Cool Car - Television Tropes & Idioms

Just one of the few functions among many of the "Fenton family RV".

Beekeeper 1: To the Beemobile!

Beekeeper 2: You mean your Chevy?

Beekeeper 1: ... Yes.

-from the Simpsons episode Lisa's Rival

"Why of all people do you need a van?...Wait. You know what, I don't wanna know."

-Green Lantern to Flash, in Justice League

It looks cool and goes fast. It may even be bulletproof and contain an assortment of weapons and gadgets. What is it? It's a Cool Car.

If you're lucky, it comes with a Cool Garage.

Sometimes, the car is cool enough that it actually can become a protagonist in the series -- e.g. Knight Rider. The General Lee is arguably the main protagonist of The Dukes Of Hazzard.

Most Cool Cars, even ones that have no inherent super abilities, will be curiously immune to breakdown or physical damage. No matter what manner in which the hero drives, as long as he's determined to stay on the straight and narrow and fight for the forces of good, his car shows an Empathic Weapon's ability to never get scratched, dented or even dirty. For instance, the General Lee is used for innumerable jumps, but there is never any mention or evidence of the car's structural integrity being damaged on landing, which was addressed in Mythbusters. In reality, they went through a lot of General Lees and police cruisers on that show.

Driving a Cool Car is a good way to ensure yourself Rock Star Parking.

Examples:

The Batmobile from Batman, in its various incarnations, has come to define this trope to the point where any character's cool car may be dubbed the (Character'sName)-mobile. (Real-world example: the famous "Popemobile"). Just to let you know, the Batmobile in Batman Begins is a Lamborghini Gallardo-Hummer H2 crossover. When Lt. Gordon gets a view of the Batmobile, he says:
Lt. Gordon: I gotta get me one of those.
The General Lee from the The Dukes Of Hazzard
KITT in Knight Rider
The Mach 5 from Speed Racer is so goddamn cool it's even listed as a Super Robot.
Ray's GTO from Due South
Duncan MacLeod's black 1964 "Flair Bird" convertible Ford Thunderbird from Highlander The Series
A different Ray's Corvette in Stingray
The Dodge Viper in Viper
The A Team had a cool black GMC van
The Ford LTD from Men In Black appears to be uncool at first.
FAB-1, Lady Penelope's six-wheeled Rolls-Royce from Thunderbirds. While the original was only a model, it was actually built for the 2004 Live Action Adaptation. (Though in an egregious example of Product Placement, it was no longer a Rolls Royce but a custom Ford Thunderbird.)
Miami Vice had many cool cars. Sonny Crockett first drove a black Daytona Spyder, then a white Testarossa, then a red F430 in The Movie.
In another Don Johnson reference, the title character in Nash Bridges drove a bright yellow Barracuda convertible. Of course, all of the main characters in the show had a vehicle that was, if not cool, than at least not mundane.
Speaking of Ferraris, there was of course the red 308 borrowed by Magnum, P.I.
The Gran Torino from Starsky and Hutch
Gene Hunt's Ford Cortina GXL from Life On Mars
- Later, in Ashes To Ashes, Gene Hunt has a bright red Audi. "Fire up the Quattro!"
Steve Urkel's BMW Isetta, from Family Matters, isn't cool. In fact, it's so terrible and antiquated that it may punch through the bottom, wrap around to the top and become cool. Or maybe not. He thinks it's cool, anyway, but he's The Urkel.
- May be so uncool it's cool? You've never seen the action around one at a car show!
Gladys Crabtree (aka "Mother") from My Mother The Car is likewise not a Cool Car.
Film example: The old police cruiser used by The Blues Brothers was emblematic of the brothers' style and situation. It survived the film's stunts, held together by the very will of The Almighty, until its mission was over. Then it fell apart on the sidewalk.
The Fast And Furious series runneth over with Cool Cars so hard, they're pretty much about this trope. Just pick a car, any car. Except for the Chevelle and the Ferraris, being the former apparently uncool and the latter portrayed as "already awesome", all these cars are rigged with the most powerful, badass engine upgrades in the world, enough to make them run like Formula 1 cars, and on top of that, all of them are equipped with bangin' sound systems, neon lights, all sorts of sophisticated control computers (except for the muscle cars, of course, which rely on good ol' humongous block), LCD monitors, and, of course, a lot of Nitro Boost. The list includes:
1. Two sleek Ferraris (TFATF, 2F2F).
2. Four Mitsubishis with an awesome paint job (all movies: two were Evolutions (VII and IX) and two were Eclipses).
3. Three RX-7s (all movies).
4. A Dodge Charger (TFATF).
5. A Chevrolet Camaro (2F2F).
6. A 1970 Dodge Challenger (2F2F).
7. An apparently old and rusty Chevrolet Chevelle (Tokyo Drift).
8. A Dodge Viper (Tokyo Drift).
9. Two Nissan Skylines (2F2F, Tokyo Drift).
10. A Nissan Fairlady 350Z (Tokyo Drift).
11. A green Volkswagen Touran (Tokyo Drift).
12. A 1967 Ford Mustang with a Nissan Skyline engine (Tokyo Drift).
13. And the list keeps going on and on and on...
The entire point of the Need For Speed games after Underground is about building and racing in Fast And Furious-style tuned cars. Underground only featured import tuner cars, but Underground 2 also featured a couple of European and American sports cars. Most Wanted and Carbon finally upped the ante by letting you tune exotic cars. Just imagine driving a Lamborghini Gallardo with vinyls, custom paint job and whatnot!
Film example: Herbie the Volkswagen Beetle from The Love Bug and its sequels. Even though the Última Edición version, with its marginal 50-70 hp, is the most powerful version ever made (a stock 1963 model- Herbie's Canon age- had 40 hp), it still manages to be as powerful as a stock car.
- Notice, however, that thanks to the Beetle's extremely light weight (~750 kg / 1650 lb) it is possible to turn an ordinary Beetle into something as fast as a stock car without having to use a huge engine.
Another (twentyish) film example(s): Pick a Bond film, any Bond film. The Aston-Martin DB5 from Goldfinger and the Lotus Esprit submarine from The Spy Who Loved Me are particularly memorable examples.
The DeLorean in the Back To The Future film trilogy. The version in Back To The Future The Animated Series had even more gadgets attached.
- The real-life DeLorean is probably the coolest car ever made, at least in terms of aesthetics.
Megas XLR features a 1970 Plymouth Hemi Barracuda, that also functions as the head and cockpit of a giant robot.
In Riding Bean, Bean Bandit has a stylish car, called the Roadbuster, that not only has a high performance engine that can match most race cars, but it can orient its wheels to move sideways or extend brake blades for extremely rapid stops.
Rally Vincent's Shelby Cobra from Gunsmith Cats.
The Sprinter Trueno from Initial D is a nice subversion: Takumi, arguably the fastest racer in the series, owns the second-most uncool car in the series, the AE86, while beating an armada of EVOs, RX-7s, and R32s Granted, it was heavily modified halfway into the series, resulting it larger horsepower and lightened weight. It proved so popular it pushed the AE86 Corolla coupes from "old used car" to "sought-after classic" almost singlehandedly - in Japan, it did this before the newest examples were even 10 years old! As a matter of fact, you can also see the original Hachi-Roku in Gran Turismo 4 (the Sprinter Trueno Shuichi Shigeno Edition), as well as in Need For Speed: Underground 2 and Carbon (the Toyota Corolla).
- It's really not a bad car, just considered outdated by the majority of racers in the series. Takumi's character model, the original Drift King Keiichi Tsuchiya, started out with this car, and still considers it his favorite.
- The award for most uncool car of the series goes to Itsuki's AE85. Itsuki attempts to buy the same car as Takumi and gets ripped off with an authentic POS.
On Transformers, a disproportionate number of the original Autobots transform into cool cars, even those for whom it is not thematically appropriate, like Techno Wizard Wheeljack. Jazz, for example, transforms into a Pontiac Solstice, while Barricade transforms into a Ford Mustang squad car. A Hummer H2 was first considered for Optimus's vehicle form, but the creators decided to keep him a Peterbilt trailer truck.
- In the 2007 movie, Bumblebee actually alters his vehicle mode (from beatdown vintage Camaro to a custom concept car version) mid-movie just to impress his human companions. This might apply to many of the Cool Car Autobots — just because you're a heroic living machine on a mission to save the planet doesn't mean you can't want to look good doing it.
Videogame (and eventually movie) example: Spy Hunter had the G-6155 Interceptor, that can transform into a boat.
Subversion: Ben 10 has the main characters traveling across America in the Rust Bucket, which comes with all the special gadgets but blows the Cool Car vibe by being a rusty-looking old RV.
- Played straight in the Time Skip Alien Force, where the team rides around in Kevin's sports car (this troper is unsure of the exact model...Mustang?). And then subverted again when Gwen's brother owns a car dubbed "the Awesomemobile" that is decidedly unawesome.
Accidental subversion: as part of a Product Placement deal, Hiro and Ando treat the Nissan Versa as though it were a cool car in Heroes -- when unfortunately, it's just a mundane family compact. And being from Japan, they wouldn't even know it as a "Versa" -- in Japan and Latin America, they call it "Tiida". (That last bit can be explained away by the fact that they read it in the ad for an American comic book. And it's a rental car bought in America.)
The Ecto-1 from Ghostbusters and its related material. It may be a bit of a subversion, as the model of car used was shown to be old and junky, yet it is still considered a cool car due to its visually striking appearance.
- On the other hand, the Ghostbuggy--preferred mode of transport for the other guys--is an uncool, beat-up old jalopy. At least until it decides to transform into an airplane, speedboat, snowmobile...[[Doctor Who:"Did I mention it also travels in time?"]]
Darkwing Duck had a variation on this, in the Ratcatcher, a "cool motorcycle" designed to match and expand Darkwing's superhero aesthetic. It rarely evinced Cool Car gizmos and options, and due to the slapstick nature of the cartoon, it often crashed or suffered damage, but DW's sidekick Launchpad McQuack could be counted on to tirelessly fix it up each time in the show's Cool Garage, Darkwing Tower.
Danger Mouse had a sleek yellow matchbox-sized flying car, with jetplane-style wings, that was actually called "The Hero's Car".
Used somewhat inexplicably in Torchwood, given that the titular organisation is meant to be a secret, making the decision to drive around in a very distinctive and eye-catching vehicle with the name stenciled onto it a rather strange idea.
Literary example: Crowley's Bentley in Good Omens. His infernal powers literally protect it from damage, at least until he drives it through a wall of fire formed by a highway shaped like a diabolical sigil. He continues to drive it all the way to his destination, holding it together through sheer force of will, until it no longer resembles a classic Bentley, or a car for that matter.
The 1967 Chevy Impala driven by the Winchesters on Supernatural. This editor would argue that it has achieved co-protagonist status, along with Sam and Dean.
The old Krofft videogame series Wonderbug combined the titular Cool Car with a Secret Identity as an old junker of a dune buggy called "Schlep Car". The buggy's secret identity was so junky that even the letters on its license plate were crooked, while its superpowered form was sentient, had an actual face (made by its headlights and bumper), and could fly.
Possibly copying the above show, Hanna-Barbera's Wonder Wheels had a similar junky motorcycle transforming into the titular sentient super-vehicle, though its driver also got a change of outfit during the transformation.
Literary example The Great Red Shark and The Great White Whale from Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas The Great Red Shark is arguably the fourth biggest character (behind Raoul Duke, Dr. Gonzo, and Drugs.)
"The Last of the V-8s" in the first two Mad Max films.
In Doctor Who the Third Doctor spent much of his time on Earth driving around in 'Bessie', an antiquated canary-yellow roadster which on first glance would look the furthest thing from 'cool' you could think of. It's quickly revealed, however, that the Doctor's constant tinkering and playing around have made it a super-powered car that anyone would kill to drive.
- He later traded up for a weirdly incongruous Jetsons-style flight-capable bubble car, which rapidly acquired the Fan Nickname of 'The Whomobile'.
Madame Foster's car from Fosters Home For Imaginary Friends, aside from being a Pontiac Firebird, also was once picked up and thrown back onto the road without sustaining damage. It also survived Bloo driving it, a miracle in itself.
The Coyote in Hardcastle and McCormick.
Stephen King has written not one but two novels about haunted Cool Cars - Christine and From a Buick 8.
The Deliverator from Snow Crash. Probably the only Cool Car with its own pizza warmer.
- Ng, a weapons dealer who plays a central role in the book's plot, also has a "wheelchair" which he converted from a German airport firetruck and outfitted with all sorts of goodies, such as a spy helicopter, guided missiles, and cybernetic attack dogs.
  Ng: I tried prostheses for a while--some of them are very good. But nothing is as good as a motorized wheel chair. And then I got to thinking, why do motorized wheelchairs always have to be tiny pathetic things that strain to go up a litttle teeny ramp?
Every single car in the Twisted Metal games.
Sam And Max Freelance Police drive around in a (quite literally) invincible '60 DeSoto Adventurer. It's recently been demoted to No Manufacturers Were Harmed status, though.
Cars, in which every single character IS a Cool Car. Lightning McQueen is a NASCAR stock car, Sally is a Porsche 911 Carrera, and even the senile Model T Lizzie is cool.
Cheerfully subverted in Wacky Races, where most of the cars are goofy and incredibly uncool. Ironically the coolest car belongs to Dick Dastardly, who never wins.
C.A.R. in The Replacements, who is more intelligent than several of the human characters.
The titular vehicle in the horror movie The Car. Just because the thing is a driverless Satanic serial killer doesn't mean it can't be cool.
Michael Korben's car in If Looks Could Kill
Every car driven by Will Smith in I am Legend
Danny Phantom has the Fenton Family Ghost Assault Vehicle AKA the RV.
Gordon Freeman acquires a post-apocalypsized 1969 Dodge Charger as his main method of transport throughout the second half of Half-Life 2: Episode Two. Interestingly, the developer's commentary states that they were actually considering subverting this Trope by making Gordon drive a total junker and even having a character comment on its crapiness, but they ultimately decided that it's better if the player has a positive impression of the vehicle.
The Reliant Regal three-wheeled van owned by the main characters of Only Fools And Horses is a famous subversion, the So Bad Its Good of the car world. It's popular enough that more than one Real Life Reliant Regal owner has painted his vehicle to look like it, and it came second only to the General Lee in a poll of the best-ever TV cars.
The Gadgetmobile from Inspector Gadget, which has transforming gadget-powers like its owner.
- The Movie subverts this at the beginning, when Gadget goes to jump into his car. It looks like he's going for the red sportscar, and pulls away in the 70s jalopy.
Subverted on Columbo's Peugot 403.
Webcomic Misfile is chock full of cool cars, virtually every single character has one.
The cars from Burnout, which range from classic gangster cars to slick fifty's cars to modern sports cars.
The Middlemobile [and other vehicles] from The Middle Man and to a lesser degree, both of Dub-Dub's mundane cars.
HarryDresden's Blue Beetle is a subversion of the trope, but Thomas' Hummer is cool.
Bullitt's incredibly badass 1968 Ford Mustang 390 CID Fastback, although it sports no gadgets or gimmicks, is one of the oldest ones in the book.
The cars in the Gran Turismo series range from Joke Cars (the one HP 1895 Benz Motorwagen!), to mundane sedans, to nice muscle cars, to great supercars, to awesome JGTC touring cars, to frikkin awesome Le Mans prototypes, to a MIND-BOGGINGLY AWESOME Formula 1 racer.
The Core Striker from Tomica Hero Rescue Force, which, due to its AI, also doubles as a Robot Buddy.
The AV's from Beetleborgs and many of the rangers cars from Power Rangers Turbo.
The ultimate example would be the Blues Mobile from Blues Brothers , it's indestructable and is able to fly.
In real life- Jay Leno owns a awesome collection of these. He also owns a lot of cool motorcycles too. In fact....Jay has a rather Cool Garage in general. Jay Leno's Garage shows this to the extreme.
The Mythbusters treat their cars as cool cars, when most are junkers they got because they knew they would be ruined. Various cars have been fitted with RC rigs, prompting Adam to point out that he and Jamie should cruise for chicks in them, while remaining in the backseat. Their very first myth involved a rocket car, and when speed is a factor in the myths, they tend to call on expert drivers and very cool cars to help.

Cool Boat

« Vehicle Tropes »

Cool Horse

Main Tropes Index

Troperville

Editing

Tools