MotorTrend December 2022

May 1964: “There’s no doubt in our minds that this latest personal sporty car from Ford will sell like proverbial hotcakes.” Those were the first words of our first review of the first Ford Mustang, which we called “a fancy filly for fun-loving folks.” (Forgive us; it was the ’60s.) Our afflictive affection for agonizing alliteration aside, we guessed right. Ford hoped to move 100,000 Mustangs in the first year of sales; customers bought four times as many. Within two years, Ford sold a million. The Mustang became a genuine American icon—and we say this with acute awareness the word “icon” is grossly overused in this business—a status it has maintained, for better or worse, for some six decades. Did we know we were witnessing the birth of a legend? Perhaps not.…

Dodge’s electric future is mean, menacing, loud, and … practical? Proof: the Charger Daytona SRT concept that teases the production electric muscle car coming in 2024 and the 2023 Hornet compact SUV that brings a long-overdue entry into the U.S. market’s most popular segment. First, the Charger Daytona SRT. It’s powered by batteries and electric motors but delivers a rumble very similar to—and as loud as—the roar of a Hemi Hellcat V-8. This is Dodge’s vision of its alternative to its present generation of gas-powered muscle cars, which will cease production in December 2023. However, we believe the next generation of those cars will also offer internal combustion engines. The Charger Daytona SRT concept is designed to appease loyal customers opposed to EVs; that’s why it has a multispeed transmission and an…

Since Enzo’s day, Ferrari has pretty much built the cars it wanted to build. The Purosangue, the first four-door four-seater from Maranello, is a Ferrari that Ferrari’s customers wanted it to build. This is not, Ferrari insists, an SUV. It is first and foremost a Ferrari, the company says, and Maranello only builds sports cars. That means cars with impressive performance and dynamics that put a smile on your face. This one just looks a little different from the rest, then, and it makes a case for being a different kind of sports car. We won’t drive it until later this year, but the Purosangue should have engineers at Aston Martin, Lamborghini, and Bentley worried. The Purosangue has the perfect engine for a continent-crushing four-seater. Under the hood is yet another reworked…

We’ve waited for Horatio Pagani’s follow-up to the incredible Huayra (code-named C9) and Zonda (C8) supercars for some time. Back in 2019, Pagani dropped some tantalizing hints about the next big thing, the C10. He promised it would pack a V-12 and even a proper manual transmission. The man and his company haven’t disappointed: The C10 is now known officially as the Utopia, and it looks like nothing else on the road. Not only that, but it also indeed packs the manual we were promised, in addition to an available automated gearbox and a twin-turbo 12-cylinder engine. The engine is again built by AMG and is similar to the M158 found in the Roadster BC. But, of course, there’s more power; the Utopia churns out 852 hp and 811 lb-ft of…

Not too long ago, automakers believed hybrid buyers all wanted the same boring, amorphous blob of a hatchback. So they built expensive little cars with underpowered engines and motors, slapped badges like “Prime,” “REX,” or “EREV” on their rumps, and sat around wondering why they were nailed to the same dealer lots SUVs continued to fly off of. And then someone had the bright idea to slap those badges onto SUVs. And wouldn’t you know it—they’re flying off dealer lots. We recently had a chance to spend some time in the new Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland 4xe plug-in hybrid, and it turns out one of the latest plug-in hybrid SUVs to hit the streets is also among the most impressive. The Grand Cherokee gets the same setup as the Wrangler 4xe:…

Genesis will introduce its last new internal combustion engine by 2025, and the brand expects to sell only EVs by 2030. The GV60 is Genesis’ first dedicated electric vehicle, and it directly previews that all-EV future. There are plenty of challenges when producing a first, but it seems like the GV60 was a walk in the park for Genesis. Despite its quirky styling, the compact SUV is roomy, supports charging speeds well exceeding the average, and—perhaps most important—is fun to drive. For an SUV that has Performance in its name, you’d expect it to deliver exactly that. The GV60 Performance does. With two electric motors (one in the front, the other in the rear) combining for 429 hp and 516 lb-ft of torque, the GV60 is the most powerful Genesis today, and…