Cruz Control: The Internet reacts to the 2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz

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For years, keyboard warriors and armchair experts decried the lack of a true small pickup for sale in North America. This week, Hyundai introduced the pint-sized Santa Cruz, a machine with tidy proportions and an open bed. While many were eager to welcome this new take from the Korean brand, a few were bold enough to criticize the effort despite it checking most of the wish list they’d recited for years.

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Ungrateful whelps.

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Cruz Control: The Internet reacts to the 2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz Back to video

For the record, the Santa Cruz measures a total of 195.3 inches in length and wears a 51-inch long bed. The ‘justperfectweneeditback’ old Ford Ranger for which some internet nerds pine was 203.6 inches in length with a 71.8-inch bed. Both machines have just over 40 inches of width between their rear wheel wells.

To take the pulse of social media, we donned our Driving hazmat suit (standard company issue) and waded into conversations on Twitter, Facebook, and – shudder – the cesspools that make up internet forums. We’re still trying to wash the smell of stale popcorn and basements off ourselves.

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Here are few notable reactions to the 2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz from around the web.

Aussie rules for naming conventions are in full effect for this pundit.

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And, in a role reversal, some people in other markets are jealous of what we’re getting here.

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Edmunds has a point, especially considering the slick integration of that gauge cluster ahead of the driver.

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Not everyone immediately jumped on board.

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And some wished for a truck that was smaller still.

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Cases were also being made for a ‘midgate’ like the one with which the departed Chevrolet Avalanche was equipped.

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At least one Twitter user feels it could be a viable replacement for a Tacoma.

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Over at a Honda Ridgeline forum, users were exhibiting way more decorum than Jeep Wrangler fans were showing when the Ford Bronco showed up.

You can be assured this won’t be the last time the words “Santa Cruz” and “Maverick” are breathed together in the same sentence.

Or, it would seem, the words “Subaru Baja.”

One potential customer seems all in, which Hyundai surely likes to see.

We’ll end off with an astute observation from, of all places, the generally mouth-breathing forum on VW Vortex.