A fourth installment of the Toy Story franchise was announced on Thursday by Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger.

'Toy Story 4'

John Lasster, who directed the original Toy Story film in 1995 and its sequel, will be directing Toy Story 4. "John created Toy Story and directed the first two films, and it's great to have him back directing one of our most valuable properties," Iger said.

Lasseter revealed in a statement that the decision to make a fourth Toy Story film was made when he – along with Andrew Stanton (WALL-E) , Pete Doctor (Up) and Lee Unkrich (Toy Story 3) – came up with a story worth another sequel. In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Lasseter revealed that the film will pick up where Toy Story 3 ended and will be a love story.

“We love these characters so much; they are like family to us,” Lasseter said in the statement. “We don’t want to do anything with them unless it lives up to or surpasses what’s gone before. Toy Story 3 ended Woody and Buzz’s story with Andy so perfectly that for a long time, we never even talked about doing another Toy Story movie. But when Andrew, Pete, Lee and I came up with this new idea, I just could not stop thinking about it. It was so exciting to me, I knew we had to make this movie — and I wanted to direct it myself.”

As for the direction of Disney Pixar as a whole, at the earnings meeting Iger stated that the studio would like to have a nice balance of sequels and original films. “We’re going to have an original film every year, then every other year have a sequel to something,” he said. “That’s the rough idea.”

Disney Pixar’s original film Inside Out will hit theaters June 19, 2015, and its other original film The Good Dinosaur is slated for release Nov. 25, 2015. Finding Nemo sequel Finding Dory will premiere June 17, 2016.

Toy Story 4 will hit theaters June 16, 2017.