The recently-revealed Chevy Blazer has been provoking a lot of internet chatter. For starters, its positioning as a competitor to the stylish, 5-seat SUVs like Nissan Murano and Ford Edge, rather than as a rough-and-ready “proper SUV” like its namesake from the 1980s, has a lot of people wondering whether Chevy would not have been better off making up a new name. But it’s probably the Camaro-inspired interior and aggressive, squinty-eyed facia that has people most interested in the new model, and rightly so as both are a welcome departure from the class norm. Or rather, the facia would have been were it not for the new Hyundai Santa Fe, that made its debut only a few months ago.
Now, both models can claim rightful lineage to their facia designs – that of the Blazer is a twist on the Camaro facia, combined with a large grille from a modern Chevy crossover, while the Santa Fe is an evolution of the design introduced on the small Hyundai Kona last year. And yet, starting from different spots, the models end up looking remarkably similar from the front – ultra-narrow, squinting “eyes” positioned above large light units lower down in the bumper, separated by a chrome “wing” that runs the full width of the front, complementing a large, central grille. Sure, there are differences, like the fact that the trapezoidal grilles are flipped on the two cars, or the fact that the Chevy’s chrome wing runs through, rather than above the grille. In the end, though, both cars probably benefit from the unique front treatment that looks different to the class norm, even if they look rather close to one another.
