Cars 3 teaser trailer is darker than you might expect

Lightning McQueen is back on the racetrack – but from the looks of things, it might not be quite so bright and breezy an affair as before.

Disney/Pixar just dropped the first official teaser trailer for ‘Cars 3,’ which you can watch above, and it’s surprisingly sombre and intense for the kid-friendly series.

With new director Brian Fee taking over from Pixar head honcho John Lasseter (who directed 2006’s ‘Cars’ and 2011’s ‘Cars 2’), this third film looks to be side-stepping the colourful spy spoof territory of the second film and going back to the NASCAR-inspired world of the original.

As the above teaser shows, the film will see McQueen (once again voiced by Owen Wilson) suffering a severe crash which brings his future as a racer into question.

The grounded, serious tone of this trailer does come as quite a surprise given how the series has gone so far. But let’s not beat around the bush: neither of the existing ‘Cars’ movies are generally held up among Pixar’s finest work. As such, this teaser may stand as a powerful declaration of intent to do things differently – and hopefully a lot better – this time around.

In any case, Larry the Cable Guy will be back once again to voice comedy sidekick Mater, so we doubt it’ll all be doom and gloom.

‘Cars 3’ is set to hit UK cinemas on 14 July 2017.

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