Here’s something a bit entertaining about our readers. Crawl your way through our comment sections and you’re bound to spot some obscure references, and some of them aren’t necessarily car references! Somehow, you cyber sleuths figured out what random engine block is sitting in the queue for a ride at Disneyland. Now, we have a reference to a famed scene from Back To The Future Part II, but remixed.
Last night, Patrick George burned some late-night oil and published a piece about a pair of sweet AE86s that Toyota unveiled at the Tokyo Auto Salon. The AE86 H2 Concept and the AE86 BEV Concept are cars from your Initial D dreams, now powered by hydrogen and batteries, respectively. These cars are all kinds of awesome, I mean, just look at them!
They’re cool enough on their own, but these cars apparently retained their manual transmissions, too. These cars are a great example of what kind of fun you could have with electric and hydrogen technology, even if the latter remains a California-only niche in the United States. As I scrolled through fresh layers of comments, it was GhosnInABox who got me today with this banger:
“Hi friends! Goldie Wilson III for Wilson Restomod Conversion Systems. I’ll convert your 80’s or 90’s automotive icon to run on pure gigawatts! For only $39,999.95. So come on down and see me, Goldie Wilson III, at any one of our 29 convenient locations.” *Hydrogen conversion not available on Ford Explorer.
If you have no idea what’s going on, I’ll explain. Goldie Wilson III is a character from Back To The Future Part II. He’s the son of Goldie Wilson II, who was the Mayor of the movie’s fictional Hill Valley in 2015. His father, Goldie Wilson, was Mayor as late as 1985. Goldie Wilson III sold hover conversions for cars through Goldie Wilson Hover Conversion Systems. Look, just watch this scene, showing Marty McFly in Courthouse Square of the movie’s 2015 Hill Valley:
Is it bad that I got that reference right away? Also, this scene depicting the year has so many cool vehicles in the span of just a couple of minutes! It opens on a Litestar autocycle, a creation of Jim Bede:
There’s another Pulse autocycle off to the left side of the screen and what’s this? It looks like a Honda PC800 Pacific Coast, which likely hit the market right on time to be in this scene.
Of course, the scene shows other cool cars like a Citroën DS, a GM dustbuster van, a Ford Mustang, and more I’m probably forgetting! Honestly, the entire Back To The Future trilogy is a total paradise for gearheads. There’s a little something for everyone. Congratulations GhosnInABox (great name) and have a great weekend!
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Nobody mentioned the Supervan?
The only thing BTTF2 got right about 2015 was the piles of discarded optical media discs stored in the alley for disposal.
The most ridiculous was the neon lights along the curbs. I can’t imagine what a snowplow would do to those.
There were no snowstorms, since the Weather Service controlled the weather, so they had no need for snow plows.
I always thought that BTTF thing was a reference to the old Earl Scheib commercials. “I’ll paint any car for $39.95!!”
At last, having a significant portion of my hippocampus devoted to pop culture quotes and cool cars pays off!
Maybe my mom was right…maybe I am cool…
Nah…
What an excellent reference! Long story short, this ended up leading me down a rabbit hole of sorts this evening and I learned that Cadillac built a military vehicle called the M114. Apparently, it wasn’t all that great of a vehicle (unless you happened to be a BiffCo representative), but no matter – it’s these types of things that make The Autopian the best rabbit hole generating website out there. Thanks GhosnInABox!
Good the phone, we are going to bring up the cool cars in BTTF2 and not talk about the only one that matters!? The Saab EV1 is sitting in the Saab museum today in Trollhättan and is magnificent!
https://www.saabplanet.com/back-to-the-future-saab-ev-1-prototype/
What’s that white/red.blue thing standing on the corner in the last picture? Is that part of the future too?
Clearly, it’s a sex-worker robot in a patriotic swimsuit. Look at those hips!
Some sci-fi author wrote a short about robot sex workers. Humanoid robot technology had advanced far enough to make very realistic robots. Something tragic had occurred to throw the woman to man ratio and the robot sex workers were made in response. The gist of the story was that they made the first models too perfect so they needed to purposely make imperfect robots to better fool men. And of course it worked.
Can someone care about the homophobic commentor ? It’s utterly more offensive than a tesla hater.
The relative lack of Ford Probes in real 2015 was probably the biggest disappointment.
My favorite time travel movies of all time! And you’re right, the carscape is fantastic in those films. Marty’s Toyota, Biff’s ‘46 Ford, also hoverboards and time-traveling trains!
Nice work GhosnInABox!