Even More Random Batman Stuff

It’s about time for another Batmobile to roll outta the 20222 Mainline….and so yet again we have a Classic TV Series Batmobile takes the role. The difference is small and I could be wrong, but I think it’s the tapered orange lines. I can only wonder if Hot Wheels is running out of ideas short of changing colors completely. I don’t totally hate the schtick, but I do kinda feel like it’s a little bit of a waste considering how many Batmobiles have “existed” over the years; just look at all the cool stuff Corgi put out.

Next up are a couple of “decorated” cars I haven’t seen before. Recently a couple series of 5 cars each were released, one right on top of the other for some reason. Most of them are Batmobiles and other Bat-vehicles and it only took me a couple of seconds to realize that these designs were nothing new….stuff like the red camo Batplane, the desert camo Tumbler, Joker-themed Power Pistons, and so on.

The new ones that I noticed were Mr. Freeze in the Cool One and Harley Quinn in a Gazella GT.

Normally the “Cool One” doesn’t do much for me. The contrast inherent to a “suped up van” is mildly off-putting in most cases. However, there’s something about the color scheme and the “Mr. Freeze” context that make this iteration look kinda cool, pushing it beyond the silliness of an ice cream truck on steroids. The entire body is covered in a matte metallic blue – a deep, cold blue like the ocean. Then the blowers up top are a lighter shade, like the cold-packs you might put in a lunchbox. The remaining reflective chrome furthers the ice visuals. “Mr. Freeze” is written on the sides in a very 80’s-tech font, like something from a neon sign at a diner or arcade. The high contrast graphic of Freeze himself adds to the retro feel of the text. The exaggerated, old-school look is perfect for a high-concept villain like Mr. Freeze, and were he the type with a flashier personality, I could totally see him cruising around in this!

Then there’s Harley in the sleek, almost flat Gazella GT. Actually, this bears a lot of resemblance to the Velocita that featured her likeness, back from the late 2021 Batman 5-pack. The finish is a pearlescent white, with the hood sporting a playing card theme and Harley’s name. Accents of blue round out her post-Suicide Squad appearance, and my favorite quirk is the 2 red back tires and 2 blue front ones. Overall this is pretty much Harley Quinn 101, not that that’s a bad thing, but the limited space on the Gazella doesn’t leave much room for creative artistry (or artistic creativity…?).

So that’s it for now, but at this rate, who knows what Bat-stragglers are around the corner…?

BATMAN Gets a New Hot Wheels 5-Pack in Late 2021

See, I told you more Batman was in store! Hot Wheels is constantly putting out these little 5-pack sets of similarly themed cars and Batman has been a staple of these releases for years, though it’s been a hot minute since we’ve seen a new one…until now(ish)!

Technically, here’s what we’re looking at:

• ’11 Dodge Charger R/T
• Batcopter
• The Dark Knight Batmobile
• Bedlam
• Velocita

The Charger is sort of the black sheep of the bunch…it’s a freakin’ cop car…a police car from Metropolis at that! I mean I get that Batman and Metropolis are all existing in the same fictitious continuity and all that jazz but it feels random. Why not the damn Gotham City Police Department!? Not only is that reflective of where Batman actually lives and operates, but the inclusion is reinforced by the fact that our Caped Crusader often works alongside the police in their endeavors to thwart crime. It’s tantamount to throwing a Keystone City firetruck in a set of Green Arrow vehicles. Don’t make no damn sense.

Ok, so we’re 0 for 1, but we do have the tried ‘n’ true Batcopter coming up. I still don’t know where this design was sourced from, but it’s been around a hella long time and even though we don’t think much about Batman in helicopters this little trinket persists.

In the middle we have the Batmobile that was used in the Dark Knight Trilogy, perhaps better known as the Tumbler. The gimmick here is that it’s presented in a dark blue color, which yeah, we’ve seen before, but maybe this is the first time they’ve stuck it in a 5-pack.

Next up is the Hot Wheels Original Bedlam, an aptly named car decorated after the Joker. This wild and unconventional take on a pickup truck is well-suited to the villain.

Last is another HWO, a Velocita, done up in the style of Harley Quinn. The sleek curves of the Velocita are a great compliment to Harley. The artwork is simple but effective and I can appreciate using different colors on opposing sides much like her older outfits. Even the front and rear tires are different colors.

The Harley tribute car is the reason to pick up this 5-pack. It’s a solid artistic vision on a design that feels Harley-ish, a mark that these tributes sometimes miss beyond reproach. It’s also a good way to add a blue Batmobile to your collection if you don’t already have one!

DC Action Feature Character Cars (Part 2!)

Hot Wheels introduced this whole “Action Feature” gimmick with a few Star Wars cars, and they’ve extended it into their DC line as well. We saw the first batch, 1 – 3 (out of 5) a few weeks back, and now it seems they’ve rolled out the remaining 2 – Harley Quinn & Joker GT – alongside re-releases of older cars such as Flash and Mr. Freeze.

Just so things don’t feel too incomplete, here’s a quick recap of the sub-series:

• 1 / 5 – Superman – with blasting heat vision
• 2 / 5 – Batman – with lift & spin batarang
• 3 / 5 – Wonder Woman with sliding lasso of truth
• 4 / 5 – Harley Quinn – with smashing mallet
• 5 / 5 – The Joker GT – with chattering teeth

It’s no secret that these things are one big cash-grab gimmick, but I can at least appreciate the fact that Hot Wheels has attempted to add some variety to these “features” and the “actions” that govern them. Harley Quinn is probably the most confusing. She’s got this big metal mallet (props to the fact that that mallet is 100% metal) and it can either be positioned all the way forward, about 2/3 back, and then “all the way” back where it rests in the cavity of the vehicle. The confusing part is that there doesn’t seem to be any sort of “action trigger / release / whatever” to release the hammer. Once it’s all snug back the car, it’s good and tight; and that’s a good thing over all, I don’t want that heavy chunk of metal swinging too freely The issue is that there doesn’t seem to be a way to make the hammer “swing” automatically. You have to kinda pull it out.

I thought at first maybe the idea was to crash the car and inertia would carry the hammer forward, but no, it’s too snug. This idea kinda works with the mallet at the halfway point but obviously I’m not too keen on slamming these cars into each other so I did the best I could with the some cardboard. I could be missing something, so if you know more about this than I do please let me know!

All in all Action Feature Harley Quinn is a bit of an aberration, but again I do like that the entire mallet apparatus is metal. Perhaps that’s precisely why it’s not sprig loaded or something similar…maybe Hot Wheels realized that a sharp blow from this metal thing could unintentionally leave some permanent dents and dings on the receiving vehicle.

As for the Joker GT. well, he…has….a chattering teeth thing going on. It’s difficult to ascertain in the pictures, but basically the hood / front fender area is on a hinge (much like a regular hood). There’s a small arm on the inside of the front wheels, and when this catches a similar extension on the hood-piece, the hood-piece is lifted up. When you roll the car, the hood quickly bobs up and down as the front wheels rotate. Hot Wheels has pulled similar gags before, like with the Shark Bite. Hot Wheels might’ve dropped the ball just a little on this one; I feel like by simply giving the “inside” and “outside” of the “mouth” different colors, the rapid opening and closing (i.e. chattering) would be a lot more obvious. Instead it’s all just…white.

So yeah, maybe not the most exciting development, but at least we don’t have an incomplete subseries! Now DC-Hot Wheels, now that that’s out of your system, do the right thing and give us a Lex Luthor car!

MARTIAN MANHUNTER and Other New DC Character Cars FOUND!

For a while there I was a little worried at how many Character Cars were on the horizon, but holy guacamole, retailers seem to be keeping up for the time being (well, almost) and luckily with a little bit of patience, most of these guys have fallen into my lap.

Yeah yeah, originally I included Aquaman in this picture because I was convinced of some slight difference, but it turns out that it’s identical to the Justice League version.

Let’s get to the most unique new DCU Character Car, Martian Manhunter. They did a great job nailing down the colors, with a deep dark green, and the whole thing has a kind of cool red-blue-green-yellow (sometimes reference as our “psychological primaries”) theme going on. Both his cape and cloak clasp are built into the car’s design and get this: the “cape” part even opens up to show off some fancy engine parts. Besides the fact that he’s big and green, there’s not a lot of blatant one to two word descriptors for Martian Manhunter so I think the design was pulled off well. I might’ve gone for a slightly longer car myself, but overall I’m pleased.

Moving onward, we get the tail end of the Sketched Series, with Joker GT and Harley Quinn at 4/5 and 5/5 respectively. I’ve elaborated on my thoughts on the necessity of these “Sketched” cars in previous articles, similar to the Comic Book Styling subset of Marvel Character Cars. In short, I think the idea holds some merit, but I kinda think that this out-of-universe depiction of the characters takes away from the Character Cars as a whole. The vehicles are done well and I get the concept being put forth, it just doesn’t excite me much. Anywho, at least this subset has been put to rest and hopefully we can get back to more essential designs, i.e. heavyweights like Darkseid, Lex Luthor, Scarecrow, Nightwing, etc.

Aquaman and Hawkman were re-released as well, though neither appear to be anything new. Hawkman has remained unchanged for quite a while now and the Aquaman is the version we saw after the hokey torpedo-esque design but before the latest Justice League iteration. Basically it’s the one with the water and with the shiny gold stuff.

And that, as they say, is that! I know this is pointless, but here’s some characters I want to see enter the pantheon in the near future: (And why the hell didn’t we get a Steppenwolf for Justice League….?)

• Lex Luthor
• Darkseid
• Scarecrow
• Sinestro
• Nightwing
• Red Robin
• Red Hood
• Blue Beetle
• Deathstroke
• Ra’s al Ghul
• Clayface
• Reverse Flash
• Superboy Prime

Those are my big ones. I wouldn’t mind seeing others – Gorilla Grodd, Firestorm, Hawkgirl, and so on, but the above are kinda like my “main” picks. I was going to add Mera and Black Manta but I think they’ll be coming our way via the Aquaman film pretty soon so I’ll hold of. (What about Ocean Master…?)

Alrighty then…drop me a comment and tell me whatcha think of these new additions and/or who’d you most like to see make the future cut. I realize that some repetition will probably always be in order so that the most relevant and visible characters are routinely available, I just hope that Hot Wheels is smart enough to keep digging around in that back catalog for all-new faces.