The fourth season of "Initial D" is by far the best stage of the anime. Supposedly the fifth is even better, but I haven't seen it yet, so for now I will focus on the Fourth Stage. Before I get into it, though, it's an express introduction for people who don't know it. Initial D is an anime about illegal car racing. It has several similarities to the shounens of the adventure or martial arts subspecies, but is not intended for a younger viewer, but an older one. Not only because of a more complicated plot, but also threads aimed at a more mature audience. I mean a different approach to work, thinking about the future, greater realism in male-female relationships, or the topic with a high school student and her rich sponsor. The main character is Takumi Fujiwara, a young and talented driver who works for his father as a Tofu supplier. This job, however, is only a cover for training. His father, Bunta, is one of the most talented drivers in this universe who wants to pass his knowledge on. Takumi meets various rivals on his way, is constantly developing and at some point, his talent is appreciated by Ryosuke Takahashi. This proposed him to take part in the so-called "Project D", which is the main plot of the anime seasons 4 and 5. Project D is about winning races in different prefectures, setting new records in downhill and uphill on individual routes, and taking your drivers' skills to a new, unprecedented level.
From this paragraph there will be SPOILERS from the penultimate season, so if you felt encouraged then I recommend you start watching. If you like competition, fast cars and great music, then "Initial D" is the anime for you. Well, since the introduction is over, I can move on to the main course. The Fourth Stage starts with an atmospheric opening, a short introduction, in which the current situation is outlined and we meet the first victims of Takumi's band and the Takahashi brothers. The first race starts immediately after that. We can see that Project D, which we have heard about since the first season, is a really big undertaking - several vans with spare parts, canisters with full fuel of the highest quality, a team of trusted and experienced mechanics. Ryosuke takes each race dead seriously, approaches them individually and does not underestimate any of his opponents, even if they did not impress him.
In a review of the movie, which is the season 3 adaptation, I complained about the excess of racing. As a result, the session, although it was exciting, was also a bit boring at times. After watching season 4 I was forced to change my mind - Third Stage was relatively passable in this respect! At Fourth Stage, especially in the first half, we are overwhelmed by the amount of racing. Team D runs from A, B, C etc. and cleans all opponents one by one. It made me think of playing 100% on Steam or Playstation as I solved every quest, clearing the map of all mini-bosses and collecting every item. Project D players felt it even more because Ryosuke is a ruthless and demanding coach. The fact as the saying goes - "You can't twist shit with a whip", but Keisuke's older brother sometimes acted as if he had set himself a goal of tormenting them to death. On several occasions he said dryly to them something like, "Okay, you've done a few laps, now that's 40 more reps. Half of them will be 80% focused, and the rest you should be fucking 100%. Go to work, march off!" I don't know if I remember correctly, but once or twice he made even more demands on them. In one situation, he allowed them to rest like normal people in a hotel, but this only because of the difficulty level of the upcoming challenge. In addition, they drove and slept in cars, having little time for themselves between successive quests, just a few days for light regeneration and conversation with loved ones.
Going back to the previous thread, due to the fact that most of my opponents look more or less the same, some races have merged into one mass. Their level varied, but since most of the rivals weren't too much of a challenge, it wasn't too high. We saw many of them in the form of watching selected fragments - the beginning, a few scenes from the middle and the end. This was especially annoying with Keisuke, as his duels were presented in an even more abbreviated manner. I understand that they had to do this (I assume these threads were more elaborate in the manga) due to limited airtime, but it was annoying. Especially with people from the same school as Kyoichi Sudo (this is the one who defeated Takumi in season 2). I had high expectations of them after Ryosuke Takahashi stressed that they had great skills and would be hard to beat. My expectations increased even more after watching the scene with The Fire's On Me, which was perfectly edited with an anime excerpt. For a moment I felt that maybe this time I would get a duel at a high level ... And shit, Takumi and Keisuke races passed so quickly as if their opponents were some weaklings. Fortunately, from some point on, more interesting opponents began to appear, and with them, intriguing plot threads. The most memorable ones for me are the routes on which Takumi faced Suzuki Cappuccino and the subsequent Keisuke races. I mean two specific ones - 1 where his car was intentionally destroyed and 2 from Kyoko Iwase. I especially liked the latter because of the charming romance and the development of the blonde character. The girl fell in love with him so much that she was ready to do anything for her chosen one. I don't think I've ever seen a character so deeply infatuated in an anime. But Keisuke didn't give a shit just as deeply, making a pretty girl understand several times that until he realized his brother's dream, he wouldn't have any affairs in his head. He was also extremely cruel (even I thought he had exaggerated xD), but considering the high level of difficulty of this task and Kyoko's over-zealousness, I am not particularly surprised by him.
The above races, however, are a small beer compared to the final duel with God Arm and God Foot. They were distinguished not only by their appearance (they are not much younger than Takumi's father), but above all by their skills. It is a beautiful and rare sight when Keisuke and Takumi are terrified by the level of their opponents. Both races were amazing and kept you in suspense until the very end. I felt the same emotions as I felt when watching season 1 and 2, but with much nicer visuals. If you asked me which one I liked better, I would have no hesitation in saying it was a Keisuke race. There are several reasons for this, most notably because although I like Takumi, we saw him a lot more in action. Besides with Fujiwara, I was sure he would win his stage. However, lest it be that I do not appreciate it - it's nice that finally one of the players could not stand the pressure and pressure and vomited. Keisuke, on the other hand, had a really hard time at one point, which could be seen in his face, which showed a mix of pissed off, horror and overload. Besides, I like Kozo Hoshino much more than his friend who was racing with Takumi. A rough and sociable peasant. He's a little arrogant, but this is one of the few cases where such behavior is justified - the guy has eggs the size of watermelons, iron character and masterful skill. The moment when you crush the blonde's eggs so that he will let go at the end of one lap (something like driving the A4 motorway or the S3 road, when a guy in a fast car is behind you and forces you to change lanes by blinking long lights or getting too close), was an absolute championship. Everything Takumi has shown me so far is nothing with Kozo's action. If either he or Keisuke made one mistake, both of their cars would have been fucked to scrap, and the bystanders around could at least be injured. And I really liked his monologue, which can be summed up something like this - "You know what young? When girls are eager to have sex with you, ignore the car and go spend a good time with them. The car is not a dick, it can stand, and the older the man, the lonelier he is. Not to mention that you'll become fat like a pig sooner. What I did was mine, but I could have had more pretty women in bed."
Speaking of characters, let me write a few sentences about a few of them. I will skip Takumi, because I devoted enough time to him, and in season 4 he did not make much progress. Unlike Ryosuke, who became the D team coach. Like any self-respecting coach, he is a terrible and despotic prick. There is no translation, no escaping training or no discount. As I mentioned before, he squeezed his players like lemonade lemons before each race. Moreover, as the psychologist John Carmack put it (I'm talking about a situation when he was a teenager and had a conflict with the law), he is a brain on his feet. When his men learn the route by heart, centimeter by centimeter, he carefully analyzes his opponents. Their weaknesses and strengths, he compares them and his people, looks for opportunities to win. As a result, he is sometimes more tired than racers, which can be seen from the fact that he uses every opportunity to rest and regenerate his overloaded brain. If I had to compare him with some more famous character, it is a mix of Whis and Muten Roshi from "Dragon Ball". If we were to remove all the elements of humor or positive mood, leaving only features such as being demanding, etc. then we'll get Ryosuke Takahashi. Bunta Fujiwara didn't get much airtime, but we had fun scenes with him. One day his son drives a route he knows well, thinks about what he could improve in his technique, and then suddenly a new car appears. Immediately I thought that it must be his father. Suspicions turned 100% certainty when Bunta surpassed his son quite lightly. Then the young Fujiwara met up with his father, and his father acted as if the situation had not happened. When a little later (or a bit earlier, I don't remember exactly) Takumi asked his father what car he bought, he replied: "You know, I'm not that young anymore, so I bought myself a small and safe car. too much fuel, just right for the quiet retiree I am. " Then I roared with laughter, Bunta is a champion!
As for the rest, Keisuke has been given a few opportunities to show off what an alpha male he is. What I liked most was his action with the crooks who destroyed his car. After Team D gave them a hard time, they called the bandits. As "Initial D" is not a teen shounen, the bandits came with the intention of breaking their legs, destroying cars, etc. Ryosuke and the rest of the team went and Keisuke grabbed a heavy piece of metal like 100% chad and went to slow down the attackers. They stood in front of each other, with clubs, metal pipes or other iron in their hands, and I just waited for a moment for the blonde to ask them - "So what, are we fucking going?" The fight did not take place, because the bandits recognized Keisuke and announced that he was their idol and could at most break the legs of these losers. The other ID heroes we met in season 1 and 2 hardly appear in season 4. Their role has been marginalized and we see them mainly when Takumi visits them and reports on the progress of project D. On the plus side, I can also save God Arm and God Foot - two characteristic characters that differ from most of the racers we met in season 4. Due to the fact that they are older, they have a slightly different perception of the world and approach to racing. They did a great job as the main Fourth Stage Villas. Summing up this paragraph, Takumi and Keisuke are a duo resembling Goku and Vegeta in a way. The first is such a natural born driver - he has great talent, great genes and habits instilled in him by his father, having as much technique and knowledge as he needs (although in the end he learned in both aspects). The second one has a very good technique, an equally high knowledge of the possibilities and technical aspects of cars, and Ryosuke, who was already interested in cars as a teenager, had a great influence on his development.
Since I touched on the subject of technical aspects, a few words about graphics, lines and animation. I don't have much to say, after all, this series looks good and has no reason to be ashamed of its colleagues. As in the movie adapting season 3, there were a few imperfections, here I did not notice anything that would make me feel uncomfortable during the screening. Maybe there were some single scenes, but since I don't remember about them, they weren't really serious mistakes. The animation is smooth and good, the line does not sting in the eyes, the characters look ok, generally the most beautiful season in the history of "Initial D" so far.
As for the music that is the hallmark of this anime, it is much better than in Season 3, but a bit weaker than in Season 1 and 2. Initially, I wanted to write that the S4 soundtrack is clearly different from what we heard in S1 and S2, but after hearing him several times, I made a correction. The soundtrack does not have as many iconic songs that we associate with this anime (Deja Vu, Gas Gas Gas, Don't stop the music, Running in the '90, Adrenaline), but we have a lot of songs that I can describe as at least good or very good. And let's be honest, these seasons set the bar so high that not many anime (in my humble, subjective opinion) can match them. I am probably too biased in this case, but if I had to rate both soundtracks I would give them 11/10. Why so? Because this aspect has penetrated into pop-culture, internet-culture and people's consciousness in general, more than the anime itself. It's hard to judge if ID's popularity is mainly due to the music and the theme ("you have to watch it! Great racing with awesome music!"), But that first point was definitely a big influence. For comparison, if I had to rate the Fourth Stage soundtrack, I would give 10/10, maybe 9.5 / 10. When it comes to my favorite songs, the list looks like this: Let's go come on, Go beat crazy, the already mentioned The fire's on me, Give me your love, Night Trip, Don't go baby, All around, Forever young, Midnight lover, Supertonic lady, Power of sound (one of my favorite songs), Looka bomb and a few more. As I wrote a few lines earlier, I originally planned to be a bit more critical, but as I wrote this review, I realized that my criticism was due to overloading the first half of the anime. This also applies to songs that (like the races, the excess of events and their fast pace) were too much, making the experience overly intense. Things are better in the second half, especially for the final race against the Gods. When I heard the long unheard Back on the Rocks, I knew I was home. Especially in Episode 21, when Keisuke and his rival were risking their own lives in a dangerous maneuver. My brain exploded then, like watching Goku's first transformation on the planet Namek or the best scenes from the movie "Broly". This was due to the perfect synchronization, car sounds, characters' reactions, editing and a perfectly created atmosphere. Unfortunately, for the reasons mentioned above, I cannot say that this is the best season in this regard.
Overall, the anime is very good, although the first half can be a bit tiring. However, if that doesn't bother you, the other half makes up for all the inconvenience. I rate Fourth Stage at 9/10.