News

1st New Initial D Anime Film's Trailer Previews Ryūichi Kawamura Theme Song

A new trailer for the Shin Gekijō-ban Initial D Legend 1 -Kakusei- (New Initial D: The Movie Legend 1: Awakening) film began streaming on Wednesday. The trailer reveals that former Luna Sea vocalist Ryūichi Kawamura will perform the film's main theme song, "never fear," and the video features the song. The film is the first in a planned trilogy.

Text: To put it simply, I was touched. -Shūichi Shigeno
Takumi: Now then...
Text: Shin Gekijō-ban Initial D Legend 1 -Kakusei-
Text: The first of three films
Keisuke: I'm being caught up to!? Don't make me laugh! Damn you!
Keisuke: 86...? You really mean 86...!?
Text on car: Fujiwara Tofu Shop
Keisuke: Did I see the ghost of a driver who died on Mount Akina or something...?
Takumi: Racers sure are weird. Why do people get so excited about that kind of thing?
Itsuki: The cars that fly by, one after another! The skill! The smell of burning tires! If you saw that right in front of your eyes, wouldn't you get excited!?
Takumi: Get... Excited...?
Keisuke: I'm going to pay back that ghost.
Man: If it's down-slopes, the fastest vehicle on Akina is the 86 from the tofu store.
Boy: The legendary racer is a tofu store owner!?
Bunta: Go out and play.
Takumi: Playing is something fun, right?
Ryōsuke: The Kanto project to make the Akagi Red Suns and Ryōsuke and Keisuke Takahashi a legend starts now.
Natsuki: Let's go swimming, just You and Me.
Man: Akagi's fastest RX-7 and the Akina down-slope specialist... This battle is going to be a must-see.
Announcer: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1... Go!
Text: A work in celebration of Young Magazine's 35th anniversary
Text: Main theme song: "never fear" by Ryūichi Kawamura
Narrator: The curtain on a hot battle rises. Shin Gekijō-ban Initial D Legend 1 -Kakusei-

The film trilogy will retell the beginning of the story from Shuuichi Shigeno's original car-racing manga. High school student Takumi Fujiwara works as a gas station attendant during the day and a delivery boy for his father's tofu shop during late nights. Little does he know that his precise driving skills and his father's modified Toyota Sprinter AE86 Trueno make him the best amateur road racer on Mt. Akina's highway. Because of this, racing groups from all over the Gunma Prefecture issue challenges to Takumi to see if he really has what it takes to be a road legend.

The first new film will open throughout Japan on August 23. Advance tickets are now on sale for 1,200 yen (about US$12) with a Akina Speed Stars stickers, while supplies last.

Masamitsu Hidaka (Linebarrels of Iron, Pokémon, The Sacred Blacksmith) is directing at SANZIGEN and LIDEN FILMS. Mayori Sekijima (Arata The Legend, Phi-Brain - Puzzle of God, Skip Beat!) wrote the screeenplay, and Akio Dobashi (Dance in the Vampire Bund, Sisters of Wellber, Yozakura Quartet) scored the soundtrack. A new cast starring Mamoru Miyano as Takumi, Yūichi Nakamura as Keisuke, Daisuke Ono as Ryōsuke, Maaya Uchida as Natsuki, Minoru Shiraishi as Itsuki, and Hiroaki Hirata as Bunta will be featured in the film.

Shigeno's original manga follows Takumi Fujiwara, a high school boy with a natural talent for driving, in his racing pursuits on the public highways. The manga debuted in Kodansha's Young Magazine in 1995, and Shigeno ended the manga last July. It has over 48 million copies in circulation.

The manga inspired several television anime series (including the Fifth Stage that ran in 2012), a live-action film, several original video anime projects, and a successful game line. The manga's final battles have also adapted into an anime series called Final Stage.

[Via animeanime.jp]