To the car enthusiast, this article is basically “Dog Bites Man” 
And in order to get them to look halfway decent designers had to go back to the '70s.
Now if they could only relearn how to make them comfortable. 
Cars that were around in the 1960s, like the Camaro and Mustang, look a lot like they did back in the day. Why not take advantage of all the good will built up over decades of avid fans? Other cars that didn’t exist 50 years ago have their own design, yet are still top performers, like the Cadillac CTS-V. It doesn’t look or behave like anything Cadillac built in the 1960s.
Well, I’ll go against the grain of the article
I’m quite satisfied with my car, which has just over 200hp
it’s not retro looking, and that’s just fine with me
So essentially, my car is not cool looking AND it’s also a pathetic weakling
I have no plans of trading it in, anytime soon
Sorry but I imagined that article playing on Bloomberg news on my headset during a flight and I snoozed half way through.
Speaking of retros though, the HHR and PT Cruiser comes to mind. Like a 50’s panel truck. I rented one and had a PT for a loaner and I dunno, they look nicer than they drive. My wife thought the HHR looked like a hearse. Too bad they weren’t beefed up a little so they could be good utility vehicles.
Performance today doesn’t have much relevance to driving on trips.
Back before the interstates became ubiquitous, most long trips were on two lane roads and having better passing power than most other cars was important to making good time.
Today, there is no place I can unleash my 4 cylinder Camry and I can think of no reason I would prefer to feed the more expensive V6.