Dodge — and Stellantis as a whole — seems to have realized it may have made a misstep or two by killing off the V8 muscle car, but with a new CEO at the helm, it looks like that deadly sin may soon be atoned for. It very well could be part of a massive $10 billion investment plan Stellantis has slated for its troubled U.S. market.
A big part of that plan is refocusing on the past successes of Jeep, Dodge, Ram, and Chrysler. I guess you could say Stellantis wants to make these brands great again… or something like that. The big news here, for us enthusiasts at least, is the potential return of a V8 muscle car at Dodge, according to a report from Bloomberg. Dodge tried to reinvent the wheel with the all-electric Charger Daytona at the end of 2024, and its reception has been lukewarm-to-bad to say the least. Hell, it just canceled its flagship Charger Daytona SRT Banshee.
Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa is set to announce a significant expansion of its U.S. manufacturing investments sometime later this week, and that $10 billion (up from $5 billion) will go toward supporting Chrysler, Jeep, and Dodge, specifically. It’ll allow the brands to reopen shuttered plants in Illinois and Michigan and hire hundreds or workers. Of course, that money will also go toward a new V8 muscle car for Dodge. Here’s what Bloomberg said:
Stellantis is focused on reclaiming the past success of the Jeep brand and considering fresh investment into Dodge, which could result in a new Dodge V8 muscle car, and possibly even the Chrysler brand in the long term, some of the people said. Talks are ongoing, no final decision has been made and the amount and targeted projects could still change, the people said.
The question now remains: what the hell would a new V8 Dodge muscle car even be? As I see it, there are three ways to go. One, engineers could shoehorn a V8 into the existing Charger platform. Sure, they told me that it wasn’t possible, but now it seems that THEY LIED TO ME and a V8 would actually fit. This seems like the most likely outcome, but don’t quote me here. This is pure speculation, baby.
The second option is to create an all-new(ish) Charger or Challenger from the ground up(ish) based heavily on the previous Challenger/Charger architecture or the new Charger architecture, but modify it in such a way that it sets itself apart from the Charger Daytona flop. I sort of doubt something like this would happen, but you never know.
The third option, which is the least likely (but absolutely the funniest), would be to just say “screw it” and put the old Challenger back on sale like nothing ever happened. Stellantis was more than happy to sell the Ram 1500 Classic for 15 years, so why the hell not? I seriously, seriously doubt this would happen, but you gotta admit, it would be very funny and it would definitely fit in with the whole Make Stellantis Great Again ethos.

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