By the end of the film, McQueen seems to understand his speed limits, and decides to keep racing by training Cruz Ramirez, whom he realized has what it takes to be a racer. He temporarily took a break from racing and he trained Cruz Ramirez for sometime.
No it isn't directly stated that he's retired but it is implied. Lightning McQueen is not accepting of the simulation training and finds the idea of becoming a coach better than the idea of continuing to race, so it's more of a career change rather than a retirement.
If you thought Lightning McQueen had raced his final race, think again – a Cars 4 are on the way. It's been six years since we last saw Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) in Cars 3 (2017), but according to the studio's creative director Jay Ward, we can expect to see him again in the future.
In the season finale at Los Angeles, Lightning starts falling behind Storm after both of them pitted. He tries to keep up, but in doing so, loses his grip and suffers a dangerous crash, leaving him horribly injured and ending his worst season on record prematurely, while Storm goes on to win the Piston Cup.
Set after the events of Cars 3 (2017), Cars on the Road follows Lightning (Wilson) and Mater (Cable Guy) as they embark on a road trip to attend the wedding of Mater's sister, while visiting various locations and characters along the way.
Why McQueen COULDN'T get an upgrade to defeat Jackson Storm? (Pixar Cars 3 Explained)
Is Cars 4 coming out in 2024?
While there have been talks about the possibility of a new Cars movie, including ideas of reinventing the series, nothing concrete has been announced, and a release date before 2028-2029 seems unlikely at this point.
Pretty much yeah. Pixar doesn't like acknowledging the majority of Cars 2 besides the World Grand Prix and I guess the dent being connected to Mater meant it was connected to the spy part of the movie (despite him getting it in Radiator Springs) and might've just took it out to ignore the film even more.
Cars 2 had been far from Pixar's best movie, which meant audiences were extremely skeptical about the next installment in the trilogy. This was undoubtedly the biggest factor working against Cars 3's box office success, as the previous movie had soured many audiences on the whole concept.
Lightning even started to slow down because of the Next-Gens arriving and ended the season horribly with a near career-ending crash. Months later, McQueen recovered from the crash and was ready to race again.
Lightning McQueen was a huge fan of his racing instructor Cruz Ramirez in Cars 3. McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) even resigned from the Rust-eze racing team allowing Ramirez (Cristela Alonzo) to take his place and zip to victory.
Doc died prior to the events of Cars 2 (his voice actor, Paul Newman, died in 2008), although he continued to be remembered and referenced by Lightning, Mater, and the other cars.
He temporarily took a break from racing and he trained Cruz Ramirez for sometime. After Cruz became good at racing, McQueen continued, but it is unknown when McQueen continued racing. He still races on the Piston Cup circuits today and is winning most of his races.
Although Storm is the fastest Piston Cup racer, he is not actually the fastest car in the franchise; the record is held by Francesco Bernoulli (Lightning's rival in Cars 2), with a top speed of 220 mph.
It leads to a terrible ending that just ruins the movie. Lightning is still declared a winner, along with Cruz, and decides to train her before going back to racing.
Cars 3. Due to his death, Doc doesn't appear physically in this movie but a huge portion of it focuses on McQueen remembering him. He is also mentioned and alluded to several times as well as appearing in a few flashbacks that McQueen has of Doc training him, which helps him focus on race.
The world premiere of the film took place at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood on June 18, 2011. Cars 2 was released in 4,115 theaters in the USA and Canada, setting a record-high for a G-rated film and for Pixar.
Mater returns in Cars 3 but in a smaller role compared to the first two films. In the first scene he is next to McQueen and tells everyone around to keep quiet so McQueen is ready for the race.
Anticipation for Cars 4 is high, but Disney has not addressed any details for the movie. Producers have shown openness to expanding the franchise, with potential for a new lightning McQueen narrative. Story details remain a mystery, focusing on potential Cruz Ramirez involvement and moving away from McQueen.
How on earth is this a DISNEY MOVIE? Generic and Hard to Follow Plot While Pixar has great simple plots that are unique in their own special way, Cars 2 has a boring and generic Spy plot that has a preachy message about being yourself. It is also confusing and boring most of the time.
An opposites-attract love story and parable about following your dreams, “Elemental” arrived to $29.6 million in domestic ticket sales in June — the worst opening in Pixar history, by a mile. Little by little, however, the $200 million film became a hit, collecting nearly $500 million worldwide.
It is unknown why Holley did not appear in Cars 3, but it is possible that the nature of her work meant that she was busy with her job around the time of the third film.
Even though Chick didn't appear in Cars 2, players can download him for Cars 2: The Video Game. It was also unknown why he didn't appear in the second film, as it never revealed what really happened with him following his pyrrhic victory in the first film.
In Cars 3, Sally continues to be the love-interest of Lightning McQueen, and attends his races to show support. She is present when Lightning crashes while trying to keep up with the nextgens, and gives Lightning the inspiration to continue racing after he is rebuilt.
