Halloween Wheels

Halloween... Hot Wheels?

Omg, how have I not heard about these before?? For the past 5 years, Mattel has been producing holiday themed Hot Wheels cars to celebrate the two most holy days of the years: October 31st and December 25th. Holiday. Themed. Toys. Maybe it's just my deprivation of decent holiday-themed sodas over the past couple of years that makes holiday object lust fill me to bursting. I was also a gigantic die-cast car freak as a kid (and frankly, I'm surprised that has not manifested itself before now). Anyway, these are awesome and I want them all.

Our Target has been relatively bare (or picked-over) in recent months, as far as Transformers and the Iron Man deluge of 2010 are concerned. As a result, I have picked up the bad habit of grazing in the other aisles of childrens' products. This has led to such questionable purchases as the 11" tall Batman Proto-Batbot and Battle Force 5 Hot Wheels cars. Following my usual passes through the action figure aisle this past Saturday, I made my way over to the toy car section. I really don't understand how kids choose toys these days- every line is over-segmented to the point that I feel like I have to read the package to figure out what I am buying. But out of the morass, THIS jumped out and latched on to my eyeballs like a HL2 headcrab: Nothing makes toy-buying choices clearer than a trio of jack-'o-lanterns staring at you from the side of a box. I've even bought My Little Ponies simply because they were Halloween themed. (No, really.) This 5-pack of store exclusive "Scary Cars" is still priced rather affordably at $4.29- heck, that seems worth it just to get cars in a box that cool. But maybe that's just me.

SCARY CAR RODZILLA Seeing this in the Scary Cars box really hit me with a wave of nostalgia. Rodzilla is the old-timer of this set, hailing from way back in 1988. I can actually remember seeing this guy in KayBee Toys as a kid (and later with my younger brother). Rodzilla translates well into a Halloween set, cast in a fierce hue of red with gold and orange chrome details. Very AD&D Red Dragon. I don't think I owned the original, but the neck is pretty loose on this one. Not a surprising problem given the likely age of the molds.

SCARY CAR '59 FUNNY CAR CADILLLAC This is a fairly new model of Hot Wheels car. I'm not a huge fan of the tampographed designs printed all over the car body. Maybe it appeals more to people in the custom car and hot rod culture- I don't know. That aside, I do like the basic scheme of matte black and clear orange, which do have a certain look of class on the Cadillac body (minus all of the crazy patterns). The car body can also be lifted up to expose the motor beneath. The placement seems a little improbable since I am pretty sure that the driver has to sit near the windshield to see out. ...unless it's a GHOST DRIVER.

SCARY CAR THE GOV'NER This is the weakest piece in the set. The car design and orange plastic that comprises most of the upper body of the car are not bad on a bottom-line aesthetic consideration- it is the ugly printed patterns (again) and the opaque plastic windows that kill the appeal of this car. The overall look is just really cheap; sub-par for the normal Hot Wheels offering. Bleh. BLAAAAHH.

SCARY CAR TORPEDO JONES I would call Torpedo Jones the sleeper hit of the 2010 set. Most people will be attracted by either Rodzilla or Phantasm when they pick up the box, but the execution of this car is simply brilliant. Torpedo Jones is an old-timey open top race car that premiered as Hot Wheel..s in 2002. There is quite a bit of metal in this car, and most of the non-metal is chrome plated, which does a lot to eliminate that 'cheap plastic' look. I don't think the car design is based on anything in particular, but I do dig the ample mechanical detail and shiny bits. Shiny. Pipey. But this Torpedo Jones has a supernatural secret!- when you turn off the lights, the driver GLOWS IN THE DARK: This brings to mind countless ghost stories of unfortunate drivers that were killed in a dangerous race, only to return to run the foggy roads on moonlit nights. Or something. Very clever use of the driver piece, in any case.

SCARY CAR PHANTASM Ok, let's be honest. If you bought the set, it was probably for this car. Phantasm is a newer car model that was also some sort of Wal-Mart exclusive chase item a few Halloweens ago. Yeah, I'm sure it was a gigantic pain in the arse to obtain (I'll tell you how much harder it is to find years later when I get done finding one on eBay). So Mattel brought the ghostly Phantasm back this year- and in Hal-lelujah Jordan CLEAR GREEN. The car design is fairly bland without the clear plastic thing going on. But maybe it was a good choice for this type of item, since the large curved planes on the car body surface show off the internal structure better than a more complex design might. What more can I say? It's clear green and it's beautiful. The car is also really lightweight compared to the others, since it is made entirely from plastic. I also like the little ghost Hot Wheels logo on this one. As Garfield says, nice touch.

After buying this set, I found out that there is a corresponding set that is exclusive to Wal-Mart. So guess where I am going sometime this week.

And then I found that they make Christmas-themed cars...

I think I am in trouble.

I also found a black DeLorean DMC-12 on the same trip. Commence loud humming of the Back to the Future theme in the Target aisles... which were mostly empty! (Benefit of going to Target at 8:30 am on a Saturday.)

[Shirahama] Go Kumon!

Like a diligent mother hen warming her eggs, I have been sitting on this review. Has it really been 3 months since last Wonderfestival? Kumon [クモン] is the latest creature to be cast in Japanese soft vinyl. Emerging from the mind of newcomer Shirahama, designed by Yatsuashi and sculpted by Kiyoka Ikeda of Gargamel, Kumon has some serious lineage... but who knows how they were planning to fit all those names on its feet! The first version of Kumon was sold in limited quantities at 2010 Summer Wonderfestival in July. The header is hand-printed by Shirahama on traditional Japanese paper in two different versions. Since then, Shirahama has also produced several one-offs and a new version for the recent Superfestival.

The name "Kumon" was probably chosen because of its dual meanings: 'kumo' is the Japanese word for spider; I've been told that a reading of 'kumon' can also mean 'agony.' Kumon additionally happens to be the name of a Japanese accelerated math after-school program (hopefully unintentional on the part of Shirahama- unless he's gifted with a sick sense of humor).

Although one might be inclined to pass Kumon off as yet another skull-faced patchi-kaiju, I think that would be a rather unfair statement. Owing to the tastes of its creator and masterful sculpting of Ikeda, Kumon has a level of polish on par with the best M1 and Gargamel vinyls. The skull is integrated into the sculpt and provides textural contrast with the surrounding spider-fur. Paint colors- dark silver and gold metallics- are also well chosen and given a balanced application to the glossy black vinyl. Kumon exudes a sense of planning and refinement that is rare among new vinyl toys. I should mention that the toy is articulated at the arms and mid-section. Not at all obvious from my photos. Overall, a very strong first showing from Shirahama and Kumon. Not typical vinyl fare, but a company to watch for collectors with tastes outside of the mainstream.