Ford, in the middle of a cut-throat war with Chrysler over who had the baddest machine on the planet, could not have been happy to see the sales success of the Plymouth Road Runner when it debuted in 1968. Ford still sold more Torinos, but a Hemi Road Runner could take pretty much any of them and send them packing back to Dearborn with a Hemi under the hood. In 1969, Ford shot back with the Torino Cobra and Torino GT models. Packing 428ci mills under the hood, this move was to ensure that Mopar guys with egos bigger than their skill capacity would learn a solid lesson from a sedate-looking mid-size Ford.
But check out the ad! A legitimately pissed-off cobra striking out on the hood of a car was simply a hazard in 1969, and you hoped the cameraman wasn’t daft enough to get close enough to the hood for the snake to reach out and have a nibble. Going banzai-running up a curvy road at speed without the catch-all “Do not try this yourself, professional driver on a closed course” save-our-ass phrasing underneath the action from back in the day when you only told Little Timmy once not to do it and if he hurt himself afterwards, the only thing you told him was, “Bet you won’t do that again.” You couldn’t make a television ad like this without a lawyer reaching for his heart meds. Shame, isn’t it?
