We visited Toyota’s 4.2m sq.ft. San Antonio Texas manufacturing plant to see how they build their rugged Tacoma and Tundra pickups. Over 7200 people from Toyota and its partners work in concert with robotics to complete a truck every 60 seconds. (Video by Jim Rough)

In 2003, a failing small town horse track in Japan made a desperate gamble: hype up Haru Urara, a horse with a record of 0-88. The country rallied around her story, “a message about the value of trying hard even when no one’s looking.” Ganbatte kudasai!

Mondo kicks off its celebration of Castlevania‘s 30th anniversary – damn, we’re old! – with a double-sided 10″ vinyl of the NES/Famicom original. The cover, sleeve and vinyl art was done by comic book artist Becky Cloonan (East Coast Rising, Batman).

(PG-13: Language) It’s official: David Cross is tougher than Redman. The actor and comedian found out that he had an iron tongue when he dropped by First We Feast’s show to talked about his latest comedy tour, Mr. Show sketches coming true and more.

Etsy shop Tasarim Takarim specializes in custom jewelry based on children’s drawings (or yours!). You can ask them to turn the doodles into pendants, bracelets, cufflinks, tabletop sculptures and more. The shop also accepts handwriting, handprints and footprints.

BattleBots recently featured a showdown between front-spinner bot Hypershock and orbital spinner Warrior Clan. The highlight of the match was the last minute addition of a garden rake which Hypershock used to swat Warrior Clan’s companion drone from the sky.

Designed by Matt Cavanaugh for Kontextür, these awesome vinyl models offer lots of points of articulation, and a fun and easy assembly process using plastic screws to attach their parts. The shark and diver each measure 14″ long when swimming.

We’re not exactly sure what we just watched, but this epic music video from Soda_Jerk and The Avalanches crams in countless references to pop culture icons from the ’60s through the ’90s, from Saturday Night Fever to Seinfeld, from The Warriors to Will Smith.

Musician Pete O’Connell shows off an unusual contraption, which automatically strums the strings on his guitar for him. While flaps on the spinning wheel hit the strings on his guitar, he can focus on fretting and adding a beat with his kick drum. Plus it doesn’t just work with a guitar.

Our pals at Everyday Carry present a collection of the most awesome gear they spotted in the past month, from bags to knives, from multi-tools to Bluetooth speakers, there’s something for everyone in this latest roundup. We particularly dig the Anso Matrix wallet.

From director and writer Park Chan-wook (Oldboy) comes an Asian adaptation of Sarah Waters’ novel Fingersmith. The Handmaiden is about a rich and sheltered Japanese girl and her Korean handmaiden, who’s secretly plotting to steal her employer’s inheritance.

Grant “The King of Random” Thompson came across some brilliantly sparkling fireworks and decided to see what would happen if he combined six of them into one giant ball of flame and sparks. The resulting explosion is quite spectacular – especially in slow-mo.

Made by Shinola for Filson, this 43mm watch features the iconic anti-forest fire mascot Smokey Bear. It also comes with a bandana, postcards based on Smokey Bear posters and a book about the mascot’s origin. Limited to 1000 units.

Sorry Nintendo, but this is how you make a miniature NES. Modder daftmike’s Raspberry Pi-based NES emulator not only has working buttons and ports, it also uses tiny cartridges as NFC tags to load games. It even has an equally tiny functional controller. Build log here.

LEGO master Sariel made this badass model of the Defender 90. It moves like a turtle even in fourth gear, but yeah, it has a fourth gear. It also has 4×4 drive, a working winch, locking differentials, and can be controlled from up to 160ft away thanks to the SBrick module.

(PG-13: Language) Our latest edition of People After Anesthesia is about an embarassed elder and a young woman with an impromptu fourth wall-breaking skit about balls. Shout out to all the bouncy balls in the world.

Now You See It made an abridged history of the movie-making capital. Hollywood started as a rebellious albeit greedy movement, then devolved into a monopoly of studios. The rise of the internet and affordable equipment could finally put an end to the blockbuster factory.

Researchers from ETH Zurich and Disney Research came up with a way to create highly detailed physical replicas of 3D models out of affordable materials. They thermoform the surface of the model to a gypsum mold cast from a 3D printed negative.

While Zack Snyder’s big screen version wasn’t exactly the recipient of fan or critical praise, Kaptain Kristian reminds us just how difficult it was to transform Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ classic comic, which took advantage of the medium in ways a film could never do.

Dortmund-based Tom Wilhelm makes ’70s-themed cruisers by hand. His trademark design is a deck carved from a single piece of wood with a bold color or pattern painted on its lower half. The decks are made of a variety of wood, including zebrawood, walnut and ash.

(PG-13: Language) There are few greater pains than stepping on a LEGO block without shoes on. So to voluntarily run barefoot on top of a seemingly endless flow of the pointy plastic bricks seems completely masochistic. Then again, this video is from the guys who did this.

Kurzgesagt’s happy little video looks at the science of Gamma Ray bursts, and how these extraordinarily powerful beams of energy that are capable of ripping apart the very atomic bonds that keep together everything in our universe, including all life on Earth.

Earth- and space-themed variants of the New Balance 580. The 580HT has a gray-green suede upper and reflective logo and heel tab. The 580DH has the slimmer Re-engineered upper in black with white specks. Drops 8/6/16 on Hypebeast.