Rental Car Reviews

[Bob]

I used to like 2 door cars a lot more before I had a family and child. Now if I can get the same performance (or pretty close) in a 4 door, I'll take it. This is why I am excited about stuff like the ATS.

By the way, I saw a new ATS-V at Charlotte Cars and Coffee last weekend. It looks very nice in person. Unfortunately the resale on V-series Cadillacs is too good so it will be many years before this is remotely affordable.

[kevm14]

Maybe I'm trying to argue that the bigger, more muscley (and thus less "sporty") a car is, the less performance benefit the coupe gives you over the sedan version of that vehicle. I'd also argue that big cars look better as sedans whereas small cars can be a little awkward as sedans. Also, if you are used to small sedans, a big coupe isn't as big of an upset. But I think I'm saying that I don't understand small sedans OR big coupes.

A big two door seems like an anachronism to me, like a 1967 Cadillac Coupe DeVille. It was cool at the time, but it's not something you'll see Cadillac trying to reproduce in current times (the Eldorado had a long life but it, too, became irrelevant once the owners died). Mark VIII died in the late 90s. The Thunderbird died, and then they tried to revive it with no luck. Hell the G-body died and was replaced with FWD because most of the people who bought those were actually better served by a W-body with a 3.8L V6. Meanwhile, GM saw it fit to continue the B-body until 1996 as a sedan and wagon - while the B-body coupe actually died a couple years BEFORE the G-body, again, because big coupes were becoming irrelevant to society. Coupe extinction (especially big coupe) examples abound.

And I think I can come up with a few more...
- Acura Legend coupe died in the mid 90s and continued only as a sedan.
- I might even use the 3000GT in this discussion (though the smaller RX-7, Supra and 300ZX also died, so it's harder to say the 3000GT went away because it was a larger coupe or because it was just too expensive for what it was)
- The front engine Porsche GT type cars went away while they now have a sedan (and SUV), and the smaller 911 and Cayman continue true to their heritage.
- BMW 8-series (though we do have the 6)
- Camry coupe and Solara are gone (shockingly the Accord coupe continues)
- Nissan created and has since canceled the Altima coupe
- DSM/Eclipse. Not even large and they're gone.
- Generally the small 2 door hatchback is gone, like the RSX.

[kevm14]

Did I miss anything?

[kevm14]

Oh yeah, the K5 Blazer. That went to the GMT-400 platform in 1992 and died in the late 90s as a 2-door Tahoe (I didn't realize it made it past 1995 actually).

Oh yeah, Ford Bronco. Dodge Ramcharger. The S-10 Blazer 2-door. The 2-door Ford Explorer. 2-door Nissan Pathfinder. It goes on and on.

[Bob]

Also dead.

[kevm14]

I might even say that at one point in history, 2-door cars may have made up like 50% of the total vehicles on the road. Today? It must be under 5%. Probably even less. More if you include regular cab pickups but those are really a different thing (and no consumers buy regular cab pickups anyway, making my point).

[Bob]

Somehow there is an ATS coupe. This is a car that I don't really understand, especially when the styling isn't that different from the sedan.

[kevm14]

I am going to agree. The ATS coupe makes no sense. The CTS coupe is also gone. By my claim, big coupes are less relevant than small so that does fit. BMW does have coupes and sedans for the 3/4 series so that's probably why Cadillac is doing that.

[Bob]

One thing that's funny is my personal ownership of 4 door cars. I would argue that the only 4 door cars I have owned (91 Corolla, 89 Corsica and 12 Prius) rank near the bottom of all the cars I have owned in terms of desirability. Having a child changed my opinion on having a do-it-all 4 door car and the next car I buy will likely reflect this.

[kevm14]

Right. And conversely, I would say the Caprice, Fleetwood, CTS-V and Maxima all had above average interest. All we're getting at is that regular cars are boring, though. In the case of the Maxima (before Bill says that's just a regular, boring car) I'd say compare that to, say, a 1996 Altima for context. Or a 1996 Lumina. Or Accord/Camry. It was above average. And the Caprice has shifted to mostly just living on its high mileage as the point of interest though after all this time I still like driving it. If only it were faster.