Subaru’s Secret New Department Just Built The Ultimate $20K Manual Hatch

[00:01] just announced three new manual transmission cars. A hot hatch, a WRX sedan, a lightweight BRZ, and every single one of these has three pedals. removing your steering wheel and handing you a subscription for your own gear

[00:16] selector, Subaru said no. Subaru said, "You're a human being and you deserve to Danger here and today we're talking about the single most unhinged, most based, most anti-establishment move in the automotive industry right now. Not

[00:32] from Ferrari, not from Porsche, from Subaru. The brand that smells like a golden retriever in a Patagonia vest just walked into the room, looked every installing, driver disconnecting executive in the face, and said, "We're

[00:45] going to do the opposite thing." Three manual cars by 2027 confirmed. I need you to understand how insane that actually is. Ford just killed the manual in the Bronco Sport. GM is turning the Corvette into a hybrid. Honda made the

[00:59] Civic Type R automatic optional. Mazda just gave the MX-5 a dual clutch. The world is moving one direction and one direction only, brother, and Subaru is speed shifting the other way. [music] This is not normal. This is beautiful.

[01:13] This is the kind of news I print out [music] and tape to my wall. And if you're the kind of person who just said, "What's a manual transmission?" Well, just close the tab. This video is not for you. Go watch a Tesla unboxing.

[01:25] giveaway for the Shelby and Supra in the $100,000 has ended and well, the winners are being picked right now. But, we're coming back bigger [music] and badder and better. So, click the link in the pin first comment because like Rocky who

[01:39] won the GT-R, like Greg who won the 100K, you can sign up to be notified and get 100 free entries once it goes live. So, click the link down below, go put in your email, and I can't wait to show you what we have cooking. All right, back to

[01:52] the cars, we need to talk about something that Subaru just created called the sports vehicle planning office. This is a real department that now exists inside Subaru Corporation. An entire office with people who do go to

[02:06] work every day and their whole job is to plan sports vehicles. Name a cooler job. You can't, brother. According to Subaru, this office is responsible for all three of these new manual models. They're pulling from motorcycle technology, from

[02:19] their Super Taikyu race program, from the engineers who apparently still love cars and haven't been completely robotomized by a focus group. Subaru even announced all this at their Fuji 24-hour race, not a boring tech expo,

[02:31] not in a press release emailed at 3:00 p.m. on a Friday at a racetrack while cars are racing. The last time a brand this nerdy made a move this cool, the entire car community lost their mind for a decade. We're still talking about it.

[02:43] Okay, let's get into the car starting with the one that I cannot stop thinking about at night. Subaru is building a brand new five-door hatchback, manual and here's the word they used, affordable. Affordable. A new affordable

[02:56] manual hatchback this year? I said what I want, I said it again, affordable been uttered by a mainstream automaker in years. Years. This thing is based on the performance BSTI concept that showed up at the 2025 Japan Mobility Show. When

[03:11] we saw that concept, everyone assumed it was just going to be the new WRX STI hot hatch. Well, nah. Subaru CTO Tetsuro Fujinagui, whose name I will absolutely mispronounce and I'm sorry if Tetsuro

[03:25] and I totally respect you enormously, called this an affordable base car. He said it's being built so that car-loving engineers can bring their own ideas to life. That's so cool, it physically hurts. What that tells us is this thing

[03:39] a canvas, a lightweight purpose-built enthusiast base on which Subaru and eventually the aftermarket can build. It's reportedly pulling from the Impreza hatchback's bones and mixing in WRX DNA. Hood scoop on the teaser image suggests

[03:53] a non-electrified turbocharged 2.4 L boxer engine. Non-electrified, as in no hybrid nonsense. Just a flat four-cylinder that goes a braap when you downshift. The wide fenders from the original concept are gone in [music] the

[04:07] teaser, which some people are sad about. Not me. That means this thing is going to be a sleeper, an unassuming hatchback that will absolutely pull on a Civic Si at a stoplight and ruin someone's afternoon. I'm buying 17 of them in my

[04:20] mind right now. And here, ladies and gents, is the juicy part. There are eventually serve as a foundation for a proper WRX STI flagship, a full-fat rally-bred driver-first STI, the kind that a whole generation of car people

[04:36] grew up worshipping on posters. If this budget hatch is the appetizer, the STI is the steak dinner. And I am hungry for some filet, baby. Let's talk about the WRX situation because this one is personal for a lot of people. Earlier

[04:51] this year, Subaru released the WRX STI tS Sport Sharp Edition in Japan. 600 units, lottery system only. 600 cars for an entire country. You had better odds hitting the jackpot on a slot machine than getting your hands on this car. It

[05:05] was equipped [music] with the STI tuned chassis, upgraded aero, and a manual gearbox. And then it sold out before most people even knew it existed. And here's the news. In 2027, the manual comes back as a permanent option on the

[05:18] WRX sedan. Not a limited run, not a lottery, a real on the menu build-and-price manual transmission WRX. But wait, there's more. Subaru isn't using the same gearbox from the special edition. They're bringing back the TY85

[05:31] manual, the heavy-duty transmission from the previous generation WRX STI, the real one, the one built to take abuse from people who rev-match every single launch from a dead stop entirely too hard on an on-ramp. That gearbox, back

[05:46] in the new WRX. The TY85 is a big deal because the current WRX has always felt like it was one major component away from being a full STI. Stronger clutch, [music] bred confidence when you're banging through gears at 9/10. That's

[06:02] what the TY85 brings. This is not a trim level upgrade. This is a character transplant. And again, the hood scoop on the teaser suggests we're you're looking at a non-electrified 2.4 L turbo boxer. Which means they are not watering this

[06:16] thing down with a hybrid system to hit some emissions number. They are making a WRX for people who want to drive a WRX. Novel concept, I know. Last but absolutely not least, the BRZ. Now, the BRZ already comes with a manual. That's

[06:30] not the news. The news is what they're doing to it. Subaru is releasing a new complete car BRZ that's based on the STI Sport Type RA limited edition from November of '25. A car that came loaded with ZF dampers, Brembo brakes, and

[06:45] aggressive arrow. Brother, 300 units Japan only, gone immediately of course. The new manual BRZ is described as being lighter and more enjoyable to drive. That's it. That's the whole brief. Lighter, more fun, three pedals, signed,

[06:59] the sports vehicle planning office. Now, I have to be honest with you. I mean, there's no confirmed power bump. The naturally aspirated 2.4 flat four isn't going turbo treatment from the rally car. Subaru was pretty clear about that,

[07:12] and yeah, I know some of you are already typing that in the comments. I totally see you, but here's my take. The BRZ was never about outright power. It was about feel. It was kind of like a cheap Porsche. It was about a perfectly

[07:24] balanced rear-wheel drive car that rewards a skilled driver. You lose 20 kg under it and sharpen the steering feel, and you've got one of the most entertaining driver's car in the entire market at any price. A lighter BRZ with

[07:37] STI suspension and Brembo stoppers is not a car that needs 400 horses. It needs grip, feedback, a six-speed manual. All three boxes checked by Subaru. Here's what I actually want you to think about for a second because this

[07:50] year manual transmissions are functionally extinct at most mainstream automakers. Not endangered, extinct. The automatic is faster, the dual clutch is faster, the EV doesn't even have gears. The entire market has decided that

[08:03] efficiency and speed matter more than connection, more than involvement, more operating a machine with your hands and feet in coordination with physical because most people driving today don't know what they are missing. And some of

[08:18] us do. And Subaru just looked at that group of people, the heel-toe crowd, the rev-match nerds, the folks who drive a stick through rush hour traffic just because it's more fun, and said, "We have a whole office for you, a sports

[08:31] vehicle planning office. We put real engineers in there and told them to make you three new cars with three pedals by 2027." That's not a business decision. [music] That's a love letter. Now, the obvious caveat, and I'd be doing you

[08:45] of these cars are currently confirmed for Japan. Whether they make it to the US or Europe depends on emission regulations, demand signals, and whether clutch pedal. That last one might actually be the biggest obstacle. But

[08:59] here is what we know. WRX sales are up 148% in the US recently after Subaru corrected the pricing. Demand for the WRX is clearly there. The BRZ has a loyal global following. And an affordable manual hatchback in today's

[09:13] market would have a line out the door at every dealership in America. The demand is real, brother. The question is whether Subaru has the guts to bring it. They built a sports vehicle planning office. I'm betting they have the guts

[09:25] to do it. Three manual cars, one brand, one announcement at the racetrack in 2026 while everyone else is out here removing pedals and adding subscriptions and making your car into a rolling iPad that's not allowed to actually enjoy,

[09:40] Subaru is out here doing the opposite in the industry and I love them for that. And if you want to win the next car that we're giving away, well, click the link definitely put in your email so I can notify you once that drops. It's going

[09:53] to be bigger, better, and better and it may have three pedals. I'm Brad Danger. that notification bell, and check out some of these Ideal vids over here. Oh, and promise me one thing. Keep living the Ideal lifestyle.