This is perhaps the weirdest “car” of all.
In Japan, Takara Tomy’s Tomica brand is synonymous with die-cast toy cars, having produced them since 1970. In recent years, however, the brand has been turning the concept of toy vehicles on its head with a new range called “Dream Tomica“, which sees the brand teaming up with various other well-known companies to create some surprising new four-wheeled products.
Its latest collaboration has been with Studio Ghibli, to create the “Dream Tomica Full of Ghibli” line. With last weekend’s Calcifer and Howl’s Moving Castle bringing the current items in the collection to nine, we weren’t expecting news of another addition for a while yet, but that all changed today when Takara Tomy unveiled its latest Dream Tomica sensation — No Face from Spirited Away.
This is the second Spirited Away-related item to join the series, following the debut of the Sea Railway train late last year. Other films currently represented in the series are: Porco Rosso, My Neighbour Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service, Howl’s Moving Castle, Ponyo, and Laputa: Castle in the Sky.
▼ “Ah…ah…ah…”
Like the other items in the collection, this new product isn’t a “car” but it is a mode of transport, and takes its inspiration from the scene where No Face joins main character Chihiro on her train journey across the sea. While it’s actually Chihiro and her bathhouse colleague Lin who travel in the traditional tarai-bune tub boat, with No Face walking after them, this new product sees No Face sitting happily in the boat instead.
As we’ve come to expect from Tomica and its Dream lineup, the boat and its passenger are beautifully detailed, with the wooden slats and single oar perfectly replicating the traditional Japanese fishing vessel in miniature form.
No Face is equally beautiful, with its features looking particularly expressive, and the lower half of its body is semi-transparent, to mimic the way it looks during this scene.
The tub boat is die-cast to give it a nice weight, while clear tires on the bottom help to reproduce the lightness of the water it glides upon.
We’ll no doubt have hours of fun pushing No Face in the tub boat, but we’ll have to wait until after Christmas to do so, as the new product is scheduled to be released in mid-January 2024.
Reservations are being accepted at the Takara Tomy online store from 30 November, though, so if you want to ensure you don’t miss out, you’ll want to mark that date in the calendar, as items like these have been known to sell out on release day.
Otherwise, you can wait for the product’s release in January, when it will be available at toy stores, department stores, mass retailers, Tomica specialty stores, Takara Tomy online, Donguri Kyowakoku (all branches and online), and Ghibli Park’s Grand Warehouse store, priced at 1,320 yen (US$8.93).
Source, images: Press release
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