Jalopnik LIVE from the LA Auto Show - Google Hangout - JALOPNIK ON /DRIVE

[SIDE CONVERSATION] MATT HARDIGREE: Hey, everybody. No one's watching this yet, but this is the Drive and "Jalopnik" live show, live from the LA Auto Show. You can see Mike Spinelli at the BMW i8, Travis there in New York. You've got Christian out by the Infiniti stand, and JF-- sorry, that's JF by the BMW. Mike should be joining us any moment. This is of course a new experiment. I'm here in the lovely media room at the LA Auto Show with a bunch of people, and this is the first experiment in showing live what it's like to be at the auto show-- a lot of dudes staring at computers, so you're getting a real good sense of it. TRAVIS: Yeah. MATT HARDIGREE: So I think the interesting thing about this show, especially relative to other shows recently, is that you've all seen a lot of the cars already. I don't think that there were a lot of embargoes that held. So you saw the Jaguar XFR last night. You saw the Porsche that came in days ago. What would you say is the most interesting thing you've seen so far Travis? TRAVIS: I'm a big Cayman fan, so it's probably going to be the Cayman, because I think it looks great. And I don't see a reason for me to have a 911 anymore. But same with the XFR-S too. I think that looks great, minus the wing. The wing's a little-- it feels like an STI on the back of a Jaguar, and that's not what it's about. But I think those are the two most impressive things I've seen so far-- SLS AMG Black. MATT HARDIGREE: SLS AMG looks good, but I think the XFR-S is an interesting point. The wing actually looks much better in person. I was down there earlier and saw it as it rolled out, and it was right there in front of me. And it's blue with a carbon fiber finish on the top of it. And it's a little boy racer, and it's a little "gawdee"-- "gawdee" and gaudy. But it looks fantastic. I actually was really impressed by that little bit of finish. The color is outrageous. They call it French Racing Blue. It's actually French Postal Blue. All the French postal materials are actually that blue. But French Postal Blue is the wimpiest name for a 550-horsepower car. TRAVIS: Right, but looking at the car itself in person, is there going to be a wing delete option or anything? Because if there's someone like me who doesn't want the wing, maybe I can get it without it. That would be the hope. MATT HARDIGREE: There are only 100 of them coming to the US. So I think that you just get it the way that you get it. But I'm sure you could take the wing off of it. It's not a hard upgrade for people to do, so I think it's doable. JF, what are you showing us? JF MUSIAL: Right now, I'm in front of the new BMW i8 Roadster concept. And funny enough, as you actually get to see concepts, a couple of different versions of concepts-- the one thing I noticed about the new Roadster is that the interior is very, very production-like now, as opposed to the i Coupe interior. Now the interior is much more like a modern BMW, though. It is still very much like a concept. Next to it is the Megacity, the i3, which is in a nice puke brown color. But again, like the i8 Roadster, the interior is actually much more refined than the other Megacity concepts we've seen. This one actually has brake rotors as opposed to plastic. And I must say that as they get closer to launching the i brand, they're doing a very good job of setting these two cars up as, I guess you can say, the halo cars of the new brand. Hope that answers your question. MATT HARDIGREE: That does, and I was just speaking with Hannah Elliot from "Forbes," and she made a really interesting point. Because we were joking about how many times they've shown a version of the i series. The i3, the i8, have been around since Geneva or Paris, the year before, or maybe two years before that. And she said that she spoke with someone at BMW. She asked that question, because it's the obvious question. How many times are we going to see this car before it becomes a real car? And she said, one more. So we have one more round of concepts to go, and then it becomes a real thing that you can buy and drive. So I think that your observation about the interior is, maybe that's one step closer. And then we'll actually get a realistic that they can build body for it going forward. TRAVIS: That's the thing though, they're going to tone it down. JF MUSIAL: The one thing I do love about the interior, though, is that they've got this worn down leather, which is pretty cool for a concept car. It's not just the best as you can get it. It actually feels like it has a coach built quality to it. Pretty cool. MATT HARDIGREE: Travis, you had a thought on that? TRAVIS: Yeah, I was going to say, it's getting more and more boring each time, though. Before they were huge greenhouses, lots of glass. JF is spinning around there like he's on a carousel. But every time it gets more boring and more boring, and now it's just going to be another car on the road that's not going to look too exciting. It's going to be another electric city car that we're going to see tons of in the future. I want to see something exciting; I want to see something new. And I don't think that BMW is actually bringing that. MATT HARDIGREE: But I think the i8 still looks great. I still think if they can get something close to that for production, that is exciting. And I think people would freak out a little bit over it. TRAVIS: Oh, I agree there too. I think that if the i8 makes it out looking somewhat close to the concept, then that's a big win. But I think the i3 is going to be too conservative for what I was hoping it would be. MATT HARDIGREE: Well, there is something else that JF is bringing up right now, which is of course the SLS. It's an AMG Black Series. You like this car. Why do you like this car? I think it's a little ridiculous. JF MUSIAL: I'm probably breaking up. I am probably breaking up right now. But yes, this is the new SLS AMG Black Series, but not in a nice black tone. It's actually a puke color yellow. The one thing I do love about the Black Series that I was [INAUDIBLE] back end with this wing. I never thought an SLS with a wing like this would actually look good, but it actually is pretty *** bad ***. Inside, not much different other than a lot more carbon fiber. Not really expecting much else out of that. But [INAUDIBLE], an SLS with a heavy duty diff-- heavy duty diff, more downforce, and more horsepower is certainly not something that you'd scoff your head at. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, earlier we called it an energy drink you can drive. And I think that that's a lot of it. And people wonder-- and I think the big question about this car is why would someone spend so much money on something that only has 150 pounds less, and it's maybe 40 more horsepower-- what is the appeal of that to the average consumer? Will there be people who will buy it? And I actually think there will. It is the most aggressive Black Series maybe since the C63, that really wild-- what was the C-Coupe that they did? JF MUSIAL: The C63 Black? MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, the C63 black coupe, that was great. And this, especially in that bright, puke yellow color-- the picture on "Jalopnik," you can see it-- it's a little bit better than that in person. And Brian Williams, who's our photographer, ' got a really great shot of it. But I think that if you love Mercedes as a brand, it's a great car for you. If you don't feel either way about the brand, I don't think there's any reason why you'd buy that over a McLaren MP4-12C. JF MUSIAL: OK, guys, I'm on a hunt right now to go find Mike Spinelli. He seems to be lost. TRAVIS: There's Mike Spinelli's beautiful face, but JF has left us. MATT HARDIGREE: Mike Spinelli is popping up. Oh, and he's by the XFR, which we were just talking about. Obviously, XFR-S is one of my favorite cars of the show. I'm here with Jaguar, actually, right now. And so I was hoping that we would have a chance to look at it earlier last night, we didn't. Though we did get to see the F-Type behind it. Can you hear me, Spinelli? MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah, I can hear you. I'm going over the F-Type right now. MATT HARDIGREE: OK. Tell me your impressions of the F-Type. What do you think looking at it? Because actually we had drinks with Ian Callum last night, the designer. And he seemed sort of relieved that it was done. Obviously the pressure of building a car that was once an E-Class, the E-Type, having that in the background, and knowing that you're going to be compared to what was once the most beautiful car-- what some people consider the most beautiful car ever made, including Enzo Ferrari's. What are your thoughts looking at it, Mike? MIKE SPINELLI: I really like it. I think, within the boundaries of what designers are allowed to do, and what they can do, and what the demands on them when it comes to making things meet regulations and all that stuff. I think, for me, the most jarring thing is seeing an orange Jag. I mean, when was the last time you saw a bright orange Jag? MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, I agree. It's actually a year of really bright colors, because if you notice around there, we've got-- just think of dark British Racing Green, and how stately Jaguar's always been, and I think it reflects where the brand's going, in that you've got this blue car-- we can see it in JF's screen-- we've got this bright orange car, and back there, there's also a metallic, very bright blue Evoque. And it's fascinating. It's really great to look at. Hey! There's Matt Farah. Matt Farah just popped into the show. MATT FARAH: Right now I'm giving away, live on "Jalopnik" right now, three tickets to the Hyundai afterparty tonight. Doors open 5:30, Hotel Figueroa with a performance by Tenacious D. I can't go because Chris Harris is going to do the Smoking Tire podcast at my house, right JF? JF MUSIAL: Yes, he's going. But I'm not going. MATT FARAH: That's cool, we don't want you man, we want Chris Harris and Nino on the Smoking Tire podcast. I'm live. And I've got three tickets for the Hyundai afterparty with Tenacious D. Who wants them? Hit me up at The Smoking Tire if you can get to the LA Convention Center, and I will give you-- JF MUSIAL: You're showing too much. MATT FARAH: They're just tickets. @thesmokingtire on Twitter. Free tickets to Hyundai. Boys? MATT HARDIGREE: All right, there you go. You heard it here first. Tenacious D performing tonight in Los Angeles @thesmokingtire on Twitter, find him. You'll get three tickets to go see that show. Chris Harris will also be on the Smoking Tire podcast later on. That's fun. This is the excitement. This is a live Google Hangout powered by YouTube-- kind of TV, or YouTube powered by Google Hangout, and a lot of coffee and adrenaline. TRAVIS: Now we've got double Jag action there. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, this is a lot of Jag going on, which is fine. This is another interesting thing. So because I'm here on the Jag trip, I'm being pampered by them. I spoke with Russ, the product guy behind it. I asked him, I'm like, well there's the V8, there's the two V6s. Isn't the V6 S really kind of the driver's car, really what you'd want? It's not a huge weight difference, but isn't that the best one? And he seems to agree, inasmuch as a person who works for automaker can agree, that though it's not as expensive, it's not quite as much power, and it's not quite as fast, that the driver's car is the V6 S. TRAVIS: And it's probably because it's not as fast, but I'm betting it's more fun, just because there's less power. And then if you have the smaller wheels and tires, there's less grip. So you'll actually be able to use the power, instead of having 495-horsepower on the Roads, which is a tall order to use these days, when you can barely wind anything out. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, let's talk about that car as well. TRAVIS: Yeah, so I think it's a great looking car. I don't think Jaguar is really doing anything wrong at the moment either, which is pretty great to say for an automaker. Especially now that the-- what was the other one, the X-Type? That little Mondeo-based, now that that's finally-- MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, the X-Type. TRAVIS: --long in the memory. Everything's pretty good. MATT HARDIGREE: X-Type and S-Type at the same time. Can you imagine? That was a crappy lineup. TRAVIS: There was a lot of oval headlights and old dentists driving the same cars all around. Ian's done a really great job of making these things look really modern and really great. MIKE SPINELLI: Where are we going next? MATT HARDIGREE: I don't know, Mike. Where do you want to go next? MIKE SPINELLI: Let's see. Well, we've got Landi right here. MATT HARDIGREE: All right. Well, go find something fun and then check back in. MIKE SPINELLI: OK, will do. TRAVIS: I've got to say-- the Range Rover, though, in pictures a lot of people gave it a lot of flack. But in person it doesn't look Explorer-y. It looks really good, except for the front door that got these vents, and apparently they put vents on the door now. MATT HARDIGREE: OK, so here's the note on that, while we're looking at an image of it from Mike, and he's got a great shot of the car. Two main design things here-- it's very good looking. I agree with you in person that it's even better looking. So the vents are like this iconic thing from Land Rover, in the sense that it's been around since 2001. They're talking about how iconic the brand is, and I don't think that that's a thing they needed to bring over. The second issue with the design-- as someone gets a phone call-- is that they showed us yesterday an image of the car when they got rid of the vents. And they said, look how much better it looks when you have the vents, because it picks up that line and that aluminum trim piece along the door. And I was sitting there with Matt Jones from Top Gear. And we were both like, actually it looks better without. They shouldn't have shown us the Photoshop without the vents. I'm not a huge fan. I'm sure that it's going to stick around. But I do like the aluminum trim piece, and it does make the trim piece look OK. But the point, the reason why that is, the car's longer now. It's very much like a station wagon, really. And so with that feature, they're able to make the car look shorter. And they're able to decrease the distance. Also, if you look at the taillights, that's why the taillights wrap and the front headlights wrap-- because it makes the car shorter. JASON: Can I interject something about these vents? MATT HARDIGREE: We're going to have Jason here, our design expert, talk about the vents. JASON: So the vents, they're set in the door. And here's the thing. Fake vents are OK to a degree, but you have to explain to the person buying the car-- at least halfway pretend they make some little bit of sense. Like the fake vents in the Mustang always could have been brake coolers. In the door, what are they doing? They're crotch cooling devices? It's absolutely absurd. It's almost insulting to stick the fake vents on the door itself. They're not even near the engine department. It's silly. I mean at that point, where it becomes so blatantly-- I don't know. They're just ridiculous gills at this point. On the door. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, they are. They're door gills. JASON: They're door gills. And the fact that they're on the door and absolutely are completely divorced from any utility whatsoever, I don't know, I feel like that makes them kind of silly. MATT HARDIGREE: Especially for a utilitarian brand, so I agree. JASON: For some other brand where you could just turn them into a design element, not even pretend they're vents, not even call them vents. But for a Land Rover, I think it's inane. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, I agree. And Mike's got a great shot here of the actual Land Rover, the LR4. And you can see the vent is front of the door, not aft. JASON: Yeah, it's part of the engine compartment. Even if it doesn't, you could imagine it's extracting heat or doing something for you, not pretending to cool your groin. TRAVIS: They're just lines in the door. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah. So groin coolers-- from here on out, they shall forever be known as groin coolers. MATT FARAH: We are live online. MATT HARDIGREE: I don't know who that bro was. MATT FARAH: Zack Klapman. Ladies and gentlemen, Zack Klapman of The Smoking Tire. Can you do your Cosby, Bill Cosby. Do your Bill Cosby, quick. ZACK KLAPMAN: [INAUDIBLE] MATT HARDIGREE: He's doing a Bill Cosby impression. TRAVIS: Sounds like Bill Cosby's in a fish tank. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah. You've got to work on that a little bit. TRAVIS: Yeah, that's a good impression. MATT HARDIGREE: OK, I'm going go to a screen shot here of one of my favorite cars from the show if I can find it. Hold on a second. Do we have any questions from Kinja? CHRISTIAN: Auto show related, no. MATT HARDIGREE: Nothing about the-- CHRISTIAN: Why does Jason look so much more professional than everyone else? But other than that-- MATT HARDIGREE: Jason was just born professional. Bring him back in here. Look at this look. And he just has a nice sweater. That's why. JASON: I just got this haircut in my kitchen from my wife yesterday, and I'm still not comfortable with it. MATT HARDIGREE: He has the most recent haircut because his wife did it yesterday. JASON: I get something for that. Here at the auto show, most recent haircut gets to sleep in the trunk of your choice. MATT HARDIGREE: Yes. Where you going to be sleeping? JASON: There are so many good ones. I mean, how do you pick? I'm going to take the rest of the day to really sit and figure it out. But so far, I'm thinking that new Acura's trunk, the interior of the trunk was one of the most exciting parts of that car. So maybe that one, the RLX. MATT HARDIGREE: That's awesome. Actually, Mike has us here with the Beetle convertible. We can actually bring someone in who's driven the Beetle convertible. Raphael, if you want to come over here. You're going to be in three way here. Come and have a seat right here. RAPHAEL ORLOVE: I drove the Beetle convertible. What do you want to know? MATT HARDIGREE: Well, tell me about the car. What were your impressions? RAPHAEL ORLOVE: Well I drove the TDI five-speed manual, and I drove the Turbo six-speed manual, and surprisingly, they were remarkably unremarkable. So the diesel wasn't really surprisingly torque-y, nor was it was very unrefined. And the Turbo was powerful, but not really possessing any character whatsoever. MATT HARDIGREE: Really? OK, so characterless. So the dream of having a diesel five-speed convertible in the US is exciting. JASON: That's appealing, still, I think. And I would think this is a relatively fun diesel five-speed convertible. RAPHAEL ORLOVE: Yeah. I mean, I didn't get to take it on the fun, twisty canyon road. I took it on a more scenic route. Some other people that drove that one on the really twisty route said the five-speed diesel was really fun. Because you really have to work the engine. The power line falls. You just get the surge of torque right around 4,500 or 4,000, and then its just gone in another 500 RPM. And so you're really having to plan everything out and work and have a good time. But otherwise, just sort of something your mom could drive. JASON: I have a question. I saw in your post, they mentioned there's three trim levels, like a '50s '60s, and '70s. And they said the '50s is the most expensive one. What are they putting on it? Because the one I didn't see, which they should have had, is the giant chrome over-rider bumpers. If you're going to really do it, you need to *** do it. So what exactly are they doing? I know they're using the rims, which are great. I like the vintage rims. RAPHAEL ORLOVE: I actually can't remember. I know they've got the great rims, they've got the nice paint, I think it comes with better-- I don't know if it specifically comes with the fender audio system. And I feel like there was something else, but I honestly can't remember. JASON: So why is this the '50s one? Is there more chrome stuck on it? What are they doing? RAPHAEL ORLOVE: Well it's triple black, or however black you want to call it. JASON: Is that really '50s? RAPHAEL ORLOVE: I think it's particularly '50s. You look at it, and it looks like-- JASON: But it's not really a '50s color. The Beetles in the '50s, I don't even know if they offered them in black. RAPHAEL ORLOVE: OK, so they actually did have a '50s Beetle there, and it was two-tone cream and black, and I honestly don't think that would fly. You couldn't-- [INTERPOSING VOICES] JASON: If you're going to do it, I say-- RAPHAEL ORLOVE: I thought it was classy, I thought it looked good. MATT HARDIGREE: OK, cool. Well, thank you. Thank you for insight, Raphael. RAPHAEL ORLOVE: Indeed. MATT HARDIGREE: Is that Wes Siler? Who is that? He's muted, somebody un-mute that gentleman over there. MIKE SPINELLI: Wait, where's Wes Siler? Were you looking-- hold on a second. MATT HARDIGREE: I see a guy who looks Wes Siler-esque. He's talking but we-- MIKE SPINELLI: Back here? MATT HARDIGREE: Is that Christian? Has he hacked a computer? Has Wes Siler hacked into-- MIKE SPINELLI: Is that Wes Siler over there? I don't know. MATT HARDIGREE: It looks like him. I see Wes Siler, and I see him talking but I can't hear him. Can we un-mute Christian? TRAVIS: He has to un-mute himself. So there's got to be-- MATT HARDIGREE: He has to un-mute himself. TRAVIS: There's got be a button that says mute. MIKE SPINELLI: I'm un-muted. TRAVIS: Not you, Mike. JF. MATT HARDIGREE: He's a handsome looking man. MIKE SPINELLI: OK, all right. MATT HARDIGREE: Well, we're learning here, folks. Did we have a question, Travis? TRAVIS: We had one good one from Kinja that was from teampenske3 about what are our thoughts on if the Fiesta ST versus the Mini Cooper S and who wins that battle. You've got cars that weigh similar amounts, similar specs, similar cars, same class. I'm imagining the ST is going to be considerably cheaper. Not considerably, but I think it'll be cheaper. It'll be more utility because it has five doors. But Ford makes great hatchbacks, especially the European cars we've been waiting for for years. So I am giving the edge to the Fiesta ST over the Mini Cooper S. You figure 197-horse in the ST, 203 in the Mini Cooper S, something like that. So it's about the same-- MATT HARDIGREE: So negligible. TRAVIS: Yeah. Curb weights should be about the same. I think the Cooper has it there, but then the ST is going to have more space, easier to get people in the back, easier to haul things. Because that's what a hot hatchback's about. It's about being a sports car and being a hatchback. It's the best of both worlds. So you can take everything you want with you and then drive fast getting there. So that's what I'm giving the edge to the ST. MATT HARDIGREE: I'll go with that too. So the fastest of the cars from Mini Cooper that aren't John Cooper Works are the S's. And I had an S Coupe, which was an S convertible-- the "Bro-adster." The Mini "Bro-adster." I guess they call it the Roadster, but I always call it the "Bro-adster." And it was very quick, and it was very fun to drive, and it's a great car, and I don't think you can go wrong either way. But it was not very useful. Also, boxy because it was a convertible. But it just felt like a small thing that you would spend lots of money on, whereas I feel like the Fiesta ST, it's got great mileage, relatively speaking. It's something you can convince your significant other that you can buy as a normal, small utilitarian city car that you can also take out on the weekend and drive very quickly, very aggressively, with lots of anger. TRAVIS: And 34 MPG is what they're claiming on the highway, which is pretty damn good. And then you've still got the six-speed sport suspension. We're not getting a slush box here, we're not getting anything wussy. What's Spinelli drinking? MATT HARDIGREE: Let's switch over to Spinelli, what is Spinelli drinking? MIKE SPINELLI: So this is a Mini smoothie, because Minis remind people of the frozen drinks. It's one of the many foodstuffs that are available to pampered automotive journalists here at the LA Auto Show. I've already gotten many sliders-- about two or three sliders at least. TRAVIS: Shrimp? MIKE SPINELLI: No shrimp. I had a vegetable wrap, and I had a piece of prosciutto de parma. TRAVIS: Ooh. MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah. That was not at Fiat, though. TRAVIS: Was that Suzuki? MIKE SPINELLI: Suzuki was serving the-- nothing. Nothing for dinner there. TRAVIS: Suzuki had the sushi from Mitsubishi that they had yesterday. MIKE SPINELLI: That's mean. TRAVIS: I'm sorry. MIKE SPINELLI: I'm in Toyota, so if there's anything you want to do over there, just let me know. If not, I'm just going to keep walking. Wait a minute. I got one for you. Bam! TRAVIS: Ooo. Now is that the Corolla with the Celica engine? They don't make that anymore, do they? Because that was a little too exciting. MIKE SPINELLI: No, this is a Camry! TRAVIS: Oh, that's a Camry. I can't even tell anymore. That might be the RAV4 too, 'cause the front end is exactly the same on the Camry as it is on the RAV4. And that's something that the whole line looks exactly the same now. That could be an Avalon too. MIKE SPINELLI: Well, this one here, this is the dark Camry! Yeah! And the light Camry! We are live. -Oh really? MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah, are you-- -I'm a design student from San Francisco. MIKE SPINELLI: A design student. Where do you go to school? -Academy of Art. MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah, Academy of Art? You want to be a car designer? -Yeah, I'm working on being a car designer. Hopefully, when I get a job. MIKE SPINELLI: Are you doing any projects right now? -[INAUDIBLE]. MATT HARDIGREE: So we can't actually hear what the design student is saying, so we're going to-- MIKE SPINELLI: Sorry. Sorry, Matt. Cool, thanks very much. TRAVIS: Mike, you might want to go over to Mazda. Was Mazda right next to you? MATT HARDIGREE: No, Mazda's in the other room. Isn't it? Or is that Mazda right there? MIKE SPINELLI: No, Mazda's right here. MATT HARDIGREE: OK, what's up with the diesels? Talk to me about the diesels. We've had some questions from Kinja. They want to know about diesel crossovers, they want to know about the CX-5, they want to know what's going on in Mazda land. MIKE SPINELLI: You mean me? MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah you, Mike. Tell me what's going on with diesels. What's with Mazda? MIKE SPINELLI: Well, to be honest, I heard they were putting a diesel in something, but I wasn't there this morning. So let me find the exact vehicle we're discussing. TRAVIS: The 6. MIKE SPINELLI: CX-5 Dempsey. TRAVIS: Dempsey's like diesel. MIKE SPINELLI: It starts with a D. MATT HARDIGREE: So this morning-- we broke this news first-- it's the Mazda 6. It's not the CX-5. MIKE SPINELLI: OK, sorry. MATT HARDIGREE: It's a 2.2 liter diesel, 310 pound feet of torque. Really torque-y engine. No mileage yet. The press conference for Mazda isn't actually until tomorrow, so the news hasn't actually officially come out. But if you walk around the show floor, it's very obvious that the Mazda 6 is going to be diesel. And that's a good looking car. Mike's getting video of it here. I really like the Kodo design language, or the fluid in motion, whatever they want to call it these days. TRAVIS: Doesn't matter. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, whatever. It doesn't matter what they call it, I agree. I think it's the best looking of the new mid-sizers. I would actually put it over the Ford Fusion, which is the best one that you can buy right now. Because the Fusion-- it's just a touch derivative with the grill. I think it looks good, but I think the grill is so overwhelming. It's so beautiful, and it's such a strong design feature that the rest of the car is a little weaker in comparison to it, whereas I feel like the Mazda 6, nose to tail, looks fantastic. And it looks very cohesive. TRAVIS: Right. And this is opportune-- we just got a question in Kinja about how we think the diesel 6 is going to be received by people in America. And I for one, I'm not entirely certain, because Mazda doesn't have a reputation with diesel the way that Volkswagen and Audi have as well. So I don't know if it's going to be received straight up, the first time out. MATT HARDIGREE: I'm with you. They have to build on what Volkswagen has basically already established, which is a success with diesel. They've sold a ton of diesel vehicles, the sport wagon in particular. And even though the Jetta is really a mid-sized vehicle, it's more of a compact-- it's actually closer in size to the Mazda 6 that we want to see. So I think there could be a lot of cross shopping with the Jetta diesel and the Mazda 6. But it's the first mid-size, non-luxury diesel you can get. And so I hope that Mazda has the money to spend on the marketing to get people into cars, because Mazda's in a tenuous position now anyways. But it's good. Anything that differentiates themselves, that market is so full of cars. And I don't think a lot of people will buy the six-speed diesel. I'm really glad they're offering a six-speed diesel. But I think that having an automatic diesel vehicle will give someone a reason to look at Mazda when they might have otherwise just gone and bought a Camry or an Altima. TRAVIS: Totally agree. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh, there's my favorite car. Is that JF or Mike who's looking at my favorite car of the show, which is the Volvo Polestar S60 concept? JF MUSIAL: Matt, that is me. That is me, Matt. Sorry about the Internet connection, but here we go. The concept Polestar S60, I actually think you're right. It's actually one of the best looking cars of the show, just in terms of a Volvo that looks aggressive. Really nice. MATT HARDIGREE: Tell me a little bit about it. What do you know about it? JF MUSIAL: Very little, other than the fact that it's still a concept. We've heard rumors that they were going to do a limited production run. But the fact remains that as a concept car-- it's not really a concept car. It's a body kit with limited performance upgrades. Hold on, let's look at this. 501-horsepower, 0 to 60 in 3.9 seconds, 186 mile an hour top speed. Let's see, that's pretty much all I can decipher from this right now. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, so I think that there was some confusion when we posted this last week, which is that you cannot buy this car. Although I've heard there's one of them, and I hear Jay Leno's buying it. But there's no proof to that. Any time that there's a crazy car built, people think maybe it's Jay Leno buying it. Obviously it'd be really expensive. The 500-plus-horsepower in that small of a car is not something that you can easily get. However you can get that color, and you get some of that body work, and you can get a 30-horsepower improvement in your S60. So you can make the car look like that, sort of, if you want to. But it's also got the same French Postal Blue color, which has been something that's sneaking into the cars. I think yellows and oranges and bright postal blues are sort of the colors. And as we look at the interior, you can see the beautiful Alcantara 100 shifter. Yeah, Alcantara everything. JF MUSIAL: The one thing about this, though-- I was a big fan of the old S60 type R, and I loved that gear shift that was kind of a metal fold with the gear shift, the manual gear shift. But the Alcantara actually is pretty good looking. Inside are Recaro seats with the Polestar logo on it. Not much else different. But yeah, I like it though. MATT HARDIGREE: And even with today's engines, it's not always super easy to get 500-horsepower to that car. But I bet if you called Polestar, if Volvo wouldn't do it, I bet you could make a version of that car starting with the stock S60. Not too expensive. It would be a lot of money, but I think you could come close to that performance. And maybe 500 isn't the magic number. Maybe 400 is actually the magic number with that car, to get the most out of it. But I think you could get close. But it looks great. It's interesting. Though Zach, our weekend contributor, made a point, which is that-- as JF walks around the Volvo stand-- that this is the first time in years-- certainly that we've ever seen since we've been in existence-- there are no station wagons. There are no wagons on the Volvo floor. No wagons at all. JF MUSIAL: You're right. There are none. There are SUVs-- no wagons. MATT HARDIGREE: We've got some crossovers, the XC. Some of those XCs are a little close, but it's sad. It actually makes me really sad that that's the case, but so be it. JF MUSIAL: Yeah, my mom had a B-series when I was growing up. MATT HARDIGREE: I have no idea where Mike is. JF MUSIAL: Mike has gone outside, which is something auto journalists don't typically do. So this is something very interesting to see during an auto show. MATT HARDIGREE: See, I'm excited about it. I don't know what he's doing. MIKE SPINELLI: I'm trying to find some cool ***. [LAUGHTER] MATT HARDIGREE: Live TV, folks. JF MUSIAL: Here's a unique one, the LS F sport. We saw one of these on the 405 this morning. I don't really think there's much to say other than walk past it. Bye-bye. TRAVIS: I never get the point of what that thing is, just because it's a big Lexus. Why you need to the big sport back? I don't get any of those big cars that have all the big, sporty, pretentious-- JF MUSIAL: It doesn't make any sense. TRAVIS: No. JF MUSIAL: You're right. Here's the LFA Nurburgring Edition in white. MATT HARDIGREE: There's a lot of hate for this car. I don't think a lot of people get the car. I mean, it's a very Toyota design exercise. It's not over the top. I think it's beautiful in its purposeful sort of way. I think people give it crap in a way they don't give McLaren crap for doing a very similar thing. JF MUSIAL: Here's one of my favorite cars of the show, actually, in a different color from what we had previously seen it-- the LF-LC concept car. Really awesome, awesome color on it. Can't really see it at the show right now, but it looks great. This is one of the few Lexuses that-- if it went into production, obviously it wouldn't look nearly as good as this. But if it did, it would actually be a car I'd consider getting if I was in the market. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, Lexus is far away from exciting, but they're getting closer. And I think that this is a big step in that direction. I would totally buy the car. It's beautiful. It's the best version of what they call a spindle grill. I actually think it looks like the Cheat from "Homestar Runner." It's the same shape. But it's very nicely detailed. And also, actually, like you said with the BMW, every version of this car that we see looks a little bit more like something you can actually drive. So I hope that means that we are at least no more than one more concept version of this Lexus away from something we can drive. JF MUSIAL: I love their new design language, especially with the front headlights that are starting to trickle down to some of the other Lexuses at this point. Pretty cool. MATT HARDIGREE: I want to hear from Mike. What's Mike doing? Is that a Callaway? What is that? MIKE SPINELLI: So that's the '97 Callaway concept. They've got it, and they brought it with them. It's pretty cool. MATT HARDIGREE: That is really cool. TRAVIS: Yeah. That's awesome. MIKE SPINELLI: It was a Le Mans winner. All right, so let me get you the story. MATT HARDIGREE: All right, what does it say? TRAVIS: We have a question in Kinja, if anyone cares. MATT HARDIGREE: All right, while Mike's running around, what's the Kinja question? TRAVIS: Well, Micki joined in-- Micki Maynard, our good friend. And she wants to know if there's any celebrities on the show floor, if any celebs were at Jaguar last night, and if they know anything about cars. She saw Paul Newman once in New York, so that's-- MATT HARDIGREE: That's it? That's a great question from Micki. So I'll start. Famous people I've seen so far at LA Auto Show related events-- Jaguar had a decent showing. Like I said, we had drinks with Nico from Jaguar. We had drinks with him. He literally talked for two hours nothing but Jags. And he knew his cars, and he's owned bunch of them. Shannyn Sossamon, who's an actress-- she was in "A Knight's Tale," she was also in a band called Warpaint, which is an LA band that's actually fantastic-- was there. No Lana Del Rey sightings. I haven't seen Patrick Dempsey, who's here all the time, but they're definitely running around. JF, Mike, you guys see anybody famous so far? MIKE SPINELLI: I haven't really seen anybody famous. I saw a guy that I thought was Ray Winstone, the British actor, but I think it was the guy who wrote for "Autoweek." MATT HARDIGREE: That happens. TRAVIS: So awkward. MATT HARDIGREE: I'm pretty sure I saw Chris Bangle on an escalator. JF MUSIAL: We saw Ken Block last night. And we saw Ken Block's car. I saw Ken Block during the day, and then I saw his car at night. He has this Focus RS. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh, that's awesome. Ken Block was here. And I just lost Blake again. I was going to-- hold on a second. BLAKE RONG: How's it going? JF MUSIAL: Here is the new Impala design. MATT HARDIGREE: Matt from Top Gear is going to join us in 10 minutes. Can you come back in 10 minutes? We'll do live. We're live on the internet. It's very exciting. TRAVIS: It's a new thing. MATT HARDIGREE: It is. Blake, have you see anyone famous here in LA this week? Any parties last night? BLAKE RONG: I was basically this close to Jay Leno yesterday. And I was going to say hi, but then I was like, I don't really watch late night shows or your show in general. So what am I going to talk about? MATT HARDIGREE: That's true. I saw Adam Carolla. Actually, this is the thing-- and this might be an article tomorrow that you might see-- which is that Adam Carolla has terrible taste in being a human being but has phenomenal taste in cars. Like, I cannot stand Adam Carolla. BLAKE RONG: I'm really glad it's not the other way around. MATT HARDIGREE: I'm glad it's not the other way around. Because you'd feel bad, like somebody with good taste but bad cars. But Adam Corolla-- BLAKE RONG: Did he wear like a Three Wolf Moon shirt or something? MATT HARDIGREE: He didn't wear a Three Wolf Moon shirt. By the way, this is a Three Wolf Moon shirt at the LA Auto Show. BLAKE RONG: Best dressed and worst dressed simultaneously. MATT HARDIGREE: Simultaneously. TRAVIS: Blake wore his suit. MATT HARDIGREE: Blake Rong now of Auto Bimonthly, right? BLAKE RONG: Yes, "Auto Biweekly." MATT HARDIGREE: "Aut Biweekly" magazine. Sorry, Biweekly. I didn't want to short you a week. TRAVIS: I saw a guy from Auto Bi-Friendly. Get it? MATT HARDIGREE: What? BLAKE RONG: Auto Bicurious? MATT HARDIGREE: Oh, Auto Bicurious? That's a great publication. I'm a huge Auto Bicurious reader. Back behind you is Neal Pollack sitting down over there. He refuses to be in our viral video, I don't know if you can hear that. You don't want to join Auto Bicurious? Auto Biweekly Curious? BLAKE RONG: Auto Bicurious Weekly. MATT HARDIGREE: Auto Bicurious Weekly. -I don't know that. MATT HARDIGREE: It's who he writes for. TRAVIS: It's a buyers' guide for new cars. MATT HARDIGREE: Where are we with JF, what are you looking at? Can we hear JF? JF, what do you got? Well, he's showing the new Impala, which I don't think is bad looking. TRAVIS: I don't either. MATT HARDIGREE: What do you guys think? TRAVIS: I think it looks good. I just think that the rear overhang is far too long. But other than that, I think it's a very handsome car. It was actually surprisingly handsome when I saw it for the first time in New York last year. MATT HARDIGREE: I agree. TRAVIS: It's so old, though, isn't it? MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah. If you're going to keep it front wheel drive, I think it's OK. That's a weirdly competitive market now-- the full size front wheel drive car, which Toyota did with the Avalon, and really rekindled that market and restarted it. So that's been fun to watch. Actually, we have another car that's actually way more exciting than the Impala, though, which is what Mike is looking at, which is this really great Hyundai Veloster concept. Do you want to explain what this is? JF MUSIAL: Me or Mike? MATT HARDIGREE: Mike, can you explain what that is? No, he's already walked away from it. He has no idea what's going on. All right, let me pull up a picture of it. I'll use our Jalopnik screen share feature, and I will bring up an image of this unexpected-- we didn't know it was coming-- very cool Veloster concept. TRAVIS: The Veloster C3 roll top, I believe, is what they're calling it. So it's a really quirky Fiat Abarth in a way. MIKE SPINELLI: Sorry, guys. I was having audio issues. Here it is-- the roll top. And by the way, they're calling it a roll top because-- check that out. Yeah. MATT HARDIGREE: That's hot. TRAVIS: It has a rolling top. MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah, that's why they call it that. TRAVIS: Makes sense. MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah, and it's got its own fixie. TRAVIS: So it's a hipster-ready car, is basically what we're-- MATT HARDIGREE: It is. It's a totally hipster car. But I have to say, I would be really excited-- that roof thing's a little questionable. It might be hard to pull off. But I love this split gate. It's just like the Range Rover. It's got the low split gate. And then of course the whole roof comes up on the car. But I think the Veloster is one of the best looking cars you can buy today. And not just the best looking car under $25,000-- one of the best designs, most interesting designs that you can buy. It's very concept car like. And this would just make it that much better, if you buy it. MIKE SPINELLI: Well, the interesting thing-- again, this is one of those things where some marketing research people get together and say, here's how you can sell to millennium. Because they like cute cars with a lot of utility. They throw the U-word around a lot. So, it has the utility minded, still fun, and textbook hipster, fixie bicycle kind of thing going on. TRAVIS: And to jump off that roof point, I don't know if it's that undo-able, because we have the Fiat, the 500C, which has that roll back roof that might have to switch up a little bit. But it feels like it's probably something that could go into production-- maybe in a more refined form, maybe not-- pulling forward instead of going back or something. But I think it's pretty cool. Except for the "Miami Vice" theme there. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh yeah, the black and the white and the blue. The color looks really good in person. I actually really like that spearmint blue color on the wheels, which is something that we saw a lot of at SEMA. However, doing the black front wheel and the blue, it's very Illest, very Fatlace, but it's not to my tastes. I get it, but it's not necessarily my thing. TRAVIS: Right. OK. MIKE SPINELLI: Ill. That car is ill. MATT HARDIGREE: It is ill. It's real. Matt from Top Gear is going to join us at some point. I don't know where he went. JASON: He was in the car with you yesterday. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, we actually drove last night. We had a fleet of Range Rovers to pick from to get places. We actually drove in Jason's Beetle, which was a great experience. JASON: '73, I'm glad you had fun. If you want to drive it, it's still on the table. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, I might drive. I was too drunk to drive it last night. Don't drink and drive. Jason was sober, so he drove. His hair was a little crazy, but he didn't look it, so we had to get a ride. JASON: But my window regulator was all screwed up, and then Matt, the fine British gentleman, finally broke it. And it's supposed to rain for two days tomorrow. Last night in my driveway, I was pulling the door panel off to try to fix it. MATT HARDIGREE: This is old Beetle ownership. This is actually owning a '70s Beetle, not a new Beetle-- JASON: Yeah, with the '70s kit. MATT HARDIGREE: --with the '70s kit. JASON: Very different experience. They didn't even consult me, which pisses me off a little. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, so we're mad at Volkswagen for that. JASON: Can I mention one thing for insiders who want to know what it's like behind the scenes of the car show? MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, go for it. JASON: The bathrooms are disgusting. I don't know it it's because this is such a male dominated profession, but the bathrooms here rapidly get disgusting so quickly. Hey look, it's Matt. JASON: Hey, its Matt. Matt, have a seat. You can be on camera. MATT JONES: Cool. MATT HARDIGREE: Joining us live on Jalopnik is the Matt from Top Gear. There's Derek D. Hold on a second. We're going to go to Mike real quick. DEREK D: Hey, what's up Jalopnik? I'm Derek D from "Fast Lane Daily." Good to see you guys at the LA Auto Show. That's like a rocking show, that is in there. Yeah, Matt-- do you know what these numbers mean? MATT HARDIGREE: I think it's a sales thing. This year so far, Audi has already sold more cars than they ever have, and November's not even over with yet. December hasn't started. So the diesels are exciting. TRAVIS: Top Gear's getting an inside look at how we run our website. That's not-- MATT HARDIGREE: Top Gear's watching it. So this is Matt Jones. So last night, we both went out drinking, as I mentioned. He was with me with Jason, and we went to a bunch of parties. And somehow with a drive in the Beetle, we ended up back at the hotel. And we both said, we'll meet in 20 minutes at the after grill bar at the Sunset Marquis. And I fell asleep, and I felt bad because I thought he was waiting for me all night. MATT JONES: No, I was not waiting. I was definitely, definitely in bed, very much in bed. Because I went back-- I had a little sit down to rest my legs. I was a bit tired. Obviously, being in a Beetle was quite an exhausting experience. JASON: There's probably some fumes involved. MATT JONES: Yeah, exactly. So I got to clear my head. Next thing I know, ***, 7:00 AM. It's like, oh no. Hardigree's going to be angry. But, he was all right-- or big ***, as you insist I call you. MATT HARDIGREE: I am the big ***. That happened. What's the most impressive thing you've seen here in LA so far? MATT JONES: I saw a man who was on one of those scooter things-- MATT HARDIGREE: Like a Segway? MATT JONES: No, he was a large man. It was on one of those little fat people cart things. MATT HARDIGREE: Like a Rascal. Invalid carriage. MATT JONES: That's right, yeah. His flanks had actually enveloped the sides of the invalid carriage. That was the most impressive thing, and there's a bunch of cars. But yeah, that guy was-- JASON: Wow. Was he wearing head protection? MATT JONES: Definitely, yeah-- SIPS, as I believe Volvo calls it. JASON: In America, we've evolved to where you have integrated SIPS in our humans now. That's how far advanced we are. MATT JONES: But no, that was probably the most impressive thing I've seen. The cookies, on the Jaguar stand are also superb. MATT HARDIGREE: I haven't had any sweets. I need to go down to-- MATT JONES: You need to stop doing internet stuff. Is anybody watching this? MATT HARDIGREE: No. I think there's 50 people watching it right now. To those 50 people at home, I appreciate-- JF is smiling because he knows secretly the number has doubled. MATT JONES: Who's JF? Is that the bottom left guy? MATT HARDIGREE: That's JF, right there, on the bottom left. MATT JONES: Is he a "Jalopnik" writer? MATT HARDIGREE: He does Drive. MATT JONES: Should I have heard of him? MATT HARDIGREE: He's one of those Drive nutters. MATT JONES: OK, right. I saw Chris Harris walking around. MATT HARDIGREE: So the question that Micki had earlier, are there celebrities here. Chris Harris is the ultimate celebrity. And he's here right now, I need to go find him. MATT JONES: I saw a guy that looked just like Chuck Norris. I don't think it was Chuck Norris, but he looked so much like Chuck Norris. MATT HARDIGREE: I don't think this is a Christian, holy enough place for Chuck Norris, because he's very much into that. MATT JONES: Is he? Is he a God fearer? MATT HARDIGREE: He's a very evangelical-- MATT JONES: Or does God fear him? MATT HARDIGREE: True. Touche. This is that British wit. MATT JONES: You probably read about that on the internet, if you're an internet user. The long-armed British wit has breached America. MATT HARDIGREE: Slowly. We just got Basil Fawlty. We just got "Fawlty Towers." So that's where we're at. MATT JONES: You've got a lot to look forward to, then. MATT HARDIGREE: I cannot wait. You've met John Cleese? -Yeah. And his daughter. MATT HARDIGREE: Is his daughter hot? -Yes, pretty attractive. MATT HARDIGREE: John Cleese's daughter is hot. Can we-- TRAVIS: That's breaking news. Do we need a post? I'll post it. MATT HARDIGREE: Camilla Cleese, somebody Google in screencast, Camilla Cleese, because this is an important question. MATT JONES: Yeah, I want to see what she looks like. MATT HARDIGREE: We need what she looks like. Let's switch over to Spinelli or JF. Let's switch over to one of them so that they can talk while we look up Camilla Cleese. MIKE SPINELLI: So Justin Hyde, what have you seen here that-- by the way, from Yahoo! Autos-- what have you seen here that impresses you more than this tie? JUSTIN HYDE: This tie? Oh, thank you. MIKE SPINELLI: This beautiful tie. JUSTIN HYDE: Thank you. Yes, it's very nice. Impressed-- we already said Black Series, right? MIKE SPINELLI: Black Series. JUSTIN HYDE: SLS AMG Black Series, did anybody say that? MIKE SPINELLI: My arms aren't long enough. JUSTIN HYDE: Shorty. MIKE SPINELLI: Man, I'm short. JUSTIN HYDE: I've got to do everything for you. MIKE SPINELLI: So Black Series and-- [SIGNAL LOST] MATT HARDIGREE: We've lost Mike, but we're back here now with a picture of what Camilla Cleese looks like. MATT JONES: She's quite glossy in that. She seems to be covered in a film. MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, it's a very glossy photo, but it's attractive. MATT JONES: Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, she is. She is, but would you mark that a 10? MATT HARDIGREE: I would say she looks like an 8. MATT JONES: An 8? MATT HARDIGREE: Do you think too high? MATT JONES: Yeah, that's very generous, yeah. MATT HARDIGREE: I like the jacket she's wearing. And that mustache is really fantastic. MATT JONES: That's John Cleese. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh, I was saying John Cleese is an 8. TRAVIS: John Cleese is an 8. MATT JONES: You did that well. I mean, we're talking about-- If you're talking about John, solid 10. Solid 10. MATT HARDIGREE: OK, all right. We all agree we would sleep with John Cleese. MATT JONES: He looks like he'd be a tender lover. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh, absolutely. MATT JONES: And also, the pillow chat. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh my god, it would be fantastic. I would just call-- maybe clothed, or maybe not-- I would just call John Cleese and talk to him on the phone. Or FaceTime, or Google Hangout. MATT JONES: What even is that? MATT HARDIGREE: This is Google Hangout. MATT JONES: This is Google Hangout. MATT HARDIGREE: You're watching it now. You're having a conversation with tens of people on the internet. MATT JONES: I see. Tens? MATT HARDIGREE: Tens of them. MATT JONES: How many people are online now, 50? Still 50? Has it gone down? MATT HARDIGREE: That John Cleese thing probably pushed us up to 100. TRAVIS: There are dozens of us literally dozens. Possibly one dozen. MATT JONES: I got to get a drink. MATT HARDIGREE: All right, you need a drink? All right, thank you. Matt Jones, Top Gear. All right, well, we've got JF. Can you hear us, JF? What's going on? Is he muted? What's the deal? Un-mute yourself, JF. TRAVIS: I have official viewing numbers. 187 people watching right now. MATT HARDIGREE: Oh, 187? Well, you guys are getting the best of the LA Auto Show. Let's get some more cars here that we want to look at. I'm curious about this Fiat 500L here-- which just debuted. I saw Ralph this morning. You can see it there. Ralph was really excited about it. It's really important for the brand. Also the 500e only for sale in California. We said the 500L is like a Mini Countryman, but it's not all wheel drive. Tell me about it. TRAVIS: Well, it's more that it's a large version of a small car, just like the Mini Countryman is a four door of a Mini, which I call it the Medium Cooper. So this is kind of like a large Fiat 500. So it's not like it's a 500 at all. It's just using the 500 nameplate to then create some buzz around it. I think it looks like a nice car, I honestly do. But I don't know if it should be called a 500 based on what it is in the end. Does that make sense? MATT HARDIGREE: It's not unattractive. Do you think this is the direction they're going to go with for the new Fiat 500? Are we getting a glimpse of it early? TRAVIS: I think so. I do. I think that it's tough, though, for them with the 500, because they're going to have to modernize it from what it was. And now it's just going to be this. It's going to be like the new Beetle, which the new new Beetle isn't like a new Beetle, just like that 500 isn't a 500, I guess. I think the new 500 will look a lot like that with two less doors, and obviously a lot smaller, but probably bigger than the current 500. And then they'll have to put a car below it that's smaller, and it'll go into that stupid Russian doll situation that we've had for BMW, I guess. Because they have to make something smaller than the 3 Series. And then they made the 1, and they're going to make smaller than the 1 because the 1 is getting large. MATT HARDIGREE: Gotcha. And this is the Ener-G-Force, the "scientologically" named Ener-G-Force. It's a future glimpse of what the Fletcher Gelandewagen's going to look like in the future. I'm not a huge fan of it. I think that it looks very masculine, I'll give it that. But I'm not very excited about it. TRAVIS: I think if they have to modernize the G-Class-- which they probably do, because it's been around since 1976-- I think that this is probably the best way that they can do it. Because it just looks like a big angry truck. It's OK. I kind of like it. I'm not sure I understand how it works. MATT HARDIGREE: Can we hear Spinelli? Is Spinelli back? TRAVIS: I think we're back with Spinelli, yeah. MATT HARDIGREE: Spinelli is just walking, wandering around, looking for more food, accosting people-- which is exciting. TRAVIS: Maybe he can find somebody for us. We've lost JF. JF is out of battery. MATT HARDIGREE: Poor JF. Oh, there's the Black Series again. And this is the issue with LA. Detroit is a real, true two day auto show, LA's a one day. There's going to be some news tomorrow with Mazda, but they squeeze a lot in into a day. The press conferences are 30 minutes apart. It's very hard to get your bearings about what's going on. Oh, there's the Ener-G-Force. Good job, Mike. MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah, sorry. Here it is. MATT HARDIGREE: That's good. Give us a close up tour of this crazy thing. MIKE SPINELLI: This crazy thing? MATT HARDIGREE: It's just like a crazy, roided out freak right there. And there's also the car. Bam-- Matt Farah joke. He's huge. That's the Matt Farah of SUVs right there. Mike can't talk, so he's just going to show us images of this. What do you like about it, Travis? I don't get it. Explain it to me. TRAVIS: I like that it's a big freaking truck, and that's what it's supposed to be. It's supposed to be eco and hydrogen powered and some sort of strange, weird cistern system on the roof that somehow converts water magically through the power-- I don't know-- of science. I think there's science involved. And it gets it to become the motivational force of the vehicle somehow, is what I got from the press release when I first read it. But I still think that it looks like a G-Wagen, but it's modern. And that's what I like about it, is that they didn't try and take the car and then now it's not a soft rotor. It's still unabashedly going to go off-road. It's going to do with it was built to do way back when. And plus it's never going to be built anyway, so we can look at it and say that it looks-- I think it looks kind of cool. Except for the stupid things, like they put G's in LEDs in the headlights because they thought that's a good idea. Because everybody needs LEDs in their cars now or else they're not real cars apparently. MATT HARDIGREE: OK, I'll give you that. All right, that's fine. And we see the SUV, the old Gelandewagen next to it. That's not bad. In that sense, it's a big, kind of crazy, truck. I do like it. I think that is an interesting look. We had a question from Kinja about Nissan. And what is Nissan looking like at the show? Which is a good question, because the press conference just started two minutes ago, Nissan. They're going to show the new Rogue, so we are very close to seeing-- I don't know if there are any pictures of it up on the web yet, if it's leaked. Actually, you know what? I'm going to beat everyone on the internet to this, and Raphael is going to start writing it up soon. But the Nissan Hi Cross concept-- hold on, let me screenshare it for everyone. Well, there's also this weird Smart car with wings. TRAVIS: That's a thing? That's legitimately the thing? MATT HARDIGREE: That is legitimately a thing. But right now what we're looking at is-- TRAVIS: Oh, wow. MATT HARDIGREE: There it is. The Hi Cross Concept is what they're calling it. But that's a preview of the new Rogue. Interesting thing about the rogue-- TRAVIS: That's great. MATT HARDIGREE: So they make the Rogue and the Juke, which are essentially a similar class of car. The Rogue's a little bit bigger than the Juke. But they made one really feminine and one really masculine. The Rogue was obviously the really feminine one. You can see it here. This is actually a little less feminine. I'm not a huge fan of the current Rogue. This actually looks better to me. TRAVIS: Yeah, it does. But I don't understand their strategy with crossovers, because if you have the Murano, the Pathfinder, the Rogue, Juke-- there's one more, isn't there? MATT HARDIGREE: Not here. The Pathfinder Xterra, that's not a crossover. TRAVIS: Xterra's not a crossover. So they have four things, and they cannibalize each other, especially now the Murano, and now that the Pathfinders like that. And I just don't like the Rogue. I don't see a point of the Rogue. I never did. I think that the Juke is-- MATT HARDIGREE: It's for ladies-- ladies who won't buy Nissan Jukes. TRAVIS: But a lot of men don't like Nissan Jukes either. That's the problem. I like the Juke personally, but I know a lot people that don't like the Juke. MATT HARDIGREE: I like the Juke too. I'm with you. What was up with the Smart? Did we ever do a story on that Smart? What's up with that crazy Smart with the wings on it? TRAVIS: I don't know. I thought that this was a joke that apparently is actually a real thing. MIKE SPINELLI: So this is [INAUDIBLE]. So you know who exactly I'm talking about-- Jeremy Scott. You've been to Fashion Week, you know who he is. He designed this Smart car. This in the back represents eternal majesty. No, I have no idea what it represents. TRAVIS: Did you say eternal majesty? That's what-- MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah. TRAVIS: It looks great. So basically they-- MATT HARDIGREE: It looks-- MIKE SPINELLI: I don't know whether that's a thing. So let's just take a look at it. What have we got? TRAVIS: I don't get this thing at all. I don't see a point. Apparently this is the new Smart car. This is the next year's Fortwo isn't it? They're going to add wings to the back for like an air break or something? MATT HARDIGREE: Mike, of course, is reporting from the Blitz in London. TRAVIS: It sounds rough down there. MIKE SPINELLI: Yeah it's their new design language. TRAVIS: It's the Phoenix. They're trying to sell more things to bird lovers. The avian crowd is who's going to be buying this new car. MATT HARDIGREE: Avians are huge Smart car buyers, because there's not a lot of light pollution. TRAVIS: Right. So if you're a big fan of titmouses-- titmice, I guess would be the name of the bird. I just wanted to say titmice. Crows. MATT HARDIGREE: You did get titmice on the-- TRAVIS: Any avian fans are going to love this new Smart car, but I can't see it. It's just us now. So is there a reason why it's Forjeremy? Is it a charity car? Is that what the deal is? Because I honestly didn't research this car at all today. MATT HARDIGREE: No, I didn't either. it's a fully functional electric car which-- oh, it looks like the wings he did for the Adidas shoe. There's Adidas shoes with the wings, which looks very good. That was Jeremy Scott. So it's kind of a Jeremy Scott sort of thing. TRAVIS: So it's like-- who's that guy that ran a lot in Greece? You know who I'm talking about. The ancient guy, with the wings on his shoes and the running messenger of some sort. MATT HARDIGREE: It starts with an N. Nicko, like the drummer from Iron Maiden, Nicko. TRAVIS: I'm pretty sure it's not Nicko. MATT HARDIGREE: No, I'm pretty sure it's Nicko. TRAVIS: It is? MATT HARDIGREE: Salman Rushdie? TRAVIS: It might be Salman Rushdie. It actually is Salman Rushdie, if you didn't-- MATT HARDIGREE: Yeah, Nicko McBrain or Salman Rushdie, or-- TRAVIS: It's one of the two. MATT HARDIGREE: We're borderline. TRAVIS: It might be Paul McCartney. So what's your big disappointment at the show? What's the thing that you wished was better so far? MATT HARDIGREE: So the biggest step that anyone's taken-- and I'll bring up an image of it right now. Hold on a second. Let me screenshare this to you. So you can see here that the Lincoln stand is all vintage Lincoln cars, which is really exciting. And it's actually the boldest thing that I've seen in a while from an automaker at a stand. Because you go there and there's a gorgeous Lincoln MK2. And the MK2 is interesting because there was a time when Lincoln was so ahead of the game and so on top of it that they launched another brand on top of Lincoln. There was Mercury still, and there was still Ford, and there was Lincoln, and then there was this new Continental brand that the MK2 was going to be the flagship of. Now Lincoln is in such bad shape in terms of their model mix, that they're going to replace all of these cars tomorrow with MKZs, which is terrible. The MKZ's not a bad car. Because we like the Fusion, so theoretically we like the MKZ. But I just don't care. And it's not a luxury car. That's the worst part of the luxury market, the front wheel drive mid-sizer. I'm just not into it. So it's a disappointment that Lincoln is not going to replace these cars with something that's a flagship, real life car. And they're not going to take this opportunity to do anything but show a car we've already seen for an entire year, since January-- almost a full year since The Detroit Auto Show. But I think that the Jaguar, which is a few years ago, even though we liked the XF, Jaguar was just basically the XK and the XF and an outgoing XJ. And then it was just the XJ, the XF, and the XK. And now we've got an F-Type. So There's four cars. So Jaguar's having great sales-- 35% up this year. You can turn a brand around. It takes a really long time. And Jaguar's had to go through all the different steps. So I'm curious to see if this is really the first step of Lincoln, or we're going to look back at all these cars in a year or 2 and laugh at what Lincoln did because it wasn't a success. So it's a disappointment that there's nothing better from them. TRAVIS: Well, what else in the front drive, mid-size, luxury category? You've got Acura TL, Lexus ES, and this, right, the Lincoln MKZ. MATT HARDIGREE: Buick Lacrosse, if you count that. TRAVIS: I'm not going count that. MATT HARDIGREE: Cadillac XTS is all-wheel drive, but it's essentially the same thing. TRAVIS: But I think that's larger. I think that the CTS would be more the same size, though. MATT HARDIGREE: True. TRAVIS: So who would buy the Lincoln over any of those cars that we just listed? I know that I don't think that I would. If it drives as well as the Fusion does, great. But it doesn't look as good as the Fusion does. That's the problem with it. MATT HARDIGREE: No, it doesn't. I don't know who would. I've got no good answer for that. I think that Lincoln has trouble. And until they can make a vehicle that is desirable that we don't already get from Ford, I think they're-- but there's 3 people in the company. There's Alan Mulally, and there's Jim Farley, and there's Mark Fields. And Jim and Mark want to keep Lincoln going for some reason, they don't want to lose the brand. And they've been given a little rope. At But I don't see what the plan is, and I don't think that the MKZ is a good part of the stand. I think putting 6 MKZs out there tomorrow is just going to remind people that they don't have a plan that we can see yet. TRAVIS: I spoke to Jim about a year ago, and he had said that they were going to go for an independent shopper who is high intellect-- that sort of thing. But that's the people who bought Saabs. And those people didn't really buy a lot of Saabs. And where is Saab now? Saab is auctioning off wagons that it never actually built because they have to pay off creditors and stuff. So I think it's going to go the way of Saab, unfortunately. MATT HARDIGREE: I concur. Well, I think this is good. I think we've been on the air for about an hour now, which is what we said we would do. We had some technical difficulties, but we're figuring it out. Those who tuned in to watch it live, I really appreciate it. Thanks for coming out. Thanks to the guys at Google, Google Hangout-- guys and girls who were helping put it together. Ian, JF, Mike, Matt Farah, who stopped by, Christian, Travis for anchoring it, Jason for popping in, Matt from Top Gear, Raphael, the whole team. Thanks for watching. If you're watching this on replay, you can always go back to jalopnik.com for all your car news. And we'll have more news, new Kia Forte, new look at the Rogue coming up soon on jalopnik.com. All right. Thanks, guys. TRAVIS: Right. See you later.