Two and a half metric tons is a whole lot of metal.  In today’s world of space-age, light-weight materials that weight could easily translate to three compact cars.  Yet, we have the Dodge Durango—a massive 5.1-meter, traditional body-on-frame SUV that’s unashamed of its plus-sized American origin as a McDonald’s Quarter Pounder.  The Durango’s certainly not healthy: its heft makes it too big for some of our roads and it guzzles gas like there’s no crisis.  And like the stars-and-stripes in wax-coated paper, the Durango is comfort food.

The Durango’s wrapper is simple and straight-forward.  If you’re relying solely on the exterior as a measure of gravitas and luxury, then you won’t be gastronomically satisfied.  In fact, those familiar with the pre-facelift Durango will note that the new one looks plainer and simpler, with all the bear-inspired features thrown out.  Still, since this Durango’s a facelift, there’s some degree of ursine styling like the hutched styling and squared-off shoulder line.  The bear’s been given a sophisticated makeover though thanks to the huge crosshair grille and spiffy chrome clad 17-inch alloy wheels.  Weighing the doors, the Durango does feel like the Quarter Pounder of SUVs—the doors feel solid and heavy, shaming similarly priced competitors.

Once the Durango’s unwrapped though, the interior is a showcase of solid execution with first-rate materials.  This is still Americana so there are some hard plastic surfaces here and there, but at least this one feels well-screwed together with buttons that actually work and stalks that engage crisply (this is compared to Dodge’s newer offerings).  There’s no beef patty in the Durango, but leather and suede does come standard be it on the first or the third row.  The interior’s extremely roomy too, providing ample space for 8 hungry adults.  It’s an extremely comfortable place to be in.

Unlike our aforementioned Quarter Pounder though, the Dodge does have a tasty treat buried somewhere between the carpeting: modern creature features.  No expense was spared here: the front seats are adjustable electronically with a memory function for the driver; the interior lighting uses LEDs creating futuristic mood lighting whenever someone alights from the car.  Perhaps the best morsel of the Durango has to be the MyGIG entertainment system.  At first, it may look like a typical audio unit, but the large LCD screen has a touch-screen interface making it easily accessible to all but idiots (eat your heart out, iDrive!)  Almost everything can run on the Durango’s audio system and for the more technologically-oriented owners, there’s an auxiliary input jack to hook up an iPod and even a 20GB internal hard drive to store ripped CD tunes.

The ursine styling has been lessened and in its place it's more sophisticated with chrome...lots of chrome!

The interior is well-built (much better than current Dodge cars) and very roomy. The seats are lovely: finished in a combination of suede and leather.