Mater is Pixar’s rusty tow-truck character in the Cars franchise. He lives in Radiator Springs and becomes Lightning McQueen’s closest friend after helping the stranded racer understand the town.
Mater is characterized by his humor, loyalty, improvisation, and enormous confidence in his own stories. His friendship with Lightning is important because Mater treats him as a person rather than as a famous racing star. The character later receives a much larger role in Cars 2 and headlines the Disney+ series Cars on the Road.
Mater’s name is pronounced like “tomato” without the first syllable, a joke connected to the American expression “tow mater.” Fans sometimes confuse him with Guido, the small Italian forklift, or Luigi, the Fiat 500 tire-shop owner. Those characters are Radiator Springs residents, but neither is a tow truck.