#2017ChevroletCruze

It wasn’t long ago that the Detroit Three were fending off the Japanese on home soil as the Land of the Rising Sun cranked out reliable car after reliable car for the American masses. Then came the Koreans — Kia and Hyundai — who brought over cheap metal to win market share but quickly turned around their quality and reliability woes and produced some of the best products in the industry.

So why is it that, after 108 years of building automobiles, General Motors still manufactures abysmal garbage?

It’s not easy to live down past embarrassments.

In a junior high school basketball game, I banked in a free throw. Two decades later, do you think my older brothers have forgotten?

More than two decades ago, General Motors launched the third-generation Chevrolet Cavalier. The degree to which it was an abysmal excuse for a Honda Civic rival became increasingly clear over its decade-long run. Although its replacement, the Chevrolet Cobalt, won’t go down in history as an all-time great, it was a meaningful leap forward. The Cobalt’s replacement, Chevrolet’s first Cruze, was full of big car manners in a small car body.

Now we have the second-generation Cruze, thankfully offered in North America in a hatchback bodystyle.

The 2017 Chevrolet Cruze Hatchback is by no means perfect, but if you haven’t already re-written the line in your brain under “Chevrolet Small Car Reputation,” it’s time to do so.

Tarted-up production cars revealed at the SEMA show aren’t exactly the stuff of shocked gasps and hurriedly sent text messages to friends, but there’s often some useful gear to come out of the annual trade jamboree.

The blue window tinting and wheels on the pair of Blue Line “concepts” trotted out by Chevrolet ahead of the show likely impressed no one, but it’s what lies beneath that matters. Starting next year, the bowtie brand will let owners of its newly redesigned compact gain some extra horsepower in a manner that won’t void the warranty.

Yes, the Cruze is joining the tuner scene.

With its diesel-powered competition sidelined by scandal (and soon to be scrapped), General Motors sees a big window of opportunity for its new Chevrolet Cruze diesel.

Rather than being worried about consumer sentiment in the wake of Volkswagen’s emissions scandal, GM can’t wait to put the moves on the legions of spurned diesel diehards, Automotive News reports.