Mini Cooper S Is a Nifty 'Personality' Car

I can see my son driving a Mini Cooper.

Reviewed by Dan Neil, at the Wall Street Journal:

THE PERSON WHO DRIVES this car is fun at parties, hot in the boudoirs, dangerous with firearms. No, not the chandelier!

You want one of these people at your weekend corporate retreat. But only one, I think.

Mini owners, right? It's a thing. And like the hilarious office mate you can't turn off, a fully optioned Mini Cooper S can be just a tick more fun than is strictly bearable on a day-to-day basis. Maybe you're not in a day-glo checkerboard mood, you know?

"That's your problem, Debbie Downer," this car says, shaking its maracas at me. "Turn that frown upside down!"

Fine.

Redesigned and re-engineered for the 2014 model year, the Mini Cooper S Hardtop (three-door compact) pretty much owns cuteness in the comparative set of midprice personality/performance. Let's meet our bachelors: VW Golf GTI, Ford Focus ST, Hyundai Genesis Coupe, Scion FR-S/Subaru BRZ, Ford Mustang. These cars' transaction points hover around $30,000 and they are all powered by turbo'ed, free-spooling four-bangers (excepting the Subaru/Toyota twins, which are naturally aspirated). Some are front-wheel drive, some rear drive, with two doors or four, but they all sell handling finesse more than blazing horsepower, styling charisma more than raw sex appeal...

And at Mini, "INTRODUCING THE NEW MINI. NOW WITH 5 DOORS."