Here’s why Jaguar’s Type 00 concept has caused such a storm

It flew under the radar, so you may not have noticed, but apparently Jaguar released a concept car this week?

Yeah, OK, so the reveal of the proudly pink Type 00 – to my knowledge the first concept car named after a type of flour since 1989’s Mazda Strong Wholemeal – failed to dampen the frenzied wildfire of debate that’s raged since Jag showed off that ad a couple of weeks ago. If anything, it poured a couple of gallons of (pink) paint-thinner on the flames.

This may have been exactly as Jag intended. If they wanted exposure, they sure got it. Mad, spittle-flecked rage? They got plenty of that, too. Put diplomatically, many people seem to have found the Type 00… somewhat confusing.

So why this mass public outpouring of befuddlement? Well, according to some of the online commentary, it’s because the Type 00 is a vile desecration of everything Britain holds dearest, an affront to our very civilisation. (My dudes! Calm down! You’re shouting at a big pink EV!)

But there’s another reason that, I think, goes some way to explaining the general confusion, and it’s this: concept cars are kinda weird, right?

The Big Jag Rebrand is one of those rare car-industry stories that escapes our strange little corner of the internet and into the mainstream. The Type 00 found its way onto the front page of pretty much every major news website in the UK, and plenty beyond. And it turns out, the things car-people think are normal, normal people don’t.

Like, for example, the concept of a concept car, if you see what I mean. In the wake of the frenzied reaction to its car-deficient advert, Jag’s response was ‘wait and see the car’. Which, unsurprisingly, led a lot of regular humans to believe the next thing they’d be shown would be an actual car they could actually buy.

They didn’t get one. What they got instead was a ‘design vision concept’ representing a ‘prelude to a future generation of Jaguars’. Which, in the car-world, isn’t a totally weird notion. But, in the real world, very much is.

When the Type 00 photos leaked online on Monday night, at least a couple of major newspapers became very agitated by, well, pretty much all of it, but in particular the lack of speedometer in this shot:

I mean, if we’re splitting hairs, the Type 00’s interior is lacking quite a few other things, too. Including ‘literally a single button or control of any kind’. Worrying about the Type 00’s speedo is like worrying whether the Paw Patrol pups have been safely microchipped: sure, it’s a concern. But also they’re talking, crime-fighting juvenile dogs who drive cars, so…

It’s easy to be sniffy. But I won’t (apart from that last paragraph). Because take a step back, and the concept car is a fundamentally mad notion, right? Everyone, look at our new car! No, we’re not going to make it! Though we might, at some point, make a car that looks something like it! In some regards!

Does this happen in other industries? When Dualit are planning a new toaster, from memory they don’t first unveil a concept toaster that looks excitingly swoopy, doesn’t actually have any slots for your bread, but possibly contains, like, the Aristotelian essence of that future toaster. That would be mad.

But with cars, we go along with it. Or, at least, car-people do. Normal humans, not so much. Which bits are you meant to take seriously, and which with a big pinch of pink salt? It’s a valid question with no simple answer.

It sounds like, in design terms at least, the production version of the Type 00 will be mighty close to its concept. But still, not that faithful. The real thing will have four doors, for starters. And a speedometer. And licence plates. And, presumably, wheel arches that permit some suspension travel.

This is a grandmother/egg-sucking situation, I realise. You’re on TopGear.com. You get concept cars. You will have your own reasons for holding your own strong, strong opinions about the Type 00, reasons totally unrelated to how production-final or otherwise the concept is.

But pity those who don’t. Wrapping your head around Jag’s big rebrand is complicated enough, without also trying to grasp the inherent strangeness of concept cars themselves…