It stems from the timid styling, poor marketing campaign, and not giving the people a truly new vehicle. The platform was around for a good long while before it turned into the GTO. I have an old C&D magazine where they compared a Holden HSV-R to the BMW M5(i believe it was '02?). That car was basically a 4 door '05 GTO. It had an LS-1 worked over by Callaway to produce nearly 400hp, and it ran neck and neck with the BMW in nearly all their tests. The car is a great car, but not what people expected, or wanted in a new GTO. That name is held in a much higher regard, and warranted a better effort from GM to give the consumers something more than worthy of the badge. Instead they got a really good car that did many things well, but failed to stand out in any way, and grab the imagination, or tug on any heartstrings of GTO or Pontiac loyalists. It really is a shame, and I wish they had a better platform that they could build on and improve. It was definitely a Q-ship type of car that I would have defintely looked into buying. Especially after watching the video below.
http://i.b5z.net/i/u/1473169/f/Video/kennygto989.mpg