Enter Initial D. As far as many fans are concerned, it's not just a very good cars/driving anime, it is _the_ driving anime, there is really nothing out there that even comes close in this category, at least I haven't found it yet.
This is the 4th "season" if you can call it that since this one lasted 2 years now (and the third "season" was just a 100-minute movie). Many newcomers to this anime will probably at first glance look at the fairly high episode count over the 4 installments and think the creators have just about squeezed the last drop of juice out of the lemon, but that is far from true. You realize by the end of ep. 24 that there is much more to be told, and the ending is VERY abrubt if you ask me. I've been told that it's due to the fact that the anime caught up with the manga that they need to put the project on a temporary hold until there is some elbowroom again. (Normally I'd think that "only" a double episode release every 2 months should be enough for the manga to stay ahead, but quality over quantity, eh?)
So what is the story about? Takumi Fujiwara is a 19 year old guy who lives in gunma. Following the events of the prequels he has now finished school and is now working at a moving company, while also helping his father do deliveries from his tofu-shop. Usually after having finished these deliveries he takes the aging '86 for a spin in the local area since his BIG passion is street racing. For the past year he has been a local hero since he hasn't lost one downhill battle yet, but now things have been taken to another level. He has now joined the 2 rich sons ryosuke and keisuke in a "racing team" that will challenge all racing teams from more remote areas.
Intense battles and realism!
The battles are very intense and you will always wonder what happens next. I got completely hooked and swallowed one episode after another. Also as in the prequels and there is alot of real life racing information to digest. What strengths and weaknesses do 4WD cars have compared to FF and FR cars? What is the difference between a twin turbo, a single turbine turbo, a super-charger and NA tuning? How do you efficiently use the weight-shifting of your car to cut corners? All of these questions and LOTS of more are asked and answered. For a semi car-freak as I am this was candy.
There is always a smart guy standing by the track
Obviously, for the anime to be this educational, all of the detailed information has to be explained at some point. This usually happens during the races where the team leader Ryosuke will explain this to the other team members. While this is good and all, I don't like the way he always knows exactly what is going on at a certain point of the race. The exact moment he explains a random racing theory by the roadside, the same thing happens in the race. It can also be mental things "keisuke is probably having a hard time in the race right now, doubting his skill. But now he will gain confidence again and overtake the other guy" voila guess what happens. OK OK you can explain this by saying Ryosuke is just such fantastic team leader and he knows his drivers as well as the opponents 100%, but this doesn't explain why the random guy at the roadside with no connection to the team or the drivers knows the same stuff! He can also dive into the current mental state of the drivers and explain the same stuff to the ignorant guy next to him. While this didn't bother me like no tomorrow and I don't have a superb suggestion as to how this should be done better, I still think it's worth mentioning. Maybe after the races after having talked to the drivers these in-depth analyzes would be more realistic?
This is a street racing anime, BUT...
...part of what makes ID such a likable anime, is that there is more than that. These are young guys afterall and they do have friends at home. Side characters such as the Gasoline station trio, who always hang out together help giving this anime another dimension of it's realistic feel. There are also some girls, and a little romance but this is a minor part of the show. Takumi's girlfriend moved to tokyo so she's gone, Itsuki's (the one with the funny face working at the gas station) girlfriend also moved away in the end of season 2, so to begin with there isn't alot to hope for. The girls will appear however and the way some of these relationships are played out has a very realistic feel. These are teenage relationships and the people behave that way; sometimes very immature and very unsure of themselves, these moments are short BUT golden. The only thing I can complain about here is that during all seasons, NOONE, not one of the anime's rather large collection of young males, have been capable of producing even a remotely stable relationship with a girl. Maybe these guys are nerds and for the biggest part have cars in their minds, but I could have wanted at least one reappearing female to work as a counterweight in this shounen show.
The animation is a huge improvement over the previous seasons to say the least. The cars and car battles are done entirely in CG, but unlike other shows where I have complained wholeheartedly over the awkwardness of this CG, it is implemented brilliantly this time around. The car battles don't look stupid at all, and you can see there has been attention to very small details, such as how the cars behave differently on the road, and how their tails skid differently in sharp corners.
Character designs have also been improved upon immensely. Where they felt very rough and sketchy before, they are much clearer and destinguishable now. I had a hard time to tell the characters apart before, especially with the girls, this is a little easier now, also since the colouring is much better now. If 2 people had pitch black hair in the movie, you can now tell that one of the guys in fact has dark brown hair not black. BUT the issue is not entirely gone. Although very cute and nicely animated, the girls still look very similar, and sometimes the only way to tell them apart is looking at who they hang out with. Who's that? Ah it's the one with the 86' driving brother.
The sound in ID4 is very good indeed, even more so than in the earlier seasons. All the car sounds, may it be the engine sounds, or the skid sound in a hair-pin corner, are very detailed and realistic. I'm almost positive that these sounds are recorded in real life, and not just generated on a computer.
The voice actors are thankfully the same as we know from before, I couldn't tell there was a new one at least. Takumi and his father Bunta are their usual stoic selves, where Itsuki is much more lively; the voice actors reflect these personalities very well. The girls mainly appear in emotional scenes, and their voice actors do a nice job here. The OP and ED songs are again some kind of alternative J-techo stuff with nice rythms, they are catchy for a while, but like most electronic music they get old sooner or later. The background music is excellent however. There are some very good "battle" songs, but there are also some tunes that are used to build up some kind of event or intensity, this really helps you get excited.
All in all I can recommend this anime to just about everyone. The intensity of the battles and and the realistic feel will even get the incarnated shoujo-fans excited, I can tell because I am one myself. I can honestly say this was one heck of a "ride" :)
