Every automaker has its own look. Whether it’s a seven-slot grille, round tail lamps or a Hofmeister kink each company tries to claim its own signature styling elements.
This familial resemblance is part of what makes a Jeep look like a Jeep, a Corvette a Corvette and a BMW unmistakably Bavarian. But even within the carefully constructed confines of design DNA there are outliers. Vehicles like the Ford Flex or Hyundai Genesis sedan are something of automotive non sequiturs because their designs are so dissimilar to everything else in their parent companies’ respective lineups.
Moving a step beyond the merely unusual, some vehicles are just plain weird. Have you ever seen a Fiat Multipla? They look like the disabled offspring of a bullfrog and a bird. Of course there are plenty of other products that are just as alien. Here’s a list of 10 Vehicles currently in production that could have come from another planet.
The Chevrolet Spark is a tiny city car that’s easy to park in congested urban areas and even easier to keep fueled at today’s borderline-astronomical gasoline prices. It’s a plucky little hatchback that’s more fun to drive than any vehicle with 84 horsepower should be. But it’s got one very unusual design element; its headlamps are gigantic!
Those massive lights are actually longer than the car’s hood and make the vehicle look like it’s staring at the sun and squinting. You could blame the unusual look on the car’s heritage; it’s possible the Spark came to earth from an extraterrestrial world, but a more likely explanation is that it’s built in South Korea, which for many is a world away.
The next car on this list comes from a planet beyond the Kuiper Belt where everything is lopsided. Roads are wider going in one direction than the other, buildings look like something Pablo Picasso painted and playing cards are all different sizes. The Hyundai Veloster is a sporty compact that hails from the Asymmetric Planet.
The vehicle’s signature element is the layout of its doors. There are two access hatches curbside for passengers and one elongated door for the driver. It’s an intriguing layout that’s unique to say the least. It kind of brings to mind the 1998 Ford Windstar minivan. Instead of a proper slider, engineers stretched the driver’s door by about six inches to make it easier to get into the back seats. Will the Veloster have a sliding portal at some point? It’d be cool if it did!
The Buick Encore is a subcompact SUV from GM’s somewhat-premium Tri-Shield brand. It’s essentially a rebranded and restyled Opel that’s offered to unsuspecting North American customers. But just because it gets a new grille and different wheels doesn’t change its fundamental design. Unfortunately the car looks like a stowaway from the Potato Planet.
The Encore is rather bulbous and somewhat lumpy, not at all unlike a farm-fresh Idaho Russet. The spud connection is especially evident when the vehicle is slathered in “Deep Espresso Bronze Metallic” paint, one of those earthy hues so many luxury or wanna-be-luxury brands like to offer. The Buick Encore is probably best served hot with sour cream and chives.
Product is the most important force driving the automotive industry. Companies that invest in their vehicle lineups and keep them fresh are typically the ones that succeed with customers. But for mysterious reasons cars and trucks sometimes fall through the cracks. Vehicles that end up in this automotive blind spot can go years without any meaningful update.
One of the most senior models on the market today is Ford’s venerable E-Series van. This hard-working, blue-collar schlepper hails from the 1970s Planet because that’s when its underlying architecture was introduced. Yes, on its home world platform shoes, disco dancing and polyester are not just in vogue, they’re a way of life.
Most extraterrestrial worlds are spherical; all you have to do it look at the full moon on a clear night for proof of the universe’s penchant for roundness. The earth, sun, moon, Jupiter and Kepler-20f are all spheres, just like beach balls, except they’re not contained within the margins of a bin made of plastic pipe and elastic cord.
Flipping convention the bird is Nissan’s Cube. This diminutive box on wheels comes from a world with six identical sides, and each one of them is flat. The car looks like a craps table die sans any dots. Apparently in Japan right angles and straight lines are popular, but what else can you expect from the country that invented square watermelons?
Honda’s fuel-sipping CR-Z hybrid hails from the Contradiction Planet where left is right, yes is across the street and the color purple is a basket of puppies. This car is an oxymoron if the auto industry ever built one.
The tiny two-door is billed as a performance hybrid, two traits that, believe it or not, are exclusive to one another. The car is designed to sip fuel and deliver an engaging driving experience. It may be decently thrifty but with a combined total of just 130 horsepower the CR-Z will never deliver breathtaking acceleration and therefore it isn’t all that much fun. At least a proper manual transmission is available. If Honda wanted a three-letter name for this vehicle perhaps they should have gone with W,T and F.
Scion’s teeny, tiny iQ city car was born and raised on the 1/3 Planet, a place where things are appreciably smaller than they are here on Earth. The miniscule hatchback’s wheelbase stretches just 78.7 inches; that’s a little more than six and a half feet. AutoGuide.com’s Editor-in-Chief Colum Wood is nearly that tall!
Of course the wheelbase isn’t the only thing that’s small about the iQ. It’s powered by a 94 horsepower engine and only weighs some 2,100 pounds. Most Olympic sprinters could bench-press more than that and they’re not even built for lifting!
The original Jeep Cherokee was a rough and tumble utility that was built like a railroad spike. It was rugged, affordable and very effective. Later models were powered by an indestructible and torque-rich straight six engine that could extricate the little truck from just about any situation.
After a multi-year hiatus Chrysler is reintroducing the venerable Cherokee nameplate, but things just aren’t the same. The new model, which goes on sale in the third quarter of the year, looks nothing like its revered predecessor, in fact it looks like nothing else in Jeep’s lineup. In addition to its unprecedented design the vehicle is built on a car-based unibody architecture. This 2014 model is most certainly from the Things Just Aren’t What They Used to Be planet.
Gold rims, multi-color paint jobs and superfluous sticky-backed chrome add-ons are all hallmarks of the Ostentatious Planet, home world of the FJ Cruiser. This off road-ready truck is Toyota’s take on retro design. Unlike other automakers the company has little heritage to draw from, but its Land Cruiser lineup is one major exception.
The FJ is designed to mimic some of those early Japanese four-wheelers but instead it comes across as merely a caricature of the originals, and that’s never a good thing. It’s cluttered with plastic cladding and let down by bizarre styling. The Toyota FJ Cruiser had such potential but instead it’s a design alien that should have been illegal.
With hood-mounted headlamps and a gaping grille the uniquely styled Nissan Juke is a true extraterrestrial on planet Earth. Vehicles don’t get anymore alien looking than this alligator-inspired crossover.
The Juke’s body is not very tasteful but you’ve got to give Nissan credit for taking a risk. Unfortunately risks don’t always pay off. Not many customers are interested in a close encounter of the ownership kind. So far this year fewer than 15,000 people have opted to take a Juke home.