I do think there are cultural issues though with the US vs Europe. It's very common that cars that are known for quality and reliability in Europe are regarded as exceptionally temperamental in the US. When I first moved to the US I couldn't understand why German cars had such a bad reputation for reliability here. Most of them are traditionally considered more or less bulletproof in Europe.
But after while I noticed that many American owners don't pay any attention to maintenance schedules, and just wait until something breaks. Some cars are forgiving of that, and some aren't.
Nowadays I rank cars into roughly 3 categories: those that hardly ever break no matter what you do, those that are fine if you do what you're told, and those that break no matter what you do.