Have you ever seen a more stunning vision of orangish-red? The Twin-Pod Cloud Car is a marvel of crimson engineering, and one of those few vehicles that seemed a little "off" if you didn't actually have more than one figure in it.
The Cloud Car is a rather sedate vehicle compared to others - no moving parts, no obvious guns, no playset-like bigness. It's like a flying peapod. The picture on the box is humorous because it is open to interpretation. Are the guards chastising Luke for stealing a Cloud Car? Is the crumbly white stuff it's on supposed to be ice, as in Hoth, or did Kenner take the name literally and mean it to be a cloud? To top it off, where's the Cloud Car pilot? They made one - was it not in time to get on the box?
The Cloud Car has two cockpits for figures, built-in guns (look closely on the fuselage, they're there), and landing struts that come down. However, it is unclear from other sources whether the Car floated on repulsorlifts when it was at rest and the struts may have just been something for the toy.
Why should you own this vehicle? Five reasons:
1. If you own the Cloud Car Pilot you must, or else his existence is for naught.
2. You have to own something that dared fire a warning shot by the Millennium Falcon.
3. That color! Where else can you see that besides the Maximillian robot from The Black Hole?
4. Probably the easiest Star Wars vehicle to hold - like having a built-in handle.
5. There's something strangely phallic about it...
Backstory:
The Storm IV Twin-Pod Cloud Car was built by Bespin Motors right in Cloud City. This explains the coloring, since it was made for atmospheric defense, and the color blends in nicely with Bespin clouds. It has central ion engine block for thrust, and mainly repulsorlifts for maneuverability. After the Empire occupied Bespin, the Cloud Car was sold to outside markets, and its design was also copied by other markets. It sported two small, but powerful, blaster cannons, and the twin cockpits allowed for a pilot and a gunner.
This toy has my second favourite Kenner TV commercial (after the "nice legs" C-3PO one obviously). "The canopy opens and the landing gear, goes.... up!". Wow, action packed huh! The CC has always been a favourite of mine and was really tough to find in the UK, where along with he US version we also got our own 'day-glo' orange version! Which - if you can imagine - looked even cheaper than the US version!
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