Now this is a weird little occurrence that I didn’t see coming, but looking back it was bound to happen. Hot Wheels has been rolling out these Disney Character Cars like a freakin’ machine and with so many new ones hitting shelves, it means the older ones don’t hang around as long. As a way to offer up these older cars to newer fans, it looks like they’re content to put out some “series-less” waves – we saw one of these around Christmas 2019. I’m not sure how this was officially recognized, but right now we have a very similar incident that is officially recognized.
Poised right between Series 6 and Series 7 is the “Disney / Pixar Series”. If you look at singles from past series, you’ll notice that most of the cards have a red background with a big ol’ “Disney” logo in the empty space on the front of the card. Usually one car out of the set would have a blue background and feature the “Pixar” text logo in the free space. Well it looks like Hot Wheels rounded up all these Pixar-specific releases, added Woody and Buzz to the mix (yes they are “Disney characters” but they were conceived as “Toy Story Character Cars”), and now we have a sort of amorphous pit stop between Series 6 and 7:
- Woody
- Buzz Lightyear
- Mr. Incredible
- Mike Wazowski
- Sulley
- Wall-E
- Nemo
- Dory
Generally I would just write this aberration off as a sales gimmick – ok, maybe not a full-on gimmick, but definitely a way to sell old stuff to new people. However, now Buzz and Woody are thrown into the mix and my whole shit is thrown off. Now if the “Disney” versions were different than the “Toy Story” versions I’d have no problem, but for the first time, we have a full-on crossover: 2 cars exists as part of 2 different series/sets of Character Cars. That is frustrating, and yes it bugs the hell out of me, but what I did was buy up Woody & Buzz, specifically these “Disney Pixar” branded versions, and these 2 particular hunks of metal and plastic will live in the DISNEY CHARACTER CARS box.
I don’t mind these sorts of “non-series” so that newcomers can get older cars, but I also kinda like the idea that when I see these that aren’t labelled with any particular series I don’t need to worry about them as long as I’m caught up. I guess that’s technically still true here but it feels sneaky. Wanna reissue Buzz and Woody? Go right ahead, kids love these guys and I bet they’d sell year-round. But straddling these identical cars across 2 series…I feel like a CRT that someone just held a magnet up to.
Anyway there it is / here it is. Buzz and Woody: honorary members of the Disney Character Cars, sans series number or designation within series, a product of the colloquially branded “Series P” (Pixar).
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