Because more Veyrons are always better than fewer Veyrons, the FKP Hommage is unquestionably a good thing.
But it’s also a confusing thing: a tribute to modern Bugatti’s original hypercar...based on its follow-up to that hypercar. Sure, it imagines what an updated Veyron could have become...but didn’t the Chiron do that in the first place?
But, as well as a source of significant philosophical confusion, the FKP Hommage is the latest example of a manufacturer raiding its own heritage for inspiration. Because hey, why let some outside company mess around with your back catalog when you could do it yourself?
Here are seven more examples of car companies getting creative with their own history.
1) Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale
You come at the king, you’d best not miss (artistically speaking). Alfa Romeo’s modern reboot of the most beautiful car in its really-quite-beautiful portfolio—Scaglione’s magnificent Tipo 33 of the ’60s—had the potential to be a grim, new-VW-Beetle-grade retro-disaster.
Thankfully, they stuck the landing. At £1.7 million (P137.8 million)—around eight times the price of the Maserati MC20 on which it’s closely based—the new 33 Stradale is admittedly a pricey way to live out your “’60s Riviera Boulevardier” fantasies. Whole lot cheaper than inventing a time machine, mind you.
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2) Lamborghini Countach LPI 800-4
If you were a child of the ’70s or the ’80s, the OG Countach was the ultimate bedroom-wall poster car. With the new Countach LPI 800-4, Lamborghini was clearly hoping all those kids of the ’70s and the ’80s have grown up to run successful hedge funds.
Or 112 of them, at least. Built around the bones of the Sián, the new Countach does an unexpectedly convincing job of dragging Lambo’s V12 icon into the 21st century. As arrogantly arresting as the original? Not quite. A whole lot easier to reverse-park? Very much so.
3) Land Rover Defender V8 Churchill Edition
In 2016, Land Rover finally stopped building the original Defender. Only it didn’t, really.
A couple of years later—clearly spotting the long queue of punters seeking (a) that blocky old Defender aesthetic, (b) a slightly more modern driving experience, and (c) the sensation of having their wallets emptied at pace—Land Rover quickly cranked up production of Classic Defenders, taking old shells and stuffing them with such modern treats as a 5.0-liter V8.
And if £200,000 (around P16.2 million) for an ‘old’ Defender simply isn’t wallet-emptying enough for you, you’ll be wanting the new (sorry, ‘new’) Classic Defender Churchill Edition, which pays tribute to the Series I gifted to Sir Winston in 1954 for his 80th birthday.
Was Churchill’s original Series I packing a 400hp V8, Bilstein dampers and uprated anti-roll bars? It was not. Do we still approve? As Churchill himself famously said, “Oh, yes.”
[“Oh, yes” was the Churchill car insurance dog, you muppet. - Ed.]
4) Bentley Speed Six Continuation
Bentley doubtless does not consider its 2025-issue Speed Six a rewriting of history, seeing it instead as a straight continuation. But it’s a new car from 1929, arriving nearly a century later, so clearly, something has gone wonky with the chronology here.
Built using period techniques and with absolutely no concessions to modern luxuries such as synchromesh or safety, the modern Speed Six (yours for £1.5 million or around P121.6 million plus taxes, old boy) represents, in Bentley’s words, a resumption of production. Always keep ’em waiting, chaps.
5) Jaguar C-Type
Another continuation car with Le Mans history, another grand debate on what constitutes ‘original’ and ‘authentic’ and indeed ‘furious raiding of one’s own back catalog.’
Granted, the metaphysical implications of ‘What if Jag had made more than 50-odd C-Types in the early ’50s?’ aren’t quite so juicy as, say, ‘What if Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s chauffeur had been taught to actually read a map?’
But hey, while this particular timeline may not have averted mass global conflict, at least it leaves it with a bunch more pretty old Jags than we had previously. We’ll take it.
6) Aston Martin DB5 Goldfinger Continuation
Another continuation car, but one with a rare sense of humor. Aston’s own tribute to 007’s company car of choice in 1964’s Goldfinger packs pretty much every gadget found on the Q-branch-enhanced original.
Smoke screen? Check. Battering rams? Check. Oil slick delivery system? Check. Bulletproof rear shield? Check. Ejector seat? Actually, not-check, since modern health and safety consider the finest feature of Bond’s DB5 a trifle life-threatening. Which was kinda the point, right?
7) All the Pagani Zondas
Does this count as rewriting history? Debatable. But at the very least, it’s an interesting anomaly that, more than a quarter of a century after revealing the first Zonda—and 14 years since replacing it with the Huayra—Pagani is still pumping out new examples of its debut hypercar.
Well, when we say ‘pumping out,’ we actually mean ‘making very occasional one-off versions for its most valued and indeed valuable clientele.’ The most recent, the Zonda Unico, was revealed last year and apparently inspired by the towering Kunlun mountain range of western China. On account, we’re guessing, of both being quite pointy and many millions of years old.
NOTE: This article first appeared on TopGear.com. Minor edits have been made.
