I think it's great that Toyota wants to enter the hot hatch segment with the 86. It'll make the 86 more practical for those who need it, while offering something no other hatch in the segment offers with RWD (other than BMW's 1 series hatch which isn't sold in the US). If it's a success, the increased sales volume/profits should make higher performance variants of the 86 more viable and cheap.
But IMO if Toyota seriously wants to enter the segment, they need to (1) make the design more aggressive, and (2) drop in a turbo. Those two things are pretty much par for the course and critical to be competitive. They're not going to win over any hot hatch buyers without them. Back to the drawing board Toyota?
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