It’s fair to say that the Cars franchise is the creative runt of the Pixar litter. But while the Owen Wilson-voiced racecar Lightning McQueen has few fans aged older than 10-years-old, the merchandising tie-in have been revving up Pixar’s bank balance for more than a decade.
After the original film – racecar learns to enjoy life in the slow lane – was coolly met by critics, the follow-up – racecar becomes involved in global espionage – did little to resurrect the series. But now the first full trailer has arrived for Cars 3, hot on the tails of a teaser that crashed its way back into cultural relevance last November.
Back on vocal duties for the threequel is the late Paul Newman as the wise Doc Hudson. Despite having died in 2008, the legendary actor will feature in the film, using outtakes from his work on John Lasseter’s passion project in 2006.
Cars 3 sees Lightning McQueen going full circle on the knowing wink to The Color of Money from the original, this time becoming the mentor to an up-and-coming racer, all while wanting to beat brash upstart Jackson Storm (Armie Hammer) in one last race.
That ‘one-last-shot’ motif has been widely embraced by Pixar; Cars 3 continues an up-and-down run of sequels from Pixar, with Toy Story 4 and The Incredibles 2 in production after the box office success of Finding Dory last summer.
Whether Cars 3 can re-ignite the franchise remains to be seen, but take a look at the trailer in full below before making your mind up on July 14th.
