I'm lucky. I get to drive interesting cars pretty much all the time. When I'm not reviewing new models for CultureMap, my personal vehicles tend to be fun, or slightly different. Driving something with an extra bit of passion, or uniqueness, or peculiarity just puts a smile on your face, and sometimes the faces of others around you. It's not about spending a lot of money — a 20-year old Miata is a blast, a 15-year old BMW offers loads of character, and there are even SUVs that unite passionate owners like Jeeps and older Land Cruisers.
There are so many interesting things you can drive to choose from, and because of this, driving a modern midsize sedan is usually . . . depressing.
So it's a shock to switch from a car that turns heads to a beige-colored penalty box, invisible to the naked eye. These days it's impossible to buy a bad car in the midsize segment, but there's a good chance you'll get a dull one.
They all can go from A to B, and all offer sensible transportation. But why must they look so dreary; so compromised?
It doesn't have to be that way. Last year, Kia stunned the auto world when it introduced the Kia Optima, an affordable midsize sedan with knockout good looks and class-rivaling quality. Has the paradigm changed?
We spent some time driving the 2012 Kia Optima Hybrid to find out if there's substance beneath the style.
The Optima is Kia's midsize challenger, and the first thing you notice it a shape and styling. It looks premium and expensive, and above all else, purposeful. That look was cultivated by Peter Schreyer, a German designer whom Kia hired in 2006 to revamp the brand global design.
It looks like Kia got their money's worth. The Hybrid version is distinguished visibly by unique wheels and a slightly lower ride height.
It has a distinct look, in a segment traditionally filled with cars designed to not be memorable.
The proportion hides its size — the car has some heft and length to it (over 190 inches long), but that's concealed under the guise of the graceful 'four-door coupe' aesthetic that's popular with German manufacturers these days.
The gently sloping roofline hides a spacious backseat and trunk.
The front is defined by the "Tiger Nose," which is Kia's name for the corporate grill that has started appearing on everything in the lineup. The face unifies the brand, and the Optima pulls off the Tiger Nose better than anything else so far.
The Tiger Nose grill is echoed in the shape of the windshield at the top where it meets the roof. The slick-looking, black-painted roof is also equipped with a massive, nearly full-width sliding dual sunroof.
Our Kia Optima Hybrid was fitted with particularly noisy Kumho Solus KH25 tires, which squealed a bit in most corners taken at over 15mph.
It has a distinct look, in a segment traditionally filled with cars designed to not be memorable.
The dashboard is dramatically canted toward the driver, in a way that brings to mind the BMW E36. the steering wheel has a strange scaly texture. According to the specifications, it's leather, but if that's considered leather then it had us fooled.
There's a USB connector for your iPhone or MP3 player near the gearshift. It's a small nitpick, but it would be much better if this were in the armrest compartment or concealed somehow so you don't have to unplug your cable to hide it from prying eyes every time you park.
Interior is laid out well, but we prefer the black interior over this lighter tan hue.
A lot of the downsides of the Kia Optima Hybrid involve the Hybrid system itself. We've driven the base Optima, with a 2.4-Liter and the Optima Turbo, with a 2.0L 274-hp motor under the hood, and both were smoother, more enjoyable and seemed more refined to live with every day than the Hybrid.
The Turbo, particularly, was much sportier and more fun than we expected.
The Hybrid uses a 2.4 liter inline-four connected to a 30kW electric motor and a six-speed automatic transmission, offering 206 hp. The 1.4kWh Lithium Polymer battery sits underneath the carpet in the trunk. It's rated a 35mpg city and 40mpg highway.
While driving, the power swells at strange times, with a lag and then an electric surge of power two seconds after you needed it. Low speed maneuvering is often accompanied by various electric whirring sounds under braking and acceleration.
Sometimes we experienced rough transitions between EV mode and gas power, particularly when the engine needed to shift gears. Even in gentle driving around town, the gas engine sounds strained and overworked and often lags as though it's in the wrong gear.
The Optima Hybrid, like almost all hybrids, has regenerative braking that collects energy when you press the brake pedal. We found this contributed to a disconnect in brake pedal feel — basically it seems like you're stepping on an orange, with oddly varying levels of pressure throughout the pedal travel.
The Optima Hybrid LCD display in the gauge cluster shows leaves growing or galling off a branch, depending on your driving. There's also an Eco score: ours stayed at 157 the entire time we had the car.
We aren't sure if that's good or bad.
The Kia Optima Hybrid offers a tremendous value: a hybrid in a sexy body, with navigation, HID and nearly every other option ticked, for right at $26,500.
Out pick would be the base Optima 2.4 or the 2.0 liter Turbo over this hybrid model though. The base version starts at nearly $5,000 cheaper, and much more enjoyable overall, without much of a hit in fuel economy (24 city/35 highway).
What's exciting is that the midsize class is no longer plagued with mediocrity. You can choose design over vanilla.
And as this critical segment heats up, we'll be seeing more of this. The Optima's sibling, Hyundai's Sonata has made huge waves with it's own brand of funky styling.
Next year the Ford Fushion, which I previewed at the Houston Auto Show, will hit the market looking like no family sedan we've ever seen.
It's a great time to like interesting cars.
