This is sorta old news (from 2-3 weeks ago), but who cares, no one visits my blog for up-to-date anything (reality: no one visits my blog, period). Some of the greatest news I've heard in a long time got dropped by Funimation (an anime licensing company), they'll be releasing all 3 seasons (plus a movie, and a side story) of Intial D. For anyone reading this that doesn't know (sadly probably almost all of you), Intial D is an anime series that spans from the late 90's-mid 2000's, it's about Japanese "touge" (mountain pass) racing, and it's one of the most addictive shows I've ever watched. The shows concept is simple enough, an unknown racing prodigy get involved in an impromptu street race during his morning delivery run (he delivers tofu for his fathers shop). This seemingly minor encounter quickly escalates into an explosion of interest in the underground racing scene, as racers from all over Japan seek races with the new mystery racer.
As someone who likes anime, and car racing, this show is everything I enjoy in one awesome package. The best part of this news is that Funimation will be releasing almost the entire show (there's a 2nd side story, but I'm not even sure if it's on DVD in Japan). The series was previously left incomplete by Tokyopop (the company who owned the license before), with only the first 2 seasons and the side story getting a US release. The show will also be getting re-dubbed (in English) which is supposed to be more faithful to the original (not that it would be all that difficult, considering the hack job Tokyopop did originally). The dub will also use the original "eurobeat" music instead of the pop, rap, rock, etc. soundtrack TP put together, I consiter that good news, since the eurobeat goes better with the races than some pop song from a b-list musician. Then again, music is subjective, and I'm sure lots of people would like to hear pop songs instead of 90's music sang by Japanese singers in English to high speed dance tracks, but fuck them they don't deserve eurobeat.
I'm not terribly interested in the dub, since I watch 99% of my anime in Japanese, with subtitles (I'm an "elitist"), but I'm really interested in the release of the movie and the 3rd TV series, since I've only been able to watch them on video google, and you tube. Even though the show is getting bashed on some anime forums, with fans saying "no one cares about Intial D anymore", I think they're full of shit (obviously Funimation does too). Intial D has a bigger audience than just anime fans, people love cars, and lots of people love racing, and I'd be willing to bet a lot of them would over look the fact that it's a cartoon, if they knew it would be insanely entertaining (which it is).
I personally can't wait, then again I suppose that's obvious by now, since I spend the last 3 paragraphs blowing my nerd load all over the place.
