I bought the DS Pope set because I wanted those two cars and the prices were so good. But I took it back, even though I loved the sculpted eyelids and detailed mouth on the Pope. I don't care about scale, but the problem is that at the larger size they don't compare well to Mattel's because they have less detail, not more like you'd expect, with a few exceptions. The cars feel thinner, and the pupils are just a single figure-8 decal with edges that are easy to see within the white windshields. Their decorative decals flake…I couldn't find a single Pope set with the vertical stripe reaching all the way up to the point of the Pope's hat, and I often see pupils that are half missing.

Both Mattel and the DS have poor QC from a collector's POV, but at least there are always dozens of Mattel ones to choose from. Fortunately, my DS is lousy with Crabbys…I had to go through more than a dozen before settling on one that had the eyes in the same position in both sculpted "sockets" and all the decals everywhere intact. I'm a nut about eyes…I agree that the soul of the character is there, and they're the focal point of toys that you intend to display.

That said, among my favorite Cars toys are the Disney Store's big Frank, their monster trucks, and the new Tony. I think the Tony combat ship is as beautiful as any large-scale ship model I've seen, and I have it up on its own shelf. The USS Independence is an amazing design, and now I have one with personality (including awesome teeth!). They smartly left off the part under the mouth that submerges (the "chin"), which Mattel left on, and it makes him really powerful. Of course I had to go through several to find clean eyes and a vertical, unbent mast, but it was well worth it!

Both lines have their positives and negatives, but I'm just not getting excited anymore about the Disney Store's new sets of diecast cars.