The U.S. branch of Toyota has launched an anime show on YouTube called GRIP: A Toyota Story. The weekly mini-episodes tell the story of dedicated Toyota drivers going up against SynthCorp, a giant tech corporation dreaming about a driverless future.
The company describes the series as a “high-octane” anime featuring action scenes, high-adrenaline races and the struggle of the human spirit against silicon intelligence. The protagonists are driving the marque’s latest sports cars, including the GR Corolla hot hatch, the GR Supra and the GR 86 wearing an iconic livery.
The main antagonist of the story, SynthCorp CEO Aron Synth, used to be a famous driver himself, but lost an arm in an accident and became obsessed with the idea of seizing all car controls from imperfect humans.
The first season will consist of five series telling a complete story. Whether there will be another season later remains unknown. The company avoids drawing any direct parallels between its latest pet project and the legendary Initial D manga from the 1990s, but there’s no discounting the possibility. After all, it was largely thanks to that manga that the Toyota AE 86 gained its iconic status.