They called it "Godzilla" — and with good reason. When the original turbocharged Nissan Skyline GT-R emerged in 1989, it was hailed as the greatest ever Japanese sports car, a coupe to challenge Europe's top speedsters such as the Porsche 911 and Ferrari Testarossa. It was never officially exported to Europe or the United States, yet that's where the car's mystique and legend began; fans outside of Japan heard about Godzilla, but couldn't have one.
That was because, unlike any domestic car before it, the GT-R was built for one reason: to win in Japan's Group A racing series, which it did repeatedly. It was basically a street-legal race car. The 280-hp, twin-turbocharged 2.6-liter engine was impressive, but the chassis made it extraordinary. Its racing construction meant the engine could be tweaked to as much as 700 hp, and the chassis would just think it was another day at the office. Successive versions in 1995 and 1999 only further enhanced this Skyline's strong fan base.
Now meet the all-new Nissan GT-R, the most anticipated Japanese car of the new century. It's also had the longest unveiling of any coupe in living memory. Even when Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn showed the first design concept of the next-generation GT-R, minus the Skyline prefix (because the new car is not based on a Skyline) at Tokyo Motor Show in 2001, few could have imagined what Nissan had planned for the icon. Revised designs appeared at successive motor shows until the final version turned up in 2005 at Germany's famed Nurburgring racetrack wearing a black bra-like mask to camouflage the front and rear ends. The covers, and the bra, finally came off the automotive world's most high-profile striptease act on Oct. 24 this year in Tokyo — and we all got to see the reborn Godzilla in the raw for the first time.