My first impression of this was, whoa! And then I was more shocked by them upping power that much (but probably makes sense as that's what the hybrid drivetrain in the Camry/Corolla is offering). But then, since they were offering near Prius level of MPG kinda made the Prius not make as much sense, so I feel like making the Prius even more like them doesn't make sense.
I do have one concern with the design, and that is that it appears the cargo area might be smaller. It looks like that area of the car is going to be shorter. Might be wrong though and might just be because of the shape, but it looks like the seating has been shifted back plus the rear overhang shortened.
My hot take though is that, honestly, I feel like this is what the Corolla should have been. And then they should have made the GR Corolla/Yaris a Celica or something. And made the Prius be more true to what a Prius is.
For the Prius I kinda feel like they should have either kept the efficiency focus (and pushed for like 60s MPG, or get there by focusing more on electric only - making it more like the Chevy Volt) or pushed it to be more practical but still compact, like making it more of a wagon or small minivan esque, as I think its not just the efficiency but also the overall practicality that has made the Prius so popular and a more wagon/small minivan (think Mazda 5) would have made it interesting while still being true to being a Prius. They could have done a 3 and 5 door versions (so something more "city car" like, think maybe a modern iQ which would replace the Prius C, then the 5 door be more like the small minivan - which I think the Prius V should have been instead of just a Prius with a taller back end for a bit more cargo space).
I'll have to look into it, but I think all of these are plug-in hybrids? But if you've seen their plug-in (I saw a pic of a weird plastic piece that gets slotted in by rolling down one of windows on the rear passenger doors and then you run the cable through that plastic piece), it looks just straight up stupid and a hassle. I'm guessing its because the plugs (saw something about there being 2 plugs for like using power tools and bigger stuff) are inside the car and so it was easier to do them bi-directional, but why not one internal and one external? But if they did increase the electric only range to nearish 50, that's pretty enticing on its own. But it also means, this new Prius is probably gonna not be cheap.
Which this also makes me think, with the success of the Ford Maverick, I'm hoping Toyota is maybe looking at doing something similar. Which the Japanese small trucks are still pretty popular so I feel like it would probably go over better than how Ford did it, although Toyota does have to do it reasonably well. I think they should be able to outdo the Maverick's MPG, especially the highway. If they could make a little 2 door, 3 seat compact pickup that gets 50mpg everywhere, I think it'd do very well and would make for very practical daily drivers for a lot of people. And pickups I think have a lot more potential for add-ons, which helps dealers boost profitability so I think it would be something to offer dealerships to ease the pain of transition to electrification (where they're going to probably see a pretty substantial hit to the income from their service departments).