This will sound like a classic, “the bad is really good,” but listen to me: I think the big, ugly nostrils of the BMW M3 and M4 are good, and I’m sick of pretending not to. This has been my opinion since I first saw the posts of the topo rats. Now that’s my point of view.
Everyone always complains about how vehicles are grouped and legislated to death, no one is taking any risks anymore and no executive is making their vision a reality. But as soon as someone approaches the line, everyone sobs and grabs their pearls. “What did you do to the M3 ??”
I didn’t come across David E. Davis’s story about the 2002 BMW until I was an adult and had no interest in the M1, which came and went before my time. But for much of my life, BMWs were the ones that were on a different, untouchable plane of existence. Cooler than Porsche and Ferrari, because they didn’t make sports cars, they made hot rod sedans that could fall on sports cars.
I’ll never forget to look at the stuffed cake plate cooling fans behind the bumper of an E36 M3 in our mall parking lot, and then watch an M3 Lightweight on Front Street. I will never forget to sit down Alex Roy’s M5 and hearing him say it was the last big BMW we had ever seen. I will never forget to read Entry M Cup by Jonny Lieberman in the garage Jalopnik Fantasy. See a Laguna Seca Blue E46 in the parking lot of the restaurant where he worked to school. All these unpretentious cars, modified and revolutionized to offer great speed to those who know enough to buy one. The necessity, the ship q, the wolf in the sum of the parts of the sheep.
In 2021, BMW is not an unfortunate one. Depending on the year, BMW is the world’s number one or second largest luxury car seller. He builds big, expensive, tech cars and crossovers and sells them shit, presumably with a good margin. At some point, BMW had to stop making the types of cars that formed the contours of its mythology. And stopping him did.
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I just didn’t know what to do next.
The consensus among BMW fans, enthusiasts and the media seems to be that BMW itself has been trying to figure out what to do over the last decade or so. Was there the i8 / i3 detour, a front hatch with a cool round on the C pillar? I have no idea if these cars are still made. There were a couple of powerful but forgettable M cars. (People who would know say the new M2 CS is fantastic.)
I will admit that I, a person who has never owned a used BMW, was once very angry with BMW for “losing his way”. Some of the most malignant reviews I’ve ever written have been BMW reviews of the greats. I’m sure at one point I would have said that BMW just needed to recapture the magic of the E39 or E46, or whatever. As German executives wanted to say the last time I saw one in real life, “It’s not possible.” If you are the one who counts the money, I imagine it is not even desirable.
BMW can’t be completely released, the M3 has yet to be a sports sedan. So it seems like you’re leaving in a new direction or dragging yourself non-stop into conversations about how the cars you build today aren’t as good, as attractive, or as pretty as the cars you can’t and don’t want to do anymore.
For me, looking at this car, it’s clear that BMW wants to take a break. There is more evidence in a totally mortifying effort of social redesign and even more so in that video where cars are mean to each other. Someone from BMW has chosen.
The so malignant Concept 4 of 2019 was the first time in a long time that I had the feeling that BMW was heading in one direction. It was a break. The design felt familiar, but only tangentially related to the BMWs of the past, more referenced than venerable. It was also one of three exhibition cars I’ve seen in the last ten years and I remember.
The usual 3 and 4 series are about to fulfill the promise of the Concept 4. The M cars get there. They are perverse, avant-garde, shocking and a little ugly. At least visually, they are a firm rejection of much of BMW’s ethics of the golden age. People who worked at E39 might recognize them, but they might not have conceived them themselves.
Many cars look vaguely similar to the BMW right now. The M3 and M4 look like BMW of another more terrifying dimension, where people use drugs that come in a bottle and glow blue. It’s good, it’s exciting, it makes other Berliners look old-fashioned instantly. BMW has taken a shit because the designs were where others were unprepared (or not equipped) to follow them and were vindicated. I think they will be here too. Remember how crazy Bangle cars were? They may have seemed like another break at the time, but now they’re just part of the BMW myth.
I’m still vaguely aware of the cars BMW currently sells. I even lost track of the M cars later, I think the E92s. I haven’t driven the new M3 / M4 and didn’t love the latest one. So I’m not ready to say if it’s good. But when it comes to styling, this is a starting point for BMW. This is different, expression of a new ethos. You may not know it now, you may hate it, but that’s what you’ve been asking for.