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The first part was so good. This part was a huge contrast. The main characters pretty much got no screen time. They actually went out of their way to show as little of the main cast as possible. There were scenes in the manga that progressed the development of characters that was completely left out of the anime. The scene that was cut out would've made things so much clearer, and the characters' behaviors would've made so much more sense.

I think if all you care about is fighting and action, part 2 of the Thousand-Year Blood War is perfect for you. But if you think ... deliberately omitting moments between characters in order to fit in more fights is wrong, then maybe you agree with my review.

One thing I like about this season was the lack of an unrealistic villain for the sake of spicing up the plot. With these types of competitive shows, the writers very often feel the need to add unnecessary drama that never adds enjoyment for the viewers; they only cause anger and stress. I'm glad there were no sociopath character attempting to sabotage the protagonist's car or race. In fact, they did the opposite. From the beginning, we were introduced to a character who's also a racer, but instead of being rivals, they just became friends. That's a much more realistic depiction of racing competitions in ... the real world.

I gave it a 6/10 because it was nothing ground-breaking. The show's very forgettable, and the races are pretty dragged on. As a car enthusiast, I was left wanting more out of the show.

This series drags on and on and on... I feel like it could've been a single 12 episode show if they weren't trying to milk it into another hundred-episode shounen. Every episode is like the last with no glimpse of a conclusion ever coming. The idea of the plot is great, but the execution is god awful. Watching through the series is more of a chore than anything else. It gets boring when the students fail time and time again. This is basically Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner in anime form. And there's another season after this?! A conclusion will never be reached ... at this point.

Man, the characters are REALLY hard to like. Not a single likeable character in the entire show. The 2 protagonists have awful personalities. The guy doesn't know how to be in a relationship, and the girl had no communication skills whatsoever. She never says what she's thinking, which is the source of all her problems. If she just spoke her mind, and told her BF what she was thinking, there wouldn't be any problems. All the antagonists are so poorly written, it's not even believable. Nobody actually acts like that in real life. School bullies, more like psychopathic supervillains.

It's actually hard to watch the lack ... of communication being the source of every conflict in the show. The original author must have a twisted view of the world if she thinks everyone is as toxic as the characters of this show

As for the art, it's not that the art style is bad; it's just that all the characters look alike.

Very mediocre story. The selling point might be that it's wholesome, but there are far better wholesome anime that actually leave an impactful impression on the viewers. The characters ranged from fine to dreadful. This might be one of those shows that goes completely forgotten after you finish watching it.

The synopsis had great potential for an amazing story worthy of it's rating, but they dropped the ball and made it extremely bland instead. I can't help but feel disappointed that they mainly focused on the random tomfoolery of being in that situation rather than the more serious sides.

The lack of communication between the characters was ... done for comedic effects, but they made it so incredibly bad that it wasn't believable majority of the time. That frustration with lack of communication transfers to the viewers, and it just becomes a chore to sit through the episodes.

A story about driving where the writers actually know what they're talking about. I must say, the technicality was impressive.
The story does get repetitive though. Every race is just one person after another challenging the protagonist. I wish there were more side stories in between the races. There were a few romance scenes sprinkled here and there, but the writing for those was 4/10 at best. Even Fast & Furious knew to sprinkle in concepts like family and loyalty throughout the story, but with Initial D, it was 97% cars when it should've been 70%.

The art style is atrocious. I don't mind the CGI cars ... since animating mechanical objects is a pain. But they could have at least kept it consistent so it wasn't switching between 3 different styles per minute (hand drawn, filter over real photos, 3D rendering). Not to mention the character design; it was god-awful. Sometimes, you can't even tell the characters apart. They all have the same face and hair.

Speaking of characters, majority of the main cast are insufferable. The protag himself is great, but the people he hangs with are obnoxiously unrelatable and lack any form of character-development. It's sad considering they have the most screen-on time. Majority of the antagonists are more tolerable and they had the least screen-on time.

This anime is a very slow-paced story revolving around a spineless kid with no personality or heart. It's incredibly frustrating when the protag is constantly being pushed around by other unlikeable characters, and submitting to their abuse and nonsense. There was ONE redeeming quality of the story which involves a family who displayed a great deal of support for the protag and showed a great example of how friends should have your back with no expectation of anything in return. I WILL be continuing onto the next season, in hopes that it'll get better, but this one was pretty dreadful.