Originally Posted by Reactionary

The magazines are already doing their part to avoid mentioning flaws in the new 3-series, most notably the exterior flaws. The trademark horizontal door line used to be executed in a stately business-like fashion, but in the new car it looks like the edge of a surfboard. It actually looks pretty sloppy. The designers for just about every car including the current 3-series understand that the portions of the headlight and taillight that go around the edge of the car onto the side plane have to be balanced with each other. In the new car, the headlight part is sharp and jagged and extends quite a way into the side plane while the tailiight part is much less angular, even sort of weak, and barely enters the side plane. This is a total mismatch that no magazine has even mentioned. If I cover the front half of the car with my hand, the rear looks like it's from a $13,000 econobox such as the '92 Honda Civic or '88 Toyota Tercel. Real cheap looking. Directly from behind, it just looks weird and crappy. Those taillights are a real mistake. That integrated trunk spoiler with the concave undersurface is just a meaningless attempt to reinforce and justify the ill-conceived side plane horizontal door line. I'm too tired to complain about the interior, so I'll leave that for others.

Originally Posted by KC_Prelude

Lets face it, BMW's exterior design reached absolute perfection from approx 1995 - 2000 and there is no way that those body styles can possibly be improved upon, they are perfect. All the new BMW's are horribly bangled, this one much less so than all the others. There is not even any debate about the issue, the cars just look terribly wrong. Most people who buy bmw's don't care what they look like, they are usually more interested in the badge. Just goes to show you that evolution does not always produce better results.

Originally Posted by RX8-79

Obviously there's room for debate, since a debate involves two opposing sides and differing points-of-view.

Let's face it, not everyone is going to agree with you and Im one of those people. I love everything post-Bangle and wish I could meet him in person to give him a pat on the back. He took a line-up of good-looking but conservative cars and turned them all into something worth talking about. And obviously people are talking, since sales are higher than ever and profits are rolling in.

People place way too much emphasis on styling anyway. Like the saying goes, there's an *** for every seat. Where some see hideous, others might see a masterpiece. Case in point, the M-B CLS: magazines call it 'beautiful' but to my eyes it's as beautiful as a sumo wrestler's big jiggly ***.

Originally Posted by lilbigman

ok ok lets cut to the chase ,everyone knows that the only version that matters will be the new M3 Untill i see that im going to hold off on flamming bangle. But to his credit he did have a hand in designing the E46.

Originally Posted by BlueEyes

there have been some shots of the new m3 masked in disguise. I hope it will be a monster, rumor has a 400hp v8 in there. Should be good.

On a side note, I was talking to a racing instructor freind of mine. He works at a school where you bring your own car and they teach, then test for your regoinal racing liscense. He said M3 drivers have the highest fail rate, and overall, they are awful drivers!!

Originally Posted by policyvote

I think the last non-Bangled generation of BMWs were gorgeous , but sort of the pinnacle of that design. They could have made those cars for twenty years and they'd still look great. I think they're stretching for something different, something new. Finding the line between what is possible and what is right . . .

I think the industry is going through a real crisis of identity now . . . we have the technology now to mass-produce all of those crazy-looking futuristic concepts that the industry has been scuplting and drawing for decades, but the question is "should we?" It's a very very very fine line between advancing the art and making Aztecs.

Peace
policy

Originally Posted by KC_Prelude

******' A man. When I first saw the back of the 7 series I thought the trunk was open, the lines just don't fit. The only bangled bmw that I think looks good is the 6 series and its hella expensive.