Above is the 1988 Pontiac Firebird GTA Notchback. Yes, it came from the factory looking like that.
Styling in the ‘80s was a little bit on the extreme side, with cars either going radically all-in for aerodynamic efficiency or not. Either your car looked like a brick (take a gander at a Chevy Monte Carlo, for instance) or it looked like a wedge of cheese (gaze upon the beauty of an early Fiero or something). On one side you had a very straight, reactionary, traditional style. On the other you had a slavish adherence to science and the future. There wasn’t a lot in between.
Except you did, very briefly, have this one-year-only Firebird.
You could only get this package on the sporty GTA trim, and it replaced the standard car’s fastback rear glass with an upright window and a long fiberglass trunk. The rear seats and spoiler also got swapped out, as GTANotchback.com helpfully explains.
GM built fewer than a thousand of these cars, almost completely lost to history. It was a car kind of out of its own time, easily forgotten.
Has there ever been a more pointless limited edition?
Photo Credit: Pontiac
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