The new X5, to me, represents something so much more than you could imagine.
Starting with the double-wishbone set-up up front (finally!), the jaw-droppingly gorgeous interior that rivals anything Audi can put out, the muscular-but-not-too-muscular sheet metal, the engines, the elimination of the i-drive double-hump, the TRICK-as-fuck shifter, even the chrome trim that isn't broken into a million pieces like on the E90 and actually flows continously around all the windows (door seams are the exception of course) and under the door mirror ('bout time they got that one right).
To me it represents a sort of fulfillment of the quality products that we all knew BMW could build if they wanted to. It's a fusion of Audi attention-to-quality-detail and BMW performance-and-style.
That's why in my mind, even if the lines are a tad awkward in some places compared to the MK1 X5, this new generation is the most beautiful thing to come out of Munich since, well... the Z8. Or in this case... South Carolina.
