Deep in the Brazilian outback, where red dirt roads disappear into the horizon and river crossings come without warning, Mitsubishi quietly dropped a truck that would make any red-blooded American pickup guy stop dead in his tracks. They took their already-respectable Triton midsize pickup, turned the dial past eleven, and called the result the Triton Savana. Only eighty lucky Brazilians will ever own one, but every photo of this bright-yellow beast feels like a postcard from the life we wish we still had access to.
Start with what matters most when the pavement ends: water. The standard Triton is no slouch – it’ll already wade through a couple feet of muddy river without coughing. Mitsubishi fitted the Savana with a proper factory snorkel and raised the rear differential breather. Result? It’ll now push through 31.5 inches of water, a full 30 percent deeper than the truck you can buy today. That’s the difference between “maybe I’ll try it” and “hold my beer.”
Image credit: Mitsubishi
Under the hood sits the same proven 2.5-liter twin-turbo diesel that’s been hauling families and cargo across half the planet for years. Hook a trailer or load the bed – 2,425 pounds of payload says it still earns its keep when the adventure is over.
But this isn’t just a snorkel slapped on a base truck. Mitsubishi went through the whole catalog of things real off-roaders bolt on in their driveways and made them standard equipment. Front and rear steel skid plates guard the vitals. Heavy-duty rock sliders wearing the same anti-scratch X-Liner coating protect the sills when the trail tries to bite. Up top there’s a roof rack ready for jerry cans or a rooftop tent, already carrying a shovel and a set of recovery boards because somebody at the factory actually uses these things on weekends.
Eighteen-inch black pinwheel wheels get wrapped in Goodyear Wrangler Duratrac RT tires – the exact rubber a lot of guys swap onto their Tacomas and Colorados the first month they own them. A proper tow hitch and recovery strap hang off the back, ready for the inevitable moment when your buddy in the shiny mall-crawler gets high-centered.
Image credit: Mitsubishi
The whole truck wears a coat of bright Savana Yellow with black accents and just enough special decals to let the guy on the next ridge know you didn’t just sticker-bomb a rental. It looks mean without trying too hard – exactly what a work-and-play truck ought to look like.
Word from Brazil says each of the eighty examples will sticker around sixty-five grand in U.S. dollars. Steep? Sure. But when you add up everything that’s already bolted on from the factory – snorkel, skids, sliders, tires, rack, recovery gear – a lot of owners here would spend half that much the first year anyway.
So why does this limited-run Brazilian special matter to a guy standing in a dealership parking lot in Texas or Tennessee? Because Mitsubishi is waving a giant flag that says, “Hey, we still remember how to build trucks that make you want to call in sick on Monday.”
Image credit: Mitsubishi
Remember the old Montero? The Evo? Those weren’t that long ago in the grand scheme. The company that built those legends hasn’t forgotten the formula; they’ve just been keeping the fire alive in markets that still value real four-wheel drive. The Savana is proof the capability is still in the DNA.
And the best part? Mitsubishi keeps dropping heavy hints that America is finally back on the shopping list for proper off-road iron. They’ve shown concepts. They’ve talked about taking on the 4Runner crowd directly. The Triton itself keeps getting better every year overseas. Sooner or later some of those lessons – maybe even some of those exact parts – are going to show up on whatever rolls into showrooms wearing the three diamonds.
Until then, the Triton Savana is the truck we’re all staring at through the window like kids at a bike shop in 1985. Yellow, snorkeled, armored, and ready for anything the wilderness can throw at it. Eighty Brazilians are about to live the dream. The rest of us can only hope Mitsubishi is paying attention to how fast those eighty trucks disappear – because the message will be loud and clear.
America still wants trucks like this. Badly.
