If you’re too young to remember the Y2K era, I can sum it up pretty succinctly: Weird. But why tell when I can show? Just look at the picture above. And let me be clear: The Plymouth Prowler was pretty out-there even for the year 2000, but viewing it through the lens of the 2025 automotive landscape just makes it seem even more unhinged.
Visually, it was a direct appeal to hot-rodders, coming as close as possible to outright ignoring modern safety standards in an effort to evoke the chopped-and-slammed look that was synonymous with classic iron. And it looked the part, mostly in that it looked nothing like the melted-soap-bar sedans sold alongside it. By comparison, the Prowler was sleek and sinister. Remember, we were still doing minivans in 2001; the notion of Ram as a standalone brand would have elicited laughter from contemporary journalists.
It weighed about the same as the Honda S2000—2,800 pounds—and made similar power, but did it not with a high-revving four-cylinder and snick-y, six-speed gearbox, but with a minivan-spec V6 and a four-speed automatic. Snoozeville. That’s where Michel’s Auto Design comes in. This Wisconsin-based shop is offering a modest turnkey package that transforms your stock V6 Prowler into a Hellcat-powered, stick-shift monster.
We’ve seen Hellcat-swapped Prowlers before, but so far, but we’ve yet to see a shop offer this as a standing build. The “Sinister” package includes a Mopar crate Hellcat motor (rated at the same 707 horsepower as the standard road engine), a Tremec T56 6-speed manual gearbox, a custom independent rear suspension, custom valved exhaust with integrated X-pipe, an upgraded cooling system, custom hood vents, and a front bumper delete.
And yes, it retains the factory air conditioning. How’d they fit all that in there? Uh, carefully. As you can see from the video below, it was a tight fit:
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So, the Prowler’s biggest defect is solved, provided you can afford it, at least. The good news? The base cars are still (relatively) cheap, so the biggest investment here is in the upgrade itself.
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Byron is a contributing writer and auto reviewer with a keen eye for infrastructure, sales and regulatory stories.