Honda's Space Oddity

by Edward Niedermeyer

Published: February 10th, 2010

Is it me or has the new Odyssey Concept, which is supposed to preview the styling of the next-gen model, taken a few too many protein pills? Let’s hope that the production version (arriving this fall) will capture a little more of the original Odyssey’s clean, stripped-down look. Remember, if we’ve learned anything from the Nissan Quest, it’s that minivans can easily be overstyled into irrelevance.

#Design #FutureVehicles #Honda #Odyssey

Edward Niedermeyer

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Regularttc on Feb 12, 2010

Design is nice, but the 2011 SE Sienna is the best looker of the minivans today. Hopefully Honda will do away with the "Lightning Bolt" beltline that detracts here just as it does on Lincoln's MkT. The interior of the Honda looks very promising. 3 real sized seats for the second row vs. the laughable 'wedge' in the previous Gen. and now in the new 11 Sienna; useless except to sound good in a brochure. Our 2005 Sienna XLE has 8 real seats and a very confident not overstated exterior. When Toyota changed to the smiley faced Grill and revised front, they lost it. Same for the previous Chryslers; very poised and nice soft touch interior feel. New 11 Sienna unfortunately has sadly upped the Hard Plastic Surfaces Quotient. So as a previous 99' Mercury Villager, 02' Honda Odyssey, and current 05 Sienna (ready for new!) owner, I sum the current offerings up like this. Exterior leader, 11 Sienna SE, (actually sporty looking), Interior leader, should be Odyssey as Press release speaks of being able to put 3 child seats in 2nd row. Bottom line for us, is 8 life size passenger ability and acceptable looks and 28 MPG for the new Ody, looks like van #4 will be an Odyssey. (I'll just fabricate a small body panel to correct and eliminate the Honda/Lincoln 'Lightning Bolt' to 'correct' the kinked bodyline to a nicely executed, uninterupted beltline. cheers

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Caraholica on Feb 13, 2010

As the owner of an '06 Odyssey with 117k miles I really like the updated and integrated looks of this version. Hopefully, the smoother design cues will make it into production. A good portion of my miles have been between southern california and western colorado and the road manners of the current version are excellent. Whether it's empty or loaded to the gunwales, traveling is a delight on those trips. If they can keep that and add these good looks, then I'm a goner again. It might even make up for the last 3 versions of the Accord.

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