I thought about the Flex design the other day and I think that is the perfect SUV design. Boxy to accommodate more room, not overly tall or big. It was basically a stretched Sion XB and that was a good thing...now I don’t know how it drove, but from a design perspective I liked it.

Looks like a low-poly Ford Flex

Really depends on who you are and what you want.  CR is a perfectly good option for the vast majority of people out there - who just want a car / truck / SUV to do everyday stuff with.  They aren’t catering to enthusiasts.  Or off-roaders.  Or people who want cars with some type of character and charm.  They’re…

show us where he hurt you

Subaru is the way to go for good visibility. The Forester is one of the few modern cars that feels like an absolute fish-bowl to drive, in a good way. You can see anything in any direction, it’s amazing.

plenty of used cx-5's under 20k if you are willing to look at the 2015-2017's.

The rear visibility is piss-poor, though.

The Lexus is the best option here.  All the other choices are crap. 

Bimmer, Land Rover, and a fukkin CrossCabriolet? We got jokes, I suppose.

Mazda CX-5, boom drop the mic...

Not your style? Fair.

I honestly don’t know how they weight things, but they discuss several things in the road test, and they do say how things rate in different ways. They have reliability ratings that use data that give you generic real world data both overall and in general areas, although they don’t really call out specific trouble…

At least ConsumerReports goes out and buys all the cars they test, rather than sucking up to manufacturers to get free loaners. I disagree on how ConsumerReports values certain aspects of vehicles, and they also have a weird way of defining “reliability,” but if you read their actual write ups it’s easy to suss out…

They rate things on a variety of things. There is a minimum reliability score a car has to meet before they will recommend them, but it’s not the only rating.

That’s a take of someone who is clueless about CR. To get real value from them, you need to subscribe or pay for their website to read the road tests and get more detailed ratings that let you decide what is more to your liking. There is a general one size fits all overall rating, but there are more specific ratings…

It’s weird that some of these mention reliability and some don’t. If reliability is a factor then I would not pick a Subaru Forester over a RAV4 or a Ram over an F150. That’s just my opinion but long term I don’t see the Forester with a flat-4 and a CVT not having more maintenance costs over a RAV-4 with a 2.5 I4 and…

THIS.  This this this.  Carnival is a cool looking minivan with some neat features, but there’s just no way I’d consider it over a Sienna when reliability is the main issue

I have no problem recommending KIA’s, but certainly not the KIA Carnavale over the Toyota Sienna.

No; CR uses survey data with a statistically significant number of data points, unlike, well, pretty much every other reliability “rating” in existence.

They’re a steal!