well my first car was a V8 commode, ol VN SS was a piece of piss to maintain (apart from changing leads LOL), cheapish to run as a first year apprentice, big enough to have sex in, and sounded nice. Parts were cheap and I didn't care about buying some cheap ass OEM ripoff part from Bursons, knowning it was going to work just as well. Wouldn't dream of doing the same in a Jap car.
My R32 has more comfortable seats, but the 'fun' of driving it gets diluted by my 70km commute every day.
I like that in a Commodore you can pretty much turn your brain off when driving (esp in an auto) - whereas in my Skyline I'm rev matching gears cause the gearbox is notchy, and watching for it to not overboost etc, it's not as nice to just 'cruise around in' because it requires constant driver interaction.
TBH when I can afford it, i'd probably get another V8 commodore for a work thrasher, and keep my R32 for the weekends.
Agree with the points about mechanics and maintenence - around here you HAVE to do most of it yourself or with mates, as mechanics still have this 'jap crap' mentality when it comes to imports.