Let me start of by saying that this is the first time I've read the Saturn newsgroup, and I'm pretty happy with what I've seen. Compared to other vehicle groups the Saturn group is low on "my car sucks" postings. It looks like most of the trouble posts are from owners of cars that are getting up there in age, which I suppose you'd expect.
I also have to throw out the fact that I love my 2002 SL1. I got married a little over two years ago and have been making a long haul to work since then. My car is about to roll up 98,000 miles, and outside of routine maintenance, I've had no troubles. I'm still on the original tires, go Firestone!
Anyway, I recently had my car in to the dealer to have the front rotors machined and new pads installed. While I was waiting, I looked around at the '04 Ion's as we're thinking about replacing my wife's '01 Kia Rio (junk). The salesman pointed out that they've been taking pictures people who buy new Saturns. A woman I work with recently bought a new VUE and I noticed her picture on the wall.
When I got back to work, I had to tell my coworker I saw her picture on the wall at the dealership. Another woman sitting nearby overheard us talking about our Saturns. She chimed in to tell us that her fairly-recent L200 has been nothing but trouble for her: new a/c compressor, new transmission, engine trouble, etc. She then said she'd never buy another Saturn again.
At some point during the conversation, she mentioned that she bought her Saturn used. I said, "maybe the prior owners got rid of it because it was a lemon."
She replied, "I bought it as a used rental car."