Hot Wheels' tiny Spock, and other new Star Trek cars

A round-up of Hot Wheels' latest Star Trek releases below, starting with their newly announced Comic Con exclusive. Available at the San Diego Comic Con in July will be 1964 Buick Riviera, with a tiny model Spock sitting on the bonnet. This recreates a well know photograph of Leonard Nimoy with his car, taken during the production of Star Trek. The car and figurine come in a display case emblazoned with the 50th anniversary logo, and with a backdrop recreating the original photograph.

Hot Wheels' new small USS Vengeance crashing into cities near you now

Hot Wheels' latest model Star Trek starship, the small-scale (toy-car sized) version of the USS Vengeance, is starting to show up around the world now. The ever-diligent Hot Wheels fans at T-Hunted have been lavishing this release with coverage, including releasing Mattel's official images of the new model:

T-Hunted also posted the rendering of the ship used on the packaging:

And having got their hands on the real thing, posted a photo of the actual packaging too:

On top of all that T-Hunted have also posted a review of the ship, showing it in comparison to the previously released same-size USS Enterprise model. Check out T-Hunted to see how they compare.

Starships round-up: Stargazer, Vengence, Voyager, Enterprise-C, and German release!

An assortment of starship news, starting with the latest from Eaglemoss' Official Starships Collection. One of my German readers, Michael, contacted me a few days ago to let me know her had come across the first issue of the model and magazine series in German, and subsequently found a German version of The Collection's website, where German fans can now sign-up to subscribe to the series.

The German subscription model will be the same as the UK and Ireland, with the subscription extras coming every two issues (rather than every few months as in North America). The Euro price will be €4.99 for the first issue, and €14.99 for each subsequent issue.

Michael also noted that he had not come across any sort of promotion for the launch in Germany. Curiously, when asked about the German launch just yesterday, The Collection's Facebook page continued to suggest fans still need to keep an eye out for an announcement some time in the future. Which leads me to speculate Michael might have come across a test launch, as was the case when The Collection first turned up in the UK.

Meanwhile The Collection continues apace where it has launched already, with UK subscribers already up to issue thirteen. Looking ahead to issue nineteen, the USS Stargazer, Forbidden Planet have recently listed the issue, including a higher res version of the previously released image, so we can get a closer look at the model:

The Collection's Facebook page has also posted an updated image, of the second larger special issue, the nuTrek USS Enterprise. The new images now shows the Enterprise with blue bussard collectors. They've also given the UK and Ireland publication date as the 6th of March.

Eaglemoss aren't the only starship builders in town. Hot Wheels have also revealed they will be continuing to produce model ships. T-Hunted have reported on a poster, illustrating the Hot Wheels car range for 2014, and hidden among all the four wheels terrestrial vehicles is the USS Vengeance. Hot Wheels already released a model of the Vengeance last year, this new one will be a smaller scale rendition, similar to the small USS Enterprise model released last year, allowing it to be included in their regular toy car range.

Back in the prime timeline, Mark Rademaker has posted another image, showing the latest iteration of his USS Voyager Full Circle refit design:

Mark also posted a description of the process he has created to allow the refit to have happened in-universe in a short period of time:

Imagine a Baryon sweep procedure, but this time with a replicator beam. Absorbs the ship in small "caked" layers, and reorders what is needed to make the new design. Does not work for all parts so some manual work is still required. Consumes an enormous amount of energy, so it can't really compete with a more traditional way of constructing. Still in my eyes this was the only way to get the refit done in the small gap between the events in Destiny and Voyager leaving for the Delta Quadrant again. The mission was important enough to justify this method.

Finally, a new fan film project in the works, Star Trek: Futures, is to feature Tobias Richter's rendition of the Andrew Probert's concept art design for the USS Enterprise-C (as featured in Ships of the Line 2012). They have released a short animation by Richter to promote the alternate timeline miniseries, so we can enjoy seeing the proto-Ambassador in motion:

Hot Wheels' new Star Trek packaging

Back in December I posted about the forthcoming range of Hot Wheels Pop Culture cars, featuring Gold Key Comics style Star Trek artwork. Now StarTrek.com have revealed the packaging for this new range, which is even more punchy and retro than the cars themselves. StarTrek.com also report the release date for these will be mid-March.

Below are all six designs in their packaging, each focused on a different character. See my previous report for a better look at the cars.

While we're looking at Hot Wheels, they also recently re-issued their toy-car-sized nuTrek USS Enterprise. This latest version of has an improved paint job, and comes in snazzier packaging, as part of Hot Wheels' Retro Entertainment line. You can see images of that, posted by Arteem Miniaturas, after the jump:

New Hot Wheels Star Trek cars

Hot Wheels will be continuing to release Star Trek toys in 2014, but maybe not in the form you expected. Star Trek themed cars will be included in Hot Wheels' "Pop Culture" range next year. Designs based on Star Trek Gold Key Comics will be joining the electric collection of Hot Wheels cars featuring artwork from popular films, TV series, comics and food brands. T-Hunted (in two articles, here and here) have posted images of six different Star Trek designs, each focusing on a different TOS character. You can see all six below, continuing after the jump:

Trek Toys, loads of them!

All of a sudden there seems to be an abundance of new Star Trek toy information! So here's a look at the many varied Star Trek play things on the way:

First up, just when maybe you were thinking the nuTrek toy range might be winding down after Into Darkness, Hasbro have released another set in the Kre-O collection. This Toys'r'us exclusive appears to be a reissue of the USS Enterprise set, but come with battle damage stickers, and a wholly new Klingon battle cruiser model! Also included is the first Chekov Kreon figure, and new uniform variants of other characters.

Square Enix will be giving us another rather stylised take on the Trekverse, with their new Star Trek action figures, from their Play Arts KAI range. They displayed the painted versions of these for the first time at the New York Comic Con. The photo below comes from Cool Toys Review's coverage of the display. You can get a closer look at them in other photos in Cool Toys' gallery, and if you really want to scrutinise them, Toy News International, Toy Ark, and Tomopop have all posted galleries too!

Continue after the jump for news of many more figures and ship models on the way:

More covers for Into Darkness home video releases

Paramount have released more cover art for the various home video releases of Star Trek Into Darkness around the world. Here are the trio of new covers for the US 3D bluray, bluray, and DVD releases, which have used posters and promo photos in new combinations, or in the case of the 3D release, give us a new image of the Enterprise crashing towards Earth: Coming Soon and Play.com have posted images of the new covers. Curiously, if Play's listings are right the Region B release will use the same artwork (from the Region A DVD) for both the DVD and bluray versions.

Play.com also posted a look at the combi-pack, containing the 3D bluray steelbook and a Hot Wheels USS Vegeance. There are apparently four-thousand of this limited edition release:

Target in the US are getting an exclusive cover, using the character posts in a delta pattern mimicking the first film's poster style:

A Dutch site, Saturn, also list a unique steelbook cover, a pleasingly stark high contrast design:

The UK is also getting several steelbook covers, bluray.com list at least three different designs. I'd expect each might be a retailer exclusive. See those after the jump:

First details of Into Darkness home video extra features

Paramount have officially announced the bluray and DVD release of Into Darkness, confirming a September release, on the 10th specifically. Bluray.com report the release's special features have all been produced in-house at Bad Robot:

The special features included in the combo packs detailed below were produced entirely by Abrams' Bad Robot Productions and captured in spectacular high quality on Red Epic cameras for a uniquely intimate perspective of the filmmakers' process.

Bluray.com list the following featurettes to be included on the bluray release, but not it seems on the DVD only release:

• Creating the Red Planet – Experience the creation of a never-before-seen alien world, as featured in the action-packed opening sequence of the film.

• Attack on Starfleet – Go behind the scenes with the cast and filmmakers and witness the creation of the shocking attack on Starfleet Headquarters.

• The Klingon Home World – Discover the stunning world of Kronos, and see how the filmmakers reinvented the Klingons for a new generation.

• The Enemy of My Enemy – Find out how, and why, the identity of the film's true villain was kept a mystery to the very end.

• Ship to Ship – An in-depth and thrilling look at the filming of the iconic space jump sequence, which both defied the laws of physics and pushed the limits of visual effects.

• Brawl by the Bay – Sit in with Zachary Quinto and Benedict Cumberbatch as they revisit their intense preparation for the film's breathtaking climax.

• Continuing the Mission – An inspiring look at the partnership between the film's crew and the organization that assists returning veterans to find meaningful ways to contribute on the home front.

Which sounds like reasonably good coverage of the film in terms of documentaries. Compared to the more elaborate releases of the previous film there are some notable missing features though: No mention of an audio commentary, deleted scenes, gag reels, or the nice simulator tour things that gave us a good look at the new ships last time. We know there's at least one deleted scene from the film, and I would hope at very least we get a commentary (what film doesn't have a commentary these days?), so hopefully details of more features will surface later.

UPDATE: Yahoo have posted an excerpt from the "Brawl by the Bay" video. They don't allow embedding, so you'll have to make your way there to check it out.

Amazon's collector's edition, with a phaser!

As I've previously reported, the film will be released in multiple formats, including 3D bluray, bluray, and DVD. The bluray releases also include DVD and digital copy discs, and the 3D release also comes with a standard bluray copy.

There will also be retailer exclusive versions such as the Amazon release with a QMx phaser prop or Walmart in Canada's offer of a nuKlingon Mimobot. In at least some markets there will be combo packs of Into Darkness and the previous film as well. Steelbook packaging is also expected on a few releases; so far listings indicate the French version of the Amazon collector's edition, and the Italian bluray combo pack of both nuTrek films, and Walmart in the US's bluray, which also comes with a Hot Wheels USS Vengeance:

Note the front cover on that steelbook cover combines elements from two different posters. Here are pre-order links for the various releases:

• Amazon exclsuive 3D bluray with phaser: Amazon.com, Amazon.fr.
• 3D bluray: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.it.
• Bluray: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.it, Things From Another World.
• DVD: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.it, Things From Another World.
• Star Trek/Star Trek Into Darkness bluray two-pack: Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.it. 
• Star Trek/Star Trek Into Darkness DVD two-pack: Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.it.

More little ships

Earlier in the year Hot Wheels added something different to their Star Trek range, a much smaller scale model of the nuTrek USS Enterprise, offered as part of their toy car range. Hot Wheels release several series of these smaller scale toys each year, and, as T-Hunted report, the latest releases again have a USS Enterprise, mixed in with all the toy cars; this time it's a battle damaged variant of the same model. Brazilian website Seeman posted an image in their listing for it:

UPDATE: A toy car blog called The Lamley Group has posted an exhaustive set of photos of this new model. Here's one, you'll find a view from just about every other angle you could imagine, on The Lamley Group.

The previously released larger scale damaged nuEnterprise

The pattern of damage is unfortunately not based on the extensive destruction dealt to the Enterprise in Into Darkness, but is quite similar to Hot Wheels' previously released larger scale battle damaged variant of the nuEnterprise - The saucer damage appears to be exactly the same, while the nacelles have different scorch patterns on this smaller edition.

These smaller Hot Wheels toys seem to be quite widely distributed, so I would expect the new battle damaged mini-Enterprise to be popping up all over the world in the next few weeks.

In other little ships news, The Official Starships Collection Facebook page recently announced they have got official confirmation that they are allowed to go ahead with plans to include nuTrek ships in their range of model starships. They plan to have "Special Editions" of the magazines to launch them. At the moment it's not wholly clear what they mean by that; whatever form the release takes it will be great to have models of the nuTrek ships, accompanied by some of the first written information on their designs and in-universe functions.

The Official Starships Collection also posted this image of the USS Prometheus, to demonstrate how they are using the original CGI models from the productions to build the models for manufacture of the little ships:

New Hot Wheels starships' boxes

The new series of Star Trek Hot Wheels starships, the USS Vengeance, USS Kelvin, USS Excelsior, and nuKlingon Bird of Prey are starting to appear at retailers. Ebay seller Steve's NW Collectibles has offered all four, and posted photos of the packaging with its listings.

Interesting to see the new-style franchise packaging applied with TOS ships and characters on the Excelsior, so it fits right in with the nuTrek ships. Quite funny how the background on the Excelsior also omits the lens flare element used on the other ships' boxes!

 

 

 

In other little ships news, The Official Starships Collection Facebook page posted the first image of their USS Reliant and Vor'cha class models (the latter unpainted), which should be coming as issues eleven and twenty of the series, so will be out some time next year. You can also see in the background the refit USS Enterprise, which is issue two. They look pretty good!

For more information on the Starships Collection, check out my recent report, and for more images of the Hot Wheels ships out of the boxes, see my articles on the Kelvin, Excelsior, Vengeance and Bird of Prey.

First look at Hot Wheels USS Vengeance and Klingon Bird of Prey

We've had a good look at the USS Kelvin, and USS Excelsior, which form half of the next wave of Hot Wheels Star Trek starships. Now Mattel have released images of the other half of the wave, which come straight out of Into Darkness. We have the first, and so far only, model of the USS Vengeance, and a much more detailed version of the new D4 class Klingon Bird of Prey than we get from the Kre-O rendition.

There are lots of pictures of both ships, which give us the best look yet at both of the new designs. I find the Klingon ship interestingly insectile, while the Vengeance looks rather like the Enterprise-E from many angles. The pre-orders for this series had vanished for a little while, but Entertainment Earth are now offering them again, and expect them to arrive in June.

 

Mattel also posted a couple of different angles to those previously released of the USS Excelsior and USS Kelvin. Check them out after the jump: