Hyundai’s Disney anniversary collaboration is a bit… ‘Goofy’ | Axon’s Automotive Anorak

Giugiaro also revealed a more tantalising Pony-based concept coupe at the time, this being a one-off ‘dream car’ prototype to help establish the Hyundai brand name, which up to that point was totally unknown outside of its native South Korea. Interestingly, Hyundai commissioned Giugiaro to build a second example of the 1974 Coupe prototype earlier this year, to help illustrate the marque’s motoring heritage.

The Pony was not the very first passenger car to be produced by Hyundai however, as the South Korean industrial colossus had previously built various British Ford saloons under license since 1967, including the Ford Cortina (from Mark II to Mark IV variants). The Mark I Granada was assembled in Seoul until the mid-1970s.

In the subsequent 50 years, Hyundai has grown to become a true juggernaut of the world’s motor industry, particularly over the past decade, to amazingly now rank as the third largest car maker globally. In all it sold almost 6.9 million units in 2022. That rise was helped in no small part by the take over of Kia Motors 1998 – following the latter filing for bankruptcy in 1997.

Initially slow to gain a foothold in export markets, Hyundai made its first tentative steps into Europe in 1977 in the neutral Benelux and Swiss markets, before venturing into the larger and more established markets such as Germany and Italy. Hyundai didn’t arrive in the UK until 1984 via its initial importer; the ex-Jensen Bromwich located International Motors of Subaru and Isuzu distribution fame. It entered the important North American markets too around the same time, setting up a production plant in Canada to assemble Lantra sedan models and get a firm grip in the region.

Ahead of this, early British Hyundai adopters had a limited choice of bargain-priced models to choose from. There was the original Pony in facelifted form, followed by the Giugiaro-styled Stellar, a conventional saloon based around an old Ford Cortina platform. It had a well-equipped but boxy design resembling a contemporary scaled down Maserati Quattroporte, as also penned by ItalDesign. The Scoupe, Sonata, Lantra, plus various other models and a wider UK dealer network followed, all somewhat unremarkable but representing good value with reliability built in. By 1994, after its first full decade in Britain, Hyundai’s UK market share stood at a small 0.64 per cent, with 12,247 sales. Last year Hyundai accounted for a solid five per cent of the British new passenger car market, with 80,419 sales. Its Kia partner enjoyed even greater UK success, with an impressive 6.2 per cent overall market share, amounting to more than 100,000 new cars sold.

Given its very lofty podium position as now the world’s third largest automobile company today – currently only behind Toyota and Volkswagen – Hyundai is clearly far from being a ‘Mickey Mouse’ operation, so it’s therefore most amusing to see that huge shipping company and maker of everything from glue and steam irons, through to domestic white goods and commercials vehicles, is helping the Disney empire to celebrate its centenary in the USA.

As part of its role as the exclusive North American automotive sponsor for the official ‘Disney100 Celebration’, Hyundai has produced the Ioniq 5 Disney100 Platinum Edition. It’s a special edition EV revealed during the USA’s ‘Dancing with the Stars’ TV show as part of a special Disney100 Night, broadcast live across both the ABC and Disney+ channels across the USA.

Although dynamically an engaging drive, with a well-executed interior and overall pleasing design that nostalgically recalls the profile of the original fastback 1974 Hyundai Pony, the Ioniq 5 is spoiled by some disappointingly laughable tacky and ‘goofy’ stuck on external trim, worthy of a creation of the Disney animation studios. The 5’s funky rectangular LED headlights do not compensate for the nasty bargain basement-looking ‘slashes’ in the side pods and rear valence, the latter reminding me of an air vent in an very old ‘made in Hong Kong’ plastic travel alarm clock I was given as a kid many years ago. Thankfully the sporting new Ioniq 5 N, as previewed at the 2023 Goodwood Festival of Speed presented by MasterCard, is fitted with rather more discreet and tasteful black and red sill covers and spoilers that look far less ‘Mickey Mouse’.

First revealed as a concept at the 2023 New York Auto Show, the limited production Hyundai Ioniq 5 Disney100 Platinum Edition will go on sale in the USA only (with no plans for a UK launch) in early 2024, featuring a special Gravity Gold Matte exterior colour, plus the following special features listed as follows.

• Disney-inspired alloy wheel styles and unique Gravity Gold metallic colour
• Disney100 Platinum exterior badging
• Disney100 logo embossed on front seat headrests and centre console
• Disney100 logo on the floor-mats
• Disney-inspired front and rear door trim strip
• Disney-themed introduction on the interior screen upon turning the car on, this featuring iconic Disney music (irritating after a while I guess!), the Disney100 logo and pixie dust was incorporated into the ‘Dancing with the Stars’ Disney100 night as part of the opening scene

When Hyundai took its first steps into building its own cars almost 50 years ago, the company had the very good sense to bring in a proven and talented outside specialist to undertake its design work. After the initial Giugiaro era though, Hyundai was brave enough to tackle its own styling work, with some very mixed results (such as the unresolved X2 Accent, flabby XG30 and disjointed Scoupe). After decades of practice, Hyundai now finally seems to have got the hang of good design, as proven by its distinctive Tucson (with its unique ‘heraldic shield’ headlamps) and Kona and Nexo cross-overs.

Its recent and uncommonly aerodynamic loniq 6 (with a remarkable world-beating Cd of just 0.21) may share some elements its smaller Ioniq 5’s Walt Disney design with its odd profile – resembling an upturned banana – but at least it is refreshingly different and individual. Hyundai clearly took inspiration from Pininfarina’s extreme aerodynamic Fiat Ritmo/Strada-based CNR-PF concept car of 1978, which had an exceptional low Cd of 0.172, as well as an inverted banana shape too.

If and when Hyundai gets round to stop fitting such tacky add-ons as the Ioniq 5’s air dash and side skirts to its models, as it surely will, it may by then be threatening the tediously predictable and (to me at least) strangely over-rated models of the Volkswagen Group to vie for second position in the global car making stakes. Hyundais’ next 50 years promise to be very exciting indeed…