Acura has just released the first official image of its all-new TL near-luxury sedan, and well, the most we can say at this point is “there it is.” We’ll suspend judgment until we see it firsthand, but for now, all we can say is it shares the controversial styling cues of the 2009 RL.
That said, it does not appear to be as bad as the RL, whose recent ’09 facelift also features Acura’s “guillotine grille” but lacked many changes to the rest of the body to complement it. The TL, however, like the redesigned 2009 TSX, features an entirely new body, and its larger size clearly allowed designers to have more fun with the sculpting along the bodysides and hood, as well as fill the flared wheelwells with some truly massive rolling stock. The slim greenhouse, however, may send Infiniti designers scrambling to get a legal team together to explore copyright infringement.
Something no one here will complain about are the powertrain enhancements. Acura claims the new TL will be the most powerful TL ever, which we take to mean that it’ll get the RL’s 300-hp 3.7-liter V-6 under the hood. Even more newsworthy is a new all-wheel-drive variant (maybe this will finally tame the TL's torque steer) that incorporates Acura’s sensational “Super Handling” all-wheel-drive system.
Acura remains mum on any other specifics of the next-gen of its best-selling vehicle, and is keeping all other imagery to itself until after its official media release later this summer. It is slated to go on sale in the fall.
