2010 Jaguar XJ Review and Prices

Jaguar may have just been sold, but it's plowing ahead with a new flagship sedan. With brawny coupe-like styling, more power and a futuristic interior, this thoroughly modern XJ could be the crown jewel for Jaguar's new owner.

Jaguar keeps hemorrhaging red ink, so does Ford Motor Company, in part because Jaguar has been such a money pit since Ford bought the famed British automaker some 20 years ago. With Ford now desperate for cash, it's just finished the process of selling Jaguar as well as Land Rover after offloading a third British property, Aston Martin, in early 2007. Fortunately for Ford, several suitors lined up, including the new owner Tata Motors of India, part of the big Tata industrial combine. But that's another story.

Meantime, Jaguar sales keep sliding, especially in the U.S. The X-Type compact premium sedan has been a major flop here, which is why it's being dropped from the local lineup. Demand for the aged S-Type is down to a trickle, but that midrange sedan goes away in mid-2008 to make room for the new XF. The sporty XK coupes and convertibles are doing okay, but the flagship XJ sedans have been a hard sell even after their wholesale redesign just four years ago.

Critics contend the latest XJs aren't moving because they look so much like the previous-generation cars. But Jaguar realized some time ago that it was trapped by its own visual past and began searching for a new design tradition, a 21st-century take on "Jaguarness." The XF is the first fruit of that effort. The 2010 Jaguar XJ will be the second.