Some interior parts are taken from the Pontiac Aztek SUV, notably the air vents in the dashboard. Other interior components are taken from GM's pickup truck and SUV parts bins. But the important thing is that it hangs together as a complete, rather bold interior design with lots of metallic flavorings here and there, black-on-white gauges shared with the high-end GMC SUVs, and very decent seats. The rear-view mirror self-dims automatically. Glass is all Solar Ray glass which cuts heat and UV transmission.

Seats are thick, comfortable and supportive and keep you centered when driving off-road at odd angles. The shifter is a bit of design overkill, with a big, round, shiny handle that's meant to bring macho indoors but takes up too much space doing it.

Overall, the interior works pretty well. The small vertical side glass makes you want to hunch over to see out, but if you like intimate interiors, this might be the one for you.

We were astonished at the high level of speech articulation across the truck from left to right and front to back. It was easy to have a relatively long-distance conversation from the back seat of the Hummer at 75 miles an hour, and there was enough seat adjustment and rear-seat leg room that I could have sat behind myself, which is terrific since I'm almost 6-foot, 4-inches tall. Compared to this, the big Hummer is both short-coupled and loud inside.

It takes a healthy step up to get into the Hummer unless you use one of the two available step-plate options. And there is an unusually high liftover height at the rear floor. You don't get 10 inches of ground clearance without paying for it, and the truck ends up not very friendly to those of moderate stature. But you do get six 12-volt power points, fore (3), aft (2), and in the rear bumper (1).