If everything goes right, pony cars are about to get really interesting. Ford is reportedly working on something new and Chevrolet is reportedly bringing back the Camaro. However, The next generation of mainstream American performance cars is going to look much different than the recent era of Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Camaro and Dodge Challenger that many of us are fond of, and all signs point to Dodge being right 20 years ago. Even if some of the discourse at the time was offended by the then-new LX-body Charger’s form factor.
That’s right! After being told the sedan was dead and the muscle car was dead, the industry shrugged its shoulders and asked the important question: porque no los dos?
Meanwhile, the venerable Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana gain something significant for 2027, Gordon Murray is set to reveal another hypercar, and the Land Rover you probably forgot about it set to end production this year. Welcome back to The Morning Dump, where we slice and dice the car news of the morning into tasting-sized portions. Matt is at Monterey Car Week this week along with most of the crew, which means I’m holding it down on desk duty. Let’s get cracking.
The Mustang Sedan Is Reportedly Real
Last year, Ford filed a trademark application for the model name “Mach 4,” which sent the internet into a frenzy of rumors. Could we finally be getting a Mustang sedan, or perhaps even an all-wheel-drive model? It turns out that the former is far more probable, as Automotive News reports that a full-scale prototype example was recently shown to dealers.
Ford also brought an early prototype of a four-door Mustang onto the stage, giving dealers the clearest view yet of a product first revealed at a 2024 meeting and reported by Automotive News. Multiple people who saw the prototype likened its size and design to a Porsche Panamera.
The people asked not to be identified because the meeting was not open to the public.
Executives promised that the four-door Mustang would have a price tag of less than $40,000, a 0-to-60 mph time of under 4 seconds and more rear-seat space than the Panamera, according to two of the people. Ford did not discuss a name at the meeting but previously has identified it to dealers as the Mach-4.
If the purported Mustang sedan is indeed the size of a Panamera, it’s going to be huge. Porsche’s large sedan measures 198.9 inches stem-to-stern in standard-wheelbase trim and 204.8 inches long in long-wheelbase Executive form. The former figure’s more than 10 inches longer than a Mustang coupe and the latter’s merely 1.8 inches shorter than the new Dodge Charger. That ballpark would make sense given the limited rear seat space in the current Mustang coupe, but it’s still quite the departure for one of America’s most iconic nameplates and it might not be alone.
A few days prior, GM Authority dropped a new report on the forthcoming seventh-generation Camaro. If it pans out, GM’s pony car could also adopt additional doors.
One of the most obvious changes for the new Camaro will be the body style, with GM Authority sources indicating the new Camaro will boast four doors, rather than a traditional two-door layout. The four-door model would reportedly feature dimensions comparable to the Chevy Malibu or Chevy SS.
So what’s with the shift? Well, unlike in the ’80s, coupes just don’t work for most people anymore. As soon as you have kids, you have rear seat access and car seat fitment and all that to worry about. Not to mention stroller and diaper bag storage. Once those kids get a little bit older, they’ll go to school and make friends which means a middle seat in the rear—a rarity in modern coupes—becomes an enormous convenience. As your kids grow up, they might get too tall for the tight rear headroom of many modern coupes, and by the time they’re through college, your knees might just say no to daily-driving a low-slung two-door.
For the most part, this relegates modern coupes to second-car status, sometimes even third-car status. And that’s hard to justify. When the median house price in America is $410,700 and the average new car carries a transaction price of around $49,000, the prospect of another new car payment is often just too much for the personal spreadsheet. However, add a pair of rear doors and suddenly, you have a far more justifiable daily driver. One that you can easily do the school run, the airport run, or the lunch run in.
Dodge figured this out two decades ago with the reborn Charger. Purists were up in arms about it having four doors, but guess what? It sold, and sold well throughout that generation’s entire production run. In 2019, the Dodge Charger outsold the Ford Mustang and more than doubled the sales figures of the Camaro. And that’s with the two-door Challenger alongside it. Understandably, Dodge still offers a four-door version of the new Charger, and while sales of the LB-generation car hasn’t exactly picked up where the old model left off due to a controversial EV-first launch and premium pricing, the four-door option opens that model up to those who simply couldn’t make a coupe work.
A Touch Of Modernity
It’s an unusually exciting time for the Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana vans. GM’s oldest vehicles are getting their first big standard equipment addition in years. The previously-fitted old-school head unit with no built-in Bluetooth is going in the bin in favor of a modestly-sized touchscreen infotainment system. As first reported by GM Authority:
The updated system, identified by RPO code IOR, will feature a seven-inch HD color touchscreen in the Express, along with Bluetooth phone connectivity and Bluetooth audio streaming. The upgrade will apply across the Express lineup, including Cargo, Passenger, and Cutaway models.
This is essentially the same infotainment system as in a base Chevrolet Trax, although its feature set in the Express and Savana hasn’t been confirmed yet beyond bluetooth audio streaming. It might still have Apple CarPlay and Android Auto stripped out of it, but at least GM van drivers should now be able to wirelessly listen to their favorite podcasts on the go without the need for a phone dongle to split charging and AUX duties. While photos of the new unit in the Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana haven’t been released yet, don’t expect a whole new dashboard. It should still be fairly simple in there, as you’d expect for vehicles with their roots in the ’90s.
A New Gordon Murray Car Is Coming
It’s just about the eve of Monterey Car Week, and Gordon Murray Special Vehicles is looking to make a splash. It just released this teaser photo of a new hypercar that seems to sport a roof scoop and NACA ducts and a delightfully flat deck. Is there a whiff of S1 LM to the silhouette? Certainly, but it’s not that few-off limited-run special that broke the internet last Car Week.
So what could we be looking at here? It’s safe to assume it runs a Cosworth V12 and features a carbon fiber tub, although beyond that it’s anyone’s guess. Just figure it’s going to be rare, it’s going to be expensive, and with several members of The Autopian on the ground for Car Week, we’ll be there with photos of it in the sunshine.
Wait, They Still Make That?
Quick, can you name every model in the current Land Rover lineup? There’s obviously the Range Rover and the Range Rover Sport, along with the Defender. The Range Rover Evoque and Velar are still with us, as is the Land Rover Discovery, but one of the marque’s seven distinct lines is coming to a close in its current form. The entry-level Discovery Sport is set to roll off into the sunset. As Autocar reports:
A JLR spokesperson told Autocar: “Discovery Sport production will end in December 2026, in line with normal product lifecycles. As part of this transition there will be a managed sunset of manufacturing ahead of this date for certain markets.”
The compact, unibody Discovery Sport is a car that I legitimately forgot Land Rover still made. Not because it had been memory-holed for any particular reason, but because it’s both the slowest-selling car in the range and it’s very difficult to tell the difference between a 2025 model and a 2020 model. It’s the Ann Veal of the Land Rover lineup [Ed note: her?], present but not massively memorable. Believe it or not, the model’s discontinuation was actually announced two weeks ago, only to be met with the equivalent of a shrug. Truly, you heard it here third, but someone could tell you again in another two weeks and you’d probably have completely forgotten the news. Either way, it’s the natural end of the Discovery Sport’s model cycle, so it doesn’t make sense to update it to meet GSR2 requirements. If you want an entry-level Landie, there’s always the Evoque.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
Last weekend was a bit hectic. Several big car shows, places to go, people to see, but I kicked it all off with a bucket-list concert: Broken Social Scene, Metric, and Stars. Hearing “Anthems For A Seventeen Year Old Girl” live is simply sensational, especially on a warm night as the sun sets on the city skyline. Sing it with me now, “Park that car, drop that phone…”
The Big Question:
All these rumored four-door pony cars beg a question: What’s the least-practical car you would actually daily drive?
Top graphic image: Dodge
Welp, score another one for marketing departments and brand dilution. Ford really started the modern trend of diluting the sports car brand with the Mach-E, and then Stellantis followed suite with the 2 and 4-door cars having the same name. Chevy may as well join the party.
In my considered opinion, Ford would have been better off keeping the Mustang branding off the Mach-E and just calling it the Mach-E. Stellantis should have branded the EV coupe something like “Barracuda” or something that wasn’t “Charger”, even though that makes the most sense, because electric. Chevy has tons of non-Camaro names it could use for a performance sedan – Malibu, Chevelle, whatever.
Impala also comes to mind.
Nova? Chevy III? Bel-air? Lots of meat on that historical bone. Same with Ford and Stellantis.
The stellantis thing didn’t really bother me in the same way the mustang and Camero do. They used the timeline to their advantage. With how Charger was a two door then a 4 door what most people saw as 30 years later for close to 20 years. So adding back a 2 door version just felt like connecting them back together. If they had launched the Challenger as the charger 2 door when they brought it out no one would have batted an eye. Bringing out a 4 door under that nameplate after a long time first was key and smart. And most people didn’t remember the dogshit cars from the 80s that are called chargers they just glazed over that. Still was 20 years probably enough time to reset the name.
Ford is another story the Mach e should have never happened. Too many other good names to call it it’s not a mustang. And a name that has only meant one thing and been in constant production for 55 years when they announced it.
GMs crimes aren’t as bad as Ford’s but still too many names why errode a brand you bring cancel and bring back every other decade. It’s never been a 4 door nor should it be. I could see GM trying to do a rush job to do what the charger did. Their issue is too much history and people remember all the Cameros.
I don’t understand how ford can sit there and think Porsche panamera then mustang 4 door. Don’t they wonder why didn’t they call it the 911 or 991 but a completely different name plate. Or they it’s just a new brand under ford like Lincoln has become.
TBQ – If someone made a plug-in hybrid Sprinter-scale van camper, I would daily that thing.
Hey Autopians! We need a name for this category-sized vehicle. It isn’t a van, it isn’t a truck, and it isn’t a delivery van either. I just use Sprinter-scale as everyone knows what I mean, but that is a bit specific-model centric, and we would prefer a non-Mercedes.
Isn’t that a VW Westfalia?
I owned an ’80 VW Westi for about 14 years, and no, a Sprinter-scale is much larger. We’ve been shopping for a larger camper based on a Ford or other large van (for which we don’t have a common term for)!
I work from home, but I am mostly dailying a C4. Seems fine. Not having kids was one of the best decisions I think I have made.
Yes, same! Though sometimes I wish I had kids so I could justify owning a minivan.
Cars aren’t rational. If you want a minivan, get a minivan. You don’t have to justify that choice to anybody.
I do have to rationally justify it to my bank account, sadly. But otherwise, yeah, get the car that makes you happy!
You want a reason? Mobile man cave!
Hear me out. Get a full size van. They’re rad.
I tend to daily a manual 392 challenger and never really had much issue with fitting kids in it, or really anything. I do have other cars and the thing is terrible in the snow, so the other stuff comes out to play when the roads get slippery. I would have really liked an AWD 392 manual trans Challenger or even a more door charger, even though those did not float my boat from a styling POV.
Super Seven. I have always wanted one, and I would daily that around town when not on my motorbike
I have a clone, and mine has no windshield. That gets tiring after while.
I want one while I’m young enough to handle the nonsense.
What kind of clone?
An SCCA racer built it (and used to race it) in Tennessee. Tube frame with a lot of Miata (brakes, suspension) Nissan (SR20DET, transmission out of a harbody), and Mazda (RX-7 diff). He worked it through the TN DMV and got it titled as a 1968 Lotus 7, so all I had to do was take the title in to my VA DMV.
tbq: I’m honestly not sure what the least-practical car that I could daily-drive is.
I’m currently daily-ing a ’95 Miata. I suppose I could go less-practical by reducing fuel economy to buy some more power, but I don’t want to significantly reduce reliability to do it. What fits in that space? Additional constraints are that I dislike front-wheel-drive and V6 engines, and an automatic transmission would be much too practical. Oh, and I don’t fit in the Honda S2000, which is the smallest of steps in the less-practical direction.
Maybe an aftermarket-turbocharged Miata.
If you change it from “car” to “vehicle”, I daily a Honda Magna 750. I could theoretically take another person, but I never have.
TBQ: I don’t have kids so I would argue my least practical daily was a gmt400 Suburban, down to 11mpg in the winter and until I added heated seats the engine wouldn’t make it all the way up to operating temperature for most of my drive so it was also FREEZING. My best daily was a 1996 BMW 318ti, excellent car. Enough space for 4 in a real pinch, I also squeezed a 50in Plasma TV in the hatch, also noteworthy was my Fiesta ST, but the BMW was more comfortable on St. Paul’s roads.
I would daily a modern muscle car, but I don’t want to suffer the depreciation…. I am happy to see more sedans coming on to the market, sedans are the gateway drug to wagons.
They’ve already made a four door Mustang with the Mach-E… so I’m not sure why I would be upset about the nomenclature at this point. It’s just a branding exercise hoping that people will extend their positive feelings for the Mustang brand to a new vehicle. If it’s a good car, it’ll sell. All Audi’s look the same, and have similar naming conventions, so having shared styling cues and a ‘Mustang’ name has some precedent in the market. I can see where there would be some concern over a saturation of the nameplate… if everything is a Mustang, then nothing is a Mustang anymore. Similar to how I don’t care about any Audi product because they all look the same.
Yeah, brand is already diluted, so… meh.
I feel like getting upset over a four-door Mustang is ridiculous. The Mustang name evoques thoughts of V8 RWD fun, and also good handling to a certain degree for more modern ones. Adding two doors in no way diminishes what the Mustang is all about, it just enables people to buy one who couldn’t have justified it otherwise.
Hating four-doors for not being “youthful, stylish” coupes and treating their existance like a threat to a perceived image you’ve made a personality out of is a really annoying boomerism which I’d love to see die. I’ve always admired Australian car culture for embracing four-door muscle cars and acknowledging that they just allow more friends/family to go with you, they got it right, and it’s about time we did the same.
Viva la Mach 4.
Personally, I’d rather see Ford bring back the Crown Vic… but give it all the Mustang go-fast bits.
When that sells as well as the Charger, then they can introduce the long-roof variant.
Would.
A car with one seat (for me, the driver).
Toddler and wife making major messes in the new truck gets tired quick.
I sort of dailied my C5 back when my parking situation only allowed for one car to be home at a time. I even loaded my mountain bike in it once.
It’s been a while since I daily drove at all but when I did the last car was the same I have now: Porsche Boxster, which I would guess is not very practical for most here.
I personally don’t have much of a problem with bringing a sedan Mustang or Camaro to market but like many here I also would prefer they lean into the heritage bin a bit deeper and name these with something more appropriate. The Falcon for Ford seems like an easy choice and maybe the SS for Chevy. They could also go Impala but that one has had more recent negatives they may wish to avoid.
The one thing I fear in all this is that it will eventually kill the coupe. I don’t mind the addition of the sedan or 4 door coupe (if they must) but I’d still like the option of a coupe. But there doesn’t appear to be much appetite for lower volume vehicles and choice seems to erode everyday (remember the number of body styles we used to get?).
It’s also strange that sedans are also not too popular at the moment, although I guess there are a few making small gains in the market. It seems an odd time to be talking about sedans though. I don’t mind it, let’s just leave the coupes alone please.
TBQ: As a single man of a certain age with no demon spawn, Miata without a doubt.
Or maybe that beat-up X-90 from today’s SBSD.
I would challenge you to try a regular cab short bed 2wd pickup and see if that would not be worse?
Probably something like a GTI. Which is in general a practical car so no surprises there. If coupes of decent size still existed I wouldn’t mind the kids crawling back there, but the BRZ/86 is a wee bit small for a family of 4. Kids don’t get smaller after all.
And while I could do this, we just took the van on vacation and honestly, it’s a damn joy on a trip like that. But would a prefer to daily a hot hatch over it? Yeah.
Can confirm; GTI can family of 4 and even a small dog in a pinch decently well. When it makes fun sounds, it contrasts very well with the larger, anonymous family-mobile and is a nice change of pace.
I will not complain about the return of the American sports sedan. I think Ford and Chevy can very easily have the edge if their variants do not share a platform with full size jeep vehicles.
TBQ: My former 2 door mini, served me well as a single man for 6 years. Very rarely needed more room.
Least practical daily for me would probably be the car I’ve already got as my daily: Veloster N. Has been the school run car the past few years, brought both kids home from the hospital. Just did a short family vacation a week ago with it.
But it’s also the absolute limit on being able to do those things. 1 inch smaller in the hatch or rear seat room and suddenly it’d quit working. 1 fewer passenger doors and it’d quit working. Have to seek out the smallest kid seats/baby carriers. Had to strategically time when our oldest went forward facing to being the same time the youngest moved out of the baby carrier
I’ll daily my 986 until I have kids, and even then I’ll probably still commute in it until they start going to school since my wife has good rear seats in her car and doesn’t commute so it’s usually available for any child- or dog-related outings
TBQ : I daily an FR-S and an electric motorcycle. When the weather is good enough, I daily a 2003 KHS Flite500 road bike.
Practicality is not really a central focus now that the kids are all nearly grown.
If you change your mind I have found long wheelbase, pre 2000 mountain and touring bikes quite practical when loaded with racks and panniers. Cheap too.
The most impractical car I’d daily would probably be an Aptera. Winter driving on unplowed roads could be a little dicey with the tadpole layout but that’s what snow tires are for. If it could fit my skis or a few RC planes into the back seat then it would cover most of my driving. It would need charging at night but even a little contribution from the solar would help.
I would happily daily a Miata again if 3/5 days I wasn’t on Kiddo pick up duty. I try to drive my NA as much as possible. Unfortunately, it would be a bit frowned upon to put two kiddos into a Miata plus myself. My family thinks I am crazy for going from a “small” Civic to a smaller GR Corolla. Neither are actually small; they both have plenty of space for booster seats. I never quite understood why most parents think they need the big giant car, but I also grew up in tiny econoboxes. Even the minivan my parents had for some of my childhood was the small one. They had a ’94 Festiva, ’01 Focus, ’03 Elantra, ’06 Mazda5, ’06 Saturn Ion Redline, ’08 Honda Fit. They didn’t get a “big car” until I had already moved out for college. The Mazda5 was replaced with a Mazda6, which has since been replaced with a Mazda CX30, and the Fit was replaced with a ’15 Miata and ’03 Corolla
Excellent point about “small” cars not being that small in reality these days. Back when I had my 2012 Cruze I parked next to an early 2000’s Accord. They were very similarly sized. Cars have gotten larger.
Yup, my Type R is 10″ shorter in length than a 2002 Accord, but it has the exact same wheelbase and is 3″ wider.
I’m a lot older than you, when I was young our “Family Car” was a 1982 Datsun B210 hatchback for a family of 5. Before that, and the blending of two families Mom had a Granda, neither of these would have reliably worked if there had been any sense of safety in the 70s/early 80s. Car seats, booster seats etc never would have worked in either having to share the rear row with my older brother who is 10 years older than me.
As for me, I sold my Scion tC after about six month of parenthood. Had I not waited until my late 30s it probably would have been easier to manage, but getting the infant carrier in and out of the back seat got old REAL quick, definitely could not have managed two of those rear facing seats when our second baby came, I would not have been able to drive.
I keep getting the feeling that Ford is treating Mustang like a sub-brand. We know they’re Fords, but first impression is the galloping horse. The “Mach 4” name is a little corny, but I can’t think of a more appropriate Mustang related name that fits a larger but probably quick sedan.
Ford definitely is treating it as a sub brand. There are no Ford Badges on a Mustang, only the Horse and/or Trim level. Chevrolet did the same thing with Corvette.
Same deal with the Bronco (though they are allowed some Ford badges). Two completely different vehicles with vaguely similar styling and very similar names. But I think Ford is failing to grasp that giving the same name to multiple vehicles gets confusing in a hurry. If people like my dad (not a car nerd, but likes cars and follows the news) struggle to wrap their head around this, just imagine how lost your typical schmoe will be.
Mustang fans lost their minds when Ford put out the Mach-e as a Mustang. I wonder if they will have the same reaction to the Mach-4?
As long as it’s offered with a V8, I don’t think many of them will care.
There is definitely a vocal subset of Mustang purists who hate the idea of it being a sedan for whatever reason, who are already complaining.
I’m fed up with sedan hate in general honestly, there’s no reason they can’t be just as sporty and fun while having good proportions and styling, and making additional body styles of a sports car just means more people can fit a fun car into their lifestyle. Yet, people are out here declaring that those people should not own Mustangs because somehow the mere existence of a sedan version would render their coupes pitifully uncool by destroying their legacy, never mind that it would still look, sound, and drive like a Mustang, just with extra doors…
Big fast sedans are automotive perfection.
I would DD a single cab short bed pickup in a heartbeat. It wouldn’t be practical to me in the sense I live in a small city, street park, work in an office, and have only actually needed a truck bed twice in the last five or six years. But I have DD’d two in the past (a 2007 Colorado and 2017 Silverado) and they were easily my most fun vehicles. Couldn’t tell you why other than they just felt great.
I’ve owned a Chevy Monza, a Plymouth Duster, an Olds Omega, a Pontiac Grand Prix, a Monte Carlo, an El Camino, an S-10 Blazer, a K5 Blazer, four pickup trucks, and even a Geo Metro. Plus I got to drive a Plymouth ‘Cuda with a 383 and the pistol-grip 4-speed and I’ve ridden in many Camaros and Firebirds. All of them were 2-doors. For the most part, all of them were fun to drive.
I also own or have owned an Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight, a Plymouth Custom Suburban wagon, a G10 van, a Chevy Tracker, a GMC Envoy and a Chevy Trax. All of them were 4-doors. For the most part, they weren’t all that fun to drive.
I’m guessing the newer 4-door ‘Muscle cars’ might be fun to drive, but I would have zero desire to own a high-performance 4-door vehicle. I just don’t see the point. My next vehicle purchase will most likely be a Slate.
TBQ: Probably my 5th-gen El Camino.
TBQ: Probably a BRZ or GR86. It has a decent trunk and a pass through for storage. I could easily make it work for 99% of my life