Most car reviews get straight to the point. Sure, you’ll find a funny one-liner here or there, or maybe a string of sentences best described as a hallucination, but rarely are you just going to sit there cackling. Then there are car reviews you can never forget because they had you giggling from start to finish. What’s the most hilarious car review?
Now, I want to keep this clean. By hilarious, I’m talking about funny because the car was terrible, or just the article or video itself was just so fun. I don’t want to pick on any of our industry colleagues here, past or present. Admittedly, part of my goal here is to give myself some deeply entertaining reading material this weekend. But hey, I’m sure all of you will want something great to read, too!
I was inspired to write this after reading The Bishop’s excellent story about the worst Pontiac. The legendary John Davis is one of my automotive journalist heroes (I work for two others), so I watch each and every MotorWeek review that I can. Something I love about John is that he can always find something that he likes about a car, and it’s inspired me to live in a similar way. But the silly side effect is that when there’s a car that disappoints the MotorWeek crew, you probably remember it. The Pontiac T1000 was one of those cars, and you just have to read the Bishop’s piece on it. But here’s the video:
Everything about this review has me smiling from start to finish. The “Made In U.S. Of A” sticker on the trunk to the 60 mph time of 30 seconds had me practically on the floor. John just kicks the poor car when it’s already down, too. Again, you have to read the Bishop’s piece to get the full effect.
More recently, I found myself reading every single word of Car and Driver‘s “M5 vs. M5 Comparison Test” that was published on December 29. Honestly, when I saw this one pop up in my feed, I did a double-take. This story was a glorious, almost-serious comparison between a BMW M5 and a Kubota M5.
Everything about that piece is terrific, from the imagery showing the tractor chasing the BMW to the fact that it sounds like the Car and Driver team did some real tractor stuff. Even the spec sheets at the end are great. Here’s the line about how quickly the Kubota M5-111 can accelerate:
ACCELERATION
30 mph: as if
60 mph: never
Top Speed: 23 mph (mfr claim)
Here’s another snippet:
However, the M5-111 excels in categories that the BMW doesn’t even bother to contest. Its power takeoff rating, for instance, is a stout 89 ponies. Its hydraulic pump can flow 17 gallons per minute, and that system makes cool noises like “wheeeesh” and “KNNEEurrrrr.” The M5-111’s LA1854 front loader offers a maximum dump angle of 64 degrees. BMW doesn’t publish the M5’s maximum dump angle, let alone its attachment rollback time or cubic feet of heaped-material bucket capacity, stats that Kubota happily shares.
Perfection. Finally, I have to give a shoutout to Bob Mayer of TV station WTVJ in Miami, Florida. Back in the 1970s, he reviewed a bunch of the best that automakers had to offer, and his reviews are so great. He would talk about how so many cars were just huge, steaming piles of crap with a completely straight face and serious tone:
Jason wrote a whole story about this, lol.
So, I want more stuff like that to get me through my weekend. What’s the most hilarious car review you’ve read, heard, or watched?
Top graphic image: thecardsaysmoops/YouTube
Another one from my teenage years:
https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a15133335/2004-dodge-ram-srt-10-road-test/
Brock Yates and John Phillips of Car and Driver (two guys who couldn’t be more unalike in personality) do a pseudo review of the Ram SRT10, in the style of an email exchange between the two discussing the pros, cons, and ridiculousness of a 500 horsepower pickup truck. Remember, when this came out, cars like the Supra and Mustang GT were sub 300 horsepower cars.
This devolves into the two equally exchanging personal insults while making a very relaxed effort to stay on the subject of the truck.
Through all the humor though, they manage to drop in every single bit of numbers information you would get in a press release, but it’s done in this long form conversation that is factual, funny, and never feels forced. Or at least it didnt to me.
Remember, I was a hillbilly kid that didn’t even have cable or internet, so I was still nearly a decade away from discovering the wit and banter of Top Gear. This was comedy gold to me. I probably read this review 4 times in its entirety.
Seriously read it. It’s great.
One of my personal favorites that’s not so much outright hilarious but more wryly smirking was Consumer Report’s short form, next-to-the-circles review blub for the SN95 Mustang – along the lines of simply “the continued appeal of this primitive rear driver eludes us.”
I’m sure it does, perhaps best to go back to ranking washing machines.
For a written article, PJ O’Rourke on driving a Ferrari cross-country.
https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a15142347/ferrari-reinvents-manifest-destiny-pj-orourke-and-a-ferrari-308gts-archived-feature/
Only God can make a tree, but only man can drive by one that fast. And if the lowly Italians, the lamest, silliest, least stable of our NATO allies, can build a machine like this, just think what it is that we can do. We can smash the atom. We can cure polio. We can fly to the moon if we like. There is nothing we can’t do. Maybe we don’t happen to build Ferraris, but that’s not because there’s anything wrong with America. We just haven’t turned the full light of our intelligence and ability in that direction. We were, you know, busy elsewhere. We may not have Ferraris, but just think what our Polaris-missile submarines are like. And, if it feels like this in a Ferrari at 130, my God, what can it possibly feel like at Mach 2.5 in an F-15? Ferrari 308s and F-15s—these are the conveyances of free men. What do the Bolshevik automatons know of destiny and its control? What have we to fear from the barbarous Red hordes?
It’s a classic for sure. A hidden gem that even O’Rourke doesn’t pick up on is that the Ferrari he’s test driving isn’t for some silly TV show as he thinks; it’s actually for the pilot episode of Magnum PI.
I think Bob Mayer’s R-body Chrysler New Yorker takes the cake – paint runs, leaking rear door, sticking door handles, every time he hit the brake the clock would turn off and lose the time and the map light would turn on
Or, his bustleback Seville one with the wall of text on the screen listing everything that failed during the week
Both were insanely expensive cars, too
There was a Car & Driver article in the mid 90s (written by Larry Webster, if memory serves) that covers the installation of an aftermarket supercharger on an SN95 Mustang GT.
I can’t find it, but I seem to remember lots of hyperbole, Larry injuring himself (not seriously), and a wicked result at the end.
Any of the old Road & Track spoof reviews get my vote. I remember them mostly in the April editions, but a quick search shows they were all over the place.
From the folks over at the autosport.com forums:
1962: San Francisco Cable Car
1963: London Bus
1964: Morris Major-Mini-Minor
1965: None
1966: Gresley A3 Pacific Locomotive
1967: Sopwith Camel F.1
1968: Electrophant
1969: Greyhound Bus
1970: Mercedes Benz GT (Garbage Truck)
1971: (January) Jaguar XK-EE 12
1972: Goodyear Blimp
1973: Hop Rod Pogo Stick
1974: Maserati MT-3 Bicycle
1975: Cal Poly Rose Parade Float
1976: None
1977: Arrow JP 770 DW Roller Coaster Car
1978: Quantu-Motion Motorboard (motorized skateboard)
1979: Soarmaster C5A Commuter Special (motorized hang glider)
1980: Willis Flyer (laydown go-cart)
1981: Budweiser Clydesdale 8-Horse Hitch
1982: Route 66 “road” test
1983: Sedan Chair
1984: Kenworth W900 Aerodyne
1985: KSC 554,756 Hardtop (Space shuttle hauler)
1986: Pontiac 0-77 Excitement Hot Air Balloon
1987: Six Italian Urban Electrics (Bumper cars)
1988: Queen Elizabeth 2 versus Concorde
1989: None
1990: North American Mustang P-51D
1991: Hover Dynamics RX2000 (Hovercar)
1992: Runyan Racing 20DT (Dog sled)
1993: JPL Rocky IV Microrover (Martian surface rover)
1994: Three Great Subterrainean Transport Systems (London, Paris, and Tokyo Subways)
1995: America 3 (America’s Cup Yacht)
1996: Indiana Jones Adventure Troop Transport Ride
1997: 1958 Porsche Junior (Tractor)
The list should be as follows:
1. All Regular Car Reviews videos.
2. Everything else.
Two great examples. Note that they are very NSFW.
https://youtu.be/hoxqtnI4I4c?si=TP0b_AvxrgK0uOHr
2004 Chrysler PT Cruiser: Regular Car Reviews
https://youtu.be/s7vUfHW157k?si=pSDgJ23nQiCrgsrm
1980 Ferrari 308 GTSi: Regular Car Reviews
For some reason I missed the Ferrari but the PT Cruiser one is True Art.