I think you need to watch the WRC coverage more. I look at an EVO or an STI and think of disgustingly high speeds through the mountains areound Monte Carlo. I do laugh my ass off when I see base model Lancers here in NZ with an EVO body kit though
As is it looks kit-car like; sloppy and w/o good lines. It's heavy, too, has a lot of barely-useful go-fast crap on it that would probably break below 50,000 miles, has boy-racer attitude that's great if you want to impress someone's little sister, and to boot, is probably very easy to drive far too fast.
You raise the biggest issue for me - the boy racer image. I think the "heavy" comment is unfair - it is relatively light compared to many new
sports cars. In my experience, they are pretty well engineered. There are plenty of 100k mile prior models floating around NZ. Admittedly the Subaru has a reputation for a weak gearbox. The Evo is solid.