Check out this hilariously over-detailed Hot Wheels hooptie. It’s packed with all the colorful cliches of a car maintained on a budget of “grandma sends me $20 every birthday.” It kind of looks like the starter car in a street racing video game. Or, the starter cars my friends and I all had when we thought street racing was cool.
Ironically, my grandma’s annual b-day card wouldn’t be enough to pick up this model. It’ll be $30 when it becomes available on August 30. That’s one big-ticket Hot Wheels, but clearly a lot of special care went into making this look exceptionally wretched.
And of course, another factor in pricing is that this is a Hot Wheels x MSCHF collab (“Not Wheels”). MSCHF describes itself as “an art and media company known for creating viral and controversial products that generate media attention and public debate.” If you go to its site, you’ll be assaulted with pretty much the website equivalent of this model car. The vibe is trying so hard to look messy and uncool that it comes back around to being cool. Lots of hyper-meta, hyper-modern energy.
It’s 2024, so, I can’t tell if it’s actually a company, or a couple of guys being silly, or an ad agency trying to Trojan Horse its way into the Gen Z zeitgeist. It’s also hard to tell which of MSCHF’s “products” are things you can buy and which are jokes. I might be a little too old and stodgy to get most of their humor, but I do appreciate the Not Wheels toy.
They got absolutely everything: Mismatched body panels and wheels, bad Bondo job, damaged glass, and stripes that don’t cover the whole car. It’s great. But it really evolves into a masterpiece when you look closely and see the tiny details: Parking tickets, Zip-Tie bumper-attaching lace … the un-retracted seat belt hanging out of the door?! Come on! Magnifique. Or, actually, derelicte. Ha, I bet the Venn Diagram overlap of people who buy MSCHF products and would understand a Zoolander reference is pretty lean.
It looks like you’ll be able to order this funny little piece of cultural commentary after 11 a.m. Pacific time this Friday, August 30. It’s unclear how many will be available, but I suspect you’ll see some pop up on eBay for $100 shortly after the sale goes live. So if you do want one, it’s probably worth jumping on the site this week. I particularly like the second bullet point in the item listing: “Includes only three wheels so CAR DOES NOT ROLL.”
The “I am HOT WHEEL” bumper sticker really speaks to me, too. Maybe I’ll recreate that in real-car size and slap it on my Civic.
I’m leaning towards picking one of these toys up myself. But I also promised my buddy Pawinn at Acuity that I’d buy one of his titanium oil caps so I might be tapped out on high-dollar novelties this month. Good thing the month is almost over! Buy the trinkets; the wheels of capitalism must roll.