By Carlos Sandoval

1. By Carlos Sandoval

2. HWTV Background • I chose HWTV because I feel that it was the subject I was most interested in. • HWTV is important to me because it shows different racing lessons and techniques for certain environments.

3. HWTV History • The story had started in 2003 with Highway 35: World Race (top right). • It was soon followed in 2005 by Acceleracers (bottom right).

4. HWTV History Part 2 • After Acceleracers, Mattel had taken a long break, and didn’t make another show until 2009, when they released Hot Wheels Battle Force 5. Unfortunately for many of us, it had absolutely no link to either of the two previous seasons other than about two characters, and a brief appearance of one of the previous cars, which was the Power Rage (bottom right).

5. Plot of Hot Wheels Highway 35: World Race • The season, Highway 35 World Race, was about a community (if you could call it that) of drivers that raced specially-designed cars through racetracks built in other dimensions. At the end of the track was an artifact called the “Wheel of Power”, which contained unlimited clean energy. But these drivers weren’t the only ones who knew of it. There was another team of drivers (or robot drivers), called the Racing Drones, who wanted it for their own evil purposes. They had a human spy enter the races to sabotage the other teams and obtain the Wheel for them. He failed to obtain it, as the main driver, Vert Wheeler, reached it first, and took it back to Earth. For winning the World Race, each member of his team won a check of five million dollars. When the spy met the leader, Gelorum, he soon discovered that they were all robots built by the Accelerons, an ancient race of aliens that created Highway 35. The other drivers were confronted by the Drones, and were ordered to bring out the Wheel to them. Vert decided that they had to return the Wheel back to the end of Highway 35. They started on their way to the portal to Highway 35, destroying many Drones on the way. When they got to Highway 35 and put the Wheel back where it belonged, Gelorum swore that she would return.

6. Plot of Hot Wheels Acceleracers • As promised, Gelorum and her Drones had returned, and took over the city that was at the end of Highway 35, which was the host of the Wheel of Power. Dr. Tezla, at the time the Drones took over, had attempted to take it away from them before they had obtained it to prevent their takeover of the city, and Earth. However, he failed, and barely returned to Earth with his life, and without his car, thanks to a device he installed to his car called “Emergency Driver Return”. But fortunately for him, when he would study the Wheel before it was taken by the Drones, he discovered that it was also a key to countless new tracks called “Racing Realms”. At the end of each Realm would await new powers from devices called “Accelechargers. Since Tezla was badly injured from the accident on Highway 35, he called in some of his old drivers from the World Race to enter these Realms and obtain Accelechargers, to prevent the Drones from getting further into world-domination. The drivers he called had joined two different street-racing teams: Teku, a team of tuner cars and skill; and Metal Maniacs, a team of brawns, aggression and muscle cars. Tezla’s drivers who had joined these teams were Vert Wheeler, Kurt Wylde, Mark Wylde (who had taken the nickname “Wylde” from now on), and Taro Kitano. At first, they refused to help him because he wouldn’t let them return to Highway 35 to race just for fun, but when they heard that the Drones were involved, they had no other choice. The drivers soon found out that the Racing Realms were more challenging (considering they had to make it through within an hour), and even lethal. The drivers would barely make it out of each Realm alive, but sometimes would lose their cars on the way. Halfway through this season, they discovered that they and the Drones weren’t the only ones entering the Racing Realms. The fourth team was an unknown government of secret drivers and scientists called, “The Silencerz” (yes, that is actually how they spell it.), who study the Acceleron technology for unknown purposes. The Silencerz are all disguised in full cover suits with no transparency, to hide their identity. During the third episode, Kurt and Markie decide to settle their competition in the Junk Realm, with Markie crashing off the track, and soon being trapped in the Realm. Kurt later finds out that his brother was captured by the Drones. Outraged, he brings the Teku and Metal Maniacs together to rescue his brother after the next realm, (which is in the final episode). Vert, however, stays behind, as he had been finishing every Realm in last place. He was starting to believe that he was no longer the best, and thought he would just mess up the plan. After the rest of the drivers enter the Realm to rescue Kurt’s brother, the Racing Drones finally find where Dr. Tezla is hiding, and takeover. They collect the rest of the Accelechargers, and the portal reconfigures for a race through every Racing Realm. However, just before the Drones had entered the Acceledrome, Vert had managed to escape to the garage, and find his car. Only a few seconds after Gelorum, Vert goes to enter the Realms to stop her. They enter every Realm within seconds of each, to show whether they have learned the skills of each Realm or not. Once they reach the end, they meet an Acceleron. Gelorum requests that he races her, but the Acceleron refuses because she cheated through each Realm with her Accelechargers. He then says that Vert deserves to race because he used his own skills to complete the Realms. He then gives Vert a new racing suit, and the title of “A True Acceleracer”. Furious, Gelorum then removes her biosuit, revealing a master Racing Drone. She then threatens to skin Vert alive, but before she could do anything, the Acceleron uses “the Force”, and throws her into deep white space. Vert soon finds out that the rest of the drivers had rescued Markie from the Drones, and returned, but were held hostage by the Drones in the Acceledrome. Vert makes a tough decision to turndown the opportunity to race with the Accelerons to save his friends. The Acceleron understands, and gives him a fourth ring to the Wheel of Power, then makes a returning portal for him. Once he returns, the drivers start attacking the Drones, but they keep coming out of the portal. Desperate to rid the world of the Drones, Dr. Tezla decides to set the Acceledrome to self-destruct. Lani, his assistant, asks him how long he has to escape, but Dr. Tezla answers that the self-destruct will be instantaneous, and that he won’t be escaping. Lani refuses to let him sacrifice himself, then Gig, Dr. Tezla’s robotic assistant, tells them to escape, and that he would be the one to detonate the self-destruct. He then informs the drivers to leave the Acceledrome immediately. Vert, having many Drones close on his tail, decides to go for the portal as his escape. Just split-seconds after Gig detonates the Acceledrome, he escapes right before the portal permanently closes, leaving the rest of the Drones behind him to be destroyed by the flames and explosion. Vert escapes, but appears in the Silencerz base. The rest of the drivers then decide to go look for him. Anything after that is unknown since the creators never explained what happened when Vert discovered that his dad was one of their drivers.

7. What’s Going On? The Hot Wheels series had mostly revolved around a California teen named “Vert Wheeler”. He was skateboarding home from the DMV with his new license when he saw a new truck mysteriously parked in the driveway of his home. After about ten seconds of his arrival, the car started, and opened. It turned out that it was an invitation to a World Race. The invitation stated that the winner would be known as the fastest driver in the world. Upon hearing this (the invitation was on a screen in the car), Vert decided to go look for this race. From that point on, his life had changed.

8. How It Ended As stated in some of the previous slides, Mattel never explained what happened after the Ultimate Race, and Battle Force 5 had absolutely no link whatsoever. So there isn’t an official answer to this question.

9. Resources • http://www.accelepedia.com/ • The episodes themselves (I have very good memory to these kind of things).

10. Credits Presentation – Carlos Sandoval Designs – Carlos Sandoval Information – Carlos Sandoval Backgrounds & images – Who do you think? Music – What music? Highway 35 & Acceleracers – Mattel

11. A Little Something Else A little word. Due to how much I liked this series until BF5, I am currently writing a crossover story between Acceleracers, and Sonic the Hedgehog. Yes, I know, it sounds ridiculous, but I wanted to see what would happen. It can be read on my deviantART page. • http://madgamer55.deviantart.com/gallery/35056067