2019 Chevrolet Blazer RS AWD Review - Everybody's Talkin'

As I’ve been reviewing cars for this venerable publication for nearly three years, I’ve noticed how easy it is to become jaded about new cars. While I’m not like some journalists, getting handed keys to six figure exotics every week, I am rather lucky to experience cars on a regular basis that frequently cost more than I’d likely ever spend with my own money.

I’m reminded of this most often when something unusual graces my driveway, and a neighbor strikes up a conversation — or when I’m walking back to the car from the supermarket and someone is waiting to ask about the car. It doesn’t happen often — but this new 2019 Chevrolet Blazer RS seemingly compels conversation.

Plan your trips accordingly.

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Bigger Blazer Appears in Colorado

The jury’s out on whether General Motors will foist an SS version of its new-for-2019 Chevrolet Blazer on Americans, but some consumers stand to get an XL.

An extended version of the midsize crossover is in development, adding enough mass to the vehicle’s rear for the automaker to squeeze in an extra row of chairs. The vehicle would split the difference between the existing Blazer and full-size, three-row Traverse, but don’t expect to see it at a dealership anytime soon.

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Some Enthusiasts Are Hot Under the Collar for a Chevrolet Blazer SS

Indeed, so jazzed are these enthusiasts, they’ve created a rendering of a hypothetical Blazer SS to compete with the very real Ford Edge ST. If you’re already thinking this vehicle boasts canary yellow paint with wide, black striping, fear not — your assumptions were bang-on.

It’s an interesting idea, given that Ford’s Edge blows the existing Blazer out of the water in ST guise, but the merits of waging a hot tweener crossover war are debatable. And the vehicle itself might not be doable.

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Bark's Bites: The Blazer Might Be the Meteor That Kills the Journosaurs

It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags.”

Dr. Suess, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas

2019 Chevrolet Blazers are available for purchase at dealership near you. No, really, they are. Like, right this second. You could buy one. Some people already have. This is interesting because it’s pretty much impossible to find a review of one anywhere on the internet. A search for “Chevrolet Blazer Reviews” brings you to some news of the initial auto show reveal, and that’s about it.

To you, the TTAC reader and automotive enthusiast, this news probably doesn’t rock you to your core. But there’s a group of people that are wringing their hands nervously about this product launch.

The journosaurs.

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Monza, CarryAll - It's Back to the Past for GM China

Chevy isn’t just bringing back retro nameplates here in its home market. Sure, the Blazer is set to appear in this country next year, while the Malibu and Impala have been back for ages.

Over in China, GM is dusting off two more nameplates – the CarryAll for a crossover and Monza for a sedan. Why should you care? Because the CarryAll bears styling very much like the Blazer, portending a shift in design language for future bowtie crossover machines in this country.

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2019 Chevrolet Blazer Starts at the Most Obvious Price in Its Class

Sporting two rows of seating, front-wheel drive as a starting point, and a historical name sure to anger Bowtie brand diehards, the 2019 Chevrolet Blazer revealed itself in June and almost immediately fell from view (and conversation). Compare the nameplate’s return to that of the yet-unseen Ford Bronco, which generated gigatons of buzz in the months and years preceding its upcoming reveal.

The Blazer name’s resurrection, unlike that of the Bronco, wasn’t designed to signal the return of the same vehicle. Chevy had a hole in its utility lineup — created by the newly downsized Equinox and generously sized Traverse — in need of filling. While the sizing seems correct, many took exception to the vehicle being just another a unibody brossover. The appeal of name recognition tipped the decision makers at GM into dusting off a nameplate easily recognized by anyone who lived and breathed in North America during the past 40 years. Purists be damned.

As for pricing, to best battle its midsize(ish) competitors, GM decided on a very predictable base MSRP for its reborn Blazer.

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Ace of Base: 1994 Chevrolet Blazer

GM churned out examples of the full-size, two-door Blazer well into the ‘90s, before relegating the nameplate to its littler brother. Traditionalists frothed at the time, just as we are now after viewing the 2019 Blazer. And the circle continues.

For ’94, Chevy offered the Blazer in a couple of different flavors. You know my pick, of course – base 5.7-liter V8 engine, 4WD, and a big ol’ baseball bat of a manual shifter sticking out of the floor.

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QOTD: Unnecessary Toughness?

Late last week we were treated (or suffered, depending on your point of view) with an appearance of a Chevy nameplate not seen on our roads since George W. was just taking office for the second time. The Blazer title holds special significance for this gearhead, as he spent his formative years bouncing around a blue-and-white 1978 model. The psychedelic herringbone seat pattern has been burned into my brain, perhaps explaining many of my incomprehensible behavior patterns.

So I took notice when The General hammered the Blazer name onto a crossover with front-drive roots. Today’s question is different from Friday’s in that we want to know what other refire of a historic name caused your eye to involuntarily twitch?

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QOTD: Yea or Nay to the Blazer Name Game?

It seems there were no shortage of comments left on our 2019 Chevrolet Blazer story after it went up last night. Sorry for keeping you all up, feverishly pounding those keys. But could there not be? The decision to resurrect a fairly fondly remembered name and apply it to a less-rugged vehicle was bound to spark controversy. Twitter, that bastion of right-thinking hot takes, was aflame.

You can’t always get what you want, some might say. The middle ground in Chevy’s crossover space is too lucrative to field anything other than what we got. Sure, the model isn’t what us die-hards hoped for, they’d say, but a two-door, body-on-frame SUV just doesn’t fly, and the development costs and resulting MSRP would place it outside the hole Chevy intended to fill.

Screw that, others might say. Ever heard of the Bronco? No one shoved a .38 in the small of Chevy’s back, forcing it to dust off the Blazer name for this particular model.

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QOTD: Is It Time to 'Save the Car Names'?

It’s not a secret most of us at TTAC are not, to put it charitably, overly enamored with the current crop of alphabet soup adorning the trunk lids of most new cars today. The market has endured alphanumeric model names for years, but at least, say, in the ‘80s and 90s there was a very good chance the numbers stood for engine displacement. Not anymore.

This is why I am glad Kia has chosen to simply make up words for its new product. The Stonic is allegedly a portmanteau of ‘speedy’ and ‘tonic’. All right, then. At least it’s not the 6000SUX or something.

Automotive history is littered with many great and bizarre names. Here’s a few:

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Piston Slap: Dodging the Grand Wagoneer's Destiny?
Shandor writes:I used to have an ’84 Jeep Grand Wagoneer. When it died, I replaced it with a new ’99 Dodge Durango. It seemed to be a fairly solid, updated replacement for the Wagoneer. My mechanic, who was a master Jeep mechanic, said that Chrysler came up with the Durango to fill the gap in the market created after the Grand Wagoneer stopped production in 1991.
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Vellum Venom Vignette: The Brazil Vacation, Part II

A Captiva audience?

Aside from the car-less world of cruise/train travel, my post- CCS Design vacations involve seeing an American on the road only to feel their styling and (more importantly) proportioning are sleeker and prettier. Douchey perhaps, but it’s my benign contribution to American Exceptionalism.

Even if this “proper” Chevy is a German Opel (sold alongside many a Korean Daewoo) introduced in Frankfurt as the Antara GTC. Harley Earl may spin in his perfectly-proportioned grave…but I digress.

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The 1991 GMC Jimmy SLE – The Car I NEVER Should Have Bought

1991 GMC Jimmy SLE

The 1991 GMC Jimmy was a throwback to a better time. The design, originally introduced in the 1973 model year, was all truck and its square, upright design spoke volumes about American strength and power. Over the years, the design gradually evolved and towards the end of its product run even gained small touches of luxury. Don’t be misled by the soft velour seats and carpeted floors, though, under the skin the truck was still all business. It was a serious rig for serious men and it required a seriously big wallet to fill its seriously big fuel tank. I didn’t know it then, but I was in serious trouble the minute it hit the driveway.

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New or Used: Common Sense or Uncommon Downsizing?

Dave writes:

Hello Sajeev and Steve,

First time writer, long time reader; I must say, TTAC and Piston Slap rocks.

My wife and I are in a bit of a quandary. We currently own outright a 1997 Chevy Monte Carlo 3.1L LS with 197k miles and counting as well as a 2003 Chevy S-10 Blazer LS with 145k on the clock. Lately, we have been sinking money into the Blazer for everything from brakes, to shift solenoids, thermostat, intake manifold gasket and crankshaft position sensor (soon to be O2 sensor). I have been driving the Monte since senior year in high school (2004) and it has also had its share of problems, namely Dex-Cool and the ensuing broken conn-rod. The engine was replaced with a rebuilt Jasper at 117k. The dash is lit up like a Christmas tree, but I change the oil religiously and watch the other liquids and wear parts.

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  • Wolfwagen Is it me or have auto shows just turned to meh? To me, there isn't much excitement anymore. it's like we have hit a second malaise era. Every new vehicle is some cookie-cutter CUV. No cutting-edge designs. No talk of any great powertrains, or technological achievements. It's sort of expected with the push to EVs but there is no news on that front either. No new battery tech, no new charging tech. Nothing.
  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
  • FormerFF We bought three new and one used car last year, so we won't be visiting any showrooms this year unless a meteor hits one of them. Sorry to hear that Mini has terminated the manual transmission, a Mini could be a fun car to drive with a stick.It appears that 2025 is going to see a significant decrease in the number of models that can be had with a stick. The used car we bought is a Mk 7 GTI with a six speed manual, and my younger daughter and I are enjoying it quite a lot. We'll be hanging on to it for many years.
  • Oberkanone Where is the value here? Magna is assembling the vehicles. The IP is not novel. Just buy the IP at bankruptcy stage for next to nothing.