Acura Aims to Atone For Past Missteps with the TLX

With the news that Honda is letting Acura run its business more or less on its own, the soon-to-debut TLX is tasked to lead a brand resurgence. The 2004-2008 TL was Acura's most successful product since the Legend thanks to its well proportioned, clean yet purposeful styling. Looking to solidify the TL as a luxury product Acura gave it more tech, more size and more styling features. Unfortunately that's where everything fell apart for the TL. Lauded for its trick super handling all wheel drive system the TL was mechanically a superior machine but its heavy and overdone styling doomed it from the start. A subsequent refresh and a tone down of the "beak" front end was too little and too late to make much of an impact. As with the RLX, Acura is hoping that a new name will give the model a fresh start along with a design that ditches the awkwardness of the current version and brings back some of the sporty styling of the previous generation. The TLX has recently been spotted sans camo and the final product has stayed remarkably true to its Detroit concept. Almost by default the TLX will be Acura's best designed sedan even if there is a little bit too much ILX in the profile. For a brand that has done so well with its crossovers recently, the TLX will be a pivotal product for Acura to reestablish its footing with the rest of its lineup considering it will be pulling double duty replacing both the TL and TSX.

The TLX Concept looks great, the production version is close