The most desirable Mercury Cougars are the 1967 and 1968 versions (1st design); after which the Cougar progressively became bigger, bulkier, and overall worse. That being said, sometimes in the right light in Brooklyn, when one sees a ‘lost’ Cougar like this 1973 (i’m estimating)….it looks absurdly large and early 70s in a cool way. Vinyl roof, chrome wheels, and look at the size of that trunk lined complete with flying buttresses! Pimptastic….and funky.
IEDEI 
The only car Ford ruined even more than the Cougar was the T-Bird . OK …. you may have to count in the Mustang II as well … except at least Ford did make amends for that with the later models . Yeeesh ! The Mid Seventies . Lived thru em . The absolute worst era of American car making that took a good two decades to recover from . Bleahhhhhh . Just the thought of those horrid OTT Yank Tanks leaves a bad taste that’ll now take all night to get over 😦