Car names are hard, man. All the really great ones have long since been taken, and plenty of just-OK names are already on trunk lids too. There are also lots of not-great car names out there, but no one’s trying to come up with fresh bad-name ideas as near as I can tell.
Whether they’re amazing appellations or moniker misfires, it’s also common for names to land on what seems like the wrong car. With that in mind, let’s play a little game. Close your eyes (when you get to the end of the sentence, I mean) and imagine a car named Amazon.
It’s a pretty good name, very evocative. And what did it evoke for you? Did you imagine a rugged off-roader that might follow the banks of the mighty South American river? Or perhaps a muscular, agile, feminine machine of the sporting variety? Maybe your mind conjured a Rivian van in Bezos spec, in which case, well, you’re not wrong. But I bet you didn’t come up with anything quite like a Volvo Amazon:
Sorry Volvo, that’s not remotely Amazonian. It looks more, I dunno, a Volvo Sensible. The Volvo Steady.
Jason suggested Crown Victoria as an all-wrong choice for the iconic body-on-frame Panther platformer, and I must concur. Whether we’re talking the LTD’s Crown Victoria trim level (as seen below, resplendent in Gloss Band-Aid) or the standalone Crown Vic offered from 1992 to 2012, there’s nothing here to suggest the fur-collared velvet capes, gold scepters, and jeweled headgear that absolutely any reasonable person would imagine upon hearing the words Crown Victoria.
It’s hard to separate the Crown Vic from its cop-car fame/infamy, so I want to call it the Ford Authority or Lawman or Captain.
In a similar vein, would any celebrity be caught dead in a Chevy Celebrity? Here’s another bogus bowtie name: Chevy Citation (above). I suppose the idea here was “citation as in a formal statement of achievement,” but who doesn’t instead think of “citation as in a cop giving you a ticket?” It’s always the latter. No one’s looking at a Chevy Citation and thinking, “What an achievement, congrats on the new Citation.”
Your turn: What Cars Are Named All Wrong, And What Should They Be Called Instead?
Top graphic image: Bring A Trailer
I guess I figured they called it Citation because Footnote was a little too on-the-nose.
No one would be congratulating anyone who bought that even if had been named the Chevy Orgasm.
I didn’t see it, so I’ll add the fairly misshapen but definitely misnamed Subaru B9 Tribeca. Such a odd attempt to pair alpha-numeric and actual names.
I know it was Subaru’s attempt at an urban SUV, so why not something like the Subaru Merge?
I can’t say I’m a fan of the hierarchy of Honda and Acura’s current SUV naming strategy. Maybe it’s not the names themselves but the order in which they come.
Alphabetical nomenclature has conditioned us to assume that the earlier letters are smaller/cheaper models(think A Class) while later letters are larger/more expensive(think S Class).
Honda
HR-V-small/cheap
CR-V-medium/more expensive
Acura
ADX-small/cheap
RDX-medium/more expensive
ZDX-mediumish/more expensivish
MDX-large/most expensive
The letters are all out of order. Figure your shit out Honda. Also, this is such a minor peeve that I feel mildly ashamed sharing it, but we don’t kink shame here, right?
The Cadillac Cimmaron shouldn’t have been called a Cadillac. Does that count?
And I’ll concur on the Ford Aspire. I’m guessing the only aspiration related to that thing was the engineers wanting to move on to some other project.
Citation was too grand of a name for an X-body, and speaking of Chevy I was never able to say the name correctly after I read it being referred to as the “Corpsica”.
I don’t get the nautical naming scheme of the current Lincolns, either, although I’m guessing anybody that thinks they know what a Corsair is thinks it’s a WW2 era aircraft.
I was never really fond of Mirage, either. It worked well for the French fighter jets, but not for a car.