Yes, "it" is the new BMW 1-Series. Like many of James Healey's reviews, there's a huge disconnect between the headline ("BMW 1 Series is small but sassy"), the critic's observations and his conclusions. Combining the old "I'll ask myself a question and then answer it" format with the bi-polar "I'll raise an objection and answer it" routine, Healey plays it straight down the middle. After arguing with himself about the small Bimmer's large price tag, he concludes "Nothing unexpected for a BMW. Hey, here's one: the stupid trim pieces on the inside door handles of the test cars, a 128i convertible and 135i coupe. The pieces are mated so that you grab the joining line every time you use the door handle. Unattractive. Rough-feeling. So there." Nuh. Healey's three word summary: it's a keeper. While our Justin Berkowitz wouldn't agree, BMW might well describe TTAC's 1-Series review the same way Healey refers to the 1-Series convertible's roof rattles: faint but troubling squeaks.
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Amazing how they blew it on this one.
Newspaper headlines are seldom written by the authors of the article to which they are attached. This is probably true for the online version of USA Today as well as the print version.
However, the Q&A review writing style is oddly disconcerting.
Since Robert has opened the comparison/contrast box of auto reviewership (and is now piling on somewhat), I thought I’d share a couple nuggets from that too-honest-for-TV auto scribe from LA:
“Let’s begin with a verity, an undeniable truth that is evident from 3 feet away or from the cold distance of outer space: The new 1-series BMW is ugly. Seriously ugly. Ugly with X-wings locked in attack formation. Spare me your E.H. Gombrich or Helen Gardner. I know an ugly car when one blows past me at 100 mph.”
Though mad props are doled to the propeller boys’ engine:
“Is the 135i fast? Is Eliot Spitzer sleeping on the couch? It’s completely and utterly bonkers with acceleration. Squeeze the throttle in first, second, third gear, and it feels like a great big rubber band being launched off the world’s thumb. Huge, billowy bursts of get-gone narrow the view to a blurry vortex. The numerologists at Car and Driver recorded a 0-60 time of 4.7 seconds and a quarter-mile estimated time of 13.3 seconds. That means the 135i is quicker than the last-generation M3, which was clinically psychotic.”
Justin and Dan are pretty much in agreement…sublime engine combined with fat-guy-in-a-Speedo styling.
Can we just agree that we’d love to hoon this thing with a bag on our heads and leave it at that?
PS: Dan Neil’s complete LA Times review can be found here: http://www.latimes.com/classified/automotive/highway1/la-hy-neil19mar19b,0,2091740.story
Funny one should mention Car and Driver. They finally get to properly flog an USDM GT-R for the first time and they put this lump on the cover? Jeez…
The hatch is at least ugly-cool, this looks like a cartoon 3.
All of these glowing reviews just prove one thing, BMW is dishing out big bucks to make this thing work.
I suspect we shall soon find out how many stupid people (with money) there are in the USDM…
My issues with the 1 series are similar to my issues with the city of Atlanta. You get all the !@#$ of small with all the !@#$ of big – but none of the perks of either.
Atlanta – small town mindset, no public transportation worth mentioning, big town smog, big town traffic… brilliant.
1 series – small car size, big car weight, big car price.
There is a reason I don’t live in Atlanta anymore.
As the Charger compromised the Challenger, the 3 compromised the 1. If this was 400 pounds lighter and 4000 dollars cheaper it would be a hit. Modifying platforms in this manner bake in too many compromises. One expects this from Chrysler, not from BMW. No spiritual successor to the tii here…
If you think this was odd, go read Mark Phelan’s review of the Pontiac G8 in the Detroit Free Press…he gives the car a pass on a few “issues”….bizarre.
mxfive4, that’s why Atlanta is the most suburbanized city on Earth.
Nobody wants to live in the ‘city’. Those who do are often more focused on the ‘hipness’ of city life rather than the actual rewards of living in the city proper.
High taxes, cronyism that rivals D.C. and Detroit, terrible schools, unbelievably bad traffic, and a surprising lack of interesting sites make the city of Atlanta downright sub-standard.
I will say that the choice of restaurants is impressive and there are certain small neighborhoods that are actually pretty decent places to live. However you can get the same thing in the burbs’ with better everything for about half the price.
If you replaced the engine in the 1-series with a 1980’s GM Quad DOHC engine, that would be the City of Atlanta.
Clearly the citizens of Atlanta are justified in being bitter, and it’s no wonder that they turn to the 1 Series, guns, and religion.
i was hoping for something like a return to the 2002 or the original 4 banger 3 series, but instead it’s sort of the current version of the BMW compact. it’s less than a foot shorter than the 3 series, has most of the same mechanicals, weighs almost the same, and costs almost the same. “oh I can’t deal with a 3 series, I’ll go for this 1 series”. Talk about a small niche market.
Clearly the citizens of Atlanta are justified in being bitter, and it’s no wonder that they turn to the 1 Series, guns, and religion.
No, that’s “Atlanta”, the donut around the city where the three things the locals know for sure are that Jesus loves them most of all, that Atlanta proper is a miserable place to live and that Applebee’s is the very definition of fine dining. Those of us who actually live in Atlanta’s better neighborhoods instead of just claiming to live here because no one has ever heard of “Duluth” or “Fayetteville” tend to be fairly content and couldn’t imagine living in that bland, franchised hell OTP. If my neighborhood is a car, it’s a Volvo V70 R – Bedford Falls on the surface with a little Pottersville on tap whenever I feel the need.