A 56K-era taste of Lincoln's new luxury sedan

Do not adjust your monitor; do not check your Internet connection. This is our first look at the Detroit auto show-bound, production-spec 2017 Lincoln Continental, rendered in dialup-era pixilated glory.

Sorry about that.

This picture, which recently appeared on Ford Inside News, is in the trademark low-angle, front-three-quarter style that Lincoln (and Ford) use on their shopping websites. It’s even the same anonymous silver shade shown on Lincoln’s site -- so we’re going to go out on a limb and guess that that’s what it is intended for.

Though we won’t get a non-blurry look at the car until Lincoln pulls off the covers in Detroit, you can get a decent idea of what to expect based on this solitary still: The double-trapezoid front fascia, the ridged hood, the muscular kick of the beltline -- all elements of the stunning Continental concept -- have made the jump to the production car in one form or another.

It’s hard to gauge size based on the angle of the photo, but when you combine what we can see here with previous spy photos of camouflaged prototypes, we’re indeed looking at an upright, full-sized (or nearly so) sedan with a fair amount of presence. As to how closely the interior maps to the plush, blue suede concept car fantasy -- that's anybody's guess, for now.

Other bits of information we’ve gleaned since the concept appeared going on year ago: It’ll very likely get 3.0-liter EcoBoost V-6 power, and it will ride on a front- or all-wheel-drive platform. So it’s not exactly a suicide-door-equipped return to the Rat Pack era. But we already knew that would be the case, and we’re still eager to get a closer, high-resolution look in Detroit.

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