The Fall 2023 Anime Preview Guide

MF Ghost

In the 2020s, self-driving cars are ubiquitous in Japan. The manga centers on Kanata Livington, a Japanese driver who goes back to Japan after graduating at the top of his class at a racing school in England. The series also focuses on the MFG, a racing circuit on public roads that has garnered attention worldwide.

MF Ghost is based on a manga of the same name by Shuuichi Shigeno. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Sundays.

I know enough about cars to know what a three-pedal H-shift means, and fortunately, that seems to be all that this episode requires. I also know enough about fanservicey costumes to recognize that Ren's Angel getup is incredibly lame. You can't just stick angel wings on the back of a sports bra and call it a day—especially not if you're going to pair it with what looks less like a bikini bottom and more like plain white cotton undies. Clearly, someone spent far too much time lovingly drawing every detail of the cars and the drones that follow them and just threw something together for the angel outfit, and it shows. Still grosser is the way the camera adores panning up and down the body of this teenager whenever she's in it—and then you throw in twenty-four-year-old Aiba creeping on the high school girl wearing it. Sorry, MF Ghost, the “man in his twenties romancing a teen” slot has already been filled this season.

But you're probably not watching this for the fanservice, or at least not just for the fanservice. That means that you may be more disappointed by the fact that this first episode of a show about racing sports cars has only about thirty seconds of actual race footage (at least with Kanata, the driver we're following, behind the wheel; otherwise it's maybe ninety seconds). There isn't even much car jargon thrown in, which surprised me a bit. There is mention of specific brand names, though, and it gives the sense that real thought went into the way that familiar car types and names are being used. It feels like the sort of thing I could watch with my dad (Ren aside) and have him really enjoy on the "car talk" front.

Ren and Kanata may also turn out to be a draw, although, right now, it's looking fairly one-sided on Ren's part. Kanata does feel comfortable telling her his true purpose in coming to Japan, though, so that's a positive sign. Also fun is his reaction to being in Japan—his reaction to eating the little koala cookies and inability to use chopsticks are nice details, and he comes across as enthusiastic but not obnoxious about it. I just would have liked to see more actual driving/racing going on, which is my main disappointment here. That may come with time—though if that stupid angel outfit remains, I make no promises about watching more.

It's funny. I kind of feel cheated by this first episode of MF Ghost. When I think of Initial D, I think of two things: awesome dirfting car races and killer eurobeat music. So for the first episode of Initial D's sequel to have almost none of either leaves me feeling a little bit betrayed.

Now, that's not to say that what we did get was bad. This episode is a solid introduction to the world, characters, and story. Kanata is a half-British, half-Japanese teen searching for his father. All he has in regards to his father is a single photograph taken in Kanagawa years before. It's a decent mystery and gives the story something to do between races.

The only thing that bugged me about his story this episode is the combination of foreigner stereotypes and ham-fisted product placement. Going to Sukiya and gushing about their beef bowls like they're a delicacy (and not simply fast food) is silly. And claiming that Koala March cookies are better than all British sweets is insane. ...But I guess sponsorships pay the bills.

On the other side of the story we have our main viewpoint character, Ren. What's interesting about her isn't that she falls for Kanata moments after telling her friend that she doesn't believe in love at first sight, it's how she separates her part-time job from her personal life.

Ren is a “race queen”—kind of a cross between a typical racing “grid girl” and an idol. However, unlike her fellows, she practices OPSEC to a startling degree—to the point that she doesn't even have her name and age listed publicly. While this may seem extreme (especially if you're a man), this episode makes it easy to see why she does this. After all, she has a 24 year-old guy constantly hitting on her—going so far as to try and force the racing association to give up her personal information so he can pursue her off the clock. This makes part of the story is a cautionary tale for any woman in the service industry—especially modeling or something similar where the job involves you being nice and polite to men. The moral is simple: be like her. Keep everyone on a need-to-know basis—and horny men hitting on you at work don't need to know.

In the end, I think I'll tune into episode two for this one. I'm not particularly invested but I do want my drifting cars and eurobeat before I decide whether I want to watch the whole season or not.

I have seen all of maybe five or six Initial D episodes, which was probably twenty years ago, so I can only reckon with this new follow-up, MF Ghost, as its own thing. The good news is that newcomers can hop into this series without missing a beat; I'm sure there are some references or Easter eggs I missed, but MF Ghost stands on its own well enough. The real question is whether or not this racing anime can appeal to the automotive-illiterate viewers such as myself, who usually prefers that his car media come with a heaping helping of wanton physics-defying destruction and monologues about the importance of family.

At least as of this first episode, the answer seems to be: “Probably! …Maybe?” The potentially romantic connection between Ren and our main character, Kanata, might be enough to entice the folks more interested in blushed cheeks and stolen glances than the ins and outs of grip-weight ratios and engine tuning. If you can vibe with the round, baby-faced character designs taken from Shūichi Shigeno's playbook, then the show certainly looks nice enough to spend a few minutes with every week.

All of that stuff is secondary to the real star of the show, though: The racing. So, is it any good? Well…it's hard to say, really! We barely get anything to go on outside of a very brief pre-credits sequence, and the rest of this premiere is focused entirely on establishing Kanata's arrival in Japan and getting him situated to enter his first race. The CG used for the cars seems okay, at the very least, but the jury is still out on the spectacle that will presumably make up a large part of the appeal for this show. I'm not saying that this first episode is terrible, by the way, nor am I complaining that it dared to bother with such frivolous indulgences as “character development” and “story setup.” I don't know yet if this will make for a very good racing anime, so those of you who are primarily interested in the “vroom vroom” of it all will have to wait another week to get a real taste of the action. Fans of the original Initial D tell me that I should expect good things, but until we can see the rubber hit the road for ourselves, this one passes muster with a “Perfectly Okay, for Now” grade.

Good news and bad news, folks. The good news is that if you're like me and don't know Initials A-C, let alone D, this distant sequel will still be understandable. Doubtlessly, some references or cameos are lost on the uninitiated, but the central premise of dudes racing cars fast is as simple as you could ask for. The bad news is that this episode is one big tease, taking its sweet time as it strings the viewer along with the promise that they might get to see some of that racing before cutting to the credits just as our protagonist crosses the starting line.

That's not entirely a terrible idea since this episode instead spends its time introducing the main cast, establishing their relationships, and doing what it can to endear us to Kanata as a person before we see him as a driver. In the long run, that's the right move, as it gives us time and reasons to get invested in the cast before we start hurtling cars at unsafe speeds. Though I can't say I'm all that engaged by the characters. They're nice enough – outside of the guy constantly creeping on a teenage girl and trying to get her info from her workplace – but they're so mild-mannered and matter-of-fact that they don't leave much of an impression. Kanata's some racing whiz from a fancy driving school in England, and his personality has as much spice as your typical English dinner. Ren is a little better, but her motivation morphs into a big crush on Kanata so quickly that it's hard to get a read on anything else. Weirdly, my favorite of the bunch so far is Ogata, the kindly, middle-aged mechanic who puts together Kanata's ride. There's just something about his face that's charming, I guess.

Speaking of cars, those have gotten the most attention from the production. While the compositing on the CG vehicles isn't perfect, there's a lot of attention to detail with each one, with distinct and accurate (to my eyes, anyway) silhouettes for each make and model. A lot of the car talk goes over my head (what is a grip-to-weight ratio?), but it certainly sounds accurate, and I imagine gearheads in the audience will get a kick out of it all. The rest of the visuals are a mixed bag. I like the distinctive character designs, even if everyone looks like they're wearing lipstick, but the environments leave a lot to be desired. Most of them are (barely-)edited reference photos, and they clash pretty severely with the characters composited on top of them. However, they work alright with the CG cars, so that's probably a necessary compromise. Animation is serviceable for what happens here, but the make-or-break detail will depend on how well they can capture the speed and intensity of racing in the next episode.

That tease is enough to get me to watch another episode, if only to sate my curiosity. We get car racing less often in anime, and it would be nice if MF Ghost (short for motherf*cking ghost, I presume) could fill that niche for a while. However, if that racing isn't up to snuff, I feel pretty good about passing on this one.