Huggins Mitsubishi

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Walk Around

Were it not for the trademark, three-diamond logo, little about the 2008 Mitsubishi Lancer suggests it's related in any way to the 2006 model. In this instance, however, this is good. As decent a car as that previous edition was, its competitors have leapfrogged it in almost every sense, not the least of which is styling.

Where the 2006 Lancer was somewhat minimalist in its approach, with a swept-back hood and squinty headlights, the 2008 presents a brusque face, with a strong chin and scowling eyes, a look Mitsubishi not unfairly compares to a shark's snout. Grille and lower intake form a trapezoid horizontally split by the front bumper; Mitsubishi says this a jet fighter. Blacked-out blanks below the bumper balance the headlights and house the projector-lens fog lights when fitted. Mild creases trace the hood's power bulge from the grille back to the A-pillars framing the windshield, leaving well-defined shoulders over the front wheel wells.

Side view stays true to the shark theme, with the upper edge of the grille looming over the relatively flush front bumper. A high beltline (where the side windows meet the lower door panels) lowers the car's visual center of gravity, giving it a more substantial and more firmly planted look. A character line that plays on the car's wedge shape begins in a deep groove in the front quarter panel and front door and fills in as it moves to the rear just beneath the full-round door handles, fading into a shallow shadow across the rear quarter panel before ending at the acutely angled rear side-marker light. Even the base, 60-aspect tires on 16-inch wheels look right in the circular wheel openings.

The rear aspect is very bustle-ish, with a tall trunk lid. Taillights try to echo the headlights shark-like scowl, but don't quite pull it off, what with the large areas of surrounding, generally flat sheetmetal. In the end, it's a disappointing finish to an otherwise sleek design with a decent dose of personality.

Interior

2008 Mitsubishi Lancer

Autodom's interior styling pendulum seems to swing from busy to not-so-busy. One year there are more buttons and switches than any ten fingers and two eyes can manage and of all different sizes and shapes. Then the next, all those myriad of functions are buried beneath three or four knobs, or in the extreme a single massive one, with a few switches sprinkled here and there for fringe features. In the 2008 Mitsubishi Lancer, this seems to have been caught in mid-swing. Much of the result is good, but a few bits need further refinement.

Most important in this measure is the dash, with the instrument cluster and climate and audio controls. In the former, a large, circular tachometer and speedometer bracketing a digital, LCD-based information center in the '08 replace an asymmetrical array of two large and three small gauges in the '06. And therein lies the conundrum. The new, i.e., '08, cluster looks slicker, more modern and even a bit sportier than the '06's. But the analog-style fuel and coolant gauges in the '06 were always there, so they didn't have to be called up by pressing a button somewhere. And they communicated their information more readily, requiring just a quick glance instead of a refocusing of the eye on a tiny tower of light.

There's good and not so good, too, in the climate and audio control panels. The most basic functions, like fan, temperature, mode, volume and tuning, have traditional, relatively large, rotating knobs. They're properly placed, too, with climate below and audio above, where it's more accessible. After all, most people adjust audio settings more frequently than climate. And reasonably sized, well-marked buttons select station presets and manage other media. But the data telltales are easily obscured LEDs tucked away in a slit at the center top of the dash where deciphering them forces drivers to divert their attention from traffic and shift their optical focus from distance to close. Again, like the instrument cluster, it all looks good, but comes up short in function.

The shining exception to all this ambivalence is the display and control head for the GPS-based navigation system. Buttons and rocker switches with firm tactile feel call up the desired screen. Moving a joystick in the lower right-hand corner highlights the desired function. Pressing it accesses the function. While some of the information is more entertaining than essential, like the x/y axis dot graphs showing average speeds and fuel economy over a floating two-hour window (especially when higher speeds coincide with higher fuel economy; cool), the ease of use is tops.

The story pretty much remains the same elsewhere around the interior. Front seats are comfortable, with adequate, if not great depth in the seat bottom cushions. The driver's door armrest and the padded top on the front center console are both too low, and the center console is too far rearward, for supporting a driver's elbows on straight and boring interstates. The handbrake positioning is not optimal, resting proudly between the driver's seat bottom cushion and the center console at just the right height to trip the bottom of a slurpee on its way to or from one of the console's two cup holders.

Rear seats are marked improvements over the '06's. There's more definition in the cushions, the seat bottoms are deeper and now there are three head restraints, all adjustable. The fold-down, center armrest in the ES and GTS is more stable than it looks, meaning everyday driving isn't likely to spill the kids' soda pop.

By the numbers, the 2008 Lancer makes the most of its more than two inches of added width over the '06. Careful packaging of interior features and trim gives most of that two inches to front seat hiproom and adds almost twice that to rear seat hiproom. This parks the new Lancer smack in the middle of the pack on this measurement. The Nissan Sentra, the H

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