Still weighing the scales heavily toward replacing my ‘06 Subaru Forester post-nursing school with something with a manual. Manual, or hybrid car; can’t decide, but I have time.

One thing I’d be interested to learn more about is profitability. One of the hallmarks of luxury—not just in automobiles, but high-fashion, real estate, etc.—is that profit margins are higher specifically because people are paying more for two things, only one of which costs the producer anything real: quality and…

It’s a lot cheaper to integrate a screen with a handful of buttons than it is to individually wire a dozen or more (I count ~27 buttons in that ES300 picture). It’s also fairly cheap to replace those screens if they break, or update the entire interface, especially since more and more marques are using Apple CarPlay…

Marketing exists to either a.) sell people things they don’t need (because if they needed them, they’d be looking for them and not need to have someone tell them about it; it’s preying on induced demand and hoped-for information asymmetry) or, b.) reflect the excesses and inefficiencies of capitalist markets, which…

This is the moment I’m still waiting for from Hyundai or Kia.

I think that’s just a matter of change of relative circumstance. Say you’re a kid in the 1970's, looking at a C3, marveling at how fast it looks—and by connection, conscious or not, how fast it must be. Fast forward to 2018, and most family sedans with their up-level engines will outgun it without trying too hard. Are…

For the same reason that I paid $16 or so for a September 1997 issue of Car and Driver—reinstantiation of idealized memories. It was the first car magazine I (at the time 8 years old) ever received, and I loved it. I still remember laying on my bedroom floor one evening, reading it to/with my dad, who mostly doesn’t…

Thing is, any AMG Merc isn’t really a sleeper. That’s what the old 600-series cars were for. At least for the Amerian market, they stopped making an S600 with the 2018 refresh, and the SL and big coupe (S Class coupe nee CL) lost their 600's with the most recent redesigns.

I will forever lust after the 2006-2011…

I’d say that if you’re shopping in the $100K+ category, perhaps you should care about things like pedigree, sound or status. If you don’t care about these things in a car, then why are you spending $100K+ on a car?

I’m not disagreeing that there are plenty of other interesting options, but a V8 certainly isn’t among…

This is why I really hope Hyundai lets Genesis build something 90% of that Essentia concept. First of all, it looks amazing inside and out. Second—and more importantly—Genesis currently means nothing to almost anyone. Third, Korea has basically all the technology to make futuristic vehicles on its own. Why not append…

Cue the predictable responses of, “union in industry A is bad, so all unions are bad”. It’s called the ecological fallacy, guys; look it up.

You leave my car alone!

Considering how many other million-dollar electric coupes are pouring out of wherever they hell they want to, why not actually build this as is, sell it at an audacious yet Korean-discounted $750K, and establish Genesis and Korean luxury as stalwart in one fell swoop?

God, this thing is so badly proportioned. I’m not a fan of the current version, which is all kinds of bland, but wow is this one worse.

Sadly, you’re not wrong. I’m among the apparent minority who like the new Accord’s looks, so I was hoping to get a new hybrid one in a few years, though the possibility of this being a liftback would’ve swayed me to the Insight instead. Guess my choice is made.

But how the companies function financially has a strong bearing on the engineering aspects. With Kia being essentially free from Hyundai’s control of its finances, either company could behave in a way such that they diverge and are more visibly separate. It is truly just a marriage of convenience. Conflicts of…

Ah, false. Hyundai owns only about a third of Kia, far from enough to be a controlling interest. Pre-’97 Asian financial crisis, they were separate car companies altogether, and Kia’s automotive ventures actually predate Hyundai’s.

Best part is probably that it wouldn’t likely fit under the hood, so...mid-engine quad-turbo W16 SUV?

Ladies?

While you plebs get this little canoe, I’ll be in that limo from the Windowlicker music video. That way, in the almost inevitable situation when this...oxcart...breaks down, I can fit it inside my car. Could your limo have another limo in it? Didn’t think so.