Lights, camera, action: 2025 MU-X meets the press
WRITTEN BY: BEN SMITHURST
When did sequels get this good?
From moviemaking to manufacturing, updates to beloved originals always seemed to follow a disappointing formula. That was: 1) take what was good about the previous thing, 2) vaguely rehash it, only a bit worse, and 3) head to the pub. This is how whole cinemas came to ponder when Keanu would show up in Speed 2: Cruise Control (hint: he wouldn’t), or to bin their Sega Dreamcast consoles, or to gag on their Vegemite iSnack 2.0.
Bad sequels are typically uninspired and always lazy. Good ones, on the other hand, can only be born of passion, inspiration, humility, and a lot of hard work. Case in point: the 2025 MU-X. We’re in a hip, high-ceilinged warehouse space in Brisbane. There are hours to go ahead of the new 2025 Isuzu MU-X’s Australian media launch. Everything seems in place. And yet 16 Isuzu UTE Australia (IUA) staff continue to bustle around a dozen gleaming SUVs, polishing, prepping, doing final run-throughs. Demonstrating effort that’s not just apparent today, but that’s been ongoing for years. In moments, 18 of the nation’s automotive press walks in, to begin a two-day taste of Isuzu UTE’s new model. It’s go time.
MU-X by the numbers
The local story of the MU-X has been one of runaway success, culminating in a barnstorming 2024 in which IUA sold no fewer than 17,978 SUVs. The model was Australia’s 15th best-selling car of 2024, and the 6th best-selling 4x4 outright. Along with the D-MAX ute, the country’s fourth best-selling car overall, that result cemented IUA into Australia’s Top 10 car brands for the third year in a row.
MU-X sales alone leapt by close to 30 percent year-on-year in both 2023 and 2024. It was a staggering result for a marque with just two models in its stable, and IUA Managing Director Junta Matsui, calmly welcoming the media from a velvet-draped lectern alongside a slate-grey metallic MU-X X-TERRAIN, knows it.
“Success in one of the world’s most fiercely competitive markets is not something that we take for granted,” he says. “The updated 2025 MU-X represents a major milestone in the evolution of one of Australia’s favourite SUVs, keeping the MU-X at the pointy end of the highly competitive large-SUV segment.”
It’s an important day for IUA, the culmination of an exhaustive process of listening to feedback, tailoring the new seven-seater to Australian conditions, and incorporating an exacting design evolution and a suite of new technology. The presentation goes smoothly. Q&A sessions are held, then the journos, YouTubers and other proud car geeks pair up and head out for the first session: a two-hour road test. The convoy is away.
“If you’re in the market for an accomplished go-anywhere seven-seater with a long warranty, you’d now be even sillier not to consider this one,” explains Marton Pettendy from CarExpert.
Okay, but what’s new about the car?
For a mid-life update, in particular, there’s a lot to take in. First there’s the MU-X’s evolved exterior, which made a palpable first impression on the motoring journos. A balance of geometric and aeronautical cues is apparent in the new front end, the most decisive expression of Isuzu’s distinctive ‘Hexa Pod’ design language so far. That includes a taller, more confident nose, highlighted by a remarkably sophisticated grille which resolves into sleeker, more curved, and aggressively angled bi-LED headlights.
The presentation may have promised no-holds-barred off-roading capability, but the first impression is less of ruggedness than of refined strength. Some new technology is expressly for the rough stuff, such as a new ‘360° Surround View Monitor∓’ on higher specs that allows you to see below the axles, in real time, allowing you to be your own spotter when negotiating boulder-strewn trails. Elsewhere the suite of updated tech is less Double Island Point than it is Double Bay. (Not that the below-axles view won’t be handy if you’re trying to park safely between the Real Housewives’ production crews of our capitals’ leafier suburbs.)
There’s the upgraded, up-to 9.0-inch infotainment touchscreen, with its wireless (or wired!) Apple CarPlay® and Android Auto™. There’s the array of upgraded Intelligent Driver Assistance System◊ (IDAS) features, such as Intelligent Adaptive Cruise Control (IACC), which reads all manner of speed limit signs, and allows the driver to match the new limit with the press of a button. There’s Traffic Jam Assist (TJA) and Lane Keep Assist (LKA), which can work together, for example to independently steer, accelerate, and brake, to keep pace with a leading vehicle at under 60km/h, or stay in the centre of your lane from 0-140km/h.
There’s all that, and more. Road drive done, most of it is discussed that evening, alongside tomorrow’s much-anticipated drive location: the legendary, and legendarily challenging, Black Duck Valley 4x4 Park in the Lockyer Valley.
The rough stuff
“I took the 2025 Isuzu MU-X off-roading, and it blew my mind,” stated Zane Dobie from Drive.com.au.
“Whoa whoa whoa!” says Exhaust Notes Australia’s Salvatore Gerace, as he lifts the front passenger tyre skyward then gentles it down again, as his X-TERRAIN clambers undaunted up one of Black Duck’s hairier runs for non-competition spec 4x4s. His stock road tyres grab and track, urged onwards by the MU-X’s clever Rear Diff Lock and Rough Terrain Mode combo.
The MU-X crests the deeply rutted, boulder strewn, and at one stage, seemingly vertically stepped trail at a canter—and without damage. All dozen MU-Xs follow suit, repeatedly, before heading off on a long, multi-hour trail that rounds the entire park itself. If there’s any drama at all, it’s minor: a former Top Gear journo receiving a lip-full of tiny, translucent spines after foraging a ripe pink prickly pear fruit from the bush; two writers endlessly cresting the same near-vertical rise in 1.9L and 3.0L models, arguing about preference; several drivers wiping off suction-cupped GoPros on trees. Feedback on the ground, and later, on social media, is positive.
“Clearly Isuzu UTE Australia has watched our video, because they’ve addressed a lot of the areas of criticism we once had a couple of years ago,” says CarSauce’s Jacob Brooke, directly into the camera. “Isuzu has not held back with this update, changing the design, giving the interior some love, and even the way it drives is now better than before.”
Trails conquered, content captured, and catering dispatched, the wordsmith convoy packs up and begins bounding back to Brisbane.
“It’s classy and a little luxurious, but still ready to get dirty when you leave the city streets and head off the beaten track. The most impressive thing though is that Isuzu has listened to its customers and upgraded the model to suit their needs”, exclaims Salvatore Gerace from Exhaust Notes Australia.
That’s a wrap
The journos head home, or direct to the airport, or to the hotel bar. IUA staff trickle behind, including the crew of Isuzu off-roading guru and 4WD instructor Matt Taylor, plus half a dozen IUA sundry helpers, drivers, and stills and video photographers. All hard at it until the last moment.
Publishing embargos mean there’s no huge rush to hit ‘send’ on reviews, but as those trickle out over the next fortnight, it seems clear that this sequel has been warmly received. To the critics, at least, it seems to be shaping up as a bravura encore performance.
Sequels can be dicey, unless the makers have put in the work. Critical acclaim in the can, IUA can now only wait to see how it goes at the box office. “Today’s drive was an opportunity for us to showcase the strides we’ve made in refining the MU-X—enhancements inspired by real-world feedback from both customers and the media,” says Junta Matsui, at dinner.
“And after hearing some of your initial thoughts, I can confidently say that this facelift is about more than just turning heads; it’s about delivering a driving experience that meets the high expectations of Australian motorists.”
To explore more about the MU-X, click here.
