I get what your saying with the rest of your post, but this part....come on!

1. Looks nothing like a sunfire, whether you like how it looks or not. Looks more like a modern Austin Healy roadster if anything.
2. Chassis was built from the ground up, specifically for this application.
3. It'll out handle a sunfire, while running on rims.
4. It's rwd
5. 52/48 weight distribution.

If everyone let their bias towards FD reliability sway them, the Rx-8 would not have sold at all. It's a totally new chassis, built from scratch to be a roadster. It's gonna handle well. I'm not concerned about exterior build quality, since the body was hydroformed. Interior quality looks to be up to par. Whether or not it holds up, we'll see, I guess. I'm now gonna stop defending the car from ridiculous statements before I start looking like a fanboi :D