Sure enough, automakers think that enough time has passed since Toyota unleashed its latest worldwide premiere – the 2024 Land Cruiser for North America, Asia, Australia, and Europe.
They think that now, just ahead of a significant car event like the Monterey Car Week and its many celebrations, is the ripe time to present their models on the red carpet of online premieres. Cadillac did it in New York with the first-ever all-electric Escalade IQ rocking Ultium technology up to 750 horsepower and a gargantuan $130k starting price for an impressive, estimated range of 450 miles (724 km).
Hyundai also took its 2024 Santa Fe to… where else but Santa Fe, New Mexico, for the official world premiere of the fifth generation. Radically styled compared to the previous iterations, the boxier Santa Fe returns to the three-row lifestyle and has two powertrains for America, a 2.5T GDI with 277 hp, and a hybridized 1.6T rocking almost 100 ponies less. Plus, they also presented the XRT Concept, a rugged take on the new Santa Fe, which shouldn't be confused with Mitsubishi's prototype that previewed the latest Triton (L200) pickup truck.
However, not everyone is ready for the abundance of Monterey Car Week premieres or these two major novelties. Some people are content with ruminating about the ins and outs of the 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser (known as Prado or 250 across certain regions). And that includes folks dwelling across the imaginative realm of digital car content creators. For example, this virtual artist, known as Theottle on social media, has resorted to CGI slicing and dicing the 2024 Land Cruiser on more than one occasion to make it a veritable digital series.
He first started the virtual trend with the new yet vintage Land Cruiser First Edition going back to its roots and turning into a digital, three-door convertible soft and hardtop SUV that could easily pick a fight with the corresponding versions of the Ford Bronco and Jeep Wrangler. Secondly, the stylish yet rugged Land Cruiser also morphed from a five-door off-road SUV to a four-door commercial pickup truck version that could render both Toyota's overseas Hilux and the acclaimed Tacoma obsolete if it ever happened.
Interestingly, this pixel master is not beyond size restrictions, and knowing that Toyota and Suzuki collaborate occasionally, he decided to see if a rebadged Suzuki Jimny dubbed 'Toyota Land Cruiser 25' would attract an audience. Well, given how the front fascia of the Land Cruiser First Edition looks excellent on both the three- and five-door Suzuki Jimny's body, it's not hard to imagine the model returning to North America by way of badge engineering. So, do we give it our CGI hall pass, or is this simple rebadge and front-end restyle a hard no?
Aurel has aimed high all his life (literally, at 16 he was flying gliders all by himself) so in 2006 he switched careers and got hired as a writer at his favorite magazine. Since then, his work has been published both by print and online outlets, most recently right here, on autoevolution. Full profile
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