Hello everyone, welcome to a new edition of Today On The Boulevard. The premiums from Hot Wheels continue to be some of the hardest releases for me to find. Sometimes, I'm able to find entire sets, while most of the time I'm finding remnants. No matter what I find, something is always better than nothing. So for today's post, I'm going to be sharing some of my newest premium finds.
Hot Wheels Car Culture is something that started out as a new premium series back in 2016, and has turned into something special that continues to amaze everyone each year. Now, not too long ago, Hot Wheels released an assortment that was called Exotic Envy, and it featured some of the hottest exotic cars on the market today. Sadly, I wasn't able to get all five, but I was able to get three.
I don't know about the people in your area, but the ones in my are hoarded up all of the Bugatti Chirons and the Lamborghini Huracans. To be honest, I knew I wouldn't find the Bugatti. I'm going to assume that folks are hoarding these up because the value of the old Veyron soared when Hot Wheels could no longer make Bugatti's vehicles. Although it would have been nice to find it, I really don't need this assortment's release of the Chiron. Sure, it features a two-tone color scheme, but the colors picked for it are black and blue. Though they aren't the same shade, these colors were already used for two of this casting's releases that I have. Metallic black was used for a mainline release, and bright blue was used for the HW Exotics five-pack.
The Lamborghini was a little surprising. I didn't think it was going to be one of the ones that got hoarded. It's not like I don't have some great releases of it, it's just I wanted to have one that was finished in green. But being the type of collector that I am, I can live without it. Alright, let's move onto the other three.
This Car Culture assortment featured two very nice Aston Martins. One of them is the Aston Martin Valhalla Concept, and it's the one that's brand new.
Since it's new, I really thought it was going to be the hardest one to find, but no. This was actually the main one that was left every time I found this assortment on the pegs. I guess being new wasn't enough to make it outshine the Chiron. I'm actually glad it didn't, because this is the main one I wanted from this assortment. The real car is absolutely beautiful, and this Hot Wheels version looks just as good.
The Vulcan is the second Aston Martin from this assortment, and it's the first premium release of it. I'm really happy they decided to put this casting into their premium line. The mainline releases of it are nice, but being a premium means that we'll get very stunning releases like this one.
Being a premium also means it'll receive more details, and I'm not just talking about the ones applied to it's front, side, and rear. Unlike the mainline releases, the top of this release's window piece was given details. The vents on the front also received a tampo coating.
The McLaren Senna is the third one I got, and like the Vulcan, it's the first premium release of it. Due to the initial pictures going around the internet, I though this release was going to be finished in white. And since I have the white mainline release, I didn't feel the need to have a premium one that was also white. That's why I didn't get the Cars & Donuts release of the Custom Datsun 240Z. Anyway, things were much different when I found it. It was actually finished in a very, and I mean very light shade of blue.
This release's window piece is one of the reason why I'm glad there's a premium version. The mainline version of this casting feature a very dark window piece, which is fine. But this premium version features one that's not as dark, and it was given details like the Vulcan's window piece.
Overall, I'm very pleased with how these three look, and I can't wait to see how the next Valhalla looks. I hope they pick another great color for it. Alright, now it's time to move onto the next premium release for this post.
In terms of difficulty, the Hot Wheels boulevard is two steps up from Car Culture. Obviously, it's because they are exclusive to Walmart. So they are basically near impossible to find. In fact, after all this time, I've only been able to acquire one full assortment, which I wrote about in this post. Anyway, a new assortment of Boulevard is out, and there were only two different releases on the pegs.
One of the releases left, was the Custom '67 Pontiac Firebird, which is just a premium version of the casting's debut release. So I didn't need it. The other one, was the Lancia Stratos Group 5. You know me, I love classic race cars, which is why this was the main one I wanted from this assortment. So I'm glad it was one of the ones that wasn't wanted when the stock came in.
Every thing about this first release is based on a real race car. For obvious reasons, Hot Wheels had to make some changes. It's similar to the various Rothmans inspired releases. So what car is it based on? Well, it's based on the Alitalia sponsored #539. For those of you that might not have known like I didn't, Alitalia is an airline company.
It might be surprising, but I do have one issue with this release. I feel this release should have been given some of the decals that are seen on the real car. The ones I'm talking about, are Pirelli, Bilstein, and Champion Spark Plugs. All of the aforementioned are companies that have been featured on Hot Wheels. Not too long ago, we got the recolor of the M3 GT2 with the Pirelli decal, as well as a Bilstein themed Land Rover Defender 110 Hardtop. So I don't see why they could have added those to this release.
Okay, that's all of the premiums I was able to get. I might not have gotten all of the releases from these two assortments, but I'm extremely happy with the ones I was able to get.
So, have you been able to add any new premiums to your collection? If so, go ahead and let me know down in the comments section. Alright, that's all for this edition of My Want List. Till next time, thanks for reading, and happy collecting. And remember, these are just toys.
No comments:
Post a Comment