There are a few surprises among the luxury vehicles due for 2023 release, with some even venturing into family friendly territory. In WISH’s annual roundup, Stephen Corby and Andrew Chesterton share the 12 best beasts to be unleashed in the coming year.

ASPARK OWL

Sure, there are birds you can name a car after – falcon, hawk, eagle, maybe even humming bird (its wings are very fast), but owl? Yes, they are killers, but they’re a bit too thoughtful, ponderous and frightened of being seen in daylight hours to be the name of the world’s fastest electric car.

Clearly the people at Japanese company Aspark spent all their money on the tech behind the Owl and had none left for market research.

The Aspark Owl is allegedly capable of sprinting from zero to 100km/h in 1.89 seconds, which would make it the hardest-charging EV on the planet and does seem a little hard to believe.

Years ago a Lamborghini engineer told me that no road tyres will ever get a car to 100 in under two seconds. Since then Tesla has claimed a 2.1-second dash, and even that was recorded on a special sticky road surface.

What is slightly more plausible and yet even more incredible at the same time is Aspark’s claim that its Owl – powered by a 64kWh battery and with four electric motors, one for each wheel – can hit 300km/h in just 10.9 seconds. This I have to feel.

I’m guessing that at those speeds you won’t achieve the Owl’s 450km range figure, but nor will you care very much as your 1480kW and 2000Nm road rocket rips your head from your neck.

The price for the Aspark Owl seems to keep flapping around, as does its availability, but there’s a good chance that you could pick one up in the next 12 months for a mere $5 million, if you’re lucky. And brave. And like owls.

KOENIGSEGG GEMERA

The problem with hypercars is that you can really only use them to scare the living hell out of one person at a time. Fortunately, Koenigsegg has finally turned the world of high-speed terror into a family affair with the invention of its four-seat hyper hybrid, the Gemera.

Incredibly, for a car costing a touch over $4 million, it’s powered by a 2.0-litre three-cylinder engine, which sounds a bit pathetic, but it is twin-turbocharged and joined by three electric motors, one for the front two wheels and one each for the rear ones.

Koenigsegg calls its engine the “Tiny Friendly Giant” (it weighs just 70kg), but there’s nothing small about the Gemera’s combined outputs of 1268kW and 3500Nm. All that power is funnelled through a single-speed direct drive transmission, so there will be no halting for gear shifts when you engage its ridiculous acceleration.

You won’t care that it can travel for 50km in electric-only mode, but you’ll be interested to hear that it can fly from zero to 100km/h in just 1.9 seconds on the way to a top speed of 400km/h.

Essentially, then, this “hyper grand tourer” is like an F1 car with four seats. I think my favourite feature, however, are the giant scissor doors, which fly up to give access to both the front and rear rows at once.

Quick egress is no doubt important when everyone wants to leap out and vomit after experiencing its punishing g-forces.

Just 300 examples of the Gemera will be built, and every single one of them will be sold, to a nutter.

MCLAREN SOLUS GT

You might think the Lamborghini Countach is the most famous and worshipped supercar of all time, but you’d be wrong. Arguably the single most talked-about – as opposed to measuring greatness by poster sales – supercar ever is the McLaren F1, a limited-run legend that had a single driver’s seat in the middle, and one on either side for two terrified passengers.

McLaren has made other supercars since, but none that could really wear the heavy mantle of the F1, until now. Behold the truly ridiculous looking and properly unique McLaren Solus GT (it means “alone”, which is what its driver will be, because it’s only got one seat.)

If the design looks fantastical (indeed, viewed from above it looks like a spaceship) that’s because it wasn’t initially created to be real; the Solus began its life as a virtual star car in the Gran Turismo Sport video game.

Personally, I don’t believe anything good comes from playing driving games – they are an ersatz, unsatisfying and frightening nerdy version of the real thing – but this car might change my mind.

The single-seat Solus is very much a track-focused tearaway, with a specially developed 5.2-litre V10 engine capable of revving beyond 10,000 rpm, a fully carbon fibre body and a slightly silly 618kW and 650Nm.

It will shred the air to 100km/h in 2.5 seconds and has a top speed of 320km/h, at which point its driver may become thinner, or shorter and more squat, because its aero package is said to deliver more than 1200kg of downforce, which is a lot. More than the car weighs, in fact, at just under 1000kg (that’s not much).

What it doesn’t have, yet, is a price, but considering it is aimed to compete with other F1-styled track vehicles as the Aston Martin Valkyrie AMR Pro and the Red Bull RB17, it may well be pushing towards the many millions. Don’t expect to get one for less than $5 million. Oh, and you can’t get one anyway, because all 25 of the examples McLaren plans to build are sold before they’re even unveiled to the public. Cruel.

PININFARINA BATTISTA

Is there a more admirably archaic term than “coach builder”? That’s what Pininfarina, one of the world’s finest and most fabled car-design houses, still refers to itself as, and it’s a name that even those people who don’t remember its storied work with Ferrari and Alfa Romeo will be hearing a lot more about now that it’s made its very own car.

Behold the Battista hypercar, which is exactly as beautiful to look at as you’d expect from a company that prizes design above all else.

Underneath all that perfectly proportioned carbon fibre is a chassis bought in from Croatian crazy EV maker Rimac. The electric motors, capacitors and 120kWh battery pack are also borrowed from what might notionally be seen as a competitor, but Pininfarina says it put plenty of work into making the Battista uniquely Italian.

Cleverly, the battery pack is not your typical skateboard set-up, under the car, but a T-shaped unit that fits behind the driver and between the two seats, with the goal being an ultra-low, super-sporty driving position.

It’s also completely and utterly bonkers beneath all the beauty, with a Space Shuttle-towing 2300Nm of torque – all of it instantly available from standstill and capable of shoving you to 100km/h in under two seconds – and 1378kW. Just read that number again. It’s the amount of power you’d get if you strapped three Ferrari 488s together (someone should try that).

The top speed is 350km/h and the claimed range is 450km from a single charge. And all this can be yours for around $3.5 million. Or you can just buy a poster instead.

LOTUS ELETRE

At first blush, Lotus turning its attention to a giant SUV feels a little like Elon Musk suddenly declaring his love for the deep rumble of a V8 petrol engine (or for the US Securities and Exchange Commission).

It’s just a little out of character for a brand that built its reputation on super-light, two-door sports cars that were roughly the size of a mousetrap – and every bit as comfortable to sit in – to suddenly produce a 5m -long SUV like the incoming and all-electric Eletre.

But while it might be bigger, the Eletre (billed as the world’s first hyper-SUV) is still very much a Lotus, with the China-made EV equipped with twin electric motors that should deliver around 445kW of driving power (Lotus says that’s just the starting point), which is enough to clip 100km/h in an incredible 2.95 seconds.

It’s not just fast on the road, but lightning quick when you’re parked up, too. The Eletra gets an 800-volt architecture, unlocking super-fast charging – Lotus says a 350kW DC fast charger will deliver 400km in driving range in just 20 minutes. And on range, the Eletre is equipped with a very big battery in excess of 100kWh,with the brand targeting a driving range of around 600km between charges.

Production is kicking off in China this year, before a full-scale launch in the new year, with prices expected to start at around $200,000.

It’s the future of Lotus, no doubt. And that future is very fast indeed.

RIMAC NEVERA

Oh good, someone has invented a hypercar for the self-obsessed, social-media generation. I was quite excited about the Rimac Nevera, one of the many vehicles currently vying for the title wildest EV ever, but then I found out it has 14 cameras fitted all around its body and cabin so that it can record footage itself without the need for mounting GoPros.

And that made me want to cry. It also made me less surprised to learn that the first customer of this $3 million machine was a Formula One World Champion Nico Rosberg – I’ve always been suspicious that someone who wears a helmet for a living could have such beautiful hair.

Things got worse when I heard that Rimac is also working on an “autonomous track-driving feature”, which will arrive as part of a future software update. I bet Rosberg won’t use it, but Rimac says the feature is now as fast around a race circuit as its test drivers.

But let’s put all that behind us for a moment and just boggle at the Nevera’s numbers – like 1427kW of power and 2360Nm of torque from its quad electric motor set-up, powered by a 120kWh lithium-manganese-nickel battery.

Obviously it’s stupidly fast, with a 1.85 second claim for the zero to 100km/h dash and a top speed of 412km/h, but it’s also braining ts competitors in terms of electric supercar range, with a claimed figure of 547km.

Just 150 examples of this hand-built in Croatia Rimac will be produced and, yes, you guessed it, they’re all sold. But just imagine what they’re going to come up with after this…

ROLLS-ROYCE SPECTRE

The fact that Rolls-Royce is going electric is no real surprise. The clock has been ticking on big petrol engines for a while, and they don’t get much bigger than the potent 6.6-litre V12 favoured by the mega-luxury marque.

And to say the brand is excited about it is an understatement. Rolls-Royce has spent a long time ironing out all noise and vibration from the drive experience, trying to create the most cosseting, cocoon-like atmosphere it can for its well-heeled human cargo, and the biggest weak point in that plan has always been that thumping engine. The new Spectre does away with it entirely, with a new electric architecture that’s expected to out-perform the brand’s flagship petrol engine, which should mean outputs in excess of 465kW and 870Nm and a driving range of around 800km.

This being a vehicle at the pointiest end of the luxury market, you can also expect Rolls-Royce to find a way around the idea of plugging the vehicle in to recharge (don’t expect to see many in the queue for chargers at your local shopping centre). Instead, the Spectre will no doubt introduce induction charging, allowing owners to simply stop atop a charging pad to replenish the batteries.

A drip-feed of information surrounding the Spectre is all we know so far, including the fact it is being submitted to a 2.5-million-kilometre testing program, and that it will ride on an entirely bespoke platform exclusive to Rolls-Royce. Everything else is guesswork. But all will be revealed at the launch in the fourth quarter of 2023.

ASTON MARTIN DBR22

The stunning Aston Martin DBR22 is the kind of vehicle that transports you to a simpler time, back when nobody saw any real issue with a supercar that would try to murder you. How else do you explain the near-complete lack of windshield, or the fact that, should you roll over in the roofless DBR22, it’s your head that will be protecting the rest of the car from the impact and not the other way around.

But death is a small price to pay to spend time behind the wheel of a vehicle as visually striking as the DBR22, which looks as though it’s driven off the set of a James Bond film. The design is courtesy of a clever 3D-printed subframe that has allowed the brand to capture the spirit of its race cars from the 1950s while also saving weight and increasing stiffness.

The DBR22 is powered by a 5.2-litre twin-turbo V12, which will send a massive 526kW and 753Nm to the rear tyres via an eight-speed automatic gearbox. Hold on tight and 100km/h will arrive in 3.4 seconds, while the top speed is a claimed 319km/h (at which point you’ll no doubt be wondering why they didn’t spring for a windshield).

The bad news? For now the DBR22 is a one-off, but there are heavy rumours it will be entering production in limited numbers in 2023 so watch this space.

LAMBORGHINI HURACAN STERRATO

Now look, it did feel as if the world was ending, or had at least lost its way, when the first supercar company made an SUV (the Lamborghini Urus, a crime against design as well as brand heritage), but at least it seemed like an obvious and sensible commercial decision – and it did boost the company’s overall sales by around 300 per cent. Happily, the same wildly Italian car maker is now doing something far more bat-guano crazy, and more in keeping with its unhinged, death-or-glory nature, by releasing a version of its hugely fun Huracan V10 supercar that’s designed to be driven on dirt (aka completely sideways).

This is not, to be clear, a soft-roader of any kind; oh no, it is a howling mad supercar – the company’s biggest-selling non-SUV of all time – that comes with a slightly higher ride height, flared wheel arches, off-road cladding, roof racks and a light bar, but the same bonkers 388kW and 510Nm engine. It looks fabulous, or at least it will until it inevitably ends up upside down and covered in gravel rash.

Lamborghini’s regional director for the Asia Pacific, Francesco Scardaoni, says it will be “an interesting segment to explore”, and it’s certainly an entirely new one, with, perhaps unsurprisingly, no competitors to worry about. “We have had expressions of interest in this car worldwide, including from Australia, and we have letters of intent from people here, people who are placing deposits with our dealers to get one of these cars,” he adds.

Between 500 and 1000 units of what will be the last variant of the venerated Huracan before it is replaced by a more modern hybrid supercar are expected to be built, and you can expect it to cost somewhere north of $500,000 in Australia (or around $385,000 in Europe).

KOENIGSEGG JESKO

In the past, Koenigsegg has been almost as difficult to take seriously as it is to pronounce. Yes, it has promised and promoted hypercars with hilarious numbers since it was founded by its humble Swedish owner, Christian von Koenigsegg, in 1994.

What it’s actually managed to produce since then is barely more than 200 completed cars, or what Tesla sold in the past 30 seconds. Still, when what you’re offering is the most expensive vehicle ever sold in Australia – which the Koenigsegg Jesko will be when it arrives next year, at around $8 million – you don’t need to shift too many units.

Still, among its many promises, Koenigsegg says it’s now ramping up production to more than 100 a year, and one can only hope the Jesko is at the front of the queue because the world needs cars with a top speed of 565km/h (did I mention they make grand promises?)

The Jesko is seriously over-powered by a twin-turbocharged 5.0-litre V8 engine that makes the absurd outputs 955kW and 1500Nm, all of which goes to the rear wheels. The claimed zero to 200km/h time is just 5.6 seconds.

All I can say to the owners who are well off enough to throw $8 million at one of them is, good luck with that.

Just 125 Jeskos will be made and, incredibly, a few of them are coming down under, via our sole Koenigsegg dealer, Sullivan Kerr, in Sandringham Victoria.

As you’d expect for that price, you can have your Jesko however you damn well like, as Koenigsegg says the sky is the limit in terms of personalisation; from seat upholstery to colour choices, it’s all up to you.

In a car this fast, it will all be a blur anyway.

FERRARI PUROSANGUE

Not so long ago, Ferrari people would look sick and spit our their coffee if you suggested they might one day build an SUV – I think “never” was the word they used.

Fortunately they have found a cunning way around the problem by calling the new Purosangue “a four-door, four-seater”. Indeed, the 600,000-word press release on the new vehicle uses the term just once in talking about its “completely different layout and innovative proportions compared to modern GT archetypes (so-called crossovers and SUVs)”. The Purosangue (it’s Italian for “thoroughbred”) is not an SUV, despite being nearly 5m long, 2m wide and 1.5m tall, and looking a lot like an SUV, albeit a very pretty one.

Unlike its competitors, it does have a 6.5-litre naturally aspirated V12 engine making 533kW and 716Nm, so it will at least feel and sound like a Ferrari if you close your eyes. This is not recommended, particularly in an SUV – sorry, four-door four seater – that can hit 100km/h in 3.3 seconds or 200km/h in 10.6. Ferrari does mention the fact that “the Purosangue has a more commanding driving position than other Ferraris” yet claims that driving position is still “close to the floor to provide greater connection to the car’s dynamic capabilities”.

This quite large Ferrari also debuts the company’s new active suspension system, which sounds like it would be illegal in F1 and is designed to control body roll in corners and maximise grip, to give the Purosangue the same levels of handling genius as “one of the marque’s sports cars”.

It sounds miraculous, and I can’t wait to drive it, because it sounds like it’s defying all kinds of physical laws as well as the evidence of my own eyes, because it really does look like Ferrari has made an SUV.

TOYOTA GR SUPER SPORT

Will it get built, will it ever go on sale, will it catch fire, again? These are some of the questions surrounding the undeniably exciting-looking Toyota GR Super Sport – arguably the single most enticing vehicle ever to emerge from the world’s largest car company. Rumour has it that the exciting hypercar project has been canned, and that a test mule caught fire – never a good sign – but Toyota steadfastly refuses to countenance such quitter talk. It’s also important to note that the GR (it stands for Gazoo Racing, and yes, that does sound silly) halo car is very much a passion project for Toyota boss Akio Toyoda, who is – perhaps surprisingly for someone who runs the company that makes the Camry – a mad motorsport enthusiast and keen driver. If he really wants Toyota to have a proper supercar, even if it’s only so he can drive one, it’s still likely to happen.

The GR Super Sport uses a 2.4-litre twin-turbo V6 “Toyota Racing System” hybrid platform based on the one found in its Le Mans Hypercar (LMH) racing cars, and is said to produce at least 735kW. It could, however, if rumours of its triple-motor hybrid power plant are true, be considerably more than that.

The lofty goal of the Super Sport – and Toyoda San – is to take on race cars for the road like the absurdly fast Mercedes-AMG One and the Aston Martin Valkyrie. There’s no official word yet on how many will be built, where they will be sold or what the price will be, but if it looks as good as the photos we can only hope it does become real. A spokesman for Toyota Australia refused to engage with our speculation.