THIS is the 2018 Mercedes-Benz CLS – which won’t please Mercedes

The 2018 Mercedes-Benz CLS is due to be revealed at the Los Angeles Motor Show this week, but ahead of that we get the first leaked official photos.

After playing tease for a while, Mercedes are due to reveal the new CLS in the next day or two. But the interwebs have beaten them to it.

Published initially by Motoring in Australia (obviously with the Prue Leith timezone excuse), the pictures show a car which holds no real surprises.

Looking a lot less individual than the CLS did when it first arrived, the new CLS is a sort of smoothed-out, grown up four-door coupe with much stronger overtones of the E-Class. It doesn’t look as individual.

Inside is even more E-Class, and apart from a few titivations – like the ambient lighting, air vents and steering wheel – it looks very E-Class. Which is a real shame.

The original CLS was a car which Mercedes let show some individuality, not just with its (for then) almost unique four-door coupe body, but with an interior which didn’t feel like a different size clone of other Mercedes models.

So if you were waiting for Mercedes to re-invent the CLS in this generation as a trend-setting, individual offering it looks like you’re going to be disappointed.

More details and information on the new CLS when Mercedes goes official. Which shouldn’t take long now.