Toyota Mark II Grande GX61? Check! Boomerang antenna? Check! Pompadour? Check! Harem (MC Hammer) pants? Check! It can’t get more (late) 80s than this! Stop! Hammer time!
Toyota Mark II Grande GX61 Boomerang
Tag: GX61
Almost two weeks ago I posted a couple of videos of Magnum P.I. like commercials by Toyota for the Mark II GX61. I was wondering why the salary man was in both commercials, but now Zeb from GX61 cleared that up: that man is Shigeo Nagashima, a professional baseball player who played with the Yomiuri Giants till 1974. After that he became the manager of the Yomiuri Giants till he got fired in 1980. After that he didn’t do anything till 1992 when he became manager of the Yomiuri Giants again.
To quote Zeb from GX61:
So THAT’s why these cars often have baseball bats on the parcel tray!
Probably the Toyota commercials funded his unemployment during the early eighties. He did a some more commercials than the two with the 1982 and 1983 GX61!
1981 Corona T130:
1981 Corona T130 commercial
1984 Mark II GX61:
And in 1988 he did a commercial for Visa:
Now what is that last commercial supposed to say?
What does Toyota have in common with Ferrari? Simple: both were selling their cars through the Magnum P.I. image!
When the Magnum P.I. television series aired in 1980 the sales of the Ferrari 308 GTS (and other models) boomed. Tom Selleck’s favorite car had so much appeal to the audience that everyone loved the car, including me! Even though I was only a little boy back in the early 80s that 308 GTS is somehow burned in my mind together with the image of a mustache wearing P.I.
Apparently Toyota thought the sex appeal of Thomas Magnum was strong enough to sell the “sporty” 1982 Mark II GX61:
To be honest: the 1G-GEU sounds really sporty…when modified the right way… But it will never sound as good as the V8 of any 308! ;)
The same salaryman features in the second commercial in this clip:
But then he promotes the Mark II Grande Limited. The seats of that Grande Limited look like one of those very comfortable couches from the 60s my grandma used to own. Mmmmm, soft! ;)
According to the poster of this original 80s footage it should contain a Carina A6.
So, let’s spot the Carina!
It could be at 0:19 or at 0:44 or at 1:03, but IMO all three cars are the same Mark II GX61 Hardtop coupe. Taillights are definitely not Carina and match more or less this Mark II:
I must say that they look quite the same so I understand the mix up.
Video is a bit boring nowadays while back then it was supreme action. Maybe we’re getting used to all that D1 action from Jaan. Nice stock AE86 and Skyline RS-Turbo R30 though!