Initial D Extra Stage 2

Quick take: Extra Stage 2 is a great tie-up to the Iketani and Mako side love story. If you felt a little empty after the missed connection, you’ll find a nice little completion to that arc here.

Extra Stage 2 revolve around Iketani and Mako having a second chance at love. The story is fairly simple but is actually very well written and helps clear up the empty feeling after the missed connection between them earlier in the series. Everything is well paced and moves logically. You will not find anything deep in relation to the main Initial D story. Togue racing is limited in ... this series.

Both CGI and drawn art are well done in this short side story. Drawn art is treated to an overhaul of rich colors and generally looks much better than First and Second Stage.

Sound quality is good, acting is well done and comprehensible. OST music is better than in previous seasons as is the sound of the cars.

Iketani and Mako are the main focus of ES2 and undergo decent development as both grow.

You’re not going to find anything profound in Extra Stage 2, but it is a welcome conclusion to the Iketani and Mako subplot, so if you wanted more of that, you’ll really enjoy Extra Stage 2.

Initial D: Extra Stage 2 is a Shounen, Sports OVA that I expected more from but instead I was disappointed with yet another failed attempt at a relationship.

Extra Stage 2 takes place sometime between the 1st & 2nd races of the Project D timeline. Remember those cool races during Project D, well you can forget them because this OVA focuses on Iketani Kouichirou, who’s still thinking about Mako (Impact Blue racer) from the time he couldn’t meet her 6 months ago (Extra Stage 1). Then by a stroke of luck, he gets another chance to meet her and from then on it’s a 40 min ... snore fest to the finish. Initial D has always been known for developing its characters through some awesome & exciting races but sadly this OVA is on the same level of a Naruto Filler. So naturally character development is basically absent here, since there was only 1 race and even that was lackluster compared to all the previous ones.

Thankfully I won’t be coming down hard on the animation and music, as they both were pretty good for this OVA. The animation is the same as always, poorly animated characters but nicely rendered cars, however it seems they followed the animation from the previous Extra Stage and not Project D, which drops a point in my book. At least the same old catchy soundtrack is back but with barely any opportunities, it just feels wasted.

Overall Initial D: Extra Stage 2 can be described simply as a stab at some romance in a racing anime but they should have known better from the first try that giving such unimportant characters the spotlight just spells disaster. It’s a shame that Takumi gets less screen time than Kenji (bet no one remembers him). In other words this is only worth watching if you have nothing better to do and I mean absolutely nothing.

Initial D: Extra Stage 2 is probably one of the worst things I've had the misfortune of watching. I understand a lot of people enjoy mental and physical mutilation and gain gratification from it. I for one, do not. At all. What does this show do to you to warrant such a descriptor you might ask? It says "remember that thing that you liked? Y'know, character development? Tension? Romance? Drama? Things mattering in the show that aren't just cars going vroom? Yeah fuck you I shot your kid in the face".

This entire OVA adds nothing to any of the characters and all it does is ... say "Wow look at this poor bastard, can't catch a break xDDD" so that some lonely reject out there watching this (you) can #relate to it.

It takes any setup made for the viewer about caring about either of the two characters and says "um ackshually, fuck you for caring. IDIOT. HOW DARE YOU WATCH THIS" and honestly, I agree. I wish I never did. This show needs a very large flag attached to it, probably somewhere close to or around the steaming pile of shit that it is that says "Waste of time, do not watch unless you need something to put on in the background while you're filming your 90's aesthetic anime tiktoks you fucking loser".

**SPOILERS** It even goes so far as to say "And they never met again" because it hates the idea of the fanbase actually creating an ending where these two perfectly fine characters might, I dunno, actually live somewhat comfortably and happily together. It needs to explicitly state that both of them went home that night, cried themselves to sleep and had explosive diarrhea from all the emotional anguish they had during that day. If you look very closely you can actually see the brown patch form in Iketani's pants when he realises he doesn't have a spare tire. Probably the only fun fact to come from this show.

Anyway, please don't watch this if you value your time, sanity, money, rights to vote, anything. Just do not do it. This was clearly written by someone who hates the idea of two people getting to know eachother, and developing a happy normal relationship. It's so obvious that the person absolutely hates romance and happy couples in general and it reeks of pathetic sigma male grindset bullshit before it even existed at the time. It's okay to have feelings as a man, it's okay to have wants and needs and have more than 1 thing that you do at a time in your life. It's very possible to be passionate about a hobby, and also be able to have a normal dating life. I promise you.

This show is not only stupid, pathetic, but worst of all, it's predictable. It's 50 something minutes long and you know exactly what's going to happen more or less beat for beat since the first 5 minutes. Again, maybe this is something to watch if you're breastfeeding or knitting scarves for orphans or something, but this is not something that you sit down to watch with your buds on anime night after school. You will get bullied. Killed maybe. Kids are ruthless.

Closing notes: Please don't watch this and if you ever see live footage of this show out in the wild (DVD, Video Tape, CD, Keychain), burn it. Shoot it with a gun, burn it, throw acid on it, just do SOMETHING to remove its existence from this universe. You kin will thank you. To summarize it in one word: Stupid.