The Bat - The Dark Knight Rises Hot Wheels die-cast vehicle

By now, everyone knows that The Bat was the cool new vehicle introduced to the Batman in this summer's "The Dark Knight Rises". We've gotten several versions of the Tumbler Batmobile, first introduced in "Batman Begins" and the Batpod from "The Dark Knight", but only one Bat (Mattel's version) so far, which I never bothered to pick up, as I found it to be hugely overpriced and underdetailed. I was very surprised to stumble across a die-cast metal Bat as part of the new wave of Hot Wheels Batman vehicles at my local Wal-mart, and this was one I couldn't pass up...

The new Hot Wheels wave includes The Bat, the Batpod, a 1980's version Batmobile, and the Batmobile from "Batman and Robin". They all come in blister packs with a drab brown cardbacks customized as to the source (movie, etc.), and sell for about $8. 

I'm not sure about the scale for The Bat, but it measures about 4" long, and comes with a flimsy plastic "stand". The top of the carapace is die-cast metal, while the underside and most of the rest is plastic. The canopy is a single piece of clear plastic, allowing a view of the seat inside the cockpit.

The shape and outer detailing of the vehicle is very good at this scale. The panel engravings are a little "soft" (not very deep or pronounced), but the overall shape and look is great.

The underside reminds me of a lobster tail, mostly because of the curve and the panels. There are two plastic rotors awkwardly placed and non-functional under there.

The post of the "stand" fits into a hole in the center, but the ship tends to tilt to one side, and the stand arm isn't long enough to keep the vehicle off the ground. The ball is just a little too small to be snug enough to hold any "poses", so the stand really only functions to keep the back end up a little.

From the front, the ship looks as it should, with missile pods and what-have-you gathering most of the attention.

The Bat is a great little display vehicle. It's got just enough detail to look cool, is accurate enough and cheap enough to be fun, and garners more pros than cons. If you are a fan of the film(s) and the design, you really can't go wrong with this little guy. If it was priced $2 cheaper I would have bought 2...