Bentley will officially unveil the new Continental GT V8 to the public eye at the 2012 Detroit Auto Show this January and the newly facelifted Continental GTC is expected to debut at the Frankfurt Auto Show this September. In the past, just about every Continental variation has at least the same basic 6.0-liter twin-turbo W12 engine, until now that is. Bentley is planning to debut at Detroit the Continental GT with a turbocharged 4.0-liter V8 engine option in addition to the W12.

We're not at all surprised by this move, considering the increasing number of luxury and high-performance brands utilizing smaller engines with higher ouputs. In some other Bentley-related news, the automaker is looking ahead at the future of their four-door Continental Flying Spur. For now, it will continue on as is, but the next generation model will supposedly receive a major styling change in order to make it more competitive with the Mercedes-Benz 2012 CLS and Jaguar's XF and XJ models. They reportedly want to give the Flying Spur a more aggressive appearance as opposed to its current conservative look.