We’re all adults here, right? Okay, good. The thing is, some of the Great American Muscle Cars from Great American Muscle Car Era Version 1.0 are a little — um, how to put this delicately — well, childish.
The loud colors, the wild graphics, the zany names. Fun yes, but not everyone’s cup of high-octane leaded. There wasn’t much in the way of those shenanigans coming from GM’s Oldsmobile division in the late 1960s and early ’70s, though. Lansing was in the business of making muscle cars for a more discreet performance enthusiast. Sure, Olds marketers got on the bandwagon, hamming it up with characters like the mad scientist Dr. Oldsmobile and his sidekicks, Elephant Engine Ernie or Shifty Sidney. But the cars reflected the division’s reputation for smooth power and refined performance in a buttoned-down package.
Oldsmobile’s legendary 4-4-2 made its well-dressed debut in ’64 to rival that game-changing GT-you-know-what from John DeLorean and company over at Pontiac. It didn’t take long for the beefed-up four-barrel, four-speed, dual-exhaust Cutlass to earn street cred, and in ’68, 4-4-2 became a model unto itself.
Of course, there were many more changes afoot that year with the arrival of GM’s all-new A-body, shared by Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, and Buick — with each division adding its own distinctive touches. In keeping with the design ethos of
