Oh man, looks like I missed some replies here. Sorry guys.
Those Group B cars are interesting. I don’t follow Rally much and didn’t know about that class. That Peugeot driveline is fascinating.
A longitudinal engine in the MR2 is intriguing, but makes some sense. I assume the Lexus IS will get the 2.0 turbo engine and AWD, so Toyota could drop that in the MR2 and just mount everything backwards. They could use the same engine, transmission, and transfer case. Put the ring gear on the opposite sides of the front/rear differentials so the wheels turn the correct directions, and off they go. It makes more sense from a production standpoint, imo. That would also put the transmission and transfer case under the front seats, and the front of the engine would be facing the rear (handy for maintenance).
Other option would be to partner with Porsche and use a Cayman transmission, although to my knowledge the Cayman transmission is just RWD.