Yeah after inhaling chemtrails for a few years people will believe in literally any conspiracy. 

Does *anyone* offroad with these vehicles, or is it just to make them look cool to people who take them grocery shopping?

I haven’t looked at Masonry’s site for a long time. How can this guy care about his brand at all — they even sell Masonry golf carts now!

I’d say there are two big strikes against this vehicle:

I don’t think that’s a big improvement vs. a (new) GTI. The Countryman has a smaller trunk, but it does have more volume when the rear seat is folded. Unfortunately a good chunk of the Countryman’s extra volume is also vertical, since it’s 4" taller than the GTI and they are within 1" of the same overall length.

“Victim Blaming” is a pretty loaded phrase to use when discussing a car accident since it’s frequently used for things like sexual assault, BUT at least you didn’t call me a Tesla Stan or Elon Worshiper.

I use to live in Silicon Valley (and I’m happy to have left!) and the ‘dump tesla’ trend has been happening for YEARS now —I had friends calling the Model S the “Camry of Palo Alto” before the Model 3 was even released. After a couple years, the Model 3 became so cheap that it was basically an anti-status symbol for…

At this price the interior should be absolutely restored like-new, including the seat fabric, original radio, no idiotic cell phone, and an undamaged center console.

This is also a public service announcement that you should not let a 70-yr-old grandmother drive a 400-500hp car (with a 0-60 time of ~4 seconds) unless she knows what she’s doing!

BAM! Takata airbag through the heart!

but WTF will you do if it rains while you’re shopping?! Without AWD, that Honda would slide, flip, end up at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean no matter if you’re parked in Colorado or Vermont.

Yeah it’s 0-60 time is like a Ford Maverick Hybrid or base Honda Civic. It’ll be absolutely fine in traffic, but this is no modern sports car.

At least it was an I6 — that provided a bit of differentiation from the ‘rough’ GM V6's and 4-cyl engines from the Accord and Camry. These days literally everyone has a 250hp I4t in just about every vehicle — I can imagine a world where there is just 1-2 stock 2.0L i4t that are shared between *all* car companies the…

This is disappointing, and just last week Anandtech shut down as well.

It’s a sign of how far BMW has fallen, IMO, and that in the US market there is no excuse for BMW to offer a generic 250hp i4 in anything but an entry level 1- 2- or 3- series.

Yeah a crown isnt my choice of daily driver but I’ll take it over a k5 or a stripper model of 5-series.

Damnit I’m always typing v6 instead of i6!

I like the design although I’m torn on the rear of the vehicle. I do not think these outdoor photos with all the shadows show the car in the best light, so to speak.

I disagree — no one is cross shopping these and the price difference is like 50% of the Kia’s price. If what people say about the Kia experience is true then you can’t hurt their reputation in a comparison like this.

From what I see at Kia.com, the K5 GT does not come with summer tires. It costs about $40k loaded versus the $58k base price of a 530i.