The SRT8 is obviously the most important unveil with a 425 HP 6.1-liter V8 HEMI that is now available with a manual transmission. The Challenger SE has a 250 HP 3.5-liter V6 HEMI capable of 25 MPG on the highway and a 276 watt Boston Connect sound system. The Challenger R/T has a 370 HP 5.7-liter V8 HEMI that is also available with a track pack that includes a six speed manual transmission and more.

  51.2%
- 48.8%
= 2.4%

And, we are pretty sure that 2.4% is less than 3%, so both the Charger R/T and the Challenger R/T are permanent members of the Jalopnik Fantasy Garage! And by the power of Grayskull raw "because I say so," the two Dodges will share a single spot. Reality be damned.

Dodge Charger R/T

In the mid-1960s the Dodge boys had to stand aside and watch as Pontiac sold tens of thousands of GTOs. Not surprisingly, Dodge dealers were pissed. Chrysler President Lynn Townsend (the man behind the Pentastar) called Dodge's chief engineer Burt Bouwkamp into his office and demanded a solution, adding, "for God's sake don't make it a derivative of the Barracuda." Bouwkamp and his team followed the order and in 1965 presented the Charger II Show Car. If the public liked it, the thinking went, Dodge would build it. As Bouwkamp said, "It was pre-ordained that they would like it." Dodge went on to build the Charger, selling 37,344 in six months. However, added competition from the Chevy Camaro and Ford Mustang saw total sales for all of 1967 drop to less than 16,000 units. A redesign was ordered.

The resulting car was the 1968-1970 B-body, quite simply one of the baddest looking machines ever built. While the previous version had all the right go-fast stuff (including the introduction of the 426 Street Hemi) it looked frumpy. Not so for the new model, as Dodge's stylists knocked the sinister-look ball out of the park and into the next millennium, where the car continues to blow minds and take numbers. That's owed to its seductive double-diamond or "coke bottle" styling, where the body bulged out at the front and rear quarters. Think about it: how much time did you spend as a child fondling a Hot Wheels General Lee? We bet a lot.

Like all great muscle cars, the Charger didn't just look hot, it frigging flew. Power came from a variety of engines, but only two matter in today's context: the please-mod-me 440 Six Pack Magnum and the 426 Hemi with its insane compression ratio straight from the factory. We know the Hemi had the power advantage (supposedly), pulling 433.5 horses on the dyno in 1965 (the factory claimed 425). but Bill Hickman, the baddie in Bullitt, hooned the 440. Long story short, we wish we had tough decisions like this in front of us nowadays. How does this sound — if the Charger R/T makes it into the Garage, just imagine it comes stuffed with your favorite engine, as it really don't matter. And if you like, just debate it in the comments.

Let's take a closer look at the Bullitt Charger. First, the (awesome) Mustang(s) that McQueen drove were actually heavily modified cars. Here's what Max Balchowsky, the guy responsible for modifying and maintaining all the Bullitt vehicles had to say:

I was really impressed with the Mustang after I got done with it. I didn't think it'd make that much difference beefing it up. Later, we took both cars out and went playing around with them over by Griffith Park (near Los Angeles). The Dodge, which was practically stock, just left the Mustang like you wouldn't believe.

The Charger ran rings around the Mustang. We trimmed the tires down (on the Charger), we practically made them down to bicycle tires to try and handicap Hickman, and Bill just run them.

Dodge Challenger R/T

But on the other hand, you have the Challenger. For half a decade Dodge dealers had to bend over and take the fact that Ford was selling millions of Mustangs while they had no pony car whatsoever. To compound the injury, Chevy had its Camaro, Pontiac had the Firebird and even cousin Plymouth was raking in the youth market duckets with its Barracuda. Hell, even Mercury had the Cougar. All of that changed in 1970 when Chrysler, saving (maybe) the best muscle car for last, green-lighted a Dodge version of its new E-body chassis. And man oh man, was a legend ever born.

Like its big brother Charger, the Challenger was available with a raft of engine choices, but again the only two we care about are the 426 Hemi and the 440 Six Pack Magnum. Same power, too, but the smaller Challenger was lighter and more nimble. Performance, for the time, was massive, with zero-to-60 times right around six seconds and the quarter-mile happening in the mid 13s. And with decent tires, the times dropped. The Challengers looked the part, too, with their sleek snouts and bulging, slightly jacked up haunches. Designer Carl Cameron actually borrowed the design for the grill from a sketch of a '66 Charger he drew that was to be turbine-powered. We love that.

But you just can't talk about think about the Dodge Challenger without a close examination of Vanishing Point and the car meant to the film. For those who haven't seen the Barry Newman original, slap yourself. Then, bookmark this page, go rent it then watch it. Finished? Good. And now you know that for no reason other than the fact that he can do it, Kowalski jumps into his white "supercharged" Challenger and decides to drive from Denver to San Francisco solo in 15 hours. While hopped up on goofballs. Why did you climb the mountain? Because it was there.

For years the rumor mill has prolifically churned out all sorts of speculation as to what exactly Kowalski was driving. For certain it was a white Challenger with a Hurst four-speed. One camp maintained that there was in fact some sort of special, also hopped up, supercharged Mopar mill under the hood. Sadly, that's just not so. Vanishing Point featured five different Challengers (and a doomed Camaro!) in the role of Kowalski's ride (though oddly at one point Newman claimed there were nine cars). Four had 440 Magnums, while one had a 383 with a three-speed slusher.

Many people (me nearly included) consider the chase scene in Bullitt to be the greatest ever. However, where Bullitt is only an — admittedly — good movie that just happened to feature an eye-popping chase sequence, Vanishing Point is nothing but a car chase. And, paradoxically, anything but a car chase. America was near the bloody end of the Vietnam War and the young not white privileged enough to get a college deferment were being drafted and slaughtered in an essentially meaningless old man's war. At the same time the politics of the day seemed hopeless and the idealism of the 60s had crashed and burned. Vanishing Point then, was an expression of disgust, a shot across the bow of the status quo. With car as metaphor. And of course, the car chosen to vent this rage was the mighty Challenger. Kawolski's ticket to ride, man.

Maybe you're not feeling it: the hunger for freedom, the raw angst, that generations' damaged zeitgeist. One of my favorite moments from Die Hard was when Agent Johnson shouts to Agent Johnson, "YEEEEEEEEEE HAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!! Just like fucking Vietnam!" To which Agent Johnson replies, "I was in junior high, dickhead." I want to leave you with a poem by W.S. Merwin that I'm hope will shed a little light:

Losing a Language

A breath leaves the sentences and does not come back
yet the old still remember something that they could say

but they know now that such things are no longer believed
and the young have fewer words

many of the things the words were about
no longer exist

the noun for standing in mist by a haunted tree
the verb for I

the children will not repeat
the phrases their parents speak

somebody has persuaded them
that it is better to say everything differently

so that they can be admired somewhere
farther and farther away

where nothing that is here is known
we have little to say to each other

we are wrong and dark
in the eyes of the new owners

the radio is incomprehensible
the day is glass

when there is a voice at the door it is foreign
everywhere instead of a name there is a lie

nobody has seen it happening
nobody remembers

this is what the words were made
to prophesy

here are the extinct feathers
here is the rain we saw

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The Jalopnik Fantasy Garage, So Far:
RUF RT12 | 1978 Aston Martin V8 Vantage | Honda 1300 Coupe 9 | 1931 Daimler Double Six 50 Corsica Drophead Coupe | Ferrari 288 GTO | Chevrolet Corvette ZR-1 | 1970 Buick GSX 455 | First Generation BMW M Coupe | Bugatti Veyron 16.4 | Ford GT | Citroen SM | Porsche 928 | Jensen FF | DeTomaso Vallelunga | Audi Quattro S1 | Buick GNX | Nissan Skyline R34 GT-R | Honorary Fantasy Garager: The LS1 Powered Rotus | Lamborghini LM002 | Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe | Ferrari 250 GTO | Bentley Speed Six | Talbot-Lago T150C SS Figoni et Falaschi Raindrop/Teardrop Coupe | Porsche 917 | Audi RS4 Avant || Lamborghini Miura | Mercedes-Benz 450SEL 6.9 | BMW E39 M5 | Jaguar E-type | Mercedes-Benz 300 SL

Related:
Spy Photos: Production Dodge Avenger; Avenger To Be Assembled! Dodge Dealer Memo Confirms Production Of New Sedan, Minivan [internal]

You've already read the review of the Jeep Compass (or at least you looked at the pictures). Well, the Dodge Caliber is a Jeep Compass with a Dodge grille grafted on. Actually it's the other way around. I'll just say the Dodge is the car DCX was supposed to build, while the Jeep is the botched-nose-job twin that made it to production because it "did well in the clinics."

But enough about the Compass, we're here with the Caliber, and trying our best to avoid any Dr. Evil Fembot-like puns. The Caliber follows up the Dodge Neon, which was launched under the oh-so-cute tagline of "Hi." That probably explains the "Anything But Cute" advertising message of the Caliber. But we didn't need an ad to tell us the Caliber is ugly, we can see it with our own eyes. Although it's a more awkward, Citroen CX kind of ugly rather than a what-were-they-thinking, Studebaker Avanti kind of ugly. [How dare you — ed.]

On a positive note, the Caliber is definitely not bland. And the exterior shape results in a spacious interior. The inside feels huge, although a large dashboard top is a shade too minivanlike for our tastes. The plastics, which reviewers have universally maligned, are not quite as bad as you'd think. They look great until you touch them and realize how horribly cheap they seem. But such is the compromise of a budget car (though the Caliber R/T we tested starts at $19,985). You could have nicer plastics, like a VW Rabbit or a Honda Civic, or you could have cool shit like body-color inserts in the seating and on the dash, a semi-refrigerated drink compartment, lighted cupholders, AC power, and flip-down rear speakers. It really depends on what you like, and if you like features, the Caliber has a ton of them.

Unfortunately, if you like driving, there are better choices than the Caliber. The Caliber goes about its transportation duties with a can-do approach. The 172-hp four-cylinder gets things moving quietly, but not exactly quickly, and it's likely either of the less-powerful engine choices struggle in this area. Part of the sluggish response — also somewhat evident in the steering — has to be due to the all-wheel-drive system. The continuously variable transmission also hides some driving sensations with its smoothness. Like the interior plastics, though, enthusiastic driving spotlights the budgetary trade-offs. From a market standpoint, that's probably a good idea. Budget-car consumers tend to focus on safety, features, and space, and the Caliber succeeds on all of those fronts.

Let's just say, if the wizards who built the Neon SRT-4 can make a similar transformation with the Caliber SRT-4, that car will be awesome. In the meantime, the Caliber presents itself as a solid entry in the compact-car market. [Mike Austin]

Related:
Jalopnik Reviews: 2007 Dodge Caliber R/T, Part 2, Part 3 [internal]

read and heed... [SRT Forums]

Related:
Spy Photos: Dodge Avenger? [internal]

THREE (3) VEHICLE DRAWING C PRIZES: 2009 Dodge Challenger R/T. ARV: $30,000.

Although that number's just an approximation, and heavens knows it don't mean a hill of beans — it's certainly a good indication Dodge's looking to move some of these here muscle cars. The Charger's priced at about the same ($30,705) for the R/T with a HEMI, and since the two share the same underskirt, that pricing makes some sense. [Hat tip to Zerin!]

Official Sweepstakes Rules [Dodge/ePrize]

Related:
No Free Mustache Rides From Dr. Z — How About A Free Dodge Challenger Instead? [internal]

Why you should buy this car: V-8 boeuf, solid handling, decent hauling capacity. If you're a family of four or less with at least one enthusiast driver in the mix, the Magnum should definitely be on your list of potential buys.

Why you shouldn t buy this car: A minivan, an SUV or a luxury car it isn't. For the same money there are smaller cars that get better mileage, vehicles that can carry more that get better mileage, or more luxurious cars that get better mileage. But there's no direct competitor to the Magnum. You know if you want it; if you're not sure, you probably don't.

Suitability Parameters
· Speed Merchants: Yes
· Fashion Victims: Yes
· Treehuggers: No
· Mack Daddies: Yes
· Tuner Crowd: No
· Hairdressers: Yes
· Penny Pinchers: No
· Euro Snobs: No
· Working Stiffs: Yes
· Technogeeks: No
· Poseurs: Yes
· Soccer Moms: Yes
· Nascar Dads: Yes
· Golfing Grandparents: Yes

Vitals
· Manufacturer: Dodge
· Model tested: R/T
· Model year: 2006
· Price as Tested: $34,095
· Engine type: 5.7 litre Hemi V8
· Horsepower: 345hp
· Torque: 375 ft.-lbs.
· Wheels and Tires: P225 / 60 R18 Touring
· Drive type: rear-wheel-drive
· 0 - 60: 6.1 secs
· 1/4 mile: 14.7 secs. @ 97 mph
· Top speed: 143 mph
· Fuel economy city/highway: 17/25
· NHTSA crash test rating front/side/rollover: 4/4/10%

[by Davey G. Johnson]

Related:
Jalopnik Reviews: 2006 Dodge Magnum R/T, Part 1, Part 2 [Internal]

Exterior Design ****
I'm givin' it a four, mainly because I like the Charger's angry-eyebrows front end more than the wide-eyed, vaguely phallic nose of the Magnum. And of course, the 300's the best of the bunch. That said, I really dig the choptop styling of all the LX cars, and the semi-fastback five-door look makes it a MILF-wagon for sure, yet it remains butch enough for the boys.

Acceleration *****
It's got a damn Hemi. What more do you need to know?

Braking ****
Good pedal feel, modulation's predictable, I only got into the ABS once during a panic stop.

Ride ****
The ride's simultaneously firm and compliant. Detroit finally learned how to make a V-8, rear-drive wagon that avoids wallow like Tom DeLay avoids the citizens of Austin.

Handling ***
The Mag's handling belies its weight, and in some instances, the heavier rearward bias gives it a bit of an advantage over the Charger. I can't really explain this, but that's the story my ass told me, and I'm stickin' to it. That said, I'm still pissed at Chrysler's engineers for making the steering too light at highway speeds. It's the LX line's one Achilles' heel.

Gearbox ****
The five-speed in the LX cars was the first example of a decent implementation of Chrysler's AutoStick manumatic that I've ever actually enjoyed. The fact that the trans is Merc-sourced probably has something to do with it, because Chrysler itself hasn't built a decent autobox since the venerable 727 TorqueFlite.

Audio/Video ***
The optional Boston Acoustics stereo system sounded great blaring everything from the Lazy Cowgirls to James Brown to Pinhead Gunpowder once we dialed out a bit of the boominess. As a kid-carrier, the Magnum's lacking in playtoys, but as an adult driver's car, it's got all you need.

Toys ****
The Hemi's a phenomenal toy. We can (and did) play with it all day. Other than that, the nav system's the only other toylike feature. But with a motor this good and a chassis this well-sorted, who really needs anything else?

Trunk ****
The Magnum is fairly cavernous with the 60/40 rear seats folded down, and the hinged roof on the hatchback makes loading easier. One point off for having to lift items over a lip and reduced headroom for seats-down episodes of fleshy-union engagement.

Overall ****

[by Davey G. Johnson]

Jalopnik Reviews: 2006 Dodge Magnum R/T, Part 1, Part 3

I just saw a guy at a stoplight in a Dodge Magnum with a bad billet grille and a set of overwrought dubs. He looked as if he may earn additional income by starring in bear porn flicks: shaved head, prematurely gray, bushy handlebar mustache, etc. I glanced down at the fender tag to check the model. Just as I'd figured. Six cylinders. For what the fool spent on bling, he could ve had a Hemi. And make no mistake, for all of the so-called sports-tourer's conveniences and avant-garde styling, you want this car for the optional 5.7 litre pushrod V8.

The Magnum s essentially a study in stylish compromise no third-row seat like mom s Country Squire of yore, but decent hauling capacity is part and parcel of the package. Thoughful touches lifted from Chrysler s years of minivan experience abound, but think of the Mag more as a less-cute PT Cruiser designed to appeal to enthusiast drivers with a need to haul stuff.

And so I treated it as such, barking the tires on launches, making ill-advised maneuvers my daily-driver Durango would (literally) kill me for, and generally having a wonderful old time with all that horsepower at my command. Sometimes you just wanna needlessly lay on the accelerator to feel the Hemi burble under your right foot. Other times you simply wanna whack it and feel the torque press you back into the seat. Most of the time it s other times. The fun of that goddamn motor simply doesn t get old, ensuring that you ll never see the EPA s 17mpg city. And it s simple to get even more stupid with the economy if you dig into Chrysler s Merc-sourced five-speed AutoStick trans, stumbling along in 2nd gear just to hear the rumble out the chrome-tipped twin pipes.

For all that muscle, it s not anything close to a 440-equipped 69 Sport Suburban, however; the Magnum s refined no wallow, nav system, firm, comfortable seats, et cetera. The interior s a tad too plasticky for our tastes it s as if DCX spent all of the money on the surplus Mercedes bits and skimped on prettifying the inside. Then again, having grown up on musclecars, I'll take the cheap-interior/great-powertrain combo over the inverse, but one would think that for 35 large (as tested) both would be standard. Still, everything falls nicely to hand, and there s no back-straining to release the foot-operated e-brake. (Was the lack of a handbrake a concession to anti-hoon forces?)

One issue I ve had with both Chrysler LX cars I ve driven (the Charger R/T is the other), however, is the steering. While it works wonderfully in parking lots and is relatively easy to toss through corners, it emphatically needs more weight at speed on the highway. And given that the Magnum harkens back to the day when V8-engined full-size cars ruled the Eisenhower Interstate System, that seems like a pretty serious misstep on DCX's part. Supposedly, the SRT8 models rectify this, but I ve have yet to get any seat time in one. Still, it seems like a no-brainer, across-the-line fix to a problem that mars an entire group of vehicles. It s my one major beef with a car that I otherwise love very much and was sad to see go at the end of its tenure. (Fade in mopey Jets to Brazil track here.)

One thing that s tough to get used to in the Magnum is the weight of the car; the sprightly Hemi and the well-geared autobox get it off the line quickly and the suspension does a commendable job of getting it around corners. While the four-wheel discs are quite capable of dragging the beast s velocity down, I found myself laying into the pedal harder than I expected to stop in the required distance. Still, the pedal modulation is good and predictable, unlike some other ChryCo vehicles I ve encountered in the past.

While I didn t haul much more than a couple of overnight bags during the course of my four days with the car, I did wring it out on the Pacific Coast Highway between Santa Cruz and San Francisco, as well as in the Napa Wine Country, the former of which led to a re-enactment of Dan Neil s infamous Ford Expedition test for the Raleigh News & Observer, which it passed albeit not with flying colors. While it was relatively easy and quick to ready the cargo area for action, the cool-looking sloping rear roofline can interfere a bit with the um, festivities, and the crevice between the load floor and the folded seatback was a little tough on the back of my conscripted co-tester. Ah, the pain one endures on the quest for truth in auto journalism. If Joseph Campbell were still of this earth, he d be all up in my steez, no doubt.

Which brings me to my final point about Dodge's wagon: in an informal poll of women I know, they seemed to prefer the Magnum to the Charger. I mentioned this to Spinelli, theorizing that the Hemi appeals to their primal side, while the wagon styling appeals to their practical, maternal side. He responded, Dr Freud's Car Corner, ladies and gentleman. Maybe we ll fire that recurring feature up when Hoon of the Day leaps the dogfish. In the meantime, I leave you with the following final, vaguely inappropriate musing: The Dodge Magnum: Beefy enough for a wannabe gay porn star, practical enough to stir the loins of a thirtysomething woman. Think of it as some perverse automotive version of Miller Lite. [by Davey G. Johnson]

Related:
The Truth About the Magnum SRT8 [Internal]

Jalopnik Reviews: 2006 Dodge Magnum R/T, Part 2, Part 3 [Internal]

Why you shouldn t buy this car: The anti-four-door brigade has a point: the Charger R/T lacks charisma. While the Hemi lets rip in fine fashion, and The Dodge Boys have pumped-up the interior volume to proper Yank Tank proportions, there s really nothing to get all that excited about. A muscle car needs drama, flair and excitement. The Charger R/T is simply too sensible for its own good. Both the interior and exterior lack the kind of killer app that lifts a bread-and-butter sedan onto that next level, where you re completely convinced that your kid schlepper is too cool for school.

Why you should buy this car: The engine.

Chrysler s 5.7-liter Hemi is a pistonheads dream come true: a smooth cruising, bad-ass blasting peach of a powerplant, offering massive bang for very little bucks. The outer wrapper (i.e. the car) lacks the ripped physique muscle car fanatics adore, but the Charger s ergonomics will increase the average driver s appreciation for the sedan s engineering and value as the miles blow by. The Charger R/T is practical, comfortable, reliable, affordable and, in a straight line, fun.

Suitability Parameters:
· Speed Merchants: Yes
· Fashion Victims: No
· Treehuggers: No
· Mack Daddies: No
· Tuner Crowd: Yes
· Hairdressers: No
· Penny Pinchers: No
· Euro Snobs: No
· Working Stiffs: No
· Technogeeks: No
· Poseurs: No
· Soccer Moms: No
· Nascar Dads: Yes
· Golfing Grandparents: No

Vitals:
· Manufacturer: Dodge
· Model tested: Dodge Charger R/T
· Model year: 2006
· Price as Tested: $29,995
· Engine type: 5.7-liter Hemi V8, cast iron block, 16-vavles
· Horsepower: 340 hp @ 5000 rpm
· Torque: 390 ft. lbs. @ 4000 rpm
· Redline: 5800 rpm
· Wheels and Tires: Continental P225/60R118H 99H All Season Touring
· Drive type: RWD
· 0 - 60: 6.0 secs.
· 1/4 mile: 13.9 secs.
· Top speed: 130 mph (limited)
· Fuel economy city/highway: 17/25
· NHTSA crash test rating front/side/rollover: 5/5/4

[by Robert Farago]

Related:
Jalopnik Reviews: 2006 Dodge Charger R/T, Part 1, Part 2 [internal]

Exterior Design: ***
The Charger s sheet metal sits somewhere between the suppository-shaped nouveaux GTO and the re-imagined Mustang GT. If it weren t for the Dodge s fastback rear, the Charger wouldn t even rate a single star. If you re looking for the real deal(ish), it s best to wait; the hood scooped and bespoilered Charger SRT-8 is The One.

Ergonomics: ****
Like its sister-under-the-skin, the Chrysler 300, the Dodge Charger is a supremely comfortable place in which to smoke Honduran cigars with your crew or take the kids to school. That said, the Charger s rent-a-car cabin lacks the slightest hint of spizzarkle. Aftermarket aggression is a must.

Acceleration: *****
The Little Engine that Could (save a Detroit automaker) stumps-up enough shove to make this 4000lbs. sedan get up and move. Never has so much neck snappage been available to so many for so little.

Braking: *****
No complaints here: great feel, massive retardation from big discs and stiffened aluminum calipers. If a car is only as good as its breaks, the Charger R/T is as good as it gets.

Ride: ***
We re talking Old School dynamics: a fundamentally floaty-drifty suspension with only a distant thunder peal letting you know the eighteens have lost contact with the pavement. Really cavernous concrete brings out the Charger R/T s inner Batman: bang, crash, wallop!

Handling: ****
Safe, predictable, controllable. How exciting is that? Still, the Dodge Boys have done their level best to keep the Charger at its level best— but the old E-Class underpinnings do not/can not a BMW make. There s only one thing for it: switch off the handling Nanny, goose the gas and steer with your right foot. Now that s what I call fun!

Gearbox: **
Under light loads, shifts are satisfyingly seamless. Give the Charger s go-pedal a proper pasting and the five-speed gearbox is easily flummoxed: kickdown is neither smooth nor instant. Note to DCX: it s time to make Merc s seven-speed box standard across the range.

Audio/Video: ***
Mr. Boombastic will be pleased with the Boston Acoustics 276 watt ICE, but anyone looking for a little Mozart with their muscle will soon find themselves in a sonic muddle. The Charger s headrests are the perfect size for video monitors, but that s more bling than bad ass, yes?

Toys: *
The optional DVD-nav with MP3 will set you back a cool $1800, and kinda ruins the whole muscle car gestalt. What we really need are some more gauges, or built-in timing gear. Something. Anything.

Trunk: *****
If the trunk was any more capacious, the Charger would have to be a hatchback.

Overall rating: ****

Summary tommorrow. [by Robert Farago]

Related:
Jalopnik Reviews: 2006 Dodge Charger R/T, Part 1, Part 3 [internal]

When The Dodge Boys first announced that the new Charger would have four-doors, muscle car aficionados howled in protest. On the face of it, it s hard to understand why a couple of extra portals would get them so enervated. When considering the suitability of an American-branded steroidal sedan for induction into the Tank Top T-shirt School of Automotive Fame, surely there are only two considerations: A) is it fast and B) how fast is it? After all, the original Charger s harmonica-style front grill and cheese wedge angularity didn t exactly set the bar for automotive design. Besides, what s a couple of doors between stoplights?

The new Charger R/T is certainly quick enough to earn its place in a musclehead s heart. With a 5.7-liter 350hp Hemi lurking under the hood (anyone opting for the V6-powered SE or SXT gets socks for Christmas), the reincarnated Charger blasts to sixty in well under five-and-a-half seconds. The quarter mile comes up in 13.9 secs. She ll top out at a relatively meager 130mph, but a quick trip to the de-limiterization shop ought to sort that out (just don t forget to change the tires).

Not to put too fine a point on it, with numbers like these, the Charger R/T can walk a Thunderbird like the lardy retro dog that it is/was. There s no fuss either; with the perfectly named ESP traction control nanny riding herd on the autobox and wheel spin, it s strictly press and play. The Charger R/T makes a nice sound too, like the world s largest rubber-band propelled balsa airplane.

As for the four-door thing, well, we are talking about a re-skinned Chrysler 300: a five-star, five-up cruiser with plenty of wallow and handling to match. Is that such a bad thing? Yes. It s about time (plus twenty years) that Detroit built a sedan that can thrash and burn. Which means less weight. Which means fewer doors. Anyway, with a 425hp hood-scooped SRT version to follow, The Dodge Boys are about to put the muscle car cognoscenti s metaphysical prejudice to the test. Is more always less? [by Robert Farago]

Related:
Jalopnik Reviews: 2006 Dodge Charger R/T, Part 2, Part 3 [internal]