The History of the USDM Impreza Part II: The Dark Ages
 

Spurred by a GC owner who shall rename anonymous telling me she liked bugeyes, I've decided to continue my epic telling of Impreza history. It's late so I'll probably add more later.

By late 2000, it was decided that the Impreza needed a restyling to keep up with the market. To lead the project Subaru executives contacted the Tokyo Metropolitan Matsuzawa Hospital and arranged for the release of Takeshi Ito. After getting drunk and freebasing coke with some hookers, he got to work.

As a slap in the face to every true enthusiast, Subaru desecrated the RS moniker by applying it to the restyled L. The L was available as a sedan or wagon and received the 2.5l EJ25 motor and new 16x6.5" wheels. Shown below, the L had an optional wing and fog lights.

http://www.edmunds.com/media/reviews...e.neon.500.jpg

Ito knew the WRX was going to be introduced to the US market, so it needed some american flair in the form of horrible styling and watered down JDM engineering. Adding a scooped hood, sideskirts, and a wing, the WRX is shown below with optional 17" wheels.

http://www.fantasycars.com/sedans/me...e_neonsrt1.jpg

Despite the weak transmission and laggy 2.0l EJ20, the ignorant masses bought the WRX and it's non-turbo breathern in droves. Many ricers sold their CRX Type-Rs and their white trash DSMs and steeped up to the WRX.

It seemed that the Subaru brand would be forever tarnished, until a bright spot in this tail of horror emerged. The youth of america had had enough of what had become of the Impreza. After working hard to get all Cs, they convinced their parents to buy them WRXs. Then while showing off their mad tite skillz to the girls at the local middle school, they wrecked them. Their selfless sacrifices will be forever remembered by Subaru enthusiasts.

http://www.examiner.net/images/012704/wrecked_carLR.jpg

Subaru is a very charitable organization, so in 2003 they decided to create a special Eric Rosenthal edition. This was essentially a regular WRX painted MDRI yellow, nicknamed sonic yellow by owners. A prototype drawing is shown below.

http://player.interactual.com/enhanc.../dumb_fig4.jpg

random facts:

It's a common misconception that the 02-03 Impreza is nicknamed bugeye because of it's headlights resemblance to a bug's eyes. This is wholly un-true. Bugeye is actually a bastardization of the nickname bug eye'd. This came about because the reaction when one sees the car for the first time is the same as when one "eyes a bug", in that they are so offended by it's grotesque appearance they feel the inextricable need to smash it.

The 2.5RS was built for twice as many years as the bug eye'd WRX, yet is significantly more than twice as good.

:lol: :lol:

I'm rolling over here.

JC... even as a bugeye owner, you've got me rolling. This, plus the AtomicLabMonkey mullet rant puts you at #1 for the funniest shit so far this year. :lol:

I run my PC on my widescreen tv, so I didn't even see the pix of the Neons until I had read the first three paragraphs. It was already funny, and then I scrolled down. POW. Hahahah! :D

:lol: :lol:

Nice short bus update :lol:

Psshh...whatever. :rolleyes:










:lol:

Heh heh. I'm kind of glad I woke up to this..

You know that car looks more like the Legacy. The scoop I mean.

I owned a NEON before my 03! woah.

JC, that's fucking great! You've got me rolling here!