It's a tricky subject. On one hand, some trims of the ranger are certainly iconic, like the raptor. Others, not so much.    I see a bronco truck as a case of building on the strenths of the ranger, and ditching the weaknesses, making it an even more compelling product than ranger. Getting rid of something good in favour or something better. 

Interesting. For some time, Ford shot down any product that they saw as a commodity. That included the escape. What are they executing differently with this product to justify it being part of the no boring products mantra?    We could say hybrid, but the escape offered a hybrid and Farley viewed it as a commodity. Is it the bolder styling, or something else we don't know about yet that really makes it an aspirational product?

Personally, I got a shock reading about a 2.7L valve failure. Catastrophic result. No indication, regularly serviced. It does happen.

Another reason is back in the early stages of NANO. The 2.7L would eventually give way to the 3.0L after Lincoln had it first. I would have loved to swap the 2.7 out of my old Fusion for the MKZ 3.0L from the MKZ.

That was just a production code. The Fathom was listed as “Maverick EV” on that report, it was a placeholder. The “Escape” EV likewise is probably a placeholder for the UEV C-segment crossover, which if I had to guess will be called the Fuze or perhaps the Mythic.   At this point with how much Ford clearly hates the Escape, I would be surprised if they reuse the name on UEV. The cheap crossover is likelier, because if they’re gonna have a shitty boring car it might as well be cheap.

Wasn’t escape also being thrown around for the compact suv on the uev platform?   All of those other names are terrible by the way 😂. I can’t wait to hear the AI generated story of how they came up with those.

Essentially yes. But no the Flex name will not be returning. It does not fit this vehicle at all. Remember this is a $25,000 small SUV. 5 passenger only, no 3 rows.   I don’t know what name is in the running for this but the rumors have been:   Maverick Sport Explorer Sport Escape   Again it is very Ford SUV like. Not Ford Bronco like. Think Maverick, current Explorer and original Escape mixed together.    This little SUV will be a critical and very focused product with very high volume expectations. It will be the new entry level vehicle for Ford.

F-100 puts it under the F-Series branding umbrella for North America. Hopefully it will not be treated as the red headed step child anymore. For ROW, you can bet that the name will remain Ranger as there is no F-Series branding. This all makes sense and is good for the F-100's (Ranger) future.

I believe Ford considers the Ranger as one of its icon vehicles. Seems strange to get rid of it for some other truck that fills the same segment. 

Here's how I see the lineup playing out.    You have fathom, which is looking to be a relatively low slung EV ute. Tons of tech/ features at a great price, fun to drive, sporty, likely lots of accessories and opportunities to appeal to the lifestyle crowd.    Then you have maverick which is still lifestyle oriented, but more conventional. Hybrid/gas instead of EV, less advanced tech, more traditional in terms of tech and design. A good entry level fleet truck.    F-100 or instead, the bronco truck which is what I believe it is. This gives Ford's midsized truck a reason to exist, an identity, which is something the current ranger struggles with relative to maverick and f-150. Targets the off-road crowd hard. More expressive boxy styling over ranger, more capability. Personally, I think taking some learnings from the ranger super duty to make the bronco truck beefier in terms of capability would be neat.    Then from there, just the usual f-series. So you have low slung funky fresh lifestyle ute, conventional small fleet truck, off-road lifestyle midsized truck, full and heavy duty trucks with both commerical and midsized trims.    I was nervous, and still am to a degree about all these truck models, but they seem to be doing a good job differentiating them.