CHRIS HARRIS

Car design can often be a fickle game, but sometimes we just have to trust those who know it best, says Chris

“NORMALLY I AVOID THE SUBJECT OF CAR DESIGN. I’M MUCH MORE CONCERNED WITH THE WAY THINGS DRIVE”

There’s an apocryphal story about how Chris Bangle and his team chose which design study would become the E63 BMW 6-Series. I seem to recall it involved lining up the cars in an outside space – some conventional looking, some outlandish – having a spiritual seance and then pointing at the one they wanted. The democratic choice was the craziest and it duly went into production. It remains the most shocking looking BMW of the modern era, and that includes the new G80 M3 currently troubling gag reflexes throughout the internet.

I was one of many who simply couldn’t get their heads around those early Bangle BMWs. His first 7-Series was simply gopping, but then the E60 5-Series arrived and I started to understand – the idea that to change its design language BMW needs to draw a line and begin again. It worked, people bought the cars – and the commercial genius was that Bangle cars looked much better when fitted with an expensive M Sport body kit and wheels. Profits soared.

The defenders of the new M3/M4’s styling cite the Bangle years as proof that BMW does sometimes need to offer a seismic shift in its design language, but I just don’t buy into that. Like him or loathe him, Bangle adhered to a philosophy and wasn’t afraid to let it run wild to the point of offending people. It was intellectually sophisticated, even if that high form could, on occasion, be reduced to looking, well, crap.

Don’t allow yourself to compare this new M3 to Bangle’s crazed genius. What we have here, no more, no less, is a pretty ordinary looking saloon car – which owes more to Hyundai as a point of inspiration than anything else – onto which have been bolted a sodding massive pair of vertical kidneys. Or butt cheeks. Or rabbit teeth.

It looks incongruous because it is incongruous. The only parallel with the Bangle years is a similar sense of bravery. In the case of the former, it was the pursuit of a paradigm shifting aesthetic, for this new car, it’s a financial gamble: that more Chinese buyers will opt in than those in other countries who will surely head to AMG and Audi RS.

Normally I avoid the subject of car design. I’m much more concerned with the way things drive. But there comes a point where even a Luddite like me has to say something. BMW clearly wants to shock us into believing this is the best possible new face for BMW M, but it just looks wrong to me. Still, it proves that making your most famous sports saloon appear like it’s just been kicked in the knackers does divert attention away from the spec sheet. There’s no manual for the UK, it’s miles heavier than before and the snappy dual-clutch has quietly been dropped in favour of an automatic. Oh, and as is always the case with M3s, I’m sure in three years’ time I’ll think this one is absolutely fantastic.