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The Honda Civic sedans and coupes don't share any body panels. Details and markings distinguish each trim level. The 2009 Honda Civic sedan presents a bolder face to the world, thanks mainly to a new front bumper cover. Where the previous bumper looked solid and heavy, with a single, subtle horizontal opening at the center, the new design incorporates a taller, more trapezoidal center opening with secondary scoop-like openings on either side. A grid-like insert in the center opening contrasts with a kind of cyclone-fence theme in the side scoops. These changes break up some of the visual mass of the bumper. The upper grille opening is also more angular than before, which goes well with the changes below. As before, a bright horizontal bar, with a prominent Honda H in the middle, dominates the upper grille. Slender headlamp assemblies still angle upwards as they curve around the fenders. Revisions to the headlights are more subtle, consisting only of where and how the color seems to show through the existing lenses. Around back, a bright chrome bar now connects the taillights just above the indentation for the license plate. The coupe sports a new look for 2009, also. Gone is the delicate, two-tiered upper grille insert, leaving just the Honda logo centered in a oval-themed black mesh. The trapezoidal opening below has been flipped, so it's now wider at the top than the bottom, and the scoops to either side are drawn out wider and more horizontal, divided midway by a horizontal strut. Save for a lower body character line, drawn slightly higher on the coupe than on the sedan, the sides of the Civic are more slab than sensuous. Understated fender blisters, more pronounced on the coupe, break up the otherwise featureless expanse. What excitement there is in the side view is in the sleekness of what Honda calls a monoform design. A central expression of this is the windshield, the leading edge of which reaches into the hood all the way to the middle of the front wheel wells, pushing the cab-forward design concept to a new extreme. On the coupe, the windshield is raked at a radical 21.9 degrees; the sedan's at a barely more upright 23.9 degrees. The sail panel (the body panel aft of the rear side window) is unique to each model. The coupe's forms an acute angle with the horizontal deck surface, emphasizing the two-door body style; while the sedan's curves down over the rear door's trailing edge, pulling the eye through the higher roofline. The coupe's be-spoilered, rounded rear profile suggests swiftness. The sedan's somewhat abbreviated trunk lid and high, chunky tail end add perceived mass to a tightly proportioned, smallish sedan. Likewise, the rear view of each body style differs markedly. The coupe's sloping trunk lid settles into a deep cut in the rear bumper, with the license plate sheltered in an equally deep recess. The sedan's trunk lid drops in an almost vertical, unrelieved sheer from a relatively high crest across the top. On the 2009 Si sedan, the grille bar is black instead of chrome. On both coupes and sedans an Si badge tucks into the grille's lower left side, and oval fog lights are set into the bumper's outboard openings. An i-VTEC label appears just forward of the rear wheel well; on the Si sedan it's placed low on the rear door. An interestingly shaped rear spoiler wraps over the outboard edges of the sedan's trunk lid; on the coupe, the spoiler is free-standing. Both sedan and coupe roll on their own unique alloy wheels. The Hybrid, in contrast, is understated, with just a small Hybrid badge under the right rear taillight. Our least favorite feature is its pseudo-aero wheels, which look as if they were cut from pizza pans. A blue CNG diamond on the right side of the rear deck lid, and NGV lettering on the rear doors identify the natural gas-powered GX.
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