Car Acrobatic Team



The Car Acrobatic Team (アクロバット族, Akurobatto-zoku, lit. "The Acrobat Clan") is a group of, as their name implies, automobile acrobats, as well as skilled racers. They are a recurring villainous organization in the original Speed Racer anime.

Organization traits
The Acrobatic Team is headed by Captain Terror, and their only other truly notable member is the cocky Snake Oiler. Though they seem outwardly innocent, they have darker sides; in addition to being extremely rude and thinking highly of themselves and vengeance, they secretly seem to be some sort of cult, holding strange rituals in the night and believing they can harness the powers of the forces of nature.

The Car Acrobatic Team first appears in the Speed Racer story arc "The Most Dangerous Race" (consisting of The Most Dangerous Race (Part 1), The Most Dangerous Race (Part 2), and The Most Dangerous Race (Part 3)). Here, they send seven elite racers (among which is Snake Oiler) to compete in the Great Alpine Race, and all are assumed dead due to poor handling of the lethal layout of the race's course, and not appearing later. Though it never actually says for sure, it is most likely that Snake Oiler died after his car exploded due to an oil leak.If so, then his dying words were, "We'll get revenge." After this, the team becomes ravenous for revenge of their defeat at Speed Racer's hands and appear in handfuls of other episodes as villains. Snake appears once in the episode "The Trick Race", while Captain Terror addresses them, revealing his plans for revenge against Speed. However, this was most likely a flashback in the Japanese version of Mach GoGoGo.

In the 2008 Speed Racer film, the Car Acrobatic Team is nowhere to be seen. Hydr-A-Cell, Snake Oiler's sponsoring group in the movie, may be their replacement.

Their members include:


 * Brawn
 * Captain Terror (leader)
 * Cobra
 * Ender
 * Knuckles
 * Poison
 * Snake Oiler
 * Tiger
 * Ugly
 * Stan (The Next Generation only)
 * Other Generic Members

The Generic Members are much like the evil men hired by Ace Deucey, who are out to get Speed’s windshield in episode 1, Tongue Blaggard, and Cruncher Block. There are extra generic members with similar cars and motorcycles, they all are less important than the other members and can make up background fodder when needed to, the generic members also appear in the Super Nintendo title, Speed Racer, My most dangerous adventures. There is also a theory suggesting that the generic background members of this team are the same as Ace Deucey‘s men from episode 1, because their cars bare the same shape and features, just an alternate color palette, and the member’s personality traits are almost the exact same.

Speed Racer: The Next Generation
The organization does not appear in the series. However, Zile Zazic is revealed to be Captain Terror, as he wears the outfit when racing during the "Comet Run" arc. It would also appear that Zile's dimwitted assistant, Stan Gibbon, was also a part of the team (revealed in a flashback in "Plot for Teacher").

Behind the Scenes

 * In the Japanese version, their members are named after animals (whose initial letters are present on their pilot suits, except for Wolf, who has the letter "U"), such as Brawn (Bear), Cobra, Ender (Elephant), Knuckles (Jaguar), Poison (Puma) Snake Oiler (Snake) and Ugly (Wolf).