Moxie is what made the first two generations of the Jeep Grand Cherokee so darn lovable. It had character. It had panache. But most of all it had guts. An authentic off-roader, the Grand Cherokee inspired its drivers to blaze new trails, to disregard the “tread lightly” sissies, to run every trail like it was the final stage of the Baja 1000. Trouble was, in the real world most owners used them for grocery getting, commuting, and family road trips. And the truth was that neither of the first-generation Jeep Grand Cherokees were much of a treat to drive in the urban jungle.

DaimlerChrysler, the German-American conglomerate with the good fortune to own the Jeep brand, aims to change that with the all-new, third-generation 2005 Jeep Grand Cherokee. Designed to be more refined, with an improved ride quality, greater comfort, and more luxury amenities than ever – without any loss in off-roading capability – the new Grand Cherokee is likely to please a wider swath of suburbanites. But will fans of the brand warm up to its more generic persona?

After hundreds of miles behind the wheels of a Grand Cherokee Laredo equipped with a V6 engine, a Grand Cherokee Limited equipped with a 4.7-liter V8 motor, and a Grand Cherokee Limited powered by a mighty Hemi V8, the Jeep feels at once like a step forward and a step back. All the rough edges of the old Jeep, the stuff that gave it a rugged feeling of authenticity, the stuff we liked about it, have been sanded off, leaving a more refined Grand Cherokee that drives exactly like most of the other SUVs on the market. The scrappy driving character of the old model has been sucked out of the redesigned Grand Cherokee, replaced by traditional design cues like a seven-slot grille, rounded headlights, and trapezoidal wheel arches that are supposed to evoke “Jeepness.” From behind the newly refined Grand Cherokee’s steering wheel, you could be piloting just about any other SUV on the market, at least until you mat the throttle on the Hemi-powered model. And while this newfound docility might win Jeep new converts, it could also drive loyalists out of showrooms, despite the preservation of its “Trail Rated” four-wheeling capability.