In 1982, when the World Wide Web, Google Analytics and ubiquitous personal pixelage was just a glimmer in a handful of geeks’ fluoro Wayfarers a film maker called Steve Lisberger imagined a world called Tron.
The film, in which Jeff Bridges played a paranoid but prescient hacker who, determined to gain access to the mainframe of a society-controlling corporation, becomes physically captured in the machine itself – inspired a generation of Space-Invader-zapping teens. But it wasn’t just the nerds and the b-boys tripping out to Arcade Funk who were susceptible to Lisberger’s Neon happy vision of the future. The groms who became car designers dug the aesthetic too.
The rumour mill has been buzzing with dreams of a genuinely desirable Electric Vehicle for years, and while the four-door version of Mitsubishi’s MiEv has been doing the car show circuit for a couple of years, this sporty version looks to be in the lead of the race to produce an EV that will appeal to a broader market than your traditional Ethical Man.
Featuring the softly glowing neon blue of Lisberger’s imagination, a fleet of touch sensitive interfaces and pinlines, the interior can certainly convince that this Electric experience may be able to be, well electrifying from a driver’s perspective.
According to reports from mainstream automotive press as well as the blogophere, in Japan the car is hotly anticipated, and Mitsubishi plan to launch the four door version as early as 2010, with the sportier two door the year after.
Mitsubishi say that the MiEv’s motor can produce up to 169 lb/ft of torque, comes with rear wheel drive and has a kerb weight of just under a metric Tonne.
This may be an Electric Vehicle that you really want to own. Just don’t break out those fluoro Wayfarers just yet.
