The Brabus Bodo coupe was officially revealed Friday, and it’s just as epic as the leaked photos on Reddit suggested. Its hood and rear deck look like they were shaped by a taffy puller, making the Bodo as close to a production version of the Maybach Exelero as we’re likely to get.
With the full reveal comes the full story. The Bodo is named after Brabus’ late founder Bodo Buschmann, and is the brainchild of Buschmann’s son Constantin, who runs the company today. It’s the one car his father wanted to build but never got the chance to, Constantin said in a press release, so it’s getting built now ahead of Brabus’ 50th anniversary next year. Production will be limited to 77 cars in reference to the company’s 1977 founding year.
The senior Buschmann apparently had a thing for cartoonish proportions. At 16.6 feet long and 6.6 feet wide, the Bodo has nearly the same footprint as a Mercedes-Benz GLS-Class. But it stands just 4.2 feet tall, with that extra-long hood and teardrop tail framing the passenger compartment. In typical Brabus black, with its menacing vertical-bar grille and scowling headlights, it looks like something a supervillain would drive.
The performance should be downright evil too. The Bodo is powered by a Brabus-built, twin-turbocharged, 5.2-liter V12 that produces 1,000 horsepower and 885 pound-feet of torque. All of that power is sent to the rear wheels through an eight-speed automatic transmission, hurling the 3,911-pound Bodo to 62 mph from a standstill in 3.0 seconds, Brabus claims. The top speed is electronically limited to 223 mph, probably because the Continental SportContact 7 Force tires Brabus had custom made for the car are only rated up to 230 mph.
Those tires—size 275/35 ZR 21 at the front and 325/30 ZR 21 at the back—are mounted to forged monoblock wheels chosen for minimum weight. Also helping to keep weight in check is carbon-fiber bodywork, draped over an aluminum monocoque chassis. The release doesn’t say outright, but the above mentioned leaked photos indicate the Bodo chassis comes from a Mercedes-AMG SL. The interior certainly looks very Mercedes, although Brabus supplies its own black leather upholstery.
If you can see past that long hood, a claimed 50.2/49.8 front-rear weight distribution should aid handling. Stopping power is provided by carbon-ceramic brakes with 16.1-inch front and 14.1-inch rear rotors, while the suspension features electronically controlled KW coilovers with multiple driver-selectable settings. Four drive modes—including Wet, GT, Sport, and Sport+—affecting the engine’s response are also available.
All of this makes the Bodo a fitting tribute. The only question is, who wore the long-hood look better: this car, or Mercedes’ own Vision Iconic concept?