+ This may be an older design, but it’s by no means ugly.
FR-S 86 badge | Micah Wright/Autos Cheat Sheet Exterior pros and cons It has the snazzy dual port exhaust, fender badging, LED lighting, and tight proportions that we want in a small sports car, but it also suffers from a lot of the same plastic maladies that plague vehicles like the Hyundai Genesis Coupe Spec-R and its little brother, the Rally Edition Veloster. The jury’s still out on the refreshed vehicles, but the outgoing model is a mixed bag for most buyers. Exterior 2016 Scion FR-S | Micah Wright/Autos Cheat SheetĪs sporty as it may appear, the FR-S is starting to grow long in the tooth. But let’s revisit the FR-S one last time, because for as much as people have bitched about its underwhelming powerplant, it’s still one of the most entertaining entry-level cars to come out of the past decade. So with less torque than a tC, styling that’s no longer new, and a 200-horsepower engine that begs to be boosted, we can see why the collaborating automakers are refreshing the twins for 2017. Dual port exhaust | Micah Wright/Autos Cheat Sheet
While the STI variant from the Subaru side continued to tease and deny us our animalistic urges, Scion watched its sales slip as even limited edition releases and mild TRD upgrades couldn’t move more units. Everyone had rushed in expecting this to be the answer to all of their rear-wheel drive prayers, only to find out that every other kid on the block had the same idea.
It’s a car that showed great potential on paper, and after the demise of the high-revving S2000, it quickly became a tuner go-to due to its rear-wheel drive layout, six-speed gearbox, and the immense number of available aftermarket parts that flooded SEMA after its debut.īut after a while, the honeymoon ended and despite showing substantial amounts of potential, the American market’s interest in the little coupe began to wane. Scion FR-S | Micah Wright/Autos Cheat Sheetįor many enthusiasts, the FR-S/BRZ platform turned out to be the most underwhelming invention since the advent of the New Coke.