If Chrysler Wants To Survive It Needs To Start Making A Sinister Chrysler Imperial Cruiser Like This One

It’s been said that cats have nine lives: the ability to avoid certain death numerous times to improbably see another day. Of course, eventually they’ll fall off of one roof too many, or not be able to play escape artist with some larger animal.

In the automotive world, it would seem that the Chrysler brand is the equivalent of the cat. Faltering by the mid-seventies, it was saved by Ricardo Montalban’s hawking of the Cordoba. Nearly out of business by the end of that decade, the mass of front-wheel-drive Lebarons and minivans saw Chrysler rise to profitability under Lee Iacocca at the beginning of the 80s, only to become a maker of dated-looking also-rans by 1990. True to form, Chrysler didn’t die, as the LH (last hope?) cars of 1993 brought the Chrysler name into the forefront briefly, and when these started to drop off the map the Daimler-Chrysler 300 gave the brand another comeback. The see-saw of fortunes is very cat-like, or like that Uncle Jimmy of yours that always seems to be on his deathbed but never actually succumbs to his ailments.

Ah, but even Uncle Jimmy cannot avoid the reaper forever, and the Chrysler brand seems to most outsiders to also be finally nearing the end. A quick look at Chrysler’s website shows three cars, but one of them (2023 leftover models of the long-in-the-tooth 300) is no longer being produced; the other two are really the same thing (the Pacifica minivan in two flavors), so that’s kind of cheating.

It’s honestly not like stablemate Dodge is doing any better as you can see from its site (which, like Chrysler, also shows a car that has been discontinued).

Reports say that Chrysler will continue to survive, and possibly be an all-electric brand by 2028. An EV crossover called the Airflow is planned for 2025. It’s not a bad looking vehicle but it appears to be something that a person cross shopping a Buick might consider. Named after the streamlined 1934 Chrysler that polarized buyers, this one seems content with going the least-resistance path of “seems like a nice car” or “generic high-end looking SUV” (complete with taillights that look stolen from a Cayenne).

Come on, where’s the soul of the brand? What values from Chryslers near-100-year history could it bring to the table that are sorely missing in the market? We’ll take a look at the best examples of this once-posh marque over the years and find a niche it could fill that’s been ignored by the other Big Three.

Big As A Whale, About To Set Sail

The Chrysler brand might have appeared in 1925, but to anyone GenX or older it’s the big, glitzy, and always slightly sinister cars of the late fifties and sixties that shaped our opinion of the brand, or even more so the upper level of Chrysler called Imperial. People often say “Chrysler Imperial,” yet up until the seventies this was a separate marque created to go head-to-head with Cadillac and Lincoln.

Imperials of the late fifties and early sixties were far more than badge-engineered range-toppers. Even after Chrysler products had shifted to unibody construction, these Imperial retained a substantial box frame connected by crossmembers that reportedly made the car so strong that years later they were later banned in many demolition derbies. The outlandish styling was essentially the magnum opus of designer Virgil Exner. A man behind Mopar’s ‘forward look’ aesthetic, these Imperials featured almost comically massive tailfins and scowling faces. Surprisingly, from the rear the fins actually almost work with the design; “Ex” might have doubled-down on the Jetsons/Futurama look, but he did it well.

These appear in films like The Godfather Part II, the transportation of choice for men that make their money in questionable ways (below, bottom). Even much later an Imperial limousine was used by main antagonist in the Lemony Snicket movie (below, top).

Later Imperials changed to an even more bonkers front end with separate headlamps tucked into a void next to the grille, as our writer Jason described in detail a while back.

If a black Exner-era Imperial were approaching you, that was not a good sign, but if a later 1969-73 model was on your tail you knew to just run for your life. These ultra-clean looking Imperials with a full-width covered-headlight grille were called “fuselage” cars because of how the sides were curved out at the beltline and then tucked inwards as on an aircraft.

Unibody designs didn’t offer nearly the isolation of the body-on-frame Cadillacs and Lincolns; sales were poor by comparison, but if you wanted a car to instill fear in everyone on the street, the Caddys and Continentals had nothing on the 1969 Imperial.

Film and television seemed to perpetrate this image.  Can you find any appearance of a “fuselage” Imperial where the car wasn’t part of an organized crime motor pool?

Who would want such a nefarious-looking bad-guy car? Are you kidding? I mean, the minute I could afford a used black W126 Mercedes S-Class sedan like the one in Lethal Weapon, Black Rain and Beverly Hills Cop films with smoked out windows and Monoblocks I emptied my savings to do so. Unlike that new Buick-looking Chrysler Airflow, a “fuselage” Imperial had no interest in appealing to that insurance executive in the white-picket-fence house. Jason pointed out that the even the advertising for the 1969 Imperials seemed aimed at family men that were nonetheless underworld types.

With even the once-intimidating-looking Mercedes products like the S-Class now looking depressingly tame with their current models, Chrysler could assert itself with an ominous yet decedent product. What would it be?

Julio, Get The Stretch

If the Chrysler name seems to be on life support, there’s one type of vehicle that’s now essentially six feet under: the stretched sedan limo. This was once the mainstay of executive transportation and now just a memory (or a beat-to-shit, sagging-in-the-middle example on craigslist for a few grand).

Such machines have been replaced by large luxury SUVs, in particular Cadillac Escalades and Lincoln Navigators. While these are nice to be chauffeured in and generally offer isolation from the outside world, the interiors do tend to feel a bit too close to their lesser Chevy and Ford brethren that have gone more upscale.

Chrysler’s (I mean, Stellantis) RAM division (which I will probably continue to call “Dodge trucks” until the day I die) has always avoided this full-sized 4-door SUV market. There’s never been a RAM Suburban, which is rather a shame since unlike a lot of old Mopar products these RAM trucks really don’t play distant also-ran to the other Big Three. In fact, they often rate higher in consumer surveys and comparisons between their better-known Chevy, GMC, and Ford rivals.

Recently RAM teased us with an EV pickup show car that really caught our attention. This sleek-looking RAM Revolution concept was a pleasure to look at, a totally different take on the full-sized truck that was exciting and different looking yet still highly functional (unlike a certain stainless steel truck offering).

It was when the suicide side doors opened onto the interior that people swooned. With sumptuous seats on sliding tracks and a glass sunroof, this cabin looked more like the inside of a high-end executive car than something you’d carry a cooler of Natty in the bed of. There were even jump seats behind the second row on the back wall of the cab to squeeze in two more people.

Naturally, we were disappointed but hardly surprised when the production version came out shortly afterwards featured very little from the beloved concept beyond the headlights.

To be honest, the features and design of that Revolution EV were all a bit much for a pickup anyway; it seemed more suited to an uber-luxury SUV than a short-bed work-and-play machine.

Are you seeing where this is going?

Needs An “I Brake For Nobody” Bumpersticker

The key to where the Chrysler brand succeeded over the years seems to have been when they offered what nobody else did. The PT Cruiser? The convertible LeBaron (and later the Sebring cabrio)? The cab-forward Concorde and New Yorker LH cars? A rear-drive retro-luxury 300? Laugh if you want, but these all did sell, likely because they were niche products that the other members of the Big Three didn’t have anything to answer with (at least for a time).

I don’t consider Rivian as being indulgently high-end, so it holds true that no U.S. maker is offering a giant luxury EV SUV right now. Cadillac is about to change that with the upcoming Escalada IQ EV, which purports to be a Maybach-like hyper-luxurious three-row machine. Based on the pictures released so far, I can see some possible problems.

First, there’s nothing imposing about the appearance or that honestly sets it apart visually from less expensive offerings (particularly some of the the slick Korean products); the old blunt-faced ICE Escalade looked far more like something driven by a person that could evict you from your apartment. I want massive and obnoxious for my $150,000, or at least something that won’t be confused for a car that costs a third of that.

Secondly, those rear doors look to be about half the width of the ones on my old Mercedes sedan and won’t make getting in and out very limo-like (especially the third row). Ah, but there’s a far bigger quandary; if this uber-wagon is destined for a livery pool, it can’t just stop for a few hours to tank up with electricity. No, I think what the streets of Manhattan need is an EV with a range-extending ICE motor to keep the beast making money.

If we take the RAM Revolution EV as a basis, we have plenty of room for three full rows, as well as a frunk space under the hood. Behind the third row is a large luggage area, but there’s no reason we couldn’t put in a rear-facing fourth row for occasional seating to let this monster carry up to nine or ten passengers when the whole crew wants to hit the next club. The gasoline range extender motor lives under the rear floor.

Now, there’s already going to be a RAM Ramcharger hybrid with a large gasoline engine offered by Stellantis soon. We could easily use this architecture for our Imperial, but I wanted to look at something that possibly didn’t sacrifice as much “frunkspace” for an engine.

You see, the frunk is the key to maximum passenger AND cargo space.  In fact, we could even go over the top and offer something not seen since pre-war times: a slide-out and pop-up luggage box for times when people have just too many bags to fit in the frunk.

Few trucks have inspired the compliments that the EV Revolution did when it hit the show circuit, and converting it to an SUV by enclosing the bed to transform it to an SUV doesn’t hurt the look. Naturally, we’ll make modifications to convert it from something suited to navigating Rocky Mountain Park into a vehicle for circling Central Park.

The eyes are the window to the soul, and something without eyes means it’s either trying to hide something terrible or it just has no soul. That kind of face is the one that made the 1969-73 Imperial strike fear in the heart, and our “Imperial Cruiser” SUV will have a similar visage to instill the same feelings in those it approaches.

Just because car lighting now can be any shape or size doesn’t mean that we can’t hide it behind retractable doors; Volvo certainly showed us a car of their own recently that did just that. Framed left and right with similar cathedral-like turn signals, the face of the old “fuselage” car fits quite nicely onto the EV RAM concept; the forward rake is balanced by the angle of the front door cut. Despite today’s overwrought “lighting signatures” and illuminated logos, the Imperial Cruiser refuses to play. Are you gonna tell it to do so?

Without the needed break for the bed on the side of the truck, the Imperial looks much cleaner and really helps to accentuate the tastefully aggressive flared fenders. I really hate riding in cars where the base of the greenhouse is almost at my shoulder, so I brought it down which also has the side benefit of further thinning down the sides of the truck between the wheel arches. A body-colored roof section separates the front glass from the rear quarters, and yes that is an actual opera light I added on the back window. I mean, every fashion trend comes back, right? With today’s LED technology they could offer a soft glow but actually be a bright, functional “porch light” to illuminate the surroundings at night.

“Suicide doors” are the party trick that gives the Imperial minivan-like access to the luxurious interior. The sliding track idea for the seats on the EV Revolution was brilliant, and it can help to quickly convert the interior from a three-row people carrier (or four-row with the cargo area jump seats deployed) to its best application as a limo for two well-pampered second row occupants. Recline your chair and pop up the footrest to sleep or hit the massage function. You’ve got plenty of room, and the side windows can be tinted to near opaque at the touch of a button.

If you’d rather work, you can pull out the folding table, pop out your laptop and cast your screen onto one of the big monitors on the backs of the front row seats. Shades of the old 1967 Imperial with the Mobile Director option!

The dashboard has screens on both sides of the large center screen (I like to have a separation between the driver and passenger’s screens, unlike the new crop of “monoscreens”). A silver-plated analog Omega clock sits below the screen, and the console sweeps in the rear passenger compartment. The analog clock for rear seat passenger sits on the back of the console; it’s actually on the door for the slide-out drinks refrigerator. There’s no reason that any and all of these hallmarks of $500,000 super luxury cars and SUVs can’t be available in a more mass-market Big Three product.

If You Don’t Look Bad, We Don’t Look Good

Eventually, it’s a fact of life that some automotive brands will go the way of Oldsmobile, Mercury, and Plymouth. Maybe Chrysler is beyond saving; the name might not mean anything to anyone under fifty years old. Regardless, let’s give the old school “badass” image one more try. If the public rejects it, there was no longer a reason for Chrysler to exist any longer anyway. I’d rather see it die than transmogrify into some milquetoast American Lexus we don’t need.

My only regret? James Earl Jones is no longer available for advertising as the voice of the Dark Side.

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