Initial D 4th Stage

Takumi Fujiwara spent his youth behind the wheel of his dad's old Toyota AE86 on tofu delivery runs, somehow becoming one of the best downhill racers in Japan without even trying. Fourth Stage picks up where the story levels up — Takumi joins Ryousuke and Keisuke Takahashi to form Project D, a team built to travel prefecture to prefecture and challenge the best street racers on their home turf. Ryousuke is the strategist who treats racing like chess, Keisuke handles the uphill battles with raw aggression, and Takumi does what he does best: making an underpowered hatchback look like it has no business winning against turbo monsters on mountain passes. The racing in this TV series is genuinely tense. Each opponent has their own car, their own technique, and their own reason for not wanting to lose, so the battles feel personal rather than just fast. And then there's the Eurobeat soundtrack, which somehow makes every hairpin turn feel like the most important moment of your life. Across 24 episodes, you get this steady rhythm of buildup, strategy, and payoff that never really gets old. If you liked Wangan Midnight but wished it had more tactical depth, or if MF Ghost made you curious about the franchise it spun off from, this is where Initial D hits its stride. The character work is quieter than you'd expect — it earns its seinen demographic.