What a great looking little car!
Gasp! The gloves are off at GM! First, I see a Buick vs. Lexus commercial last night (well played in the timing department by the way GM) and now this beauty?!!?
What’s going on over there? I haven’t seen a crummy concept in months. Have they really cleaned house, and smartened up the design department? Amazing.
what about the butt? I can’t find any pics.
Looks good so far.
Brett: The photos aren’t official. Supposedly, they are being leaked from a Bob Lutz presentation.
Is anyone other than me thinking the Toyota thing is a conspiracy by the US government to sell more of their own cars (ie, GM and Chrysler?).
NURB: I think we have a Jonathan Ive effect at GM. Ive was hired right before Jobs was canned at Apple. He was hard at work as Apple lost market share and came close to complete irrelevancy. Then Jobs came back and so did Apple.
I think the designers are GM were under bad management. When Lutz came back to GM, it seems like management started to change. Now we are seeing the results of management changes five years ago.
I think the difference is that product guys are making calls, rather than bean counters. Bean counter says, “let’s use this wing mirror on everything we make and save $.05 a unit.” Product guy goes, “let’s go ahead and spend the extra cash to make a unique wing mirror that supports the design intent”.
The conspiracy theorist in me says, “Yes, of course!”
Agree 100% with both points. The toyota thing is stupid… if it goes nuts, shift into nuetral. It’s really not that hard. One of my old cars had a sticky throttle and it was never a problem.
Secondly, yeah. Just look at any car design book from the 90s… the concept sketches for even boring pieces of crap like the grand am were actually pretty cool. It was the execution that sucked.
As for the Aveo… I think it’s a tad bit aggressive. I’d like it better as a more friendly, approachable design. Save the aggressive design for cars that actually have the guts to back it up.
Wow,
I think this is a really great concept, and I am totally in love with the granite as well. Finally there is going to be a small/economical car that didn’t look like daddy had bought it for his teenage daughters birthday, and any guy caught driving one would have his manhood questioned. I really wish that front logo badge would move up just a little though 
Is it me or does it look very mitsubishi?
Anyway…don’t like it at all.
To much of everything (is never a good thing).
I agree on the front badge. Otherwise I think this is a solid looking concept.
I think this is a huge step in this segment for GM. The interior looks really good. Looks like a lot of time was spent dialing it in. I think the exterior looks solid as well. Sure, a little reminiscent of the Mitsu stuff, but not overly in my opinion. It is aggressive, but so is the Corolla when you look at all of the faceted forms the current one has, the difference is this is a cohesive design, so it looks all the more powerful. Good job GM! … this will be the money maker, but the hatch is the one to look for.
Not to shift off topic here, but supposedly people tried that and couldn’t shift or turn the car off because of the keyless start…
I don’t think it’s too aggressive. I think it’s a nice reaction to the market. And, these actually look like they’ll be nice looking outside of the concept stage. I’m excited for the GM of the future.
The Aveo, the only way it could go was up, but then again never thing you cannot be surprised.
This time I am surprised, pleasantly. The front is a audi/mitsu/volvo c30 hybrid. The side is clean and nice, I’m okay with the double wheel flare on the rears but only okay with it.
And yes, the Toyota problems are probably not entirely naturally caused. But drive by wire has always sucked, so who was really surprised that there might be a problem. Cash, I thought the same thing, put it in neutral. Supposedly people did that and even in reverse but the car would not alter it’s mode. I owned a Toyota for years and would buy one again without a second thought, but I would get a manual so neutral would always be there.
I like a good govt conspiracy as mush as the next guy, but I think the concern now is the regulators were too lenient on Toyota in the past. There’s now no choice but to go after them fill tilt or otherwise go down with them.
That is media BS. You can shift any car into neutral. A sticking throttle does not prevent that. Keyless start does not prevent shifting either.
.
Just telling you what I heard from an account of a victim…
I heard that victim too. She said she stuck it in reverse and it continued accelerating for 6 more miles. It smells like BS to me too as the transmission and throttle are two different distinct systems. Also, the victim’s car was never examined.
I tend to think that every nutter will try to blame their driving on this problem or try to get attention from it.
Interestingly, several years ago a girl claimed a similar problem on her Kia and wanted the company to exchange it. She claimed it happened three times. Once on police camera when an officer dove into the car to try to stop it. After a lengthy investigation it was found she just didn’t like the car and faked all of the problems.
Back in my early 20’s my vehicle would automatically go 85 mph whenever I was in a 70 mph zone. It was really strange. I just blamed it on my car. However, the highway patrol never bought it. 
I have a tough time believing neutral gear didn’t work, but reverse gear definitely would not work. Proven on mythbusters debunking the scene in the original Terminator:
http://mythbustersresults.com/episode84
Exactly. You said it much more diplomatically than I could have. I’m really sick of every idiot who can’t afford the payments on their toyota deciding to crash it, then blaming this stupid problem that is easily avoidable.
Is anyone other than me thinking the Toyota thing is a conspiracy by the US government