History Main / HummerDinger

A gigantic sport-utility vehicle, built under the philosophy that BiggerIsBetter. Smaller cars, or at least their drivers, tremble in fear at its presence on the highway -- or maybe it's because the road itself is shaking under its weight. The name will be something bold and authoritative, like "Crusader" or "Kilimanjaro". It's filled with all sorts of equipment to help it tow trailers, climb mountains, and get through the rain, snow, sleet, hail, mud, and whatever else Mother Nature can throw at it... very little of which will be used by 90% of the people who buy it. Instead, it will most likely serve as a mall crawler in {{suburbia}} (or a "[[FunWithAcronyms suburban utility vehicle]]"), shuttling tots to soccer games and groceries back to the house. Fuel economy will be measured in either the single digits or in gallons per mile. The driver will be either a very tiny woman, a man [[CompensatingForSomething in his midlife crisis]], a Mexican drug syndicate hitman, or a celebrity (pro athletes, rap musicians and [[TheAhnold action movie stars]] are the most common) using it to flaunt his wealth, in which case it will likely also be a PimpedOutCar. When it comes time for Junior to get his or her license, expect the kid to shudder at the thought of having to maneuver the thing.

-> Brain: Look at all these Hummers, what kind of Jerk would drive one of those?"
-> Hummer Driver: "This car kicks ass, and I can watch Madigascar while driving. Ha ha ha, Those animals are so f***ing funny, they make me want to change lanes without signaling! (Explosion). YEAH! RUMSFELD!

-> Homer: What kind of mileage does thing get?
-> [[TheAhnold Rainer Wolfcastle]]: 1 highway, 0 city.

** The episode "The Last Temptation of Krust" features the Canyonero. The truck's commercial jingle makes up the page quote. Homer complains that it's a women's car when he finds that his "F-series" model has lipstick holders built in instead of lighters, and proceeds to give it to Marge.

A gigantic sport-utility vehicle, built under the philosophy that BiggerIsBetter. Smaller cars, or at least their drivers, tremble in fear at its presence on the highway -- or maybe it's because the road itself is shaking under its weight. The name will be something bold and authoritative, like "Crusader" or "Kilimanjaro". It's filled with all sorts of equipment to help it tow trailers, climb mountains, and get through the rain, snow, sleet, hail, mud, and whatever else Mother Nature can throw at it... very little of which will be used by 90% of the people who buy it. Instead, it will most likely serve as a mall crawler in {{suburbia}} (or a "[[FunWithAcronyms suburban utility vehicle]]"), shuttling tots to soccer games and groceries back to the house. Fuel economy will be measured in either the single digits or in gallons per mile. The driver will be either a very tiny woman, a man [[CompensatingForSomething in his midlife crisis]], or a celebrity (pro athletes, rap musicians and [[TheAhnold action movie stars]] are the most common) using it to flaunt his wealth, in which case it will likely also be a PimpedOutCar. When it comes time for Junior to get his or her license, expect the kid to shudder at the thought of having to maneuver the thing.

Chiefly an American trope, as Europe and Japan's narrower roads, crowded city streets and pricier gas makes such vehicles uneconomical in those places.

* Stan's Big black SUV from AmericanDad. One episode from 2010 even parodied the changing car market. Francine is telling the family to cut back on expenses because the Economy has caused the family to loose all it's savings in the market. Roger tells Francine that Stan spends over $400.00 a day fueling his SUV. Francine demands that Stan trade it in for a hybrid. Stan refuses because he's [[CompensatingForSomething "A big man who needs a big SUV so everyone will know how big he is"]]. The rest of the episode focuses on Stan trying to come up with the money to keep his SUV, only to end up deeper and deeper in debt.

* The [[FanNickname Hummers of Justice]] that were Horatio and company's signature vehicles on ''{{CSI Miami}}''. (The other two use SUVs, but slightly smaller and less glaring than the Hummers: Tahoes and Denalis on ''{{CSI}}'', and Avalanches on ''{{CSI NY}}''.)

-> Brain: Look at all thes Hummers, what kind of Jerk would drive one of those?"

Quickly becoming a DiscreditedTrope, as the one two punch of the late [[TurnOfTheMillennium 2000s]] gas crisis, and the [[TheNewTens 2010s]] economic depression has hit the SUV market hard, even in the United States. Even the TropeNamer Hummer brand has gone under.

Quickly becoming a DiscreditedTrope, as the one two punch of the late [[TurnOfTheMillennium 2000s]] gas crisis, and the [[TheNewTens 2010s]] economic depression has hit the SUV market hard, even in the United States.

* The [[FanNickname Hummers of Justice]] that were Horatio and company's signature vehicles on ''{{CSI Miami}}''. (The other two used SUVs, but slightly smaller and less glaring than the Hummers: Tahoes and Denalis on ''{{CSI}}'', and Avalanches on ''{{CSI NY}}''.)

* The [[FanNickname Hummers of Justice]] that were Horatio and company's signature vehicles on ''{{CSI Miami}}''. (The other two used SUVs, but slightly smaller: Tahoes and Denalis on ''{{CSI}}'', and Avalanches on ''{{CSI NY}}''.

[[caption-width-right:320:[-[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4QgWRycd7I "Twelve yards long, two lanes wide,\\

Canyonero! Canyonero!"]]]]-]

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->Can you name the truck with four-wheel-drive, smells like a steak, and seats thirty-five?\\
Canyonero! Canyonero!\\
Twelve yards long, two lanes wide, sixty-five tons of American pride!\\
[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4QgWRycd7I Canyonero! Canyonero!]]
-->''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', "The Last Temptation of Krust"

[[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TheSimpsons-giant-car_751.jpg]]]]

-->''TheSimpsons'', "The Last Temptation of Krust"

* Parodied multiple times on ''TheSimpsons''

* The second ''DannyPhantom'' episode with Desiree has Danny and Tucker drooling over giant Hummer-esque [=SUVs=]. [[SoapboxSadie Sam]] talks about how bad for the environment they are, and tries to egg Danny into destroying them. He denies her on the grounds that he's a hero. But Desiree hears the wish and turns them into literal Monster Trucks. Meanwhile, Tucker is completely enamored by the vehicle's [[AttentionDeficitOohShiny big shiny rims.]]

* Averted for some reason in the MMO ''Drift City''. Early on in the storyline, you're given a mission to drive an SUV around a long winding, hilly section of road spanning around the perimeter of the starting city. The game claims that [=SUVs=] are better for climbing up the steep hills because they have more power. Truth is, any car can drive up a hill just as easily as any SUV due to the game's mechanics. [=SUVs=] themselves generally have a higher "Toughness" stat, which has a small impact (no pun intended) on how much damage you do to enemies when you collide into them. How often you need to refuel your car depends on the tier of the car your driving, not the type, which means that [=SUVs=] last just as long as every other car in the same tier, only they don't drive nearly as fast. Also, all the cars in the game have their SerialNumbersFiledOff, unless they're from the Chrystler corporation or it's subsidaries Dodge and Jeep. For example, the "Comet" is a Mitsubishi Eclipse under a fictional name. One of the end-game SUVs is based off the Hummer H3, and actually is one of the most powerful vehicles in the game, even able to compete with other end-game cars.

Chiefly an American trope, as Europe and Japan's narrower roads, crowded city streets and pricier gas makes such vehicles uneconomical in those places. [=SUVs=] first became popular in [[TheEighties the late '80s]] and [[TheNineties early '90s]], when the success of the Jeep Cherokee and the Ford Explorer started an arms race to see who could make the largest possible SUV that they could get away with. By around the TurnOfTheMillennium it arguably became a self-fulfilling trope, with car buyers recommended to buy larger vehicles just so that they wouldn't get squashed if they got in a car accident. It rapidly became a DiscreditedTrope late in the Aughts due to the rise in gas prices and concerns over safety (specifically rollovers), though the 15-20 year lifespan of the typical motor vehicle means they're still not an uncommon sight on the road.

Another big reason for the popularity of this kind of car is the quirks in the US' Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) regulation. After the OPEC oil embargo of 1973 caught domestic manufacturers completely flat-footed with [[CripplingOverspecialization nothing but big gas-guzzling cars to sell]] as fuel prices rose, the federal government saw the resulting economic damage and instituted CAFE standards to encourage the manufacture and sale of more fuel-efficient vehicles. While well-meaning, this system had a major loophole. CAFE had exemptions for "light trucks"[[note]]The government's definition: "Light-duty truck means any motor vehicle rated at 8,500 pounds GVWR or less which has a vehicle curb weight of 6,000 pounds or less and which has a basic vehicle frontal area of 45 square feet or less, which is: (1) Designed primarily for purposes of transportation of property or is a derivation of such a vehicle, or (2) Designed primarily for transportation of persons and has a capacity of more than 12 persons, or (3) Available with special features enabling off-street or off-highway operation and use."[[/note]] intended to allow working professionals who needed more heavily-built vehicles to still be able to purchase them. However, CAFE's definition of "utility" was very broad, allowing automakers to effectively build giant station wagons and [[LoopholeAbuse market them as light trucks]].[[note]]One of the most {{egregious}} examples was when Chrysler managed to get [[http://green.autoblog.com/2010/02/04/greenlings-whats-a-light-duty-truck-and-why-should-we-care/ its little PT Cruiser wagon]] (weight: 3,123 pounds, about sixty pounds less than a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_Accord_(North_America_seventh_generation) seventh-generation Honda Accord]] midsize sedan) classified as a light truck, using a ''very'' stretched definition of such; notably, it was classified (by the government, no less) as a car for most other purposes aside from fuel economy.[[/note]] Closing this loophole and tightening the definition of "utility" has, needless to say, been a major goal of American environmentalists.

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