
No, no, no!
Say it ain’t so! This is terrible news!
Dodge is apparently going to begin negotiations for the sale of its “Viper” nameplate. Chrysler has always been the most anemic of the Big Three, and with Ford and GM both hit hard by the economy crisis, I can only imagine what the situation is like at Chrysler’s big brass. Must be hell.
But this is sad, terrible news, even though it was kind of expected. I had always hoped that Chrysler would find a way to keep the Viper alive, maybe as a low volume, limited production a year type of image car. But the financial strain was apparently too great, and now its the Viper that is under the axe.
This is personally rather distressing for me, as the Viper has always held a special spot in my heart (and that of many others). Though the Viper and Corvette have always blood enemies in competition, I hold them both in equal esteem and adoration. To me, they symbolize the epitome of the American muscle car, that is to say, a no frills, rude, obnoxious, rough, aggressive, and above all, powerful car. The Corvette and the Viper aren’t elegant, they aren’t refined, they have absolutely no finesse— instead they’re just dominant, raw, and beastly, and that scares the crap out of everyone else.
To hear that the Viper, an icon of Dodge and of America, is going to be sold… well, my day just got a little less bright. I hear that it might be sold to a tuning company, or a group of investors, whatever it is, I hope that at least in stays in America (if it becomes the Tata Viper I’ll shoot myself). The look might stay the same, the badge and performance might remain, but it will no longer be the Dodge Viper, and that’s a damn shame.



