How The Acura RDX Got Swallowed Whole By A $9200 Tuscan Villa

By Peter D @carenvy

Do you remember the old Acura RDX? The cute one? With the turbo?

Well, forget it.

This, what you see above, is the new Acura RDX. It no longer looks like a bolder and distinctively taller Honda Fit from the future. It’s now gentler, less boyish than before. Acura’s latest tweaks are their most comprehensive yet, but they’ve lead to a far more anonymous iteration of their smallest crossover.

Where the 2007 model was discretely handsome, the 2010 facelift scarred that beauty with silver bird bits. Now, for 2013, the RDX is back to being discrete, except the square chin and dimples have been buffed out by design committees. With renewed inoffensiveness, it would blend seamlessly next to the Equinox at the Chevy dealer. Having found that unique appearances and thirsty turbo engines don’t move metal, the new RDX is more mainstream from beak to tail. It seems like a withdrawal, a reversal of tactics, from more aggressive to more defensive. But where the old RDX swam in a pond of one, the new one is being plopped in the middle of the Atlantic.

So can this softer bird swim?

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