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Back to the Future | ||||||||||
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ait a minute, Doc. Ah ... Are you telling me you built a time machine ... out of a DeLorean? With these words, the world of Marty McFly is turned upside down. Dr. Emmet Brown, known throughout Hill Valley as a crackpot or mad scientist, has apparently succeeded in his dream to be able to travel through time and see the future.
As Doc Brown is about to leave his own time to explore the future in his kit-bashed Delorean—while Marty documents the experience on videotape—the underground network from which he illegally procured the plutonium needed to fuel his invention speeds into the Twin Pines Mall parking lot and guns down the doc.
Marty, fearing for his life, jumps into the car and flees. As soon as the car hits the speed of 88 miles per hour, the revolutionary flux capacitor kicks in, and he's accidentally transported back in time to 1955. His mission is clear: Seek out the much younger Doc Brown and convince him to help him with an invention he doesn't even know he's invented, so that he can ensure that everything is normal again when he goes Back to the Future.
U.K.-based Corgi has released its version of Doc Brown's modified Delorean in 1:36 scale, after much anticipation by Back to the Future fans.
This car is part of Corgi's continuing effort to bring TV and film licenses to life. Its history of die-cast toy cars includes the famous Batmobile from the 1960s TV show, the Green Hornet's Black Beauty, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and perhaps its most popular toy, the Aston Martin from James Bond, complete with ejector seat and pop-out machine guns. In recent years it has created toy vehicles from shows such as Starsky and Hutch, The A-Team, Knight Rider, The Saint and Fawlty Towers, to name just a few in its wide range.
This die-cast and plastic model is approximately 4 inches long, has gull-wing doors that open to reveal a detailed interior and includes a plastic arm which attaches to the back, used in 1955 to attract a bolt of lightning in order to return Marty back to his own time. Also included is a painted white metal figure of Doc Brown.
Cool, but corners have been cut
Corgi's name is well respected in the toy industry. Its toys were popular not only because they were accurate representations, but because they each had fun play features, like firing rockets, or flip-over headlight guns, and other hidden features. While the newer lines have fewer play features, their basic quality has not diminished for the most part.
This car's doors open in the classic gull-wing style, and a plastic lightning rod attaches to the back, but that is shy of play value when compared to the excellent James Bond Aston Martin, or the Batmobile, which both had many cool features.
Little complaint can be made about the car's detail or accuracy, with the exception perhaps of the interior. While detailed, and including a small sticker depicting Doc Brown's flux capacitor, there certainly is room for more. Perhaps a sticker of the time displays, or some of the clumsy cabling that seemed to jut everywhere, would have been welcome in this model. Welcome, but not essential.
The detailing of the customized rear engine section is good. This part is made of plastic, and attached to the die-cast body of the car. Cable running along the car's side is molded into the metal of the car, while the bumpers are plastic. Other appreciated details include the license plate at the rear that is quite clearly a California plate labeled "OUTATIME."
The biggest drawback of this car is the wheels. While Corgi's name was built on cars that had milled hubs and rubber tires, sometime in the 1970s it switched some models to plastic wheels, lending their product a "cheaper" feel. Plastic wheels are just not as attractive, and don't grip as well as rubber tires. Many of Corgi's recent offerings include the much-less-desired plastic wheels, and sadly, this car is included in that number.
The white metal figure that is included in this boxed set is well molded, and fairly well detailed. Where the figure fails, however, is in the painting. The skin tone is bright pink, and the thick paint removes any detail on the face that would make the figure interesting. This piece also seems too large to scale with the vehicle.
Even with the poorly painted figure, and plastic wheels, this is still an excellent model, and just a fun toy to zoom around on the ground or a desktop.
As a child, I owned a vintage Corgi Batmobile, and several James Bond cars. I still own a vintage Green Hornet Black Beauty. These are some of the best toys I've ever owned, and Corgi seems determined to keep those memories alive by producing quality toys at a reasonable price. It's too bad, however, that sometimes a feature or two here and there must be dropped to achieve this goal. — Sean
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