Saturday morning cartoons once again meet the modeling bench in Round2’s resurrection of classic kits featuring Warner Brothers’ beloved Road Runner and his nemesis, Wile E. Coyote. Of the three newly re-released kits, this review focuses on the hapless Wile E. Coyote and the Wile E. Willys – a loony dragster embodying a skateboard culture theme.

The MPC-branded kit consists of 4 sprues of colored parts (including 1 chrome-plated), a set of peel-and-stick decals, and a pre-painted vinyl Wile E. Coyote figure. Construction is touted as snap-together, but we found it necessary to apply either superglue or Tamiya liquid cement for virtually every step.

The 14-step assembly sequence is clearly outlined in the instructions, and took roughly an hour or so to complete. Round2 has made some effort to improve the old MPC tooling, but many parts still only snap together with the help of adult hands. The trickiest part of assembly was installing the exhaust manifolds to the engine block – we ended up needing 3 hands and some Tamiya cement.

Despite the finicky snap features and some challenging fit and handling, the kit does build-up into a cool little hot rod accompanied by the Road Runner’s ill-fated protagonist and his skateboard – sans an Acme Rocket Pack.

We really enjoyed this father-son project, and recommend the kit for any parent or adult (with some modeling skill or mechanical aptitude) looking for a fun modeling project to do with a little one in their sphere of influence.

Many thanks to the crew at Round2 for the sample kit and the opportunity for another fun build with my son!