Legitimately, how did this end up so badly? How is this the final product? Don't they spend a few years on each movie to make sure the story works before they make the film?

Lightyear blows my mind with how terrible it is because it did not have to be. All they needed to do was make a Buzz movie like the Star Command cartoon. Just a fun sci-fi space adventure comedy movie. I've heard that some people at Pixar hated that cartoon, but if Lightyear is what they thought Buzz should ACTUALLY be like, I just don't understand.
>boring as fuck story entirely taking place in the most drab, uninteresting sci-fi setting you've ever seen
>takes a character whose entire point is to be "the coolest spaceman toy ever" and makes him a boring stick in the mud
>cast of complete nobodies that pales in comparison to the crew of BLoSC
>Zurg isn't even a character, just Buzz from the future with a dumbass throwaway gag about robots not pronouncing his name right
>Stupid fucking robot cat that only exists to sell toys and be this movie's "funny mascot", even though Buzz should've been the toy they were trying to sell. Instead he sucks until the end when he's given his suit.

It's just a complete failure of an idea that should've been a slam dunk. It's not like you couldn't make an entertaining Buzz-centric movie. There was an entire cartoon that did just that. Pixar was outdone by tv writers and South Korean sweatshop animators.