I've been looking for the Hot Wheels Star Trek Enterprise for months now, and at long last I saw a couple of them at a local store just a few nights ago. About the only thing that I can really say, is that this may be the first time that I've actually been completely disappointed by something that Hot Wheels has put out.

I should probably preface my comments by saying that I'm a huge Star Trek fan. I'm not really a big fan of the new movies -- haven't actually seen the second one yet. But the franchise in general is a big deal to me, so I'm likely to get excited about any new version of the Enterprise, especially if it's being put out by Hot Wheels.
I've tried to deny the fact that I'm a Hot Wheels collector, but it's really pointless. I'm not an obsessive completist, but over the years certain collecting patterns have developed, and I just go with it. I've loved most of the Batman stuff that they've done so far, and a lot of the other movie related die-cast has been great as well. So it would seem logical that a Hot Wheels Enterprise would be awesome... but it's not.

There are apparently two versions of this little ship floating around out there, a plain version, and a "battle damaged" version. I've never seen the plain version in person, so it's actually the version with a few poorly applied scar decals that I've got. In general the toy is underwhelming. I imagine that Mattel had to deal with a safety requirement that forced them to make the pointy parts -- the engine nacelles -- out of soft bendy plastic, and it's not handled well, as the soft white plastic is both weirdly warped and somewhat discolored. The paint on the die-cast part of the ship is pretty shabby as well, with bits of white flaking off around the rivets, and what little detailing there is not lining up properly.

The more I fiddle around with the toy, the more I imagine that a kid wouldn't care all that much about what bothers me. For the most part these are all cranky toy collector gripes, and they don't mean that much in the end. If Hot Wheels takes a stab at other Star Trek vehicles I'll probably hunt for them as well, but it would be nice if they put a little more focus on detail and build quality with these ones, as most of the people hunting for them are likely to be cranky toy collectors.