ANI-MOVIES, *eX-Driver: The Movie

A year after the OVA series completed, eX-Driver got a movie sequel. The movie itself is only about an hour long, but there is also a shorter prequel special that got shown with it, along with a trio of animated shorts that you could only see in theaters. Kosuke Fujishima's bizarre future story of a world where all cars are run by AI has the occasional crossed wire where the car goes nuts and the only ones who can stop them are a specialized unit called eX-Drivers to safely chase them down. There are plenty of plot holes in this idealist view of technological things to come, but it filled in the void for fans of Initial D when they were waiting for the next season.

The prequel short titled Danger Zone takes place a few years before the OVA series with the veteran eX-Drivers Nina and Rei in their early days before Rei became an eX-Rider. Here they have to deal with an obsessive stalker of Nina who is really just a pawn of eX-Driver technician Toma who set the whole thing up to make a big getaway with secret plans. The animation in it isn't up to the same bar what was done for the full-length movie and seems more of a throwback to 90s action girl anime.

The main feature happens sometime after the OVA and takes place entirely in America where the Japanese eX-Driver team are taking part in an international race. A former mafia boss is suspected of betting on the event, and his over caring daughter plots to stop the race to save his business. It turns out that the ex-mobster was setting up a charity fund for the eX-Driver organization which a rogue member of his crew uses as an opportunity to steal a bunch of cold cash. Our heroic trio of Lorna, Lisa, and Soichi get involved in a prolonged final chase that has a decent flow to it. Even though it's only an hour long, this premise was still stretched out longer than was totally necessary.

eX-Driver: The Movie makes for a fair continuation of the original anime, but if you hadn't watched the 6-episode series then you would be largely lost on the whole premise as it doesn't lean into the main premise of what the eX-Driver organization was created for in the first place. You can catch this double-feature on most streaming services with the prequel short playing after the main one. It has some interesting action sequences but is ultimately a retread of tired car chase cliches.