Audience reviews
18 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
fh1478
Love At First Slap
Initial D: Fifth Stage is about dating a woman, who knows how to handle a hard object, and racing with the grim reaper.
On the racing front it's an ok season, it has a good feeling of danger, that appears in the last half. I do have a problem with how they are talking way too much about Aura and the spirit of the car, which I do get but it is constant this season.
The biggest problem with the season is just that a friendship gang feels so worthless and not funny when they appear, they more and less, just have one thing going for them now, and that is, they don't have girlfriends and main characters cool, that is so tiring.
It's so weird that the main guy is getting a girl who looks like the last one, that he couldn't be together, but now he has a new girlfriend, and…
Read at the sourceChanrey
It is hard to describe my feelings of Initial D fifth stage, I'll start off with the positives. The story and arcs are much stronger than they are in fourth stage, in fact fourth stage barley had any story to it. And the development of Keisuke's character is executed very well in Fifth stage. I also think the last 2 races could have had the potential of being some of the best races in the entire series, which leads me to my reasons for disliking it. The racing chorography and energy is just so much less than in the previous seasons, and despite the stage covering 242 chapters of the Manga within 14 episodes, the pacing still somehow manages to feel like it drags for so long.
Overall it has a great story to it, but the directing and energy just feels so much less than in its previous seas…
Read at the sourcestraystateprime
We, as fans, waited over 8 years, for this season, even though we needed to wait another 3 for it to be finished in final stage, it definitely was worth the wait, if it wasn't for the fact that takumi's battle was in the final stage, not this one, would give it a 10 (i might as well do it since it was an amazing season and other than takumi, nothing was missing).
In this part, it's definitely the peak of everything we watched till this date, and I have to say, even though I love older/earlier seasons more than the later ones in most anime, this is an exception, this anime just gets better, and better, every single season with characters having even more and even better development.
This and next season, I would consider is most breath taking, and makes your heart skip a beat, every singl…
Read at the sourceVyverm
As I said in the season four review: the series should have ended in season three.
This one, like the last one, is just a bunch of predictable clichés.
There are 40 episodes where you can almost visualize what will happen. None of what was so great in seasons 1-3 was present here.
Art is good. Perhaps the only good point.
The soundtrack almost doesn't exist anymore. One of the good attributes, it was slowly decaying into fourth, and is now a background feature.
The story is also non-existent. It's sad to see what happened to the characters. Nobody managed to be charismatic. Not even the new ones.
The development is so confusing, because it's so predictable, with it becoming boring.
Read at the sourcePanzerIV-J
(Minor Spoilers, probably doesn't matter though if you watched the fourth stage)
With me re-watching Inital D Fifth Stage for the forth time I concluded how much worse this show has gotten between seasons, with much unneeded romance, and decrease in quality of development between high octane shots of movement from inside the cabin of Takumi's Toyota 86 Corolla Trueno and Keisuke's RX7 FD Twin Turbo. Many moments feel like repeats of previous races with no real changes, such as none of Project D having any losses throughout EVERY race, which makes the characters feel like they do not learn everything they would need for these races, no long term knowledge at all, just win and go on.
Car engine revving and pops from the exhaust system still sound great, but the eurobeat is absolutely a degr…
Read at the sourcepolar23
I understand a lot of people hate the romance aspects of Initial D and you're totally entitled to that opinion. However, I am pretty active the car scene, and romance is also still a massive part of it. We have sad boy culture now and lonely drivers has turned unironic. It is intrinsic to the scene and the people in it, which is why I don't mind and, in some cases, enjoy it. Now to be honest, the majority of this season isn't the greatest, everything up until the grim reaper arc is a little bit of a drag. However, not only is the grim reaper arc my favorite in the series, but it's also my favorite in anime period. Sure, I'm biased because I've had a similar situation happen in my life and handled it similarly (without the deathmatch of course). It is an arc that is so deeply meaningful and…
Read at the sourceSooryan_101
Ok imma just be honest with you guys.
Despite many people hating on Fifth Stage, I loved it a lot.
Now I know there are some downsides and cons to this season, which I am very aware of. but I will just explain why -
*The art/CGI :
Initial D was known for one of the first anime to make the extensive use of CGI in the genre. CGI at that time was primitive and did it not mix with animes well. However the show managed to make the right use of it as the years went, and Fifth Stage was a huge improvement in terms of CGI. The cars are more clearer, more detailed in Fifth Stage, making it feel very modern.
The art is kinda another story though. Character designs have been compromised compared to Fourth Stage. The characters I felt who have been compromised were Takumi, Ryosuke (at times only, es…
Read at the sourcestmwg01
Quick take: If you like cars, you'll like the story of Takumi Fujiwara, his Trueno 86 and the Probed D team. Fifth stage continues the story of Project D. It does an incredible job with the best CGI bits so far, which feel much more natural to the media than any other stage. While the manga does a much better job of telling the story, you’ll still find a decent plot in this anime.
Fifth stage continues the battles of Project D. Keisuke and Takumi take on new battles and face new opponents, growing from those experiences. Much like Fourth stage, Keisuke is largely ignored and his growth is talked about only in passing. He does get an epic battle, however. Quite a few sub-plots are introduced in Fifth stage that show a depth of growth to some of the characters. This is a huge improvement be…
Read at the sourcecameronrb24
Fifth stage is another low point of the series. The races and their outcomes were some of Initial D's the least interesting ever. There's hardly any racing anymore, it's this pull away style that generally concludes with someone making a mistake and/or spinning out. The drama was hard to take serious, particularly Ryosuke's arc. This tragic romantic aspect of him felt forced, out of place, and out of character. Takumi's friend's continue to undevelop as characters. Their hardly even his cheerleaders anymore; they're just dudes who work at a gas station and wallow in their singleness. Natsuki is non-existent at this point; they just introduce a new love interest instead.
The art and cgi mostly the same as it was in fourth stage, maybe slightly improved. It's some of the best visuals so far…
Read at the sourceSlowpokeWild
I'm getting out of Fast and Furious references...
All right this Fifth Stage was boring.
Don't get me wrong. I like it but it has a lot of problems that I can't hide.
Let's start with the good things.
I really like Takumi and Keisuke "final form" they do it amazingly and this is all the hard work they put trough out all the past stages and that's pretty much it.
The art is very pleasant but I kinda miss that clunky CGI and some shoots of the cars doing crazy stuff like going 1 cm of the guardrails. Overall they still have that weird looking sometimes and I'll take it I guess.
The Eurodance it's ok, not perfect or amazing, just ok.
And I don't have more good things to say.
The bad things...
The races feel off, doesn't feel like a good win. We know that Takumi and Keisuke are beast when…
Read at the sourceRarestein
!!!WARNING!!! THERE MIGHT BE SPOILERS !!!
I love Initial D. It reignited my passion for cars and also taught me a lot about driving techniques. While the previous four seasons were exciting and had a good balance of character development and racing sessions, Fifth Stage is anything but.
Fifth Stage brings improvements in terms of artwork and sound quality, but there's pretty much no character development or story. Yes, Takumi becomes better and better at driving, Project D continues to "conqueer" many other regions, but God damn it was slow! I know that Initial D is all about touge racing, but I find it difficult to watch when most of the season consists of 45% racing, 45% discussions between team members and 10% story!
The only important parts of this entire stage were the fake Project…
Read at the sourceSirbuffalo
(Minor Spoilers)
It really hurt watching this season and there was a time where I could think Initial D was there perfect godsend anime that could never dissapoint.
Blatant callbacks to the first 3 seasons were put into place but executed terribly, the magic this series had is gone important characters and amazing races are put aside for crappy character remakes and constant talking about the race INSTEAD OF RACING not once has a series made me more angry.
I tried really hard to love this season and it dissapointed at every turn
+good art
+Interesting cars +Fresh new characters
+ryosuke race
+Interesting story
-races aren't fun anymore
-annoying talking breaks any sort of immersion
-OST's aren't kickass and exciting
-horrendous takumi ripoff
-somehow made the 86 boring
-importa…
Read at the source1nvader
5/10 Car magic is not what I asked for.
This is the only season in the series I'll be writing a review for, because it was quite the disappointment. The first was awesome, 2nd and 3rd dragged on a bit, 4th was awesome again.
Over the time the art style has been changed a bit several times, but it never improved. In this season it's probably the worst it ever was. The music is not always as extravagant as in the first couple of seasons either, although they do bring back some of the older songs.
I can get over all of that. The 2 things I really take issue with is the story and the way they presented it here. Previously the anime always came up with something new in racing and rationally explained it. Each race the supporting characters explained every little bit of detail about the drive…
Read at the sourceALongLostURT
Gone are the days of experts sitting on the sidelines discussing technique, strategy, and the characteristics of the road that Takemi is racing on. Gone is the under-dog feel. The Speed Stars side cast have been discarded for a bunch of guys who shop at hot topic and put more money into hair gel than they do car parts.
It's like someone took all the race theory that was great about the previous installments and threw them away; then took the story and put a bird on it. Holy Moley, I'm surprised they didn't put undercarriage neon lights and flashers on the AE-86 in the process of this anime.
And what the hell is up with Ryosuke's past? This is a complete character re-write. I hate how much they've fumbled the character development and interaction.
The art is the only saving grace, and ev…
Read at the sourceTheIceDragon
IMO This anime had great potential, but imo it needs a graphics / art overhaul. Comparing this anime to some of the old animes like DBZ or Naruto which continued to improve their art overtime, you can see it. Whereas Initial D's art becomes stale as I felt the artist got lazy and decided not to improve on the overall graphic quality of the manga / anime. The original is a good standard to set, but comparing it to today's anime / art, it's just not appealing and won't cut it.
Story Telling: 7/10
The story telling is amazing. The plot pace moves along well when it comes the main character and his car racing days. The character develops very quickly when it comes to the art of racing with his innate talent for it. However when it comes to expressing how the the character feels, I feel like…
Read at the sourceJCLogan
5/10 - How the Mighty have fallen.
Since the reviews here are all extremely positive, and since I watched the last two seasons back to back, I'm gonna review them both.
First of all, for anyone who has not yet watched the series:
The first 2 seasons are amazing, and the third one (movie) is very good!
After that the quality drops quickly though.
Where in earlier seasons the anime revels in showing drifts, and mixing up closeups on the steering wheel and pedals with shots of drifting tires and the rear of the car coming very close to the guardrails, all while awesome eurobeat music is playing,
in the last two seasons, less and less attention was put into these cool moments.
Where in the earlier seasons the commentary from former rivals on the roadside was ecstatic and interesting, hypin…
Read at the sourceRiver_Cloud
*Spoiler-Free for the entire Initial D seires* *Meant-to-be-short-but-fun review :P*
See, I am a fan of the Initial D series. So why have I given this one just a 7? It's not all bad depending on how you take it. You'll get what I mean:
(1) This stage is more dedicated to the development and growth of Keisuke. Since Takumi's unpredictable talent and dynamic races was what I loved, I felt a bit bored now and then. Not that Keisuke's races weren't interesting, they were all pretty good....but I guess you can't compare any other racers with Takumi. I did enjoy his character development. (Also Keisuke looked rather ugly this season but he comes back to normal in Final ;-P)
(2) Thankfully there weren't any cheesy love-drama-heartbreak idiocy this season and just when you think things will be n…
Read at the sourcejmoriarty84
Taking place where 4th stage leaves off, Takumi on his deliveries is practicing at the one-handed steering technique of his final opponent from the last season. Though he is progressing, he still is trying to figure things out. At the same time, his father is giving him props for trying such a technique and acknowledges his progress. So where does this leave Project D after beating the Purple Mountain? Their next conquest leads them to Kanagawa, a prefecture south of Tokyo which is known for having the best street racers in the nation to the point that some of the drivers are trained and active professionals, and its up to Ryosuke, Keisuke, and Takumi to show that there is a world of difference between the track circuits and the mountain passes.
To some extent, you can say this is more o…
Read at the source