If people would actually go out on adventures, explore some new terrain, push their vehicles and themselves beyond what is comfortable, get well off the beaten path and actually post up some trip reports, things may just perk up again?? . . .
Well, it's an interesting issue you've brought up. Today's Land Rovers have a lot of charisma, to be sure. Some of that is owed to Land Rover's past. I have a Defender 90. It differs drastically from the LR4. It cost around $35k. It was unsophisticated, even new, and compared to the LR4 it is absolutely barbaric. Flat glass all around. Sheet metal spot welds are unapologetically visible everywhere. Hand crank windows. The seats slide on simple tracks. No leather. No wood. It's old school to be sure. What it lacks in luxury, however, it makes up in utility and capability. It has 16" wheels and coil springs over solid axles. It has a center locking diff that I can engage when I feel like it. In an hour and a half I can lift it 3 inches, fit real 35" off-road tires on it, and tackle obstacles that the LR4 couldn't hope to get past.
Since my D90 was built, the Land Rover marque has evolved away from utility and towards luxury. Price and complexity have risen, and as we all know, complexity is the enemy of reliability. Don't get me wrong. Land Rover had reliability issues back when my Defender was built, but in a way that's different from today. The Defender (and the first generation Discovery) were well-designed trucks that were indifferently built. The first owner would encounter problems owing to whichever manufacturing defects applied to his particular specimen, but once those were sorted out, the vehicle was more or less reliable. My 90 is fourteen years old and it's my (almost) daily driver. The LR4 is a different animal. The terrain response system is a marvel. It lets someone who has no idea how to drive off road drive off road. Same with HDC and all the other ****-bang enhancements. But it is so complicated that the opportunity for an expedition-halting failure is huge. My LR4 recently had an electrical problem that took 5 weeks to diagnose and involved bringing in a technical specialist from another state. I will go places in my Defender that I wouldn't dream of going in the LR4, because I have so much more confidence that the Defender will bring me back. Because of its complexity and the attendant lack of reliability, my LR4 might see a few snow covered roads or fire roads, but it will never get too far off the beaten path, never out of the cell phone coverage area, and never beyond reach of a tow truck.
Then there's the cost factor. Back when Defenders were available new here in the U.S., they were a posh option to a Jeep Wrangler. Land Rover didn't compete with BMW and Mercedes like they do today. You have to have a LOT of money before it makes sense to risk wheeling a $60,000 vehicle. I remember when the LR3 came out. Not too many folks wheeled them at first. It was only after a few years had passed, when the trucks were on their 2nd or 3rd owners, and their values had dropped substantially, that people began to wheel them more. And the same will be true with the LR4, I'm sure.
And so I feel, sir, that your angst is misplaced. The LR4 is too new and too valuable to be seeing very many threads of trip reports and photos of trail rash.
YMMV.
