Reviews

Initial D: Final Stage is the finale to the series about street racing that began in the late 90s. Unfortunately, it falls flat in every regard. The series was on a gradual decline beginning with Fourth Stage, as it greatly reduced the personal drama that served as the buildup to the races. The drama made the races interesting to watch because there were real stakes and a reason to be invested. Instead, Fourth Stage focused only on the races themselves, with the only stakes being the continuing undefeated reign of Project D. The follow up to this, Fifth Stage, was even more of an insult, featuring greatly inferior animation to all previous seasons (no doubt due to the baffling decision to hand over animation duties to a studio that previously animated cartoons for very young children, such as Beyblade), an abysmal and unengaging plot followed by a sudden bomb dropped on the audience that was never even hinted at prior to this season, and not only seems out of place in this series but also for the character who was chosen to carry this twist. The blame for this lies on the author of the original manga. However, an adaptation cannot be shielded from criticism just because it remains accurate to the original story. A bad story is a bad story. In addition to all of this, each episode begins with a 2-3 minute-long recap of the previous episode, which is inexcusable because at the time this series was released, it was not hard to watch previous episodes if you missed them, and even if you did see the previous episode but you have the memory of a goldfish, you could look up a quick synopsis of what happened during the previous episode. During the races, we are treated to even more overexplaining from characters who continually interrupt the action to give their commentary than there were in previous seasons, as well as the author's cop-out for having to come up with any more convoluted and, at times, completely unbelievable methods for Takumi's victories, named "Fujiwara Zone". Fifth Stage is irredeemable trash. It is a shame because Final Stage completely relies on Fifth Stage to setup its narrative. It features the same exact production team, and as you would expect, Final Stage shares many of the problems that Fifth Stage has.

Final Stage begins where the previous season left off, with Project D facing off against their last and most dangerous opponents. Keisuke has just emerged victorious in the first of two races during this final match. The second and final race is almost underway. In a rare (for this series) yet still poorly executed example of setup and payoff, there is a character in Fifth Stage who appears occasionally to watch the races, who turns out to be the final opponent in Final Stage. This character, an annoying Evangelion-wannabe named Shinji Inui, drives a Trueno AE86 and is Takumi's last opponent. His backstory is told through boring exposition (again, during the race) rather than setting it up in the previous season by letting the audience watch for themselves, and is nothing more than a rushed attempt to have a cheap, overpowered final opponent ready for the last race. However, they also failed at this, because the majority of this exposition is told after the race has started. It is completely backwards. While at this point in the series believability has gone out the window, it is fascinating to see just how little the author and studio think of the audience's intelligence. According to the exposition in this very season, Takumi's proficiency with the AE86 is the result of his father's continuous training from an early age. Shinji is described as being "self-taught". We are expected to believe that Shinji taught himself to drive on his home course in an almost perfect, robotic fashion with no hesitancy to perform dangerous maneuvers, such as overtaking Takumi during a corner, while Takumi, who was trained by a highly-skilled ex-street racer, can barely match up to his skill level until the very end. It is simply weak storytelling.

After four episodes of excruciating, pointless commentary that continually interrupts the race, rushed exposition to make up for proper character development, and angsty inner monologue from Shinji, the race finally comes to an end when, through sudden exposition, it is pulled out of thin air that the engine inside of Takumi's AE86 has a last resort function. Takumi utilizes it, passes Shinji, then the engine blows up. Takumi recovers, then he drives in reverse to the goal. Everyone congratulates each other. Takumi retires the AE86, then he and Keisuke join the pro racing circuit without ever having their continually promised rematch. And they all lived happily ever after.

The animation is on-par with the eyesore that was Fifth Stage and retains its many questionable character design changes. One positive is that this time, it doesn't seem like the characters have a thousand-yard stare, and they appear to actually be looking at things. The interior car shots are sometimes passable and the CGI is nothing special. The music is forgettable, with m.o.v.e once again doing the OP/ED, both of which sound generic. The songs during the races are also bland and forgettable.

Final Stage is a disappointing, rushed conclusion to a series that overstayed its welcome both on TV and on paper. The author's lack of desire to maintain quality also hurt the animated adaptations, simply by virtue of adapting poor source material. It is a chore to get through and it is not fun to watch. The difference between the beginning and the end of this series is clear. What began as a stylized thrill ride ended as a shallow and boring exposition-driven slog littered with plot contrivances. That is the curse of long-running series. They trade a quality narrative for a longer shelf life and money. In the end, they always crash and burn.