NHTSA Opens Investigation Into Cruze & Wrangler Fires

I’ve been busy, and it’s a few days late, but here is what will probably be the penultimate edition of “Cheers and Jeers.”  Next year will be the 25th edition, and that seems to be the right time to put this to rest or for someone else to carry on with it.  Cheers! For the first time in the history of the United States, a convicted felon was sworn into office as President, and he wasted no time on his priorities of revenge, retribution, illegal immigration, dirty energy, and gutting DEI policies and subsidized healthcare, and generally making people sicker.  With tariffs used to punish perceived enemies and the longest federal government shutdown in history, chaos and economic uncertainty reigned.  The Department of Government Efficiency, led by Elon Musk, was a bust, with either miniscule savings or net cost increases.  Worldwide turmoil continued with wars in the Middle East between Israel and the Palestinians, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict continued. In the beginning of the year, the Palisades fire in the Los Angeles area destroyed nearly 7,000 structures, and resulted in 12 deaths and damage in the $100 billion range.  Towards the end of the year, the horrifying Wang Fuk Court fire in a Hong Kong apartment complex killed 161 people.  2025 will not be the warmest year on record, but the second or third warmest, as the El Niño conditions that contributed to the record heat in 2024 was not replicated for 2025. Prominent passings included actors Robert Redford, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Diane Keaton, and Gene Hackman, director Rob Reiner, and musicians Ozzy Osbourne, Roberta Flack, and Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys.  Other passings included conservative political activist Charlie Kirk, former Vice President Dick Cheney, Pope Francis, fashion designer Giorgio Armani, primatologist Jane Goodall, wrestler Hulk Hogan, and boxer and kitchen appliance spokesperson George Foreman. In automotive news, the $7,500 electric vehicle tax credit expired at the end of September, and fines for not meeting Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards were eliminated.  Against the EV headwinds, automakers made significant adjustments to their future product portfolios by substantially scaling back EVs and investing instead on hybrids and range extenders.  Tariffs resulted in some production being shifted to the U.S., and some prices were raised, but manufacturers for the most part absorbed the tariffs and will take major earnings hits.  Stellantis brought back the Hemi V8 to the RAM pickup, due to popular demand, after the Hurricane inline-six that had replaced it a couple of years ago did not catch on.  The Hemi will also be brought back to the Dodge Charger. With great fanfare, Tesla debuted robotaxi service with safety drivers in downtown Austin, Texas in June.  There were at least eight reported crashes over the next 6 months, even with the safety drivers.  Lucid is busy getting their midsize EV offerings ready to market, and Rivian likewise with the more affordable R2 model.  Toyota repositioned the Century model into an ultra luxury brand above Lexus to be sold in select Lexus dealerships. Jaguar fired their lead designer, Gerry McGovern, one year after their bold Type 00 concept reveal and heavily criticized rebranding effort.  In December, Mercedes-Benz announced that their Chief Design Officer, Gordon Wagener, is leaving the company the following month after 28 years with the company. In a rare instance of the Chinese government taking the lead on a vehicle safety issue, with some occupants unable to exit Teslas and Xiaomis on fire, backup mechanical mechanisms will be mandatory for electronic interior or exterior door handles in 2027 and 2028 in the Chinese market.  With globalization, that will likely lead to changes to EVs sold elsewhere. Vehicles canceled prior to the New Year include the Acura TLX and ZDX, Cadillac XT4 and XT6, Chevrolet Malibu, Ford Escape and related Lincoln Corsair, Infiniti QX50 and QX55, Kia Soul, Lexus RC, Nissan Versa, Porsche Boxster and Cayman, Subaru Legacy, and the Volvo S60 and S90.  The Ford F-150 Lightning made it to the 2026 model year but is already out of production for good as a fully electric pickup. There were several concept vehicles in 2025, but none was particularly notable. New vehicle introductions were sparse.  Against that backdrop, here’s the 24th annual edition of Cheers and Jeers for the best and worst things automotive in 2025: Cheers to BMW for the Best New EV with the iX3 for providing class-leading technology and a reset to BMW styling.  The “Neue Klasse” design dials back a lot of the excessive surface excitement of recent years. Honorable mention to GM for bringing back the Chevrolet Bolt with more modern technology, faster charging, and an affordable price in a familiar package.  The vehicle will be a limited edition offering, but it was also revealed that there will be a family of Bolts, without further elaboration. Jeers to the Tesla Board for Worst Corporate Governance for failing to rein in Elon Musk, who seems to be doing a good job of making people not want to buy Teslas, and for providing an absurdly excessive pay package.  Tesla is losing the carbon credits paid for by other manufacturers, who have previously provided billions of dollars of revenue, and future profitability is uncertain.  With an aging lineup and the spectacularly unsuccessful Cybertruck, Tesla is betting it all on autonomy. Jeers to Mercedes-Benz for the Worst Luxury Vehicle Interiors with their focus on massive screens rather than cohesive style, material quality, or build quality.  Mercedes-Benz has become a shadow of its former self when they used to be “Engineered like no other car in the world.” Cheers to Kia for Best Non-SUV Introduction with the K4 hatchback, which makes the compact K4 much more attractive and functional than the awkwardly styled sedan.  Kia is on a roll with record-breaking sales the last three years. Honorable mention goes to Honda for the Prelude in the near-dead sports coupe market.  The new Prelude has not been embraced by performance enthusiasts, but the Prelude was never about all-out performance.  The Prelude is being marketed to middle aged to older buyers wanting to relive the glory of their youth.  Jeers to the Honda dealers who have been tacking on $15k market adjustments. Cheers to Cadillac for the Best Luxury EV Lineup with the Optiq, Lyriq, Vistiq, and Escalade IQ.  Cadillac has been successful reinventing itself.  The lineup is far from perfect, with charging speeds that are not class-leading and excessive heft, but the vehicles are proof that a legacy automaker can be successful in the EV realm, at least until Chinese EVs are unleashed on American soil. Cheers and Jeers for the Best and Worst Rebadge Job with the Nissan Rogue Plug-In Hybrid.  Mitsubishi has only about 300 dealerships in the U.S, compared to Nissan with about three and a half times as many.  The Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV is a decent 7-passenger SUV with about 7,000 sales in the U.S. every year.  Nissan is broke and desperate for fresh product to fill gaps in its lineup.  The Outlander is based on the Nissan Rogue, but Nissan chose to take the cost-effective move of making only minor trim changes to the Outlander PHEV to turn it into a Nissan.  It will serve its purpose. Jeers to the Federal Government for the Most Regressive Sustainability Move by attempting to pull back National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) funds and removing EV chargers from federal government facilities in their all-out quest to promote the consumption of petroleum.  As the rest of the world electrifies their fleets, the long-term competitiveness of the American automakers will be diminished. Wishing everyone a safe, healthy, and prosperous New Year.

I was just about to give up because the Discovery and Range Rover was nowhere NEAR close to that. The only thing that kept me going was you said you tried Ford.  FoMoCo still owned LandRover then I think.  Or I kinda knew that the lesser Land Rovers were still Ford platforms along with Volvo.  So I said to myself, because you sleuthed Fords, maybe just maybe I should just go with what the storyline says the vehicle is a Rover of some kind along with your intuition of it being a FoMoCo family vehicle and I stuck to it and it paid off.  If it wasnt Land Rover, I would have gone to Volvo next. 

Thank you!  At least it was the right brand. 

Easy peasy. I started with Range Rover and like you...negative. But then I went down the Land Rover family from the 2015s. I did Discovery and said yikes...not even close. But I pressed on.  I got to this: And then I said...woah...that is close...so I then decided to continue on sleuthing with Land Rover and went further down the years  at around the 2010 mark And then I got this and said: BINGO!!! https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/163-2010-land-rover-lr2-photo-gallery/photos LR2  from the 2010 era:

Hey guys, see if you can figure this one out. Cannonically this is supposed to be to be a Range Rover in the story. It’s clearly not a Range Rover.   I looked at Pathfinder, Armada, some Fords and can’t figure out what it is. Should be something circa 2015 or earlier. The hazard button is in an odd place right under the screen and it looks like it has a speaker above the screen. There’s also clearly a CD player.