It would be easy to imagine that even the most automobile-savvy of individuals would have a difficult time in this generation to name the make and model of every car out there based merely on its body design.  While we are occasionally blessed with an impressive design in the car world (entirely based on opinion, but the Lotus, for example), such awe is few and far between in this day and age.  With the coming of retro designs from the H2 Hummers (which are more of a family-version of the original Hummer than a retro version) to the new Mustangs and Camaros, it is apparent that car designers are either becoming lazy or running out of ideas.
When the best idea in a board room of directors and designers is to modify a design from the early seventies, you are concerned whether anything new will ever come out of the woodwork (or metalwork).  The economically-sound car was never meant to be anything special, but there was still a time when you could tell them apart from one another.  Now that same problem has befallen our sports and utility vehicles, where it would seem one would have to buy a $200,000 Italian or a gas-guzzler that sits six feet off the ground just to stand out on the road. 
Creating generic copies of what was in the past is never as much fun as creating the future.  A car design used to be an art form, a uniqueness that stood out on the road.  If somebody tried to sell you a Van Gogh that was reworked in Photoshop for thousands of dollars, you couldn’t help but laugh.  A car design should be daring, breaking the boundaries of what is expected, and showing the world something it hasn’t seen without being concerned about the consequences.  That may be a bit extreme, but car shows that boast amazing new designs always seem to quickly fall to the wayside, when it is some of those impressive designs many Americans would like to see on the roads.