The first modern electric car to really catch the attention of enthusiasts was Tesla’s Roadster. Back in 2006, PayPal founder turned space-frontier fanatic Elon Musk took the catchy name of fabled electron dabbler Nikola Tesla (no, his machine isn’t named after the heavy metal band), gave it a tweaked Lotus Elise body and powered it with laptop batteries on steroids. The result was a lightning strike of a hit, generating breathless reporting about the two-seat roadster’s staggering torque and long waiting lists topped by celebrities such as George Clooney and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Fast forward five years. It now looks like the folks at Nissan want to capture some of that glitzy mojo for themselves.

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