Hot Wheels’ Subaru Impreza WRX, 2026 edition

Hi, I’m Justin Nguyen of 131 Off-Road. I’m here to kick off the touchdown of Savings Weekend at Justin’s Toyota and Subaru. We will blitz the competition and in no time, you’ll be driving your new Toyota or Subaru right to a touchdown.

♫ At Justin’s Toyota and Subaru, we have Toyotas and Subarus ♫

Does the Subaru Impreza really need an introduction? It’s probably the most iconic rally car of all time, one that many rally fans (Justin included) credit with getting them into the sport. Doesn’t matter if it’s the Group A version that raced in the mid-1990s, the World Rally Car formula at the turn of the millennium, or the GD that starred until Subaru withdrew from the WRC as the global economy came crashing down; if you tell someone to picture a rally car, they’ll likely imagine that sleek blue-and-yellow Impreza first.

From debut at the 1993 1000 Lakes Rally to farewell in 2008, the Impreza won 46 races in the World Rally Championship. It also three-peated in manufacturers’ titles from 1995 to 1997, and scored another hat trick of drivers’ crowns with Colin McRae in 1995, Richard Burns in 2001, and Petter Solberg in 2003.

Subaru was riding high during this stretch. That lack of a championship between Burns’ and Solberg’s, during which the marque finished third in the manufacturers’ standings, was such a wake-up call that corporate in Japan and Prodrive spent a year working on the WRC2003. Substantial updates were made on virtually everything from the engine to the aero package.^[1] They seemed to work out pretty well as Solberg won four times and edged out Sébastien Loeb for the title by one point.

It’s quite funny how beloved the Impreza WRC is, considering the less than positive reviews about the road-going counterpart.

Warren Brown of The Washington Post wrote of the 2002 WRX:^[2]

It was ugly. People laughed at its bright-blue color and ridiculed the air scoop atop its aluminum hood. Its two-toned fabric seats, black and blue, became the butt ofjokes. Its name, the Subaru Impreza WRC, was a laugh, too.

WRX. Why would a car company give a vehicle a name that sounds like “wrecks”?

It’s all part of a plan. You can get attention in the auto business by looking beautiful. You also can get it by being ugly with purpose.

Brown figured that ugliness was what made the Impreza work. Rather than appeal to a broad market by making a car that looks good, Subaru instead went for a niche of “function over form”.^[2]

No wonder rallying was used as the Impreza’s main marketing strategy. Automotive writer Brian Harper called the 2002 Impreza a “solid but otherwise unremarkable compact-sized four-door” whose commercial interest was raised by the rally car becoming a cultural phenomenon.^[3]

“Rally is a place where you can demonstrate the strength of your road car,” Subaru Rally Team boss David Lapworth proclaimed. Harper likewise noted that “[e]ven in North America, where rallying is given scant coverage in the sports sections, relegated to late-night play on Speed Channel and is only attended by the diehards and the curious youth familiar with the concept through Sony PlayStation games, Subaru sees rallying as the logical extension of its products.”^[4]

As for the rally car, that is such a classic that Hot Wheels keeps reproducing the GD model, so much so that ‘GD’ in this case can also stand for “goddamn”.

The GD was the first officially licensed Subaru to become a Hot Wheels car, appearing in 2005 alongside fellow WRC competitors Ford Focus, Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VII, and Peugeot 206. All four featured 2003-accurate liveries, with the Impreza’s specifically sporting Petter Solberg’s #7 and Rallye Monte-Carlo bib (dubiously, a race he retired from).

Later releases throughout the 2000s as part of the Track Stars and Race Aces lines opted for generic liveries of varying colors like red, black, and white. The Dirt Track Race 5-Pack restored the Subaru blue but used yellow patterns that didn’t resemble the swoops on the factory cars. It certainly didn’t help that Subaru had already shut down its WRC team by this point. As the 2010s and 2020s progressed, the Impreza continued to repeated appear in five-packs and series like Road Rally and Thrill Racers, all bearing a rainbow of colors from mustard yellow to smoky white.

Just last year, red and orange Imprezas were released in Multi-Pack Exclusives.

And that takes us to 2026’s HW J-Imports. As the name suggests, this line focuses on the JDM scene. The text on the back of the box likewise describes it, “A dream collection of Japanese Domestic Market vehicles.”

More importantly, Mattel got to partner with Subaru Corporation and Subaru of America to recreate that legendary blue-and-yellow swoosh livery. Well, sort of.

At first glance, you might think it’s the classic WRC paint scheme with the swooshes on the side being undercut by the Subaru logo in the negative space. This differs from what Subaru of America’s ARA division uses, which has just a single arc at the front while the Pleiades stars takes up the rear space.

Conversely, the Hot Wheels version also includes two curves on the hood, one on each side of the hood scoop. This was not present on any of the Impreza GD rally cars, nor on the ARA and rallycross machines. It does, however, show up on the WRC STI rally cars that the likes of Travis Pastrana and Ken Block raced in Rally America in the mid-2000s.

The Rally America Subarus had a different look from their WRC cousins, with a stylized S on the side rather than the swooshes and the aforementioned hood.

As such, it’s fair to assume that rather than directly copying one car, Mattel opted to pay tribute to several factory Imprezas throughout the aughts.

While the 2005 Hot Wheels release was clearly based on an actual Subaru WRC entry, this one lacks race-specific numbers and decals. Instead, along the doors are the #5 next to a standard “HW Rally” logo.

It’s a shame since Hot Wheels likes to create fictional races to maintain a semblance of immersion. Also released this year, the Lancia Stratos from the Car Culture Vintage Racing set mimics 1970s and ’80s rallies by having decals for a “Rally El Segundo” (Mattel is headquartered in El Segundo, California).

On the plus side, Subaru’s actual sponsor Motul was happy to lend its name on the rear. The STI (Subaru Tecnica International) name is also present.

Can’t win ’em all.