Toyota and BMW?

2020 Toyota Supra

(I seem to be on a car kick lately.)

In the 1980s I read two books set in an amusement park. The first one was called Dream Park and it was written by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes. (I just looked on Amazon and there's four Dream Park books now.)

In the second one I read (might have been The Barsoom Project) there's a ride that takes visitors through a sunken Los Angeles (there was a big earthquake and a lot of LA is under water). One of the characters says, "Hey look, there's Mercedes from before they merged with Toyota." I'm paraphrasing, of course from 35 plus years of memory.

At the time, that didn't seem implausible because of gas shortages and car sales were down. But it, of course, never happened. (The big earthquake never happened either...yet.)

But would you believe Toyota and that other icon of German cars, BMW? They aren't merging, but they are building a car together. The Toyota will be the return of the Supra. But it will have a BMW chassis, BMW engine, and a lot of BMW parts in the interior. The BMW will be the Z4. Both cars will be built in a plant Graz, Austria. A Toyota made in Europe and exported to the US? I don't think that's ever happened before.

The Supra is a good-looking car (see above). The Z4 is a handsome car, but I like the Supra better.

Pricing isn't available, but I bet neither car will be cheap.