Long before F1: The Movie and the Fast and Furious franchise, Walt Disney Pictures managed to corner the market for racing movies with a series of beloved family films, starring a sentient Volkswagen Beetle or “Bug,” lovingly dubbed “Herbie,” who became an unlikely and unexpected racing star. By the time Walt Disney died in 1966, his company had already found as much success from its live-action family films as its animated movies. The 1968 feature, The Love Bug, may have been inspired by the success of John Frankenheimer‘s Grand Prix, which two years prior won two Oscars for sound, but the simple concept of a car exhibiting human emotions and reactions while buzzing around the racetrack, quickly caught on with kids, leading to four other movies and a television series over the next 14 years. It’s been twenty years since Disney’s popular vehicular character appeared on-screen in 2005’s Herbie: Fully Loaded, starring Lindsay Lohan and Justin Long, so maybe it’s time for Disney to give Herbie another go.
Herbie the Love Bug Has a Long-Storied History in Movies and Television
These days, the idea of a kid-friendly racing movie about cars might not seem like that strange an idea, but in the late ’60s, The Love Bug was original enough an idea that it proved to be a huge success for Disney after the death of its founder. Starring Dean Jones as a down-on-his-luck racer who discovers Herbie’s “powers,” The Love Bug also tapped into the changing times following the “Summer of Love” to become the second-highest-grossing movie of 1969. The movie’s first sequel, 1974’s Herbie Rides Again, entirely changed the human cast, bringing on popular TV actor Ken Berry from F-Troop, Stefanie Powers, prolific character actor Keenan Wynn, and even Oscar and Golden Globe winner and theater vet, Helen Hayes. Critics dismissed Herbie Rides Again even faster than they did the original movie.
Two more sequels followed with the 1977 feature, Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo, bringing back Dean Jones’ character from The Love Bug and pairing him with the popular character actor, Don Knotts. That movie may have been more significant for Herbie, falling for a French automobile named Giselle — they even go on a “date”! By the time Disney made the star-studded 1980 installment, Herbie Goes Bananas, the idea of a sentient VW had truly run its course.
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Long after a short-lived ’80s Herbie, the Love Bug series (just five episodes!), also starring Jones, a 1997 television remake of The Love Bug was directed by none other than Peyton Reed of Ant-Man fame, starring Bruce Campbell from Sam Raimi‘s The Evil Dead and Army of Darkness, with Alexandra Wentworth and Micky Dolenz of the Monkees. Eight years later, Disney did give Herbie another lap around the racetrack, possibly due to the box office success of The Fast and the Furious. Herbie: Fully Loaded, starring Lindsay Lohan –coming off massive hits with Disney’s Freaky Friday remake and Mean Girls–and Justin Long, wasn’t very well received, as it tried to introduce Herbie to 21st-century youngsters with mixed results. Just one year later, Disney released the first Cars movie from Pixar, another attempt to get younger kids into cars and racing that proved to be a bigger success thanks to characters like Owen Wilson‘s Lightning McQueen and the talking tow truck Mater, voiced by Larry the Cable Guy. Maybe Disney execs saw the success of that animated movie (helmed by then-Pixar head John Lasseter) where the cars could actually talk and decided that animated movies were a better way to go in terms of racing movies.
The Popularity of ‘F1’ and Pixar’s ‘Cars’ Movies Proves Today’s Kids Need a New Herbie Movie
By the time Disney released The Love Bug in 1969, the popularity of television included Disney having a weekly show airing many of the company’s theatrical features, introducing younger viewers to Disney characters long before the introduction of the VHS in the ’80s. These days, younger audiences might find those Disney classic movies on Disney+, but back then, Herbie could be found on lunch boxes and in comic books, as well as being a regular on Sunday night’s The Wonderful World of Disney. Despite the poor reception to the Lindsay Lohan movie, the success of everything from the Fast and Furious franchise to Pixar Animation’s three Cars movies shows that people want to watch racing on screen. Similarly, the recent success of F1 at the box office clinches that adults want more racing movies, so a new Herbie movie could be seen as a gateway film to introduce younger audiences to the world of racing.
Of course, any attempt at a reboot would require casting actors who could be as big a draw as the premise of a sentient racing car. Another major stumbling block for a “Herbie” reboot might be the fact that you rarely, if ever, see Volkswagen Bugs on the street anymore, let alone even in period films. The German automaker discontinued production of the model in 2003, and it’s unclear whether kids today would find Herbie’s distinctive design uniquely adorable or just outdated, like something more for their parents or grandparents.
To be fair, filmmakers have been trying for years to bring the beloved television series, Knight Rider, with its similar premise, to movie theaters. There was even a nod to the David Hasselhoff ’80s television series in the recent M3GAN 2.0, produced by one of those filmmakers, James Wan. Disney would have to be willing to take a bit of a risk to invest in Herbie’s return, although there are many intelligent Hollywood filmmakers who could find a creative way into that relatively simple premise. We’re already seeing the success of F1 leading to a Hot Wheels movie, directed by Wicked‘s Jon M. Chu, finally being greenlit after that toy property had been in development hell for decades. Could Herbie be too far behind?