Meet Cute
January 9, 2026
Alex KiersteinThe antidote for whatever ails you at the moment is a chibi Skyline build headed to the Tokyo Auto Salon.
I got the text right after I woke up. One of my car buddies from back in my Road & Track days wrote, simply, “OMG” and linked to a social media post showing what was surely an AI-generated chibi car that looked like a Skyline. I was initially suspicious given the amount of stuff out there generated solely for attention. But no, the tiny Skyline appears to be real. And it is adorable.
It’s the product of Hardcore Tokyo via its J Beats shop. Both are expressions of Jun Takahashi’s vision, which includes a lot of Pandem/Rocket Bunny widebody kits, VIP style builds, and a fair number of lowrider pickups. Remember the Pandem widebody Chevy Camaro with the “SUPPORT VIOLENT DRIVING” decal on the ducktail? Yeah, that’s Jun.
The “Skyline” here is not a chopped-up R32. It’s actually a Suzuki Twin, an unusual kei car I wasn’t familiar with before. (How is that even possible? And yet, it happens.) The Twin is exclusively a two-seater, with an available hybrid powertrain and a soft, Y2K-ish design language. It’s kind of like a cross between an original iMac and a Ligier microcar. So, weird and interesting in its own right, but as a canvas for a superdeformed R32 it’s inspired.
Jun worked with Sunoco, Donut Media, and Pandem (among others) to bring the car to life. And of course it’s on Wats, because everything works on Wats. I’m not totally clear if it’s just a fun one-off built for the show or if Hardcore Tokyo and Pandem are going to collaborate on a kit for the Twin folks could actually buy, but y’know, the important thing is that this is a real thing that exists and is delightful in a way that an AI-slop chibi Skyline never, ever could be.
Reality can be rad. This tiny GT-R will be at the Tokyo Auto Salon on starting on January 9th. And at some point, Pandem will sell you the kit. Pricing on their site isn’t accurate, but you can at least get on the waitlist if you’re interested.
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January 9, 2026
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