At SEMA last week, an outfit called Mustang Brothers fully debuted its new build offering: The Outlaw, a 1968 Mustang “GT500″ restomod with a modern drivetrain, suspension, and styling. It’s a classic formula, and the Outlaw follows yet more tradition by making its custom bodywork look like another “Gone In 60 Seconds” Eleanor replica. There’s just one problem: Restomods are by and large bad, and the Eleanor is worse.
The Mustang Brothers Outlaw is a first-generation Mustang done up with the 5.8-liter Trinity mill out of a 2013-2014 GT500 and accompanying Tremec six-speed manual, though the Brothers claim the engine has been tuned to make “over 662 RWHP” — meaning an increase of at least one horsepower from the factory 662. It’s got suspension from a joint called Mustangs To Fear — not the first thing my mind goes to when I read “MTF” — and a classic 9-inch rear diff. The brakes are Wilwood, the wheels look like garbage, and the exhaust is a pair of sidepipes molded into the side skirts. Typical restomod fare.
Similarly typical is the bodywork, which Mustang Brothers never directly addresses but is clearly inspired by The One Car From The Nic Cage Movie. It makes sense not to mention the inspiration — its copyright holders are highly litigious — but come on. The sidepipes, the vents, the hood, the front bumper, all the Eleanor touches are here. It’s got fog lights in the lower grille, people, it’s an Eleanor — and Eleanors are bad.
The body kit adds length and bulk to the Mustang, taking its original well-designed proportions and inflating them like low-effort fetish art. The lower grille is half-covered by fog lights, yet both grilles are also flanked by separate sunken, early-aughts-looking driving lights. There are eight lights on the front of an Eleanor. You see this? This is the gorgeous car that’s sitting underneath all that fiberglass.
Even if Mustang Brothers were building this restomod off genuine 1968 GT500s — an overwhelmingly unlikely move, given that those all cost six figures and seemingly all of them have already been Eleanor’d —the car underneath would still be far better-looking than the revamped iteration.
Please, let the Eleanor kit die. Stop making these bloated first-generation Mustangs. The base car you’re working with is so well-designed, nothing you can do to it will be a marked improvement — particularly nothing that comes from a Nic Cage movie. It’s time to move on.
