The Stars of 2016 Hot Wheels Batches K & L #7. Honda Odyssey

JDM.

10 years ago, if you said that JDM would grow to be a pillar of Hot Wheels collecting most collectors would have laughed.

Now, the scene is a world away from when Datsun Bluebird 510s were pegwarmers - collectors are scrambling to get the ones they overlooked! JDM isn't a huge thing for me so I only pick up the castings I like, and certainly won't chase earlier models for ridiculous amounts of money, But over the past few years (namely 2014, 15 and 16) I've been sure to pick up the best of the best - and the latest is no exception:

The entire JDM craze was to some out of left field, to others an inevitability. A Hot Wheels Honda Odyssey is a little out of left field on the surface, but for Jun Imai (its designer) it was an inevitability. Jun has recently been adding the cars he owns to the plethora of JDM castings he has created, and the Honda Odyssey is just the latest:

Being a family man, Jun's actual Honda Odyssey doesn't sport a livery or bodykit like the (very cool) Hot Wheels replica, but he has added a personal touch:

A kiddie seat! The sporty Odyssey is also functional. Overall this is a brilliant casting of a well proportioned, immaculately executed minivan that manages to be great looking too - it sits very well with some familiar faces...

The Stars of 2016 Hot Wheels Batches K & L #6. '17 Ford F-150 Raptor

When Hot Wheels releases a First Edition, the subsequent FE Recolour will of course look distinctly different, sometimes even outclassing its predecessor (I'm looking at you, Fiat 500). Sometimes they'll adopt different wheels or a different coloured interior. But rarely will the decoration change drastically.

Hot Wheels debuted its perfect new casting of the 2017 Ford F-150 Raptor in 2016 Batch E, sporting Ford Performance's signature colour, Liquid Blue, a Raptor themed livery with bonnet stripes and their new (circa 2015) Beadlock off road wheels.

The FE looks fantastic, and so does its recolour:

The wheels have been swapped for OR6SPs (Off Road 6 Spokes) which look equally great on the model, and the bonnet stripes have disappeared. In their place, however...

Rear detailing! The recolour in dark grey looks so much better with rear details than it would've with bonnet stripes, so full marks to whoever in HW made that decision.  The two Raptors so far make a great pairing, and 2017 Batch A seems set to make that a trio...

The Stars of 2016 Hot Wheels Batches K & L #5. SRT Viper GTS-R

It could have been a lot better.

When the SRT Viper GTS-R was announced as a 2015 New Model, I was excited, as I'm a big fan of the current Viper (more on that in a post very soon). However, just as would be the case with the Corvette C7.R and Aston Martin Vantage GT3 to be released later in the year, I was underwhelmed when it arrived. The upsloped chin crisis was in full swing, and on the Viper it was destructive to the point where the only angle from which the casting looks 'right' is from above. Despite this, it remains largely proportionally okay and not that bad to look at. Granted, it could have been so much better (we haven't seen an upsloped chin on a new model in a while so my fingers are crossed!) but all 3 releases so far have brought with them great decos, which means when I put them together I can let them off. A bit.

It will always be a flawed casting (unless modified, which I very much doubt) but this latest version, the Need For Speed version in metalflake blue, still is really nice. Anyway, I'll let the photos (most of which complimentary) do the rest of the talking...

The Stars of 2016 Hot Wheels Batches K & L #4. '70 Ford Escort RS1600 (feat. a brief recent history of classic British Hot Wheels)

Whatever prompted it, I'm still thrilled they actually went out and made it.

The Ford Escort, even in it's RS1600 guise, is/was far from Hot Wheels' usual trends. Not long ago, Hot Wheels was hugely US and muscle-car orientated; rightly so, as the USA is it's biggest market and country of origin. But now there's a difference. Over the past few years HW has embraced more and more of the car culture scene, and this is evident in many areas such as the huge influence of the 'JDM craze' of the past few years and the continuation of brilliant European stock and supercars in HW's lines. But British classics? That was something no one really saw coming. They were normally left to Matchbox of course, but Matchbox had been going through a bad few years, a horrible lack of licensed models from which they're only now returning to form.

So, in 2014, Hot Wheels made an Aston Martin DB5, mainly to cash in on the 007 opportunities but did it debut in silver? Nope. That was left to the second version, instead it appeared in iconic British Racing Green, which is starting to appear more generally with Hot Wheels models:

The shock wasn't that Hot Wheels had made it, the inevitable 007 tie-ins took care of that, but that they'd done it perfectly:

Some could be heard saying 'It should've been a Matchbox!', and it was the same story with the  Lotus Espirit S1 and the Escort. However, they were vastly outspoken by the rest of us, the majority, the happy collectors who were just glad to see these cars being done and done right.

Hot Wheels' ticket into producing the Escort was of course when an RS1600 appeared in Fast & Furious 6 with the late Paul Walker at the helm, but since that terrific debut the possibilities have been explored further. Firstly we saw a great recolour in stock RS1600 white with blue stripes, but it's this year's releases that have been the icing on the cake:

The also iconic Castrol rally livery, in red, with white wheels. If this isn't reassurance that HW's designers are well cultured, what is?!? And now of course it has been recoloured in white, which is another great version. Every version has had a chrome interior to allow chrome bumpers (anyone who doesn't find that remotely cool has soul issues) and I can't wait to see what HW will do next with this casting on current form...