Video: 2009 Toyota Avalon

On the one hand, there are a lot of aging elements that kind of show this car's age, but on the other hand, it kind of offers this glimpse at a bygone era of Toyota quality, which is something the automakers kind of let slip in some of its more recent bread and butter cars. Let's take a look at both of those sides and see if the Avalon's right for you. Let's start with the cabin it becomes immediately obvious that the Avalon is a large car as soon as you get in The driver's seat, even when it's lowered all the way, has a nice high ingress height, makes it really easy to slip right in. The dashboard, sort of slopes away from you, gives the cabin this nice open, airy, feel. Our test car is an Avalon XLS. That's the middle of three trim levels. The leather seats here are nice and flat, pretty comfortable for the long haul. High-grade stuff as far as the upholstery, there's a seam here that kind of cuts across the middle of my back. A couple others on staff noticed that as well, especially if you have the lumbar kind of dialed all the way back, Maybe I just need to eat more and then I won't feel it. The navigation system, a bit dated looking with the graphics, Toyota and Lexus have far sharper looking systems in some of their more recently redesigned cars. Functionally, it's a bit of a mess as well. For example, you can't go from A here back to H, when you're inputting a street name, by pressing the left button. You have to scroll all the way across the map a lot and it's really annoying. I'm also not sure why everything has to have this sort of silver plastic sheeting over it. Same stuff that was used in the previous generation Lexus RX went out of style a long time ago. In my opinion, it doesn't look terrific. And while I'm at it, why does everything have doors over it? It's just weird. Behind door number three are the cup holders. Hopping back and leg room fairly abundant. That's where I would sit to drive. Headroom is decent and there's no floor hump here to sort of rob foot well space. The rear seats recline about 10 degrees according to Toyota. That is comfortable. Trunk volume, about 14 and a half cubic feet. Unexceptional for this segment. Cars like the Buick Lucerne, the Hyundai Azera, they have a few more cubic feet. The Ford Taurus has more than 20 cubic feet. If you live in the city, you could probably rent that out to someone. Unfortunately with some of its more recent efforts, the automaker's showing that it knows how to recapture that spirit. If you value ride comfort and cabin quality, this Avalon might be worth the checking out. If Toyota can build the next Avalon with the same ear for quality that it once had, maybe they'll still be one of the cars that really didn't see those lapses. <v Narrator>For more car related news go to cars.com or our blog KickingTires.net.