Dodge drops the Challenger, flexes new 2024 Charger Daytona EV

Dodge has unveiled its next-generation muscle cars, and they all live under the "Charger" nameplate. There are a lot of mixed emotions, we're sure, among Dodge fans today. The good? The Charger is once again available as a two-door, just like the 1960s-era classics, after having lived since 2005 as a four-door sedan. Never mind that it's still available as a four-door—that's been overshadowed by its launch as an EV, which might count as a "bad" to anyone curiously not excited by a 670-hp midrange Charger Scat Pack, regardless of what powers it. (Charger Sixpacks coming next year will offer a more traditional internal combustion alternative, albeit with twin-turbo inline-sixes, not Hemi V-8s.) Lost among all this change and bluster? What the hell happens to the Challenger?

Before today, the Dodge Challenger was the two-door alternative to the four-door Charger. Its retro styling, more so than the old Charger's, is what Dodge stylists seem to have vaguely remastered into the 2024 Charger Daytona's flowy shape, right down to its full-width grille slot and racetrack taillights. But now, with every new Charger being available in two-door form, there is no specific reason to carry on the Challenger name as a distinguishing moniker.

We've confirmed with Dodge CEO Tim Kuniskis what conclusion to draw from that: The Challenger as you know it today is dead. There are no plans to bring it back, at least as a distinct nameplate.

The Challenger was a huge success

That said, there is a lot of positive brand capital tied up in the Challenger name, whose application to a muscle car dates back to the 1970 model year. (It had been used on another model in the late 1950s, but one that predated the Challenger format we know today.) That original Challenger was long, low, and squinted through quad round headlights hooded in a full-width open maw. After dying out in the mid-1970s, the Challenger was reanimated as a forgettable, Japan-sourced compact car in the early 1980s, giving Dodge fans their very own Mustang II-style historical abberation.

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At the peak of the retro-styling craze after the turn of this century, Dodge brought the Challenger back. After having resurrected the Charger as a rear-wheel-drive muscle sedan a few years prior, Dodge wanted a coupe to take the pony car fight to Ford's Mustang and Chevrolet's Camaro. The Challenger was an immediate hit, mostly because it looked like someone stuck an original 1970 Challenger in a modern-o-matic machine. The optional 5.7-liter Hemi V-8 engine didn't hurt, either, nor did launching the new Challenger with a 6.1-liter V-8, in high-performance SRT form.

And the Challenger stayed a hit, even more than 16 years later. Ever-more-powerful engine offerings, subtle refinements, and, we suspect, a yearning among some car buyers for simpler, less techno-crazed cars that are just plain fast and look good proved an irresistible and durable combination.

Ford and Chevy spent the same years trying to hone their Mustang and Camaro into sports cars, harder-edged handlers; since the Challenger's arrival, for example, the Camaro got smaller and more cramped, if lighter and lither on a track. Ford's Mustang followed a similar path but hit a power ceiling for years before adding a 700-hp-plus option in the most recent GT500.

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Most people don't live near back roads laid out like the Nürburgring, however, making the Dodge's supposedly lower-brow straight-line-speed focus more entertaining in the real world. Big engine, big speed, big car. Simple. Dodge's Challenger was also in many ways more stylish and more practical than its competitors. Sit in a Challenger, and you'll notice a few things: First, it's tall, like, you sit nearly eye level with some smaller crossover SUV drivers; second, there's space galore, and real adults fit in the back seat. Never underestimate Americans' desire for big-ass cars — the Challenger is properly big. That makes it a better everyday companion than the Chevy or Ford. It's little wonder the Challenger became the best-selling pony car in its later years, edging out the Mustang and (now-dead) Camaro.

So, does Challenger have a future?

With Dodge's focus these days squarely on ensuring the electric Charger Daytona launches well in the market, followed by its gas-fed Sixpack siblings, there likely isn't any urgency around figuring out a place for the Challenger. And with Kuniskis' assertion that there are no plans to bring the Challenger back, we figure the likeliest shot for any sort of comeback would be as a variant of the new Charger.

After the two-door electric Charger Daytonas launch for 2024, Dodge will introduce the four-door electric Daytonas as well as the two- and four-door Sixpack gas-powered versions for 2025. A big part of the old Charger and Challengers' success was Dodge's ability to keep those two aging muscle cars fresh with new engines, new variants (such as the Widebody and Demon models), and special editions dropping periodically. The Challenger launched in higher-performance SRT trim for 2008, with normal-er versions coming later, and it was only truly updated once, for 2015. By 2017, it had added the now-iconic Hellcat supercharged V-8 option making 707-hp-plus, and later, an alcohol-injected version making a claimed 1,000-hp plus in the Demon 170. So expect more Charger derivatives in the decade or so to come, starting with the more powerful Banshee version.

After that, we could see room for the Challenger name to return, perhaps as a two-door, rear-drive-only Charger; all new Chargers are all-wheel drive, whether they're gas or electric, but their STLA Large platform is flexible, and it's expected that single-motor, rear-drive Charger Daytonas are on their way eventually. Or maybe there'll be a rear-drive Sixpack — that'd also make a cool Challenger. Again, the nameplate has fans, and those fans will be eager to see the Challenger return someday. For now, though, rip a lil' burnout for the dead Challenger, because for the foreseeable future, Dodge muscle will go only by the Charger name.