I've looked at the pictures of the F150 Lightning and the Boss 68 Mustang first editions and the jury is still out, so to speak. While I prefer realistic looking cars, i can understand the appeal of an overstated design such as these, and perhaps under other circumstances I might have looked on these more favorably. But right now I can't look at them without also being reminded of the corporate thinking that obviously went into them.

The background of this situation plainly begins with the break-out success of Funline's Muscle Machines. These toy cars burst on the scene a couple of years ago and quickly elbowed their way into prominence on the store pegs, crowding out other brands like Johnny Lightning. At the time I thought these looked cool, but since they were a little larger than standard 1:64 scale, and since I do prefer realistic toy cars, I made a conscious decision not to collect them. I figured their cartoonishly distorted features looked faddish, and probably wouldn't last long term. (Indeed it seems to me they don't fly off the pegs the way they used to.) I did break down and buy some of the Import Tuners because , at the time, they represented the only available castings of some very cool cars like the Subaru WRX rallye car. But apparently, the powers that be at Mattel viewed the success of Muscle Machines with some alarm, much as General Motors must have seen Toyota and Honda invading the 1:1 market in the 70's and 80's. And it looks like someone upstairs has decided, "If cartoon cars is what they want, cartoon cars is what they'll get."

So Mattel's response has been twofold. First they started a new line called Hot Tuners caricature cars They are, however, easy for many collectors to pass over because they are not in the mainline. So we also have Muscle Machine clones in the regular blue packs. The first one out was the GT-03 which is a distorted 67 GTO. But compared to the Lightning and the Boss Stang, (and presumably the Charger which is still to come,) the GT-03 is rather restrained. Now, exaggeration has always played a part in Hot wheels design. The original Redlines had bulging hood scoops and blown engines and aggressive rakes, but they still looked like something you might see driving down the road.

I think what concerns me most is the derivative nature of these castings. It seems that most of Mattel's best ideas are coming in response to something someone else has done. "You want chase cars hidden in the regular assortments? We can do that too. You want more classic muscle cars? Crank up the factories, boys." Now the most recent taste to spring up has been copied as well. Hot Wheels began by being the most innovative concept in diecast toys of their time, and everyone had to imitate them. Now it seems that Mattel lets others do the innovating and then uses the strength of its corporate wealth to capitalize on other people's ideas. In fact, many of the new companies like Funline and Jada are in existence today because someone couldn't get his ideas through the Mattel corporate structure. Thus, what could have been Mattel's innovation is now Mattel's competition to be imitated and co-opted.

Hot Wheels once represented a revolution in the concept of diecast toy cars, but the danger of any revolt is to become so successful it becomes the status quo for new rebels to rise up against. Right now, Mattel's strong suit is to make well-made little toy cars for under a dollar. No one else is turning out equal value for Mattel's price point, (although Welly and Motormax are making some interesting castings now.) Mattel has been shocked out of its complacency, (again) by all the new competitors. Mattel's winning hand is to continue to add value to its mainline, not to imitate its competition to co-opt the niche markets its competitors create. I will most likely get these muscle machine clones as first editions, but I don't anticipate getting any repaints of them. If we want Muscle Machines, let us buy Muscle Machines, not Hot wheels that look like Muscle Machines. If we want cool metal cars that are fun to look at and play with, let us buy the "fastest metal cars in the world" that really are "leading the way."

Incidentally, I'm not sure exactly sure when the me-too-ism crept into Mattel's corporate thinking, but if you look back in the line you will see two vehicles called the Zombot and the Phantomachine, cars that could be rolled on wheels or stood up as robots. At the time, transforming robot toys were all the rage. Interestingly enough, I have neither the Zombot, nor the Phantomachine in my collection.