My wife's new company car is a Nissan Altima, an unassuming sedan with a thirst for mayhem.

A RUSSIAN GUY DELIVERED THE ALTIMA on a one-car trailer at 10 p.m. on a rainy Tuesday night. My wife, Heather, drives a lot for her job as a nurse practitioner, so her company gave her a car. That car is a Glacier White 2025 Nissan Altima 2.5 SV, its window sticker boasting of its 39-mpg EPA highway rating, five-star safety score, and all-in price of $29,375. On its way off the trailer, the delivery guy dragged the chin spoiler on the ramps, giving the vehicle its first scrape. But surely not its last, because this is a Nissan Altima, the most chaotic car on earth.

- 

Despite looking so exceedingly normal, the Altima is a magnet for anarchy. If you turn on the news and they're reporting on a car chase, there's a good chance it features an Altima. When you see a car rolling on four temporary spares, that's an Altima move. Altimas get driven into lakes and through storefronts with alarming regularity. Just this morning, I saw a cop pull over an Altima. When I drove back through a few minutes later, there were two cop cars—the police handbook must require a two-to-one ratio when a stop involves an Altima.

My sister-in-law used to have an Altima, and one day, she went into work and later heard a commotion about a car out in the parking lot spontaneously combusting. When her insurance company totaled the charred remains of her car, she promptly bought another Altima.