Two new cars from Subaru

Subaru came up with two new cars at Tokyo, while the new WRX was busy making its debut several time zones away in Los Angeles (no decision as yet as to whether that will make it to the UK).

First is this mid-size estate. It's smaller than the Legacy and doesn't replace it. But to us it looks better than any Subaru wagon for years. And the company has made an effort with the interior quality too. It has a pair of new and efficient turbo engines, one a 1.6 the other a 2.0.

All good, and if they dropped in the boxer diesel, it would also look good to the rest of the world. It's launching in Japan first, with a decision to be made on other territories later. It's going to be called Levorg. Yes, that's Levorg.

Next up, a concept-car for a sort of modern HPE or GTE. It's got raised ground clearance and protective lower body cladding. It's got a hatch. Trouble is, it's not a true Outback, because it's front-drive only. Reason, if you haven't guessed from the shots, is that it's based on the BRZ.

So it's a bit useless off-road, but it's obviously going to seriously knacker the exquisite on-road dynamics of the BRZ. Now a hatchback version of the BRZ, without the jack-up, is one that attracts us a lot. But it probably won't happen. Toyota and Subaru are having trouble with extra variants of this car. They are on the point of red-lighting the proposed cabrio version (on show as a concept over on the Toyota stand, and pictured above). They don't think they can rustle up the necessary sales to make it economic.