Movie Review: Cars 3

I finally got an opportunity to see Disney's Cars 3.  I was a big fan of the first movie and the message it conveyed.  The second one lost me because it got away from what made the movie special.  It would have been better to call it Mater's European Adventure or something like that.  They about killed the franchise with it, but Disney executives figured there was more money to be made if they want back to what made the first one special. In the first movie, Lightning McQueen learned a lesson about taking time to slow down and appreciate life, and we also learned the lesson of how sometimes there are good things that we give up on in the name of progress.

In the latest movie, Lightning is still a big star on the Piston Cup racing circuit.  This is the movie's equivalent of NASCAR.  He has a few rivals who have fun racing together and playing tricks on each other.  This is not unlike things that happen in NASCAR.  One day, a faster, more technologically advanced car comes to race, and things change.  Suddenly, the new car is winning, and other new cars start coming in to replace all the old cars.  This pretty much happened to Lightning's mentor, The Fabulous Hornet.  We learn that he has died, and suddenly Lightning is the only one left from his era of Piston Cup stars.

When do you call it a career and move on?  Lightning wrestles with the idea that he will decide when it's time to quit.  This is not unlike what happened in NASCAR with Richard Petty.  Petty was perhaps the greatest of all time and certainly one of them.  He stayed long past his last win, and it got to a point where he was crashing spectacularly on regular occasions.  You could almost set your watch by it.  Lightning gets passed one race late in the season, and he pushes himself beyond his ability in an effort to catch up.  He crashes, and everybody assumes he's finished.  This happened to his mentor years ago.

NASCAR and racing in general is similar to what happened in the movie.  As a long time racing fan, I don't know if that's a good thing.  You're almost considered over the hill at 30.  Locally, we have old timers.  One driver at my home track raced until he died at 87 years old, but there are more kids starting in Go Karts when they are barely old enough to walk.  For every car you see in NASCAR, there are probably a half a dozen youngsters lining up to be the next driver.  If they have enough money behind them, they just may get a shot one day.  Almost gone entirely are the days where stars rose through the ranks of the local tracks and one day got to race in the big times.  I don't believe this has helped the sport.  It hurts it for reasons I won't get into here.

Lightning has some soul searching to do.  His loyal sponsors sold their company to a car that wanted it in order to market the legacy of McQueen after he retires.  McQueen is determined to prove them wrong and show them that he can sill race and win.  He even has a female trainer who is trying things that ultimately annoy him in order to get him motivated and make him faster.  It turns out that she has dreams of racing.  Lightning is still searching for answers that he might have gotten from his old mentor.  He finds The Fabulous Hornet's mentor and learns some things he never knew before.

That's the basic gist of what the story is about, and I can't say much more without spoiling the story for you.  This wasn't the best Cars movie, but it was much better than the second one.  It has a positive message.  I'm sure long time auto racing fans can appreciate what the movie is trying to say.  Eventually, we all face similar situations in life.  Somebody will eventually be gunning for your position.  I think a lesson we can take from that is that we are all links in the chain of life.  It was there before we got there and will be there after we leave.  What we do when it's our time is what matters, so we should make the most of it.  I am a fan of the Pixar Animation movies.  Most of them are at least pretty good.  If you get a chance, you should check out this movie.