I guess car companies are finally realizing that young, cool people won't be caught dead in nerdy econoboxes - unless those nerdy econoboxes are so unabashedly nerdy that they actually become cool. I adored the first-generation Scion xB (I actually contemplated trading in my BMW 5-series wagon for one), but the current, second-gen xB lost a lot of that charm.
And now Kia made the real sequel. The Soul fixes the original xB's two biggest problems - the 1.5-liter Hamster wheel under the hood and those atrocious center-mounted gauges - with a 2.0-liter and some cool gauges. The shape of the gauges really reminds me of mid-1990s Opel products (not a bad thing) and even the shift knob - with it's pull-up-to-engage-reverse-sleeve is straight Opel. Dunno where the Opel reference comes from, but I like it. Yeah, the shift linkage is slightly out of adjustment on this Soul, but that's easily fixed, and anyone who's driven an old VW knows how to get around that little problem.
I drove the Soul in four inches of fresh snow, so I can't say much about its dynamics. It was ten degrees outside, so I also didn't spend much time poking around the cargo hold. But I can say that when I first saw it, it made me grin - and let's face it, buyers in this segment won't care much about skidpad grip or at-the-limit handling. They'll be looking at the Soul because it's cute and cheap. And it does those two things really well.
Jason Cammisa, West Coast Editor
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