Profile: Hot Wheels Screamliner to the Talbot Lago and Phantastique

It's not very often that I bring generic-designed vehicles to this site; most of the vehicles you see on here are realistic on every scale.  But there are a few exceptions to the rule, especially ones that capture our imagination.  Bone Shaker and Twin Mill are a few good examples for Hot Wheels, but this latest one has some design influences on its own: Screamliner.

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Smooth as silk

Screamliner is a classic take of the big, long, and smooth coupes of the 1930's with bodywork that is so smooth only the rear fin spoiler is the sharpest part on this vehicle!  The overall styling is based on the Talbot Lago, and it shows on every corner.  The front has a chrome grille with headlights that have a little more detail than the Hot Wheels Talbot Lago, introduced in 1988.  The fenders wrap around the wheels with a slit to show this is no hovercraft, but instead uses regular wheels just like any other car.  While the Lago has vents to vent heat out of the engine, the Screamliner goes a step further with openings for the twelve throttle butterflies and the side panels are removed to expose the twelve exhaust headers.  The back end has a much smoother tapering off than the Lago, but forgoes the boat-tail hump for a straight boat-tail spoiler on the roof.  The windows are much smaller than the Lago giving the chopped look, with the interior featuring the same amount of detail as the Lago in the same chrome, but somehow it's missing a steering wheel.  The base may be plastic to the Lago's metal but it features more detail than the Lago, including the massive exhaust and engine parts.

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And it's no surprise that the Screamliner's V12 is much bigger than the Talbot's I-6 motor and three-speed manual with gears that are likely not synchromeshed.  The Talbot Lago is a French automobile manufacturer that designed GT cars that not only look good on the street but performed the same as well on the track.  Out of the family of Talbot Lago vehicles, only this T150 model is the most beautifully-crafted one of them all.  Hot Wheels designed one in 1988 and it became an instant collector favorite, always touting it's metal base and becoming one of the first few Treasure Hunts in the mid-1990's.  Since then the car has never reappeared, but I was lucky to find two of them:  one in green and this one shown in red.  It's not the best car in today's sharply-tooled castings, but it's still a beauty nonetheless.

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But wait, there's more...

Larry Wood was the designer behind Screamliner, and it's no surprise because he crafted the Talbot Lago, as well as two more vehicles inspiring the Screamliner: Phantastique and Wild Thing.  Not show is Wild Thing, a generic futuristic turbine-powered coupe introduced in 2003.  There's no wheels on this casting; only small disk wheels are found on the bottom of the base.  The hood opens up to reveal the turbine motors, and it's shape is bullet-smooth.  It's the shape, especially the fin at the rear, that was the design inspiration for the rear fin on Screamliner.

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While Phantastique was the design for the fenders that wrap around the wheels.  Introduced in 2000 this classic roadster is generic, but looks gorgeous in either metallic blue or the metallic red recolor of that year.  The body with the flared fenders looks gorgeous, and the interior is sumptuous with tan seats with chrome divider in the middle, wrapping partially around the rear decklid, following the pattern of the split windshield.  It's a car to wander your eyes over many and many times!  The base shows the big side exhaust exiting from the big motor, though power output and motor size is unknown.

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Sadly the 2000 version's are the only ones in this standard color affair; afterwards it gets bombarded with graphics left and right and multiple colors, becoming a pegwarmer instead of an instant classic.  Not even the metal base on the 2012 Boulevard can save it from the swirl of various colors.

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Speaking of colors, I hope Screamliner comes in metallic colors other than this green or the upcoming purple because this casting has much more potential to really show off it's curves, and all it takes is one mouth-watering metallic candy color!