[mikeash]

I suppose people could like a car when they buy it and then get disgusted with it over time.

I wonder if there's a paradoxical filter effect at play. If a car is really obviously bad (for most people) then they won't buy it. But if a car is bad in a more subtle way, maybe people are more likely to buy it and then hate it later. Thus, one might expect overall terrible cars (in the eyes of the general population, at least) to have a fanatical following, since they're the only ones who would buy it.