Sad to see how far Lotus has moved from Colin Chapman's philosophy. Seems to me the S is closer to the purity of his vision than the newly announced line up of Lotus cars. My appreciation of the S only grows with time. I only hope Honda doesn't stray too far should they ever reincarnate the S.

 

From an aesthetics standpoint, the new Lotus' are gorgeous and looks like they will perform to boot. I'd hold out on the bashing IMO....

At least the Elise doesn't look fugly anymore

 

Lotus needs a way to make some cash in order to survive. The positive is more money is made for R&D. It's the same for Porsche, they sell a lot of Cayenne's and Panamera's in order to release cars such as the 911.

 

Yes!
They got rid of the bug-eyes

 

I like the look of both gens of Elise much better than the "me-too" serious, aggro ubercar look of the new big fat Loti. The Elises just look more FUN.

 

its good

the elise looks dated. even the 2009 model looks like 90's styling

i think the point the OP is trying to make is, the days of lotus' sub-2000 pound car days are gone. but that does not mean the new iterations will be worse performers. id actually put my money on the opposite

 

The new Elise is rumored to weigh about 2400 lbs. No matter how you look at it, it's still 300-400 lbs lighter than an S2000. I dislike that they're stepping out of their own market to compete with Ferrari, Lambo and Aston Martin, but it happens. I'd prefer they did that instead of closing production for good.
Maybe now Lotus will become a better known name even among non-car enthusiasts.

 

The one picture I've seen of the new Elise prototype looked beautiful but it appeared to have a fixed roof. I assume the Elise name wouldn't be plastered on a coupe, right? Tell me it's got a removeable top! And 2,400 lbs is still lighter than any other production car on the market. I'm not sending condolences to Lotus just yet.

 

How is a 2800+ lbs S2000 closer to the manta of light weight than a 2400 lbs car?

 

Not bashing Lotus, just having trouble wrap my mind around Lotus cars with V8s, 7 speed dual clutch transmissions and a $118K Elan.