So often, it seems, the Germans stumble onto automotive greatness. They produce a special car outside of the normal product-planning cycle, and it becomes an instant legend. Then the marketers try to replicate that magic for the next generation but show a fundamental misunderstanding of what made the original great in the first place. No German car company is immune: Porsche 928 replacing the 911? Ha. VW R32 Mk5 replacing the Mk4? Sorry, folks. The Audi Allroad replacing the A4 Avant? Not even close. The Mercedes W113 SL replacing the W198 300SL? Hardly.
There are more examples, but BMW seems to be the worst offender. When we heard about the 1 Series M Coupe replacement, we worried. Luckily, the M2 bucked the trend, but BMW has a history of replacing brilliance with bombs.
Read the 2016 BMW M2 First Test Review HERE
From 2002 to E21
The 2002 was an aberration, created by some rogue engineers and pushed into production by Max Hoffman, the U.S. importer. Putting the big sedan's 2.0-liter engine into the little two-door '02 "accidentally" created the modern German sport sedan. The E21 320i that replaced it was a dud. It took BMW a decade to regain that mojo with the 1987 325is.
The E30 M3 wasn't in any marketing plan. It was a homologation car built solely so BMW could go kick Mercedes' butt in the DTM racing series. BMW wasn't convinced it could sell the 5,000 requisite production cars, but it wound up selling almost 18,000 worldwide. In the U.S., it was replaced by an M3 with no racing heritage and no race engine—just a larger version of the 325i six-cylinder. It sold in big numbers, but if you look at what E36 M3s are worth today relative to other M3s, it's obvious the market knows what's what. That replacement, the E46 M3, finally got another real M engine for the U.S. market. It sold like the dickens then and is still worth good money now.
