Some may think what we have here is a blatant case of plagiagism. However, Malaysian automaker Proton has a long history or dealing with both Lotus and Mitsubishi (with some of it's cars being Mitsubish derived), so both of these cars don't come as much of a surprise.
What is surprising though is what their idea of a facelift is. Where some might go to great length to hide their engineering cost-cutting roots, Proton saw it fit to simply paint sections matte black and overlay some of the clunkiest fender extension in recent memory. This concept stinks like a skunk and looks like one too. They also bring to mind the black and white cookie episode of Seinfeld, mainly because they makes me want to vomit.
For those who can't place the donor cars, the Jebal above is a warmed over Lancer Ralliart and the Lekir below is a similarly warmed over Lotus Europa (which itself is no longer in production).
There's rumors that the Europa could live on in Malaysia (not unlike the Elan did in Korea), which is good news for sports car fans. Unfortunately, compared to it's Lotus siblings, the Europa amounts to a average looking girl in a group of supermodels. I'll take what I can get though (as long as it doesn't look like this black and white disaster).
