealed in the Essential Guide.
Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: She goes along with her husband's idea to show up to Riley's hockey game in full face paint. Later, when starting to probe Riley about Jordan, she litters her speech with "cool words the kids say", resulting in an attempt so cringeworthy that Riley's Disgust nopes right out of there.
Good Parents: She's a loving and attentive mother, and quick to pick up on the fact that something's wrong with Riley.
Happily Married: For the most part, though she does keep the memory of a handsome Brazilian helicopter pilot on hand for when things get rough.
Hidden Depths: It's worth noting that her head emotion is Sadness; since Sadness seems to be the leader of her emotions (but is not a weeping mess like Riley's Sadness), it is possible this is where her understanding and compassionate nature comes from as sadness represents the ability to empathize with others.
Let's Get Dangerous!: A more friendly example. When she puts up her hair, she's about to show Riley a thing or two about playing games.
Joy: Oh! She put her hair up. We're in for it now!
Nice Girl: In a similar vein to her husband; however, her problems with Riley seem to arise from Riley sending conflicting signals about things. She (and by extension, her emotions) knows something's up but she can't really help Riley because she's literally having an internal struggle. That said she tries her best to cheer Riley up by spending time with her and voicing concern.
Speaking Like Totally Teen: Her attempt at using "cool words the kids say" resulted in a truly cringe-worthy mixture of internet slang and ebonics.
Joy: ...Did she just say "fo-sheezy"?
Unnamed Parent: Riley's parents are never named in the film itself (although her name is briefly visible on her debit card).
Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Joy may well have been on her way to learning her lesson all on her own until Mom tells Riley she should stay happy for her father's sake. While she means well, Riley takes it to mean that she should suppress her own sadness at having to move out of Minnesota until she has an emotional breakdown over it and tries to run away from home.

Riley's Emotions

The First Generation

In general

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/inside_out.jpg

Anthropomorphic Personification: Of emotions, obviously. Each of them embodies their namesake. Bing Bong is the spirit of childhood.
Big, Thin, Short Trio: The only three male emotions: Embarrassment, Fear and Anger respectively.
Born as an Adult: Though Riley starts off as a baby, her emotions don't.
Color-Coded Emotions: Each emotion is associated with a color, and when an emotion is working the console, the memories generated will be colored to match that emotion. To wit:
- Joy is a bright, effervescent yellow.
- Sadness, of course, is blue.
- Anger is a hot red.
- Disgust is green.
- Fear is a pale, washed-out, and slightly sickly shade of purple.
- Anxiety is bright orange.
- Envy is aquamarine.
- Ennui is a dark, grayish indigo.
- Embarrassment is blush pink.
Crippling Overspecialization: By their very nature, the emotions are unable to work well when one or two of their group is missing and are required for the proper response, and they know this. The biggest problem is that none of the emotions are able to operate the console in any way other than the emotion they embody. For example, Anger cannot cause happy stimuli in Riley; he can only work with Joy to put Riley in a position where Joy can create it. During the family dinner scene, Anger and Disgust's attempts to fill in for Joy only result in hollow, sarcastic comments from Riley about how she's fine, while Fear's just comes out as a Suspiciously Specific Denial.
Curtains Match the Window: The female emotions (Joy, Sadness, and Disgust). Fear can be considered a mild example, as his single hair strand is also purple, like his eyes. Except for Joy, the emotions' eye and hair color also matches their skin color.
Dark Is Not Evil: The negative emotions are just as helpful and vital as the positive ones. Joy understands this, at least for Anger, Fear, and Disgust, but the main story and message of the first movie revolves around discovering that this is true for Sadness, too.
Manchild:
- The emotions in general, including the adults', have no understanding of events they haven't experienced no matter how obvious these "should" be. Fear, for example, is easily convinced earthquakes in San Francisco are a myth and while compiling fantasies from books (e.g. meteor) can't articulate strong reasons that an 11-year-old should not run away across the country. The father thinks they did an excellent job disciplining an unusually unhappy Riley by yelling at her.
- Riley's emotions look, sound, and generally act like adults, but they have no agenda beyond Riley's day-to-day life, so they come across as this. Toddler Riley's temper tantrum about having to eat broccoli and being denied dessert is fueled by Disgust and Anger treating those things as Serious Business. Taken to eleven when Anger uses very childish logic to convince the others to run away. This is contrasted with her parents, whose equivalent emotions are more level-headed.
Meaningful Name: Seeing as they're literally emotions, they're named after what they are.
The Needless: There's always one emotion that stays up all night for Dream Duty, and Joy and Sadness go the entirety of the movie — roughly three days — without needing to stop and rest, and not looking or acting any different from not doing so. In addition, the closest we see to any of them eating or drinking is Fear drinking tea a couple times (the first time the TripleDent Gum jingle is sent up, and when he's sent to do Dream Duty, plus during the introduction of one of the extra videos) and Joy reaching for some of Bing Bong's candy tears and licking her fingers after pole-vaulting with a French Fry.
Nice Mean And In Between: After Joy and Sadness are sucked out of Headquarters, Riley is left with the nervous and paranoid but gentle Fear (nice), Anger (mean), and snarky, sassy Disgust with a heart of gold (in-between). With all five of them together, Fear is still the nice but is also joined by the optimistic fun-loving Joy, Anger is still the mean and Disgust is still the in-between but also joined by Sadness, who is very gloomy and cynical but also wants to be a helpful part in Riley's life.
Non-Standard Character Design: Unlike every other character's emotions, Riley's emotions do not share any notable physical traits with her (i.e., how her dad's emotions share his mustache and suit while her mom's share her glasses and hair) and are the only set of emotions to come to have both male and female members (everyone else's emotions are the same gender as their host).
O.O.C. Is Serious Business: All of them are easy enough to predict, considering that besides a few universal feelings (such as boredom) they will always fully act in accordance with their emotion, as long as Riley's actively feeling the emotion in question. For instance, Anger will be angry in almost every single scene he appears in, because he usually appears when she's angry; when she stops being angry, he wanders off, uninterested. To that end, Joy finally breaking down in tears in the Memory Dump comes across so strongly in part because before then, there was little to no indication that it was even possible for her to feel sad.
Pink Girl, Blue Boy: Inverted. The female Sadness is blue, while the male Embarrassment is pink.
Royal "We": While controlling Riley, the emotions tend to refer to themselves as "we" and "us", instead of "I" and "me".
Seeing Through Another's Eyes: When in Headquarters, they can see what Riley sees.
Sharing a Body: They live together inside Riley's mind (though not her physical brain) and help guide her.
Stealth Hi/Bye: Outside of Joy, this is how each emotion is introduced. As Riley first feels an emotion, they will appear from out of nowhere as if they've always been in the room.
The Team: Joy is clearly The Leader, dominating most of Riley's memories and running headquarters. Anger is The Big Guy as he's stout, aggressive, and has a weaponized ability in his hotheadedness. Fear is The Smart Guy, doing research about things to be cautious of as they approach new situations. Sadness and Disgust trade off on The Heart and The Lancer: Disgust is a cynical foil to Joy's relentless optimism, and seemingly Number Two, while Sadness is the least active, but most empathetic character. Alternatively, Joy and Sadness are obviously direct opposites and Disgust is the most stereo-typically feminine in a vain fashion conscious way. Bing Bong is the Sixth Ranger as the only main character who isn't a core emotion, a latecomer in the story, and intentionally left out of promotional materials for maximum shock value.
Tomboy and Girly Girl: A downplayed example between Joy and Disgust. Disgust is the most feminine of the emotions, while Joy has a few masculine traits like Boyish Short Hair despite being overall feminine. The scene where the two fought over Riley dropping a grape and the 5-second rule highlighted this, as Joy was okay with Riley doing something gross, much to the, well... disgust of Disgust.
Town Girls: Joy is a bossy, fun-loving Genki Girl with Boyish Short Hair who goes barefoot and gets enthusiastic about ice skating (butch), though she does wear a simple dress. Disgust is a snotty fashionista with high standards and impeccable taste (femme), while Sadness is a bookish and melancholy Dork in a Sweater who likes tragic vampire romance novels (neither).
True Companions: They are close like a family and really care for each other and for Riley.
Undying Loyalty: Towards Riley, being born from and a part of her mind.
Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Judging from the reaction that Joy and Sadness had from their trek through the Subconscious, it would seem that all the emotions are scared of the same things that Riley is, including broccoli, her grandmother's vacuum cleaner, and clowns.

Joy

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/inside_out_joy_transparent.png

"Think positive!"

Voiced by: Amy Poehler (films), Kate Higgins (tie-in material)

Considering herself to be the de facto leader of the emotions, Joy's goal has always been to make sure Riley stays happy. She is lighthearted, optimistic, and determined to find the fun in every situation. Joy sees challenges in Riley's life as opportunities, and the less happy moments as hiccups on the way back to something great. As long as Riley is happy, so is Joy. Word of God states that her performance model is a star. invoked

Actor Allusion: She's basically Leslie Knope with a pixie haircut. (Aggressively happy, even sometimes when it isn't warranted; holds a bureaucratic leadership job; tends to steamroll over her friends and colleagues, and assume she knows what's best for them.)
Aerith and Bob: Mainly due to happenstance, as Joy is an actual given name, which makes her the only emotion with a normal-sounding name.
Barefoot Loon: Downplayed. She is the only emotion that doesn't wear shoes, fitting her hyper, exuberant personality.
Become a Real Boy: It's subtly implied throughout the movie that Joy dreams of becoming human and lives through Riley to do so. She always keeps Riley happy regardless of whether it's actually healthy for the latter, and one scene has her mimicking Riley's ice skating. Taken even further in concepts for her room, which features drawings of her doing ballet and another saying "Me & Mom".
Black-and-White Insanity: Downplayed, but in Joy's mind, Happiness is Good and Sadness is Bad (perhaps Justified, as she is only mentally eleven). She accepts that Anger, Fear and Disgust are important from time to time in order to keep Riley safe, but at the start of the movie, she doesn't understand what Sadness is for other than making Riley miserable. Most of the movie is about her growing out of this attitude.
Blue Is Heroic: Her hair is blue and she's the protagonist.
Break the Cutie: Gets hit with this hard when she lands in the memory dump. Once she finds an old memory of how Riley used to stick her tongue out when she drew, as well as the core memory Sadness created, she just falls apart.
Joy: I just wanted Riley to be happy, and now... [begins to cry]
Character Development: Joy learns that endless happiness isn't always the solution, and that feeling sad isn't always bad and can be an important part of emotionally processing a problem in order to be able to fix it.
Control Freak: Joy's the boss in Riley's mind, and she places herself in charge of everything in HQ. More subtly, all the core memories are shown to be joy memories, which she — not to brag — takes considerable pride in. Considering those are the foundation of who Riley is, that means she alone was controlling who Riley is which comes to bite back afterwards, since without her there is absolutely nothing to fuel the core memories, causing them to fall apart. While the events of the movie do demonstrate that Joy plays an essential part in Riley's consciousness, the lesson she comes to learn is that it's okay and even necessary for her to step back from time to time and let the others take control.
Crippling Overspecialization:
- She is accustomed to happiness, and ONLY happiness, and as such she has a tough time with things not related to it, especially Sadness (her polar opposite). Her being unable to deal with sadness is what actually kicks off the plot.
- In another way, she is the only one to even make core memories. The crippling bit comes when she is away and the other emotions can't sustain them, causing Riley's personality to crumble. Literally.
- When she and Sadness plan to wake Riley up as a means of getting back to Headquarters, she shoots down Sadness' idea of scaring her as she doesn't want to make Riley more unhappy after the awful day she's had and insists that they should 'excite' her awake — never considering/comprehending that people don't really tend to wake up from happiness.
Deconstruction: Of always attempting to be happy and optimistic like a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Sometimes it just isn't what's best for you.
Determinator: Joy will never give up trying to do what she thinks is best for Riley, and is not one to stay in a Heroic BSoD for long.
Emerging from the Shadows: How she first appears.
Fingerless Hands: More like Toeless Feet; Joy has fingers but no toes. This might apply to the other emotions, but they at least wear shoes.
Foil: To Sadness. Their journey is about learning the importance of happiness and sadness.
For Happiness: Her life goal is to keep Riley happy.
Fun Personified: She is the personification of happiness, after all.
Genki Girl: Even the way she moves around is very flighty and energetic, full of prancing, twirling, and dancing.
Glad I Thought of It: She has a moment of this with Sadness's suggestion to wake Riley up (though to her credit, when they've woken her up and are on the train back to Headquarters, she does congratulate Sadness for the idea).
Happy Dance: In this clip, she does one while trying to distract Sadness and stop her from making Riley cry during hockey practice.
Hey, look at this! I'm doing the happy dance, I'm not wearing any pants, something something France, I'm doing the happy dance, hey!
The Hedonist: At first; she is being Innocently Insensitive to Sadness and her role in Riley's life, thinking she isn't needed. Of course, being Joy personified, she'd think that. At the end of the film, she realizes that Sadness is her equal and should be treated as such, given she was the only one who could fix Riley's depression.
Heel Realization: Has one near the end, when she realizes all her efforts to keep Riley happy in the short term have caused far more harm than good.
Heroic BSoD: Enters one after falling into the memory dump (putting her at risk of being forgotten by Riley altogether) and realizing her constant meddling has ultimately hurt Riley. She finally loses her composure and starts crying.
Hidden Depths: At least in the art book where we see what her room looks like. Along with having a window to a "Happy Place" modeled after Belle's house, there are a myriad of drawings on the wall, including one of her doing ballet and another labeled as "Me & Mom". With this combined with such actions as her miming Riley's ice skating, it's entirely possible that Joy secretly has a desire to be human.
Hope Bringer: It is implied throughout the movie that the emotions do more than allow Riley to feel but are also the foundation of more complex mental states. In this instance, Joy is the foundation for hope demonstrated by the fact that Joy keeps trying to look on the bright side of things and believes that every cloud has a silver lining.
Innocent Blue Eyes: Joy has wide blue eyes, representing her kind attitude and constant desire to make Riley happy.
Innocently Insensitive: Her obsession with keeping Riley happy at all times causes her to unintentionally mistreat Sadness.
It's All About Me: Rather mild case, but still there. Joy always wants Riley to be happy, so essentially she always wants Riley to focus on her. The conflict of the film is kicked off when Sadness creates a new core memory, which Joy is so opposed to that she yanks it out before it can generate a Personality Island and tries to send it to the Memory Dump, thus leading to the rest being knocked loose and being sucked through the tube. Also, if you look closely, all the core memories have been created by her.
I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: When Joy gives control of Riley over to Sadness near the end, considering her sense of proprietorship over Riley for most of the film.
Jerkass to One: While she's genuinely kind to everyone else, Joy goes out of her way to exclude Sadness and stops her from helping Riley under the belief that being sad would only hurt the latter. This trait fades away after she realizes how truly important Sadness is to Riley's well-being.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: She's inconsiderate of Sadness and somewhat selfish, but she truly does want the best for Riley.
Lack of Empathy: Joy has a mild case of this. She's no sociopath and does care about others' well-being, but has a very hard time expressing it properly. She's unable to understand why Sadness keeps bringing up the destruction of Bing-Bong's "rocket" since he's clearly unhappy about it, and in Joy's mind unhappy is automatically bad. She simply doesn't realize (yet) that Sadness' empathy with Bing-Bong over his loss actually makes him feel better about it in the long run.
The Lightfooted: She often moves by skipping and bouncing around - in contrast with Sadness's shuffle. A scene of note is the one where she imitates Riley's ice skating.
Magic Skirt: Her one-piece dress stays at knee level at all times, even when she's plummeting into the memory dump from a shattered recall tube. There is one aversion during the rocket escape, and there seems to be either censor steam or a coding error under the skirt. Justified, however, since she is an emotion and lives in Riley's mind, the laws of physics don't really apply to either her or her dress.
Manic Pixie Dream Girl: She is perpetually cheerful, excited, and upbeat, and is determined to make Riley the same.
My Beloved Smother: She clearly loves Riley like a mother would and only wants to ensure her happiness. But this prevents Riley from gaining emotional maturity.
My God, What Have I Done?: In the Memory Dump, when she realizes that Sadness is a very important emotion and that Joy's actions have left Riley feeling emotionally lopsided and unable to cope with such a big change.
Never My Fault: After she first meets Bing Bong, Joy implies that she blames Sadness for getting them lost in Long Term Memory, in spite of the fact that Joy trying to get rid of the sad core memory was what got them there in the first place.
Nice Girl: Post-Character Development, Joy becomes a much nicer, friendlier emotion who treats all of her fellow emotions with equal respect and always does what's right for Riley regardless of her own personal feelings.
Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Joy's behavior kicks off the loss of the core memories and the displacement of her and Sadness from headquarters. Things only get better when she allows Sadness to take control when necessary.
No Celebrities Were Harmed: Specifically designed to resemble Audrey Hepburn, down to her signature "pixie" haircut.
Nonstandard Character Design: Unique among the emotions in that her hair and eyes don't match her skin color.
Oh, Crap!: When a Sad Core Memory is formed, Joy all-but freaks out and immediately purges it.
Perpetual Smiler: For most of the film, in contrast to her foil, Sadness, who is a Perpetual Frowner.
Phosphor-Essence: She glows in a blueish light (in spite of her yellow palette), being the only emotion to do so.
The Pollyanna: Not only is she perpetually happy, but she's determined to keep Riley happy 24/7. This is deconstructed, as her Pollyanna tendencies can be more myopic than beneficial.
Red Oni, Blue Oni: The extroverted, enthusiastic Red Oni to Sadness's withdrawn Blue Oni.
Stepford Smiler: Though Joy is upbeat and optimistic about making Riley happy all the time, there are several instances where it's quite clear Joy is doing this to bury the sadness within herself. Every time Riley experiences something depressing or disappointing, Joy becomes more and more desperate to make her happy at all costs, which continues even after she and Sadness get stranded outside of headquarters and witness the destruction of Riley's personality places. It's only when she falls in the Memory Dump with little to no chance of escape that she falls into despair, crying for the first time. And it's that moment she realizes the importance of Sadness and that she went too far in excluding Sadness.
Supporting Protagonist: She's the main character of the film, but she and the other emotions are there for the sake of helping Riley.
Token Good Teammate: Perceives herself as this. Though she's able to put all the others except Sadness to good use, she's averse to any of the others actually driving and creating feelings or memories.
Took a Level in Kindness: Her character development also leads to her treating Sadness with equal respect and losing her It's All About Me flaw.
Tragic Keepsake: Bing-Bong's Bottomless Bag, which she now owns after Bing-Bong sacrificed himself to let Joy escape the Memory Dump.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: She wants Riley to be happy, but this is at the cost of risking her becoming a Stepford Smiler who can't handle her other emotions.
Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Heights appear to be among the few things that throw Joy off her upbeat game.

Sadness

"Crying helps me slow down and obsess over the weight of life's problems."

Voiced by: Phyllis Smith

None of the other Emotions really understand what Sadness' role is. Sadness would love to be more optimistic and helpful in keeping Riley happy, but she finds it so hard to be positive. Sometimes it seems like the best thing to do is just lie on the floor and have a good cry. Word of God states that her performance model is a teardrop. invoked

Accentuate the Negative: This is her default state of being. When Joy brings up several examples of happy memories, Sadness can without fail provide a negative counterpart.
All of the Other Reindeer: Downplayed. The other emotions don't hate Sadness but they don't know how she helps Riley since her taking control only hurts Riley from their point of view.
Apologizes a Lot: She apologizes almost every time she does anything, or anytime someone talks to her.
Black Comedy: Due to being Sadness, she finds sad things enjoyable and it comes off as that.
Remember the funny movie where the dog died?
Blue Is Heroic: Her skin and hair are blue and she's the deuteragonist.
Blue Means Smart One: Sadness is the blue one of Riley's emotions. She's also a Cute Bookworm who read all the Mind Manuals, which is very beneficial for her and Joy in their travel through Long-Term Memory.
Bookworm: The big glasses emphasize this. She likes reading the countless manuals on the shelf that contain all the information about how to do their jobs and how the mind works, something the other emotions are implied to find rather boring. Sadness is able to navigate her and Joy through Long-Term Memory just from reading the manuals alone.
Butt-Monkey: Usually gets mistreated by Joy and gets blamed for everything that goes wrong.
Cassandra Truth: She keeps touching Riley's happy memories because she feels that there's something wrong with them even though Joy and the others keep trying to stop her. Turns out that Sadness is doing so because she's the only one that implicitly understands that Riley is hurting and needs to signal that she needs help.
The Corruption: The reason the other emotions keep her away from the memory capsules after the move: she can turn them into sad ones. Turns out this was a symptom of Riley missing Minnesota, and therefore part of Sadness's job.
Curtains Match the Windows: Blue skin, blue eyes, blue hair.
Dark Is Not Evil: Sure, she's the literal embodiment of sadness and despair. But this doesn't make her a bad person by any means. Indeed, realising that she has a postive and important role in Riley's mindscape and shouldn't simply be suppressed away is the lesson both Riley (metaphorically) and Joy's (literally) have to learn over the first movie.
Deadpan Snarker: Towards Joy's exuberant behavior.
Joy: Think positive!
Sadness: Okay. I'm positive you're gonna get lost in there.
Deuteragonist: She's been Riley's longest-living emotion other than Joy. The plot inside the mind involves both her and Joy getting back to HQ, and Joy's Character Development is realizing the benefits of having her around.
The Drag-Along: Joy has to drag her across Longterm Memory.
The Eeyore: Being the personification of sadness, she is extremely negative and woeful. Most of the time, she just wants to lie on the floor and cry. She gets better, though, when the other emotions find out her true purpose.
The Empath: Like Joy, Sadness is a foundation for more complex mental processes. It is implied by the film that sadness forms the foundation for empathy by allowing people to recognize the pain in each other and also allow them to feel pain themselves. Without sadness Riley is incapable of regret or remorse.
Extreme Doormat: She just lets Joy walk all over her and treat her as the source of all of Riley's emotional troubles. Her occasional protest indicates she isn't completely unaware of the mistreatment.
Fisher King: To a mild extent: a cloud she sits on turns dark and starts pouring rain.
Foil: To Joy. Their journey is about learning the importance of happiness and sadness.
The Heart: At first, Joy believed all Sadness did was causing emotional pain for Riley, but by the end, she realizes that Sadness' true job is to make other people empathize with Riley's sorrow and connect with her to cheer her up. Riley can finally make up with her parents after Joy allows Sadness to take charge and Riley to open up about missing her old home.
Heart Is an Awesome Power: She allows people to sympathize with Riley so she can be even happier, as well as gives her breathing space to mourn.
Hidden Depths:
- She proves to be smarter than Joy gives her credit for, considering she knows the manuals by heart and suggests many solutions to their problems when they are outside Headquarters.
- Her role as an emotion is made clear by the end: she is gifted with empathy and knows when to call on others if Riley needs help.
Ink-Suit Actor: She does look a little like Phyllis Smith, coincidentally.
Leitmotif: Sad tuba or bass clarinet. Once she and Joy are out of Headquarters, it gets replaced with vibraphone and piano.
The Millstone: At first, it seems like all she does is screw up Joy's hard work keeping Riley happy. In the end, it turns out that both Joy and Sadness are equally important to Riley.
Ms. Exposition: She explains stuff she read in the manuals to Joy (and in extension the audience).
My God, What Have I Done?: Feels awful about all the trouble she brings for Riley, even though she does not understand why she does what she does. (The Driven by Emotions novelization suggests that the core memories are calling out to her and want her to touch them, and she only wants to do what they want. "At least, that's how I felt. Didn't that mean it was true?")
Nice Girl: Probably the nicest emotion, as she is nothing but empathetic, caring, humble, polite, and understanding.
Ocular Gushers: Her reaction to Joy offering her a flower in this trailer. Also gets a case of them when she's floating away from Joy on a raincloud through Imagination Land.
Only Sane Woman: Her tendency to point out the negative means that she can find flaws in Joy's plans. It gives her more insight into situations and how other people are feeling. Sadness warns Joy not to climb on a fragile glass beam back to headquarters, which nearly falls; she also says if they want to wake Riley up, they need to scare her. She ends up pinpointing that Riley is miserable about the move.
Perpetual Frowner: As her role implies, she's perpetually sad. She gets better near the end.
Prone to Tears: Being the embodiment of sadness, naturally she's very sensitive.
Red Oni, Blue Oni: The withdrawn Blue Oni to Joy's extroverted, enthusiastic Red Oni. She's even colored blue!
Ship Tease: With Embarrassment in the sequel. When he first appears in Headquarters with the other new emotions, she warmly smiles and looks up at the "big fella" while asking him who he is, and many advertisements and promos show them acting shy and bashful around one another.
Shy Blue-Haired Girl: She's very withdrawn and mopey, and she has blue hair.
Stock Sound Effect: Not used in the movie, but the same sound effect of her crying is used in two TV spots, this one and this one.
Took a Level in Cheerfulness: Sadness becomes more cheerful with knowing her purpose: Empathy.
What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: No one knows the positive benefits of Sadness' job, even Sadness herself, hence why Joy wants to repress her throughout most of the movie.
What the Hell, Hero?: Sadness gives Joy a brief, pleading one when Joy tries to stop the sad core memory.
When She Smiles: On the rare occasions she does smile, especially at the end of the movie, it's very cute and touching.

Anger

"Congratulations, San Francisco! You've ruined pizza!"

Voiced by: Lewis Black

Anger feels very passionately about making sure things are fair for Riley. He has a fiery spirit and tends to explode (literally) when things don't go as planned. He is quick to overreact and has little patience for life's imperfections. Word of God states that his performance model is a firebrick. invoked

Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: When Riley is a toddler, Anger flares up when he hears she's not getting any dessert if she doesn't finish her broccoli, only to immediately cool down when Dad pretends the broccoli is an airplane.
Anger: Oh. Airplane. We got an airplane over here, people.
Burning with Anger: He has a tendency to do this when things heat up.
Character’s Most Hated Song: Among the many other things that annoy Anger, the TripleDent Gum song tends to set him off the most. To his frustration, Paula and Bobby often send it up to Headquarters for a laugh.
Anger: DID I ASK FOR THE GUM COMMERCIAL?!
Curtains Match the Windows: While he's usually bald, when he gets really mad, he gets fire "hair" that's just as red as his eyes.
The Cynic: He also reflects the pessimism in Riley's mind. Unlike Sadness, the negatives he accentuates tend to be in the future or the present, as opposed to reflections on the past. For example, his "Mom bad news train", or his prediction of how Riley's first day of school is going to go.
Dark Is Not Evil: According to Lewis Black's trailer, Anger only does his actions 'because he really cares.' His main purpose is to make sure Riley stands up for herself when she's been wronged. While Anger does assist Riley, especially in moments that require quick thinking and audacity, he can accidentally make things worse.
Deadpan Snarker: To a lesser extent (and less subtly) than Disgust, implying that anger is the secondary foundation for sarcasm.
Determinator: Like the other emotions, Anger is the foundation for more complex mental processes. It is implied that anger is the foundation for courage, fortitude, confidence, and being willing and able to take Refuge in Audacity. This can be seen by the fact that he is constantly pushing Fear around and he acts decisively (if rashly) without hesitation.
Anger: Time to take action.
Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He's the most willing to take extreme action, yet he defers to Riley's mother just like the other emotions. After a bad first day of living in San Francisco, he's the one to tell Joy to back off and let the others work the console because he sees no reason for Riley to be happy. However, once Riley's Mom asks Riley to stay happy for her father's sake, Anger is the first one to voice his support with this change of events. Later on, when he puts the idea to run away into Riley's head, he changes his mind after Riley's mom calls twice, though by then, it's out of his hands.
Everyone Has Standards: He often makes Riley have an outburst when she's angry, but it's implied that even he doesn't want her to blow up at Meg, her best friend in Minnesota. Even when he grabs the controls after Meg talks about already having found a new friend, Riley simply snaps, "I gotta go!" and closes out of their conversation rather than losing her temper at her.
Fiery Redhead: In a literal way.
Flaming Hair: When he gets really angry, fire comes out of his head, giving the impression of hair.
Hair-Trigger Temper: Being anger personified, it's part of his job to get mad at virtually everything, which the other emotions have to tune down. It's lampshaded by his head bursting into flames. On top of that, he's often in a bad mood.
Hates Being Touched: Do not touch him unless you want to be punched or burned.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: While he's very irritable, he cares about Riley just as much as the other emotions; his outbursts are triggered when he feels Riley has been treated unfairly in some way.
Karma Houdini: Nearly everything that goes wrong for Riley while Joy and Sadness are away rests solely on Anger, continuously hijacking control of her, often against Fear and Disgust's best efforts to stop him, to make her lash out at others and behave impulsively. This status as the closest thing the film has to an antagonist is never really addressed. Even when he has his My God, What Have I Done? moment, his exact words are "What have we done?" as though Fear and Disgust are equally to blame.
Manchild: He constantly throws temper tantrums, even over the constant minor preventions.
Meta Casting: Just a straight adaptation of Lewis Black's stage persona, even using his love of cursing as much as possible in a family film. Quite a few of his mannerisms are also lifted from the way Black performs, such as ending a statement through gritted teeth or using a very forceful finger point.
Anger: We should lock the door and scream that curse word we know! It's a good one!
My God, What Have I Done?: Realizing he went too far when Riley gets far in running away.
Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: It's his failure to keep his temper under control and then go wild with the control panel that causes the islands to fall apart and eventually convince Riley to run away.
The Napoleon: The shortest of Riley's emotions, with a short fuse to match.
Perpetual Frowner: You wouldn't expect the personification of anger to be smiling a lot.
Playing with Fire: The fire that comes out of his head when he lets it loose is real, and Disgust uses it to punch a hole in Headquarters's window and let Joy and Sadness back in.
Red Is Heroic: His skin is red and is one of the heroes.
Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: The Manly Man to Fear's Sensitive Guy.
Serious Business: As his quote indicates, almost anything that goes wrong causes immediate wrath, no matter how trivial.
Sir Swears-a-Lot: Defied: He expresses a desire to swear multiple times throughout the film, but never gets the chance to. When the new console is installed, he is delighted by the library of curse words he now has access to. This takes on a meta example as his voice actor is the famous comedian Lewis Black, who is very fond of swearing in his standup routine.
Slasher Smile: When he does smile, it's a fairly evil grin.
Tame His Anger: One of the bonus videos has the rest of the emotions giving him anger management lessons. Fear ends up throttled by the neck.
Unwitting Instigator of Doom: During the second half, he becomes one. While he is well-intentioned, it's his ideas that lead to the unintended destruction of the islands (making Joy and Sadness' journey back all the harder), and eventually almost causes Riley to become a runaway.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: He's the one to insert the idea of running away from home to return to Minnesota because he has no idea how to fix what's happening to Riley's mind and sees going back as a hard fix for the situation. Upon seeing that it's just splintering Riley further, he recognizes his mistake and tries to stop it, but it's too late.
Worst News Judgement Ever: Throughout the movie, he's seen reading a newspaper called The Mind Reader with headlines like "No Dessert!" (when Riley is a toddler) and "Replaced! No Need For Riley!" (after Riley finds out her best friend from Minnesota already replaced her on their hockey team).

Disgust

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/53dbbe7b9022035dcf8811445b36b288.png

"When I'm through, Riley will look so good, all the other kids will look at their own outfits and barf."

Voiced by: Mindy Kaling (first film), Liza Lapira (second film), Ashley Adler (tie-in material)

Disgust is highly opinionated, extremely honest, and prevents Riley from getting poisoned — both physically and socially. She keeps a careful eye on the people, places, and things that Riley comes into contact with, whether it's broccoli or last year's fashion trend. Disgust always has the best of intentions and refuses to lower her standards. Word of God states that her performance model is broccoli. invoked

Beauty Is Never Tarnished: She is completely exempt from the trauma Fear and Anger endure while alone in headquarters.
Brought to You by the Letter "S": Wears the letter D on her belt.
Deadpan Snarker: One of her defining traits, and it transfers into Riley when she's in control, which implies that disgust is the primary foundation for sarcasm.
Disgust: [in response to Joy showing the rest of the emotions a slideshow of potential new homes for Riley, one being a gingerbread house] Joy, for the last time, she cannot live in a cookie.
Everybody Has Standards:
- Even though she agreed with Anger when he suggested running away, she was against his idea of stealing Mom's credit card.
  Disgust: A [bus] ticket costs money. How do we get money?
  Anger: Mom's purse.
  Disgust: [gasps] You wouldn't.
- More broadly, this is what she represents on a positive level, being the emotion that keeps Riley from doing anything too degrading because of rash and/or bad ideas.
The Fashionista: Because of her impeccable taste, she's usually in charge of helping Riley decide what to wear.
Disgust: When I'm through, Riley will look so good, the other kids will look at their own outfits and barf.
Green and Mean: Downplayed, she's not evil, but she wears green, her hair and skin are green, and she's rather snotty.
Green Is Gross: She, and the memory orbs created under her influence, are green representing "disgust".
Hartman Hips: More noticeable due to her tendency to sway her hips while moving and stand with one hip out.
I Did What I Had to Do: Her attitude when she agrees with Anger's idea to run away. She shows no pleasure in doing this, but agrees because she felt it was right for Riley.
Ink-Suit Actor: Very much resembles a green Mindy Kaling, with a similar hairstyle, eyebrows, and general facial structure. Despite the fact that Kaling doesn't return for the second film.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Of the Lovable Alpha Bitch flavor. She's snotty and snarky, giving off a snooty Valley Girl vibe (sans accent), but exists as more of a defense system against potentially hazardous things, genuinely regards the other emotions as friends, and wants what's best for Riley.
My God, What Have I Done?: Supports Anger's plan to run away and go back to Minnesota but later, like Anger, realizes that it was a horrible mistake.
The Perfectionist: Disgust is described as having high expectations and low patience.
Sarcasm Mode: Her typical delivery, which is transferred to Riley when she's in charge.
Shown Their Work: Disgust at first seems to be a somewhat random emotion choice to be hanging around the likes of Joy, Sadness, Anger and Fear. It turns out, however, that disgust is actually listed as one of the six basic emotions in psychology.^note
Sickly Green Glow: Her main color is green after all.
The Social Expert: Like the other emotions, Disgust is responsible for more complex mental processes as well as her base emotion. She has a fantastic understanding of other people, leading to her being the most aware of how to act in certain situations in order for the ideal outcome (i.e., frustrating Anger to the point his head spews flames and then using them to melt through the glass of Headquarters and get Joy and Sadness back inside).
Valley Girl: She's this and so much more thanks to deciding what's hot and what's not.
Vomit Discretion Shot: She has a weak stomach, and anything even the slightest bit gross will make her gag (too bad it doesn't happen much in the movie proper...).
You Are What You Hate: It's pretty amusing that she was modeled after broccoli, seeing as her first appearance has her freak out over the stuff.

Fear

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fa2ca1d06e8e91502987fedf57dd7dd8.png

"All right, we did not die today. I call that an unqualified success!"

Voiced by: Bill Hader (first film), Tony Hale (second film), Jason T Lewis (tie-in material), Pierre Niney (European French dub)

Fear's main job is to protect Riley and keep her safe. He is constantly on the lookout for potential disasters and spends time evaluating the possible dangers, pitfalls, and risks involved in Riley's everyday activities. There are very few activities and events that Fear does not find to be dangerous and possibly fatal. Word of God states that his performance model is a raw nerve. invoked

Amusing Injuries: Getting his butt set on fire by Anger, whacking himself with a crowbar, etc.
Butt-Monkey: When he isn't getting abused by Anger, he suffers himself through random chance.
Cannot Spit It Out: Originally Bill Hader had the idea that Fear secretly had a huge crush on Disgust, who still thought boys were gross, but it distracted too much from the real plot of the movie. There are still hints of it remaining, such as her noticing the new 'Puberty' alarm, and them sharing a Core Memory for Tragic Vampire Romance Novels.
Caustic Critic: When he's assigned to dream duty in Joy and Sadness' absence, it turns out he's quite sardonic in regards to the quality of the dreams he sees. The Driven by Emotions Novelization goes into more detail on this: Dream Productions can't produce anything that's as terrifying as what he can think up, so he actually finds their work "relaxing viewing".
The Comically Serious: Every potential disaster he can think of, such as a meteor hitting the school, is a serious concern to him.
Composite Character: In a meta way. The characters were initially based on Paul Ekman's theory of six basic emotions: joy, sadness, anger, disgust, fear, and surprise. However, the director felt that fear and surprise were too similar and combined both traits into the Fear character.
Deadpan Snarker: He's so used to the Dream Productions videos that he snarks about the quality and content.
Disembodied Eyebrows: To the extent that when Anger knocks him away during the hockey tryouts, they remain behind and float down like feathers. Also, in one of the extra videos, Fear has a Glass Smack and Slide against the screen as a result of being startled by Joy. His eyebrows follow in a second or so.
Expressive Hair: His one strand of hair springs upwards or droops down, depending on how frightened or upset he is. It also forms a zigzag shape if he is scared or terrified. Toward the end of the film, it even curls into a heart to reflect his happy mood.
Genre Savvy: He's able to predict the plot twist of Riley's dream (that she came to school with no pants).
Lovable Coward: He's afraid of everything, panics easily, and tries to run away when things get really bad. Yet he gets along with the other emotions, and his job is to keep Riley safe.
Made of Iron: Almost nothing seems to permanently injure him, which is a good thing given what he's put through.
Nervous Wreck: Very nervous and jumpy, as his job is to evaluate any possible danger for Riley and he sees danger everywhere. The exception is when Anger sarcastically suggests that Riley can get back to Minnesota by renting an elephant to ride, Fear likes the notion.
Only Sane Man: Of the three remaining emotions, he's the one to realize that running away is a bad idea, but the other two overrule him. This is an indicator that, like the others, Fear is the basis for more complex emotions: caution, forethought, and stress.
Properly Paranoid: The amount of abuse he's shown to take, from things hitting him through random chance to Anger beating on him, makes it hard to fault him for being so jumpy. In addition, his Establishing Character Moment shows him using his foresight in a constructive manner while Disgust's and Anger's are more jokes at their expense.
Sarcasm-Blind: Has a brief moment of this:
Disgust: So...how are we gonna get to Minnesota from here?
Anger: Well, why don't we go down to the elephant lot and rent an elephant?
Fear: Hey, that sounds nice.
Anger: WE'RE TAKING THE BUS, NITWIT!
Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: The Sensitive Guy to Anger's Manly Man.
Skewed Priorities: On his list of potential disasters to befall Riley in class on her first day of school, he lists "getting called on by the teacher" third. The first two items on his list are "quicksand" and "spontaneous combustion".
Special Person, Normal Name: In the early drafts where Joy and Fear got lost, Fear wasn't named Fear (the other emotions had human names as well, as mentioned above). His name was Freddie, as noted in the Blu-Ray bonus disc's deleted scene sketch introductions.
Sphere Eyes: Has huge, round eyes that capture a sense of fearfulness in his appearance.
Troubled Fetal Position: He assumes this position after the shocking experience with the nightmare Joy and Sadness induced.
Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Fear is afraid of everything (except elephants, it seems), but clowns are one of Riley's subconscious phobias, so he particularly dreads them.