5 Of Dodge's Best Easter Eggs And Where To Find Them
In recent years, Easter eggs — hidden messages primarily found in games and movies — have moved beyond media and into the automotive universe. Automakers like GM, Volkswagen, and Tesla have all jumped on the Easter egg bandwagon.
But probably no other automaker embraces them as much as Stellantis, the parent company of Dodge, Jeep, and Ram, among others. In fact, it could be argued that Jeep, then under parent company Chrysler, started the Easter egg craze back in 1997 with a simple air vent shaped like a radiator grill on its Wrangler. The rest, as they say, is history.
In comments made to Dodge Garage, Dodge designer Mark Trostle said, "It's about attention to detail, thoughtfulness. Putting those things in the car's design makes it that much more special as customers and owners." So while these fun, whimsical touches might not make a vehicle perform or drive any differently, they certainly add volumes to its personality and are often a nod to its heritage.
2019+ Ram 1500 Pickup Truck
Ram's fifth-generation pickup truck launched in 2019 to great fanfare, even earning the title of MotorTrend's 2019 Truck of the Year. It was lauded for its comfortable ride, fresh but unmistakably Ram styling, and luxurious interior that put many luxury cars to shame, never mind its truck competitors. It's within that well-appointed interior where we find a couple of Easter eggs — inside the voluminous center console, in particular.
On the floor of the center console, toward the rear, there's a pictorial history of all iterations of Dodge/Ram pickup trucks embossed into a plastic flap designed to keep items from sliding forward in the cavernous storage space.
Raise the armrest — which doubles as a lid for the center console and is large enough to serve as a desk for Ram owners who work in the field — and another Easter egg reveals itself. Molded into the plastic underside is a collection of mathematical charts and tables that includes a protractor, ruler, SAE-to-metric conversion charts, and more. Reportedly, the math-heavy Easter egg was created to disguise a visible mark that occurs when the plastic piece is cast.
2015+ Dodge Challenger
Dodge's third-generation Challenger has been with us since 2008, which is hard to believe because a near-constant stream of higher and higher horsepower engines has kept it relevant. Cashing in on the tail end of the retro car craze — as did fellow pony cars Mustang and Camaro — the Challenger's styling is true to its early 1970s origins. Even more so following a mid-cycle refresh in 2015 that ushered in a couple of new Easter eggs hidden away in the throwback coupe.
The first surprise is right in front of the driver's eyes. We mean that literally because there's a small silhouette of a Challenger car in the lower corner of the windshield. The uber-horsepower SRT Demon version of the Challenger (which was banned by the NHRA) has a similar silhouette, except it's kitted out with widebody fender flares and doing a huge tire-smoking burnout. Also, examining the underside of the center console lid reveals an old-timey Dodge Brothers logo.
Moving to the exterior, the already-slick "air catchers" that replace the inboard headlamps to feed fresh air to the engine are lined with an image of an SRT Hellcat, SRT Demon, or T/A insignia, depending on the model.
1997+ Jeep Wrangler
As a brand, Jeep has to be the reigning champ of Easter eggs. Some models, like the Renegade, have over 30 Easter eggs. Besides the typical Willys-style miniature Jeeps plastered all over the wheels, windshield, and shifter, here are a couple of lesser-known surprises.
The current Wrangler pays tribute to its history every time the vehicle is started, with "Since 1941" on the instrument panel display and a graphic of that model from 1941 morphing into a modern-day Wrangler. In the rear cargo area, Wrangler owners will find a message in the battlefield communication method from the early days of Jeeps: morse code. What does the code spell out? It reads "JK," the two-letter body code for the latest iteration of the long-running Wrangler.
The Wrangler's pickup truck sibling, the Gladiator, also keeps a few secrets. There's a pair of flip-flop sandals molded into the cowl area in front of the windshield as inspiration for your next trip to the beach. Also, a heart shape followed by the number 419 appears at the rear edge of the Gladiator's cargo bed. That's the telephone area code for Toledo, Ohio, where the Gladiator is built.
Finally, on almost all Jeeps, if you look carefully inside the headlights, you'll see the brand's iconic seven-bar grill peeking back at you.
2013+ Dodge Viper
Even though Dodge's rambunctious V-10-powered supercar was killed off after 2017, it still has some of the coolest Easter eggs. The final iteration of the Viper, the fifth-generation model, has a map of the Nurburgring race track in Germany imprinted at the bottom of the passenger-side door pull to commemorate the occasion when a 2010 Viper ACR logged an impressive lap time of 7:12.13 (seven minutes and 12.13 seconds).
Similarly, there's another race track etched into the bottom of the Viper's cupholder. This time, it is Laguna Seca in California, where another 2010 Dodge Viper ACR made a then-record lap of 1:33.944. For those not in the know, ACR is short for American Club Racer, the most track-oriented version of the V-10 supercar.
Finally, besides a simple redline on the Viper's tachometer to warn drivers that they're approaching the V-10's maximum operating RPM, there's a Stryker logo (a.k.a. Viper logo) in the center of the tachometer that changes from black to red when it's time to shift to a higher gear.
2021+ Ram TRX
According to Ram, its TRX muscle truck is the "quickest, fastest, and most powerful mass-produced truck in the world." Indeed, it may be all those things, but one thing it isn't is modest. The plastic trim surrounding the engine bay features a T-Rex dinosaur devouring a raptor — a not-so-subtle nudge at the superiority of the TRX over its Ford F-150-based competitor.
Inside the center console between the two front seats, another playful diagram is molded into the plastic floor of a storage cavity. It shows the size differential between a person, the Ram TRX truck, and an actual T-Rex dinosaur on a 1:60 scale. Like under the hood, there's also a diminutive raptor being chased by the massive T-Rex.
When the TRX debuted in late-2020, it dominated over Ford with a supercharged 6.2 liter HEMI V8 that produced 702 horsepower to the Raptor's measly 450 horsepower. Over the ensuing years, the Raptor bulked up on horsepower, culminating with the current Raptor R that makes 700 horsepower, just two horsepower shy of the TRX. Will this new parity put an end to the Easter egg digs at the Blue Oval brand? Somehow we doubt it.