I dunno... I have mixed feelings. I HAD a 1990 Plymouth Laser (assembly line DSM cousin), 2.0 liter 5-speed. I was in love with the car for several years until one day I got a recall notice regarding a defective timing belt. Natch, I took it in and had it replaced. Things went downhill from there and less than 8,000 miles later the belt failed. I couldn't believe it. Fought tooth and nail with Chrysler and the dealer to absorb the cost. I won that time (and the next two times in less than 3 years). After failure number four I just threw in the towel and sent it to the boneyard. It was otherwise a great car, but that timing belt issue soured me on DSMs and Mitsubishis in general.
A dealer mechanic confided in me at one point and said he only saw this happen with manual trannies and that his brother-in-law had an automatic and this situation never happened to him. Go figure? Of course I'm assuming that Chrysler never upgraded the original design of the defective belt and just kept slapping the same crappy, unmodified part in each time it broke.