Defender: A Tough Act to Follow

by Matt Bryan

The Land Rover Defender is firmly part of the British furniture; any countryside scene of rolling green fields dotted with livestock would seem incomplete without the familiarity of its boxy silhouette parked in the distance. Since the introduction of the Series I just after the Second World War to rival the Willys Jeep, the Defender has become as irreplaceable to the discerning farmer as an English Shepherd or a good pair of wellies.

The Defender has also garnered a loyal fan club outside of the agricultural community, aided by its off-road capability and ‘no-frills’ approach to design. Stories of doors falling off or drive shafts shearing only to be rectified with a screwdriver of something like a ten-pence coin are commonplace and a tribute to the merits of the Defender. Its beauty truly lies in its simplicity. But with little design change over its first iteration some 67 years ago, new legislation on pedestrian safety amongst other factors brought the production of the car to an end in 2016. 

However, its successor was recently unveiled at the Frankfurt Motor Show; a car in as difficult a situation as doing the karaoke for ‘A Million Love Songs’ after Gary Barlow himself had just left the stage. The 2020 Defender shares little with the old one: the body-on-frame chassis is replaced by a single piece of aluminium, trademark manual gearboxes swapped for more fashionable eight-speed autos and its once rugged interior now more akin to the luxury leather and veneer of a Range Rover. The exterior certainly a nod to the old car, with the flat front and rear conserving the classic cuboid shape, but now with more smoothed-out curves that right angles. Yes, it looks like a Defender, but perhaps more like one described to a designer over the telephone. Comparisons to the Škoda Yeti have some truth, but both are revolutionary in the field of automotive design. Like it or not, it’s clear that the new Defender has been thought out, each panel meticulously sculpted in an attempt to preserve the legacy of an icon, whilst bringing a 1940s design into a new decade.

But the biggest issue most take is the move away from the Defender’s unique rustic charm. Rather than champion its durability or simplicity, JLR has boasted about the 85 ECUs and the power of the on-board computer in an attempt to show its technological prowess. Whilst this would be well at home on a modern high end car, I’d suggest that the average Defender owner would be happier with four wheels, four speeds and three pedals rather than something that requires a laptop to diagnose. As many have already said, the Defender’s natural habitat is a muddy field or halfway up a Welsh mountain, and perhaps these advancements detract from the true heritage of a quintessential British icon.