#hummer

It’s been teased, it’s been leaked, and now it’s here.

The 2022 GMC Hummer EV is no longer cloaked under wraps.

Tonight’s a big night for baseball fans — it marks game one of the World Series. This particular WS is one many thought might not happen. GMC is taking advantage of the spotlight on the sport to take the wraps off of the new Hummer EV tonight.

Except an online ad has spilled the beans.

Whoops.

While General Motors still plans on debuting its all-electric Hummer on October 20th in a live-stream event catering to industry watchers and EV super fans, it will also be dipping into its marketing budget to give those watching the first game of Major League Baseball’s World Series a glimpse of the beast.

Two weeks from now, the automaker will pull the trigger on a synchronous media extravaganza guaranteed to place the electric behemoth in front of as many eyes as possible. In addition to the official debut and Fox’ baseball slot, GM has also purchased time during NBC’s The Voice — which is estimated to draw in around 9 million viewers when it returns for its 19th season.

GMC finally has a new date in mind for the Hummer reveal: Tuesday, October 20.

The all-electric SUV and truck were supposed to be unveiled to the world back in late May, but well, you know.

“Crab Mode” isn’t just what you’re in when you journey to Red Lobster, McCormick & Schmick’s, or Baltimore. It’s a feature of the new electric Hummer that GMC has teased. Complete with a silly logo.

Crab Mode? In a Hummer? Please excuse any typos, I am giggling too hard at all the jokes that are coming to mind. Yes, I am 13 years old inside, apparently.

A vehicle guaranteed to cause the least possible amount of harm to the planet and its finite resources, hands down, offered up something of a sneak peak on Wednesday.

Make that “vehicles,” plural. The GMC Hummer EV, a beast of an electric pickup due to roll out of General Motors’ repurposed Detroit-Hamtramck plant late next year, will have a sibling: An SUV, as it’s a body style worthy of the reborn Hummer name’s heritage and also the thing Americans WANT.

And check out that spa-sized frunk.

Today’s letter is clearly “T” — as far as GMC’s concerned, anyway. With little else to show off during These Trying Times, General Motors’ truck division decided to remind the public that its plan to release a large electric pickup bearing the Hummer name hasn’t changed. Just the timing.

In said truck, which was bound for a May 20th debut before the coronavirus pandemic kiboshed those plans, gazing at the stars or taking shots at enemy aircraft in some sort of Mad Max-like post-apocalyptic scenario will be made all the more easier with removable roof panels.

We don’t know what sort of person will purchase the GMC Hummer EV; presumably, the sort of person that’s also salivating over Tesla’s Cybertruck. Rugged electrics are a novel segment and we’re not sure what its demographic looks like.

Will it be technophiles hoping to secure their masculinity, or hard-living folks who’ve finally find a battery-driven vehicle that speaks to them? More importantly, how will these electric monsters stack up against established bruisers carrying tried-and-true internal combustion engines?

We haven’t the foggiest, and it looks like we’ll be waiting longer than planned to get some answers. General Motors announced it’s delaying the reveal of the new-and-improved Hummer on Wednesday. While no official reason was given, it’s almost certainly the result of lockdown measures relating to the coronavirus.

The GMC Hummer EV pickup due to arrive next year sounds like a beast, both in terms of size and power, but buyers will still have considerable choice. It has to be that way, what with the cash involved in retooling Detroit-Hamtramck and getting a fully electric truck off the ground.

It’s highly unlikely we’ll see a stripped-down Work Truck model with ironic hand-crank windows and a vinyl front bench, but there will be a selection of powertrains on tap. That’s according to General Motors President Mark Reuss.

General Motors, like every other automaker, is busy working on its electric future. The most exciting EV model yet to emerge from The General will fall under the GMC nameplate. It’ll be a pickup. And it’ll be badged as a Hummer. A 1,000 horsepower Hummer.

The automaker plans to tease the GMC Hummer EV during this year’s Super Bowl with a series of commercials touting the truck’s performance. Each of the commercials is silent, highlighting the fact that the new truck won’t make the traditional noises a performance vehicle does.

In addition to the model’s 1,000 horsepower, GMC claims the Hummer EV will make 11,500 lb-ft of torque. That should be good for a 0-60 mph time of around 3 seconds.

The pending return of Hummer to the GM stable in the form of an electric pickup is such a perfectly 2020 thing, considering Ford’s recent decision to bestow the Mustang name on its upcoming EV crossover. However, the nameplate’s reported resurrection comes not in the form of a brand, but as a lone model bundled under an existing marque (GMC).

That’s something to think about. When Matthew Guy asked yesterday what defunct brand we’d most like to see return, no doubt most of you mentioned Viking or Marquette. Maybe Oakland or LaSalle. Geo, perhaps. Canadian readers probably yearn for a return of Acadian and Beaumont.

A few of you may have even mentioned Hummer.

Steph brought us news on Friday about Hummer’s imminent return. In an about-face from the gas-guzzling image it cultivated fifteen years ago, earning it scorn and ridicule from the wheat-n-grain types, the name is going to be appended to an electric pickup.

Sure, it isn’t going to be a standalone brand, instead as part of the GMC fold and perhaps even as “Hummer by GMC”. The latter spawns images of “Chrysler TC by Maserati”, but nevertheless. Our question for you today is this: which of GM’s purged brands would you bring back, should RenCen suddenly hand you the levers of power?

The much-rumored return of Hummer to the General Motors fold is apparently a go.

According to sources who spoke to The Wall Street Journal, GM has purchased hyper-expensive ad time during next month’s Super Bowl game, during which it plans to reveal its intent to resurrect the name of once loved (and equally derided) brand. It won’t be a brand, however.

With last week’s tentative agreement between the United Auto Workers and General Motors, the end of the now six-week-long strike seemed closer than ever. GM hourly workers in the U.S. have until the end of the week to decide whether to approve the contract deal; if it gets the thumbs-up, the strike’s over.

Amid all of this labor news came a couple of tidbits, both of which stand to make the UAW happy. The first involves a resurrected nameplate built in Mexico, the other, a defunct GM brand that didn’t survive the company’s recession-era bankruptcy.

Demand for Hummer vehicles peaked in 2006 before being obliterated by the financial crisis and a spike in domestic fuel prices. Considering the brand’s most eco-conscious model (the H3) averaged somewhere around 14 mpg in the city, the nameplate probably survived longer than it should have. It took on defunct-status in 2010.

Having failed to sell off the brand, General Motors is still sitting on the property and rumors are stirring that it might be making a comeback… as an electric luxury marque.

Despite sounding like the mad ravings of drug-addled lunatic, GM has its reasons for considering bringing Hummer back to life. Jeep sales took off like cat with its tail on fire after the recession, with annual domestic volumes going from 231,701 units in 2009 to a whopping 973,227 in 2018. It’s doubtful that GM missed that or forgot that it had access to an easily identifiable brand with similar ties to the military and off-road adventure.