By Brendan Moore

My goodness, the hits just keep coming from Kia. Here we have the exuberant and pretty 2012 Kia Optima SX, a car that is sure to give serious heartburn to its competitors like the Honda Accord and the Toyota Camry.

Why? Because it does things better than those cars, it’s less expensive and it’s much better-looking – in a nutshell. That’s why. No mystery here.

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By Chris Haak

Several weeks ago, I was planning a guy’s weekend in the woods near Jim Thorpe, PA with some college buddies.  I packed my sleeping bag, extra clothes, a cooler full of beer and ice, my hiking boots, and my iPad – the basics for a night in the woods.  Had things gone as planned, I would have hauled myself and my camping supplies the 100 miles from my house to Jim Thorpe in an Audi Q5 2.0T.  Things don’t always work out as planned, though.  When I arrived home from the office, there was a gorgeous red A7 waiting for me in my driveway instead.  I kept thinking to myself, “the bank made an error in my favor.”  Despite the fact that we published Kevin Miller’s review of a nearly-identical A7, a week with an A7 was a delightful turn of events.

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By Brendan Moore

The last of the 2011 models for me, and I’m going to sneak it in under the wire here. Late though it may be, we want to include it since there are not a lot of Acura Wagons around in terms of press loaners, and it is in a segment (actual station wagons) that doesn’t have a great many possibilities for the prospective buyer. It’s a niche product, but a niche that Autosavant readers are partial to, so here we go.

In the interests of full disclosure, I should lay my cards on the table right now and state that I am a fan of wagons. Call them what you will; wagons, combis, estates, breaks, familiales, touring models, whatever, I’m a fan. I wish their numbers had not decreased to the point of almost being extinct in America, but tastes change, and now people that want a vehicle with some carrying utility buy a truck, an SUV, a crossover, a minivan, an “activity vehicle” like a Kia Forte or a Toyota Venza that straddles a couple of different vehicle types, and it seems, if all else fails, then, a wagon.

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By Kevin Miller

Something readers may not know about me is that I have an identical twin- or, I am an identical twin. My brother and I share the same DNA, the same “frame,” and look very similar to one another. While my brother and I are literally made from the same genetic material, we’ve grown to be distinct from one another in our professions and hobbies. While we’re essentially the same weight and height, I am an electrical engineer and auto blogger, who spends way too much time at a computer keyboard. My brother, on the other hand, is an Olympic rower turned collegiate rowing coach who bikes to work most days, so he has a distinctly more athletic appearance than I do.

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By Chris Haak

Back in the dark ages, there were cars and trucks.  Then there were cars with cargo beds and trucks with seats.  Then there were vans.  Then there were hippies in custom vans.  Then there were minivans, built on a car’s platform.  Then over several generations, those minivans grew to be almost 17 feet long and weigh more than two tons.  With its new-for-2012 Mazda5, Mazda is banking on the idea that perhaps we need a reset of the definition of the word ‘minivan.’

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By Chris Haak

It’s time to take Hyundai seriously as an automaker.  Akio Toyoda certainly knows this, as much of Hyundai’s current lineup takes direct aim at his company’s products, and often manages to top Toyota in a number of areas, while undercutting the Japanese company’s prices.

The Equus is certainly no joke.  It is a credible competitor for the established luxury brands at a price thousands of dollars below the asking price of those other cars.  GM, the once-and-future “world’s largest automaker” makes no product even close to what the Equus delivers.

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By Brendan Moore

Hyundai wants you to think only good thoughts when you think of them; they certainly don’t want you to think that they make pretty good cars, “but.” The Korean automaker is really not interested in having any sort of qualifier come after their name anymore when their cars are being discussed. For instance, qualifiers like, Hyundai makes good cars, but they don’t have a sports car. Or, Hyundai makes good cars, but they don’t have a true luxury car. Or, Hyundai makes good cars, but they don’t make a sports sedan.

With that in mind, Hyundai has really expanded their lineup in recent years, and the results have sent competitors in nervous paroxysms. Consumers have noticed, too, and the Hyundai lineup is doing very well in terms of sales. “Value for the money,” quality, and yes, even styling seem to be recurring themes when consumers are asked what they like about their Hyundai.

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By Brendan Moore

Decades worth of passing judgment on new cars has left me with a distinct case of cognitive dissonance when it comes to driving General Motors iron in recent years. Brain and muscle memory scream out for me to thrash any GM automobile in my review, and it only gets worse as the cars get smaller.

GM made some really crappy cars in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. Craptastic cars – that is, fantastically crappy. Their small cars were just amazingly awful, as if someone tried to make them as crummy and as unappealing as possible. I bludgeoned those cars in print and in interviews. And they deserved every bit of scorn I heaped upon them.

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By Charles Krome

It’s no doubt been an ugly year for Honda. The company has lost more than 200,000 units of production that would have otherwise ended up in U.S. dealerships, and it’s still waiting for some facilities to get back up to full speed. Sales are down more than 5 percent through October, at a time when the industry as a whole has grown by about 7.5 percent. Worse, the all-new 2012 Honda Civic has been affected by both those same production problems as well as surprisingly weak reviews, allowing rivals like the Chevy Cruze to gain a significant foothold in the highly competitive compact car segment. In other words, there’s an awful lot riding on the launch of the completely redesigned 2012 Honda CR-V—but after a recent media drive for the vehicle, I’m not expecting an awful lot of new customers to be riding in it.

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By Brendan Moore

For those of you that have never heard of him, Dan Neil is a great auto journalist. He’s also, by all accounts, a pretty good guy, and I’ve had a couple of brief exchanges with him over the years, and he does seem like a pretty good guy. He also won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 2004 (yeah, an automotive writer- cool, huh?), presented annually to a newspaper writer who has demonstrated “distinguished criticism”. The distinguished criticism the Pulitzer Committee had in mind when they handed him that award was his “Rumble Seat” column for The Los Angeles Times, his then-employer. He reviewed passenger vehicles in that column.

He now writes for The Wall Street Journal. In his review of the 2012 Honda Civic Si published in the Journal on October 22, the header on the review was, “Honda’s Sporty New Civic, Heavy on the ‘Ick’.”

I would have given him the Pulitzer just for that alone. That’s some good writing, there.

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