Hot Wheels

This may the among the first of a dubious trend - a 30-minute toy commercial masquerading as a Saturday morning cartoon. Hot Wheels was a wildly popular toy car line, spawning several imitators (like Johnny Lightning). As a product, it was quite enjoyable, and a high-quality product that now is among the mega-collectible boomer toys. And yes, my mom in fact DID throw out my "wheel" carrying case with all my cars in it! But I digress

Hard to say how the cartoon came about. Did someone say, "hey, my kids love Hot Wheels cars, let's make a cartoon vaguely related to Hot Wheels and cash in", or alternatively, "hey, I had this great idea - why not make a cartoon about our toy, and maybe we can sneak it into the Saturday morning line up, advertise our toy, and also get paid for doing it!"

The cartoon itself was the typical, generic, limited animation that looked like it cost about $150 an episode to produce. The plot was nominally about a race car club competing in some unspecified series, with some rival "bad guy" car club as a frequent antagonist. Rule #1 about cartoons - if it's about a race, it's gonna stink! This cartoon did not prove to be the exception, it stunk out loud. Nonetheless, it worked pretty well and it was relatively popular for a while. Whether it ever sold any more Hot Wheels cars is unclear.

I vaguely recall an airplane-related sister series, but it's been too many years.

I watched this avidly when it came out, my Father bought me my first Hot Wheel (Silhouette, blue) in '68, at a K-mart in Ann Arbor and had those same cars that were in the cartoon. My collection still grows, though not as fast as it did in the '60s, 70s. Latest acquisition, The Batman Vs Superman Batmobile.(always purchase two, and keep one in original packaging) Of course I was a child of the '60s-'70s, so the cartoon fit right in with the times. Of COURSE it was a commercial for the fans, but what about when G.I. Joe (the smaller figures, not the original 13 in. ones, of which I had a Navy guy) Why didn't the FTC shut THOSE down? They were in the very same category, along with GO bots, Transformers, My Little Pony, Care Bears, and all the other toys with cartoons bunch....I have given up on ANY governmental agency being FAIR, I guess....

This was just one of the cartoons I would watch religiously as a kid. It never even occurred to me that it was a 30 minute commercial for the miniature cars. It and it's sister program "Skyhawks" had catchy '70's era theme songs which had my friends and me playing with our Hot Wheels cars and toy airplanes and singing the songs every time we let the cars roll down the track. The Hot Wheels show was almost the American version of Speed Racer and traced the exploits of the Hot Wheels race club from one race to the next. Looking back, I wonder how it held my attention for more than the first episode. But even after 30 years, I can still hear the theme song in my head... "Hot Wheels! Hot Wheels! Always racin', always chasin'... Keep a turnin' Hot Wheels! Please someone get it out of my head!!

I still remember this cartoon that I never missed on Saturday mornings. The characters were the hero Jack Wheeler, Ardeth the tomboy, Kip, the minority rep of the gang who drove an MG and "Tank" the big guy. Each week they were involved in a different race scenario. Each time they were tormented by their arch-nemesis Dexter, the bad guy. Had that great 60s underpinning where the good guys always won and Dexter left in shame. Jack Wheeler always drove one of two cars, the Jack Rabbit Special or the Sand Crab. Both cars were white, probably to indicate the "good guy." Each episode featured lots of good information regarding automotive mechanics and motor mania in general. At the end of each episode, Jack Wheeler always gave the young audience a driving safety tip. He even did an anti-smoking commercial, which was aired during other Saturday morning cartoons. Its companion cartoon was "Sky Hawks" which had a similar theme but featured airplanes instead of cars. I still remember the Hot Wheels theme song - "Hot Wheels, Hot Wheels, always racing always chasing. Hot Wheels, Hot Wheels, keep a-turning now, keep a-burning now, keep a-turnin' Hot Wheels! Daytona, Indianapolis and Bonneville! Dune buggies, keep a-climbin', up the sandy hill! Hot Wheels, Hot Wheels, keep a-turning now, keep a-burning now, keep a-turnin' Hot Wheels!"

This is probably the first cartoon I can remember. I was 4 when this came out, and I remember the theme song to this day. The idea of a 30 minute commercial is quite normal by todays standards, since every cartoon out there now sells merchandise. I would like to see this come out on DVD now, because there are those of us out here that remember the cartoon, and would love to go back to 1969 and revisit this era, when it seems everything was better (at least for a kid).