Video: Hitting Up L.A.’s Best Car Spots in the Perfect Green Hybrid

And as I know from the past, you usually get something cool in terms of cars while you're here, right? I try to. And this time, I wanted the epitome of Southern California. I wanted green technology. I wanted a hybrid, something plugin. And the very nice folks at Mercedes-Benz, well, they gave me exactly that. Okay, what'd they give you? (dramatic music) Well, it is certainly green, but you did say you wanted something electrified. I don't know if this GT 63 twin turbo V8 fits the bill. Does it? Okay. This is a 2026 Mercedes AMG GT 63 SE Performance four-door. The E Performance system is a plugin hybrid. Now you're not going too far on electric power and yeah, it's a hybrid with 831 horsepower and 1,032 pound feet of torque. Wow. It's absolutely green. And, you know, it gets 18 miles per gallon combined, but it'll fit in perfectly in southern California. Orange County, maybe. Yeah, Orange County. Yeah. Now, while this has certainly woken me up with this crazy, crazy color, I am gonna need some caffeine before we get started. So how about we just head inside to that coffee shop? Caffeine first, car second. Okay. (upbeat music) Where are we going? So I think because of where we are located right now and the ease of driving, probably gonna go to Griffith Observatory first. Never been there. Yeah, it's a cool place. Check out the view. Sounds good. (upbeat music) This is a lovely drive. I didn't realize that they had such a park like this in Los Angeles proper. but what is that noise this thing keeps making? (engine revving) It's a piped in hybrid noise, but it doesn't sound like a muscle car. It just sounds like a weird angry spaceship of some kind. Yeah, I really wish they kind of focused more on the V8 sound. I think that's probably what the people buying this car really want. And I understand, you know, you can't just leave the electric part silent, but I don't know. I don't think this was the way to go. (engine revving) But the V8 itself makes a great noise. Yeah, when you can hear it. It's really kind of quiet, especially around town like this. Which is surprising for such a visually loud car that it would be so quiet from a sound perspective. (upbeat music) This is cool. Yes, this is the Griffith Observatory and as the name implies, this is an observatory. And a museum. But we're not really here for that today. We are just here for a brief stop to check out the amazing views that this affords us. (upbeat music) This is always one of the best treats of this city. You can see the whole thing from up here. Yes, and not to get us, you know, going, but looking at this view reminds me. Where should we go next? Well, how about Petersen Automotive Museum? (upbeat music) You know, descending the mountain like this, you get a feel for the brakes. And the brakes in this thing are a little bit strange. They're not always the same every time you hit the brakes, they sometimes have a different variable progression. And I find myself having to hit the brakes harder than I thought I needed to in order to stop in the distance that I thought we were gonna stop at. Yeah, these regenerative brakes that Mercedes has been doing for years now, some of them are pretty good, some of them are really not good. And I don't know, you know, if it's product dependent in terms of like if it's an AMG product, it's different, if it's a standard car it's different, but yeah, I don't know. I find it kind of touchy a lot of times. Yeah, these ones are just kind of weird. And I gotta admit these seats, they're really heavily bolstered. But if you're just trying to commute in this thing, if you're just trying to drive around in this car, they're not the most comfortable. No, this is a, I don't wanna call it compromise, but you really have to make a conscious decision to want this vehicle for daily use. I mean, it can be pretty punishing. Yeah, especially over these speed humps like we have here. The suspension doesn't react well to these at all. (upbeat music) Well I thought here, obviously we're in the Petersen, the parking garage of the Petersen. And I thought, what better way in a car themed visit, I mean this is a absolute guaranteed stop for us. And well, even in the parking garage, it's a show. Yeah. Like Ken Block's old Raptor with TRAX on it. That's pretty cool. Have you been here before? I have not been to the Petersen Museum before, but I mean, what more is there to see beyond just the parking garage? Oh my God, look at this. Also they have a Laforza, which I don't know if a lot of viewers know really what a Laforza is. One of the first luxury SUVs ever made, really. It is one of the first luxury SUVs made. So we got the, it's a hybrid, Italian style, American power. Five liter Ford V8 Pininfarina body. Interesting looks, you think it's beautiful, I know you said that. I think looks great. It looks like a Range Rover of the area. I mean, yeah, it looks good to me, but. I think it looks interesting. I would rather have this. Yes. Ford F-150 Styleside, '92. I mean, look at the size of this thing. This is what an F-150 used to be in terms of size, normal, real, usable, easy. As opposed to the behemoths that these are today. I could see over the hood, I could see over the bed, you know, you really can't do that very much in a current F-150. Plus it's nineties hot pink. Yeah, they quite literally don't make 'em like they used to as they were. No, but they should. But they should. Exactly right. But there's a lot of other really cool stuff even just in the parking garage of the Petersen Museum. 100%. Mr. Petersen's. Mr. Petersen. Former Bentley with the best license plate in the world. Hot rod. 'Cause he was the publisher of "Hot Rod Magazine". With the typical failed, you know, suspension. Typical failed suspension. You know, these used a actual mineral oil hydraulic system for a lot of the controls. Yep. And there we go, the alarm got set off. Don't get too close or it yells at you. Don't get too close, causing trouble. Jesus. But how about a green Mercedes? I think that's probably the show stopper of them all. You know what, you know what? I think it's time to actually take that thing somewhere where we can actually drive it and exercise it properly. (upbeat music) You know, out here on the highway at some slightly higher speeds, it really smooths out a bit. The suspension smooths out a bit, but I gotta admit it's noisier than I thought it was gonna be. Both the wind and tire noise are more elevated than I expected in a car costing this much. Yeah, it's got S class pricing without the S class refinement for sure. Yeah, it's a performance machine, I get that. I mean you've got these summer tires on here, low profile tires. So you're going to get more noise than normal. (upbeat music) So we braved the traffic in Los Angeles downtown and we hit the Pacific Coast Highway and then we came up here to Malibu. But where exactly are we? So we are in the famous Malibu Country Mart. Yeah. It's like an open air shopping center oasis in the middle of the long stretch of PCH. Now this is where a lot of people that like to go drive in the canyons, they stop here first for coffee, food, lunch, anything you really want in a bougie shopping center. And most importantly, for enthusiasts like myself, I come here for the crazy amazing car spotting, which, you know, you'll see super cars, you'll see Pebble Beach winners, you'll see car celebrities like Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno. But I see you looking around. Yeah, there's really. Not much to see today in the middle of a Wednesday after lunch. Only thing I can see is a gorgeous FJ60 Land Cruiser over there and the Green Beast of course. But since it's so slim pickings today, I say we just head up to the canyons. Let's go drive this thing on some roads that are appropriate for it. Let's get out there. Yeah, let's do that. (upbeat music) Go for it Aaron, don't kill us. Well no, there's no guard rail on that side. (both laughing) So this is some of the more proper driving roads. Finally. Yes finally, no more traffic. Lots of cool things to see in LA but honestly if you're a car enthusiast, this is where you want to be. And frankly, this might be one of the things you wanna be in or maybe not. Yeah, I was gonna say. I mean it's, there's a lot of performance potential in this thing because it's got 831 horsepower and 1,032 pounds feet of torque. I want more. I don't think you need more. All-wheel drive, so it's got the 4MATIC system, it's got an electronic limited rear slip differential, and it's got an electric motor in the back as well. That electric motor in the back itself makes 200 horsepower. But honestly I could do without it. I don't feel like it's really all that well integrated with the rest of the twin turbocharged four liter V8 powertrain. I mean, you're never lacking for torque and you've got this nine speed multi-clutch transmission, which if you wanna shift it yourself, you can, but honestly it does a pretty damn good job of it just by itself. And you don't really feel the need to shift it. I like just letting it do what it needs to do. I don't like trying to second guess the electronics and these kinds of things. And honestly, I dunno, these kind of cars, like these super high powered AMGs. Yeah. They feel, they're good, they handle quite well. They are over gripped. Yeah. Tons of mechanical capability. But I will say they feel more oriented towards a long, open stretch of highway where you can just absolutely cane it then. Yep. On tight California canyon roads like this. Yeah, it just feels really big to me. I mean, the two-door AMG GT is tidy. It's nice, it feels a little bit more nimble than this obviously, but this just feels large. It feels very large. I don't know if I'd describe the two-door AMG as tiny. That's still a pretty big and wide vehicle. That's like Viper sized, I mean that's. Yeah, it's smaller than this. It is smaller than this 'cause it's E class to that. But yeah, I don't know. And these roads are admittedly pretty tight for it. Big, fast, handles decently. I mean it's very well balanced. The ride quality is mixed. I mean you do have some really enormous tires on this thing. And these are the super sticky summer tires. And you're talking about being both in sport mode and comfort. Yes. It doesn't really matter. Yeah. It's still across the board, yeah. It's bumpy. And loud. It's boomy. I mean we were driving this on the highway earlier and it was, it's boomy and loud and not terribly luxurious in that regard. I mean I think that adding the E Performance plugin hybrid version of this, to me that's a European thing to do in order to get into congestion zones in European cities that require electric operation or you get taxed to death. So adding that to this thing, I don't see the benefit of it in terms of performance. I mean it is a cool car. I mean it's still tremendously cool and I think the person who buys this is well aware of what they're getting. Yeah. I don't think anybody's gonna be surprised, green or otherwise, is gonna be surprised at how this thing drives, I mean. We should talk about the green on this thing too. This is called Green Hell Magno. Green Hell obviously being the nickname for the Nurburgring. The Nurburgring. The Nurburgring, where a lot of these things are generally developed. It's a matte paint, I'm not a huge fan of matte paint. It's not purely matte though. It kind of feels semigloss. Well I'll tell you this, I definitely, so I understand there's probably mixed opinions publicly on this bright matte green color on a sedan. But I'll tell you what, I don't want my 800 plus horsepower 1,000 plus pounds feet of torque vehicle to be any, I don't want it to be a subtle color. I want people to know. That's true. How crazy this thing is. But if you plan on, you know, being a scoff law in it and, you know. (Conner laughing) You don't necessarily want it to be this color. Whoa, are, whoa, Aaron, are you suggesting that some AMG drivers may or may not be driving like crazy people sometimes? I never do. I don't know what you're talking about. Oh no, no, no, no. Give me the keys to an AMG, I'm always keeping it in the speed limit. Exactly. So yeah, overall, this or a Panamera GTS or something like that. Which Panamera would you pick? Well honestly, at this, so the issue running with that comparison. Well, remind me, how much is this one? $230,000. Okay, well wait a minute. Maybe not, maybe my comparison stands. So you have Panamera GTS that I had earlier this year, which was about $180,000, 480, roughly 480 horsepower. Yeah. Doesn't really hold a candle in any regard. No. Performance to this. Dynamically though, pretty phenomenal. So really you kind of have to compare this to the turbo SE hybrid. Yeah. Which would munch on that $230,000 budget. Like, oh I don't know, first time it had eaten in like three years. What is that? It would absolutely swallow that $230,000 budget without blinking an eye. Thank you. So at that point, kind of whatever your budget allows. Personally, fanboy speaking, I think the turbo SE hybrid is my pick in this segment because other than the crazy performance, you also get the benefit of it being quite a comfortable and more usable vehicle on a day-to-day basis if that's what you want. And you get bananas levels of horsepower and torque. Not quite as much as this, but a lot. Yeah, and I do like the, you know, the Mercedes manufacturer programs now that you can get a lot of customized things like paint and interiors and bits and pieces and whatnot. So there's a lot of fun options that you can add with these kinds of things if you have the money for it. But you can do that with Porsche as well, so. And you don't have to spend 200 grand on this car. That's true, you can have one at a much less expensive price. Well, if I can read this while we are whipping around corners, we got. Okay, how much do you think the paint is? The paint, I'm gonna say probably $5,000. $9,900 for the Green Hell Magno paint. Yeah, there you go. And then the Napa leather's like is $2,200. Carbon? The matte carbon is $2,850. Not too bad. How much is the aero package with that ridiculous wing out in the back? Honestly, $1,100. No, actually I think that's. Yeah. Read that wrong, sorry. The driving, lemme see this. But the base price of this to my point is I was incorrect earlier. You do have to spend $200,000 on this car. You must spend, no matter what, $205,000. Now that's for the AMG GT 63 SE Performance. E Performance. You can get AMG GT four-door for less than that. Yes, you can. You can get a GT, now, correct me if I'm wrong, GT 43, GT 53. Can you get a regular GT 63, no E Performance? Can you get a GT 43? I don't know. I don't think they make a four cylinder on the four door. Well no, there was V, it was six cylinder. It used to be the V6. The 43? The 43 used to be the V6, yeah. Because the 43 in the SL is the turbo four. Okay, so they changed it. Yeah. But this is the old car. This is the old car. Can't we just call this thing a name? Why does it have to have all these damn numbers? I can't figure out anything anymore. Well unfortunately you're about three decades short of. Yeah, right. Getting Mercedes to. Remember when they used to? Actually they never did that. That's true. They've never not had alphanumerics. Crazy and confusing. Except when we were in the Petersen earlier, we saw a Pagoda. We did see a Pagoda. But that's not official name. It was under a tarp. Yeah, it was under a tarp. It was under a tarp. I would've liked to see more. So overall though, I mean, it's a unique car. It's a fun car. It's definitely a more of a look at me kind of thing than instead of an enthusiast choice I would say. And final note on that paint color. This is far from the first Mercedes to wear this paint also. No, it's not. And it's not even the wildest paint that you can get on this thing. Not even the wildest paint. You have enough money, Mercedes will paint the car whatever color you want. (upbeat music) I gotta say, even after the fires, the recovery up here in terms of the landscape is extraordinary. It's beautiful up here in Malibu. Malibu is always a treat to come to. And well, you hungry? I'm kind of hungry. Do you know anywhere around here to go? Neptune's Net's not too far from here. We can get there one-quarter mile at a time. Tuna, no crust. Super. Get some lunch. (upbeat music)