This has probably been THE most inspiring series I’ve seen in a VERY long time. The series honestly made me rethink my career path and consider taking up a life of teaching.

The basic premise of the series is quite a hook — a former gang member takes up a life of teaching to hit on underage schoolgirls. Wahoo!!! A veritable goldmine of ecchi situations!!! Sound tempting enough yet?

…Well, like any other ‘baka’ that’s watched the series, then you’ve already been fooled…

Don’t get me wrong! The series is still chock-full of pervertedness (seeing the above premise, that pretty much IS a given), but it’s not about the ecchi. It really isn’t. GTO is about the determination of one man to become a teacher. It’s about how one sensei can make a difference in the lives of his pupils. The series actually gives you hope in the human race as a whole. Sorry if i’m being a bit dramatic. The series deserves it.

Animation isn’t exactly top-notch, as it retains the same roughly unpretty drawing style and character designs that the manga had. But like other top-notch anime with bad art COUGH* Initial D *COUGH, the characters grow on you and you learn to love them. ALL of them. I mean it.

Sounds are above cool. The opening track for the first season is “Driver’s High” by L’Arc~En~Ciel. If you’re familiar with this song, i shouldn’t have to extoll it any more. The seiyuu (voice actors) are all top-class here, with some anime staples such as Mitsuishi Kotono (yay!), Hikaru Midorikawa, and Seki Tomozaku. (I couldn’t really place the rest of the voices… gomen). The rest of the openings and endings grow on you as well.

As I said above, the characters ALL grow on you. You really do learn to love all of them. Each one of Onizuka’s major students has excellent character development and gets his or her own place in the limelight. Everyone actually has believable reasons for being the way they are. Everyone is very, very real.

Overall, the series is nicely put together in a very strong package. Do what you can to watch it. You won’t regret it.

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NOTE: This description was written sometime in 2003 and was recorded in the classic Otaku Fridge as ??.??.2003. Unfortunately the database would not accept non-numerical values, so this review is now dated January 01, 2003 by default.

Individual Rating: Art: 8; Story & Plot: 9; Characters: 9; Sounds: 9; Overall: 10

At first I thought that I would never like this. I am not too forgiving on the ecchi genre (well almost). The idea that a crazy, really ecchi ex-gang member wanted to be a teacher just to get close to the lot of young high school girls in short skirts and knee-length socks is uhh… someone who I’d throw off the 32nd floor. Heh. Gomen. I have been relating the first part too much with real life.

But having read the hype on the manga everywhere — as in, for a time, that was all I found — press releases in anime print and internet magazines on the GTO manga. Crazy ecchi teacher storyline that suddenly became a cult favorite? Moreover, I saw the live action movie starring Takashi Sorimachi as Onizuka. And that just piqued my curiosity.

The story is about a 22-year old ex-motorcycle gang member, who after graduating from a substandard university, aspires to be a teacher. His dream: GTO - Great Teacher Onizuka. Now it starts off with everything ecchi as is the nature of our hero here. What do you expect from a guy whose hobby is to look up under escalators staring at school girls’ panties, eh? (And damn… I think I was a victim of that in high school too. Go fig.) During the first part, I thought, is there all there is to it?

But in a series of overwhelmingly surprising events, things started going well. Life wasn’t always easy for Onizuka-sensei. There were times he almost gave up being a teacher, his students gave him a hard time (and by hard time, one of them meant having a snake crawl under his pants), his fellow teachers wanted him out of the academy… AND YET, with his unusually high stat in luck coupled with his street smarts, funny antics, he managed to overcome all of these. And like one of the impossibly hard-headed brats in his homeroom class of 3D, Onizuka-sensei managed to win me over in just a couple of episodes. Even if he was still dang hentai in the end.

It was not only Onizuka-sensei who made this entire anime work. You will follow the stories of students in Onizuka’s class. There’s the story of Yoshikawa, the wuss being bullied by girls (and if I were you, you’d watch out how this boy…grew up); Urumi, the gifted child prodigy who deliberately gave her teachers a hard time; Tomoko, also called Toroko for her unusual F-cup breasts… etc. etc. Add to that, the fray of teachers, most notably, Fuyutsuki Azusa-sensei, Onizuka’s veritable… crush? (You go find that out.) See, it’s not a boring class!

What’s great about this is that as you follow the episodes, there are a lot of developments. The students really go through their own coming-of-age, surprisingly thanks to our Onizuka over here. Relationships develop. And definitely, first impressions will change. There are astonishing revelations to each and every character, that the character you thought you’d hate would redeem themselves in your eyes wonderfully in the end.

So like the review above says, “The characters grow on you.” And boy do they. At the end, I found myself feeling sad that I only have 6 episodes to go on my 2-day marathon. But then, like I always say, I’m okay with anything ecchi as long as it’s the ecchi I like.

Besides, the opening credits are actually good. There’s even something reminiscent of Andy Warhol style and graffiti art on the opening credits that I haven’t seen anything that creative since *gasp* Cowboy Bebop. (I mean seriously, most of the opening credits on anime are just cutscenes from the entire series over there. GTO’s credits look like one good MTV.) Besides, Laruku’s song and the ending song Shizuku were not bad at all. How about that?

Individual Rating: Art: 8; Story & Plot: 8; Characters: 9; Sounds: 10; Overall: 9

Ah, high school life, my high school life…

I sometimes wished I had an anime-style high school life. True, I’ll probably be the standard anime otaku/geek/nerd archetype, but what the hey… it would definitely be an interesting life.

At least, if you studied under the greatest teacher in all of Japan…

Great Teacher Onizuka chronicles the travails of a former biker gang leader who decides to become a high school teacher… with the hidden agenda of having a 16-year old wife when he reaches 40. Openly lecherous, flamboyant, headstrong, and… well, unorthodox to say the least, Onizuka faces the perils of middle school class 3D, featuring the most diverse group of teacher bullies in any animated world to date.

GTO’s main strength is in its extremely likeable and sympathetic cast of characters. Though, it’s possible that sometimes you might find yourself wondering if these are really middle-school Japanese kids… given their penchant for violent and disgusting acts. It certainly doesn’t fit the mold of a typical Japanese teenager. But, then episodes would show that they’re concerned with love, fitting in, money, friendship, image, family — concerns of any teenager — and you’ll realize that these are pretty realistic teenagers here.

Onizuka himself is not a typical anime hero. He’s perverted and violent (wait… come to think of it, he is a typical anime hero!)… but you can plainly see his determination and will to be a great teacher. Most of all, you’d feel good about his genuine care for students, demonstrated in numerous instances, such as saving a girl from kidnappers, giving up a Mercedes Benz to an old teacher, rescuing his student from bullies, rescuing a potential suicide (yes, he does a lot of rescuing), and more as the series progresses.

And corny as it may sounds… Onizuka does the right thing. He may not do it in an expected fashion… but you couldn’t deny his results. The resolutions he comes up or the situations he finds himself into may be a bit contrived at times, but as Onizuka tries to overcome each problem he encounters — each more troublesome than the prior one — you’ll find yourself rooting for him and wondering how the heck he’s going to crawl his way out of each hole.

Art-wise, GTO’s unique character designs take some getting used to. The characters are drawn in a semi-realistic fashion… which means that there is a tendency to have ugly “realistic” characters. Case in point: Onizuka’s expressions. But, hey, they’re funny!

Soundwise, GTO features some truly appropriate opening and ending themes. “Driver’s High” is one particular favorite. The opening and ending themes capture the edgy feel of the series.

And of course… humor is another of GTO’s strengths. Prepare to laugh. Hard. Sidesplittingly painful. And often.

One by one, Great Teacher Onizuka wins his students over. Watch episode after episode and I’m sure he’ll win you over as well. Highly recommended.

Individual Rating: Art: 7; Story & Plot 8; Characters: 9; Sounds: 8; Overall: 9

Genre: Action / Mecha
Parental Guidance Recommended
Credits: 1979 Hajime Yatate, Yoshiyuki Tomino, Sotsu Agency, Sunrise Inc., Bandai Entertainment. Screenshots by GPlus.
Shop: Gundam 0079 Artbooks and Manga, DVD, Game Shop, Toys and Accessories

Shunichi Sakurai’s Description:
The year is Universal Century 0079. Humans are living on Earth and in space colonies around it, with the Earth Federation government ruling over all. However the Principality of Zeon, from a group of colonies farthest from the Earth, decides to revolt and fight for independence using its newfound military might from its robots, called mobile suits. Thus begins the One Year War, and it is here where the Federation spaceship White Base begins its trial of fire…

(42 Episodes)

In its great way, this single-handedly ushered in a new era of mecha. Prior to 1979, robot anime were more or less cut from the same cloth. They all had super powerful weapons, invincible characters and quite overemphasized the protagonists. It took this work of Hajime Yatate and Yoshiyuki Tomino for “real robot” anime to be born—and Gundam was the very first of its genre. From this 42-episode TV series came forth a dynasty of at least 10 others, a handful of OAV series and two movies over the next 25 years.

MSG introduces us to a science-fiction future war setting, not unlike Star Trek. Unlike robot anime of yore, the mobile suits are mostly commonplace and are hardly unique. They are treated not as invincible heroes but simply as tools and machines for war. Even the star of the series, the RX-78-2 Gundam prototype mobile suit, may enjoy some early advantages over Zeon’s Zaku IIs, but it too is subject to damage and obsolescence—just like in real wars. The focus is therefore shifted to where it is ultimately more interesting: in the politics and human drama of the opposing forces.

The series follows the service of the EFSF ship White Base, and its motley crew mostly made up of juveniles and civilians. Main protagonist and Gundam pilot Amuro Ray is a young sniveling inventor with an impulsive nature and a whiny attitude. Young officer and acting captain Bright Noa is forced into unfamiliar territory, never expecting having to become leader of a ship full of non-military personnel. Needless to say a significant chunk of the series is dedicated to getting the White Base crew to work as a team, in order to survive in the hostile environs it is ordered to journey through.

Wars are fought with no clear sense of right or wrong and MSG illustrates this point very clearly. The Federation and Zeon simply fight for their beliefs, yet these beliefs aren’t necessarily shared by all, such as Zeon ace and famous antagonist Char Aznable. Char willingly fights for Zeon but has his own agenda to follow…

Because this anime was aired in 1979, MSG’s spastic animation understandably isn’t in the realm of slickness populated by Gundam Wing or Evangelion. It does get the job done, though, and can arguably look better than some subsequent Gundam series. I personally found the music very appealing: military-inspired score with a late-1970s disco vibe to it. The memorable characters however are what drive this anime, and this is where MSG excels greatly—even faring better than most of the newer Gundam TV series. Before this series, major characters never died midway. Consider that as a mild spoiler of just one of the character trends this series introduced into the anime universe.

Sure, it’s more than 25 years old, but if you’re a fan of mecha you owe it to yourself not to miss this. This series gave mecha anime a soul.

Individual Rating: Art/Animation 6; Story 10; Characters 10; Sounds 8

Genre: Action / Mecha
Parental Guidance Recommended
Credits: 1988 Yoshiyuki Tomino, Bandai Visual, Nagoya Broadcasting, Network, Shochiku Film, Sotsu Agency, Sunrise.
Shop: Mobile Suit Gundam Char’s Counterattack Artbooks and Manga, DVD, Toys and Accessories

Cover Description:
It is the year UC 0093, and after hiding for so long, estranged Zeon heir Char Aznable decides it is time for him to finally claim his birthright as ruler of the space colonies. Having lost faith in the gravity-bound souls of the Earth-living humans, he and his Neo Zeon armada mount a full-scale offensive against the Earth Federation. While EF emissary Adenauer Paraya makes haste to hunt the Neo Zeon force down, Char’s longtime Newtype rival Amuro Ray has plans of his own…

Char’s Counterattack is the culmination of the longtime conflict between enemy aces Amuro Ray and Char Aznable, the beginnings of which were documented in the latter episodes of the original Mobile Suit Gundam TV series. This means that to fully understand this movie, just like the Star Wars movies you will have to watch MSG and Z Gundam beforehand.

After the regime of the Titans, the Earth Federation makes a new force to hunt down Zeon remnants: the Londo Bell fleet, where we see stalwarts Amuro Ray and Capt. Bright Noa once more. Char however has grown disenchanted with the Earth, coming out of hiding to attack his old enemy once more. We are witness to a more desparate side of him, too, despite his cool demeanor, as the movie opens with an operation to drop an asteroid on the EF headquarters.

Coming from Z Gundam, CCA is a huge improvement in terms of visual quality, in my opinion. While the mecha designs may seem simpler here, with Zeta’s fetish for transforming mobile suits removed, overall CCA comes across as cleaner, more polished and mature. Gone is the irritating limited color palette of Zeta and the animation is very slick for its time. As befits its cinematic setting, the musical score is superb.

Yet the characterization and plot drives this movie, just like the older Gundam series. Despite a more mature Amuro piloting the RX-93 Nu-Gundam, we still see vestiges of his rash nature and insecurities. Char takes out the frustration of losing his love Lalah Sune on spoiled brat Quess Paraya, and despite taking on the Neo Zeon leadership, is afraid of taking his father’s name. Gyunei Guss, a hotshot cyber-Newtype, tries to prove that he is superior to Char in a jealous fit. All this happens within the span of three days of battle heading to a climactic finish.

As a fitting finale, fans are treated to a definitive showdown between Amuro and Char - with and without mobile suits - and in both instances the action is very intense. For many Gundam fans, that will be the icing on this filling cake that ends one of the greatest chapters of Gundam history.

Individual Rating: Art/Animation 8; Story 10; Characters 9; Sounds 10

Genre: Action / Mecha
Parental Guidance Recommended
Credits: 2002 Sotsu Agency, Sunrise Inc., Bandai Entertainment. Screenshots by GPlus.
Shop: Gundam Seed Artbooks and Manga, DVD, VHS, Game Shop, Toys and Accessories, Music, Unbox Video Download

Shunichi Sakurai’s Description:
The year is Cosmic Era 71, and a war has brewed between the unfettled Naturals residing on Earth and the genetically enhanced Coordinators, who live in colonies called PLANTs. After the Bloody Valentine tragedy, the Coordinators’ ZAFT army (Zodiac Alliance of Freedom Treaty) began its assault on the Earth Alliance forces with their new weapons, the mobile suits. What happens when the innocent get caught in the crossfire?

(50 Episodes)

Another of the “alternate universe” series, Gundam SEED is a stylish retelling of the original Mobile Suit Gundam, incorporating many elements of the previous series and movies to attract Gundam fans both old and new. While the originality factor may be considered lacking by some, and others may deride Sunrise for resting on its laurels, I personally enjoyed SEED a lot.

SEED begins when ZAFT forces steal 4 of the Earth Alliance’s 5 new experimental Gundam mobile suits from the neutral colony Heliopolis. The last one, the Strike Gundam, falls into the hands of young civilian and Coordinator Kira Yamato, who is forced to fight against his peace-loving ways in order to protect his friends. He is eventually assimilated into the crew of the Earth Alliance ship Archangel, itself crippled by a lack of capable military personnel to run it. Much like the White Base of MSG, the Archangel and its crew must repeatedly fight off ZAFT forces in its treacherous path

- and one of them is Kira’s childhood friend, ZAFT ace Athrun Zala. With Kira being the only one capable of piloting the Strike, he works with mobile armor ace Mwu la Flaga to defend the Archangel from all enemies.

The tension between friends turned enemies provides much of the human drama element of SEED. Compared to older series, particularly the Universal Century ones, SEED is a bit softer in execution with Kira and other characters falling into introspective soliloquys. Kira in particular is forced to fight with his inner demons very often, despairing in his failure to protect. In the tradition of Gundam, SEED talks about the evils of war and what the distinctions between humans really mean - in this case, the big deal between being a Natural and a Coordinator.

Animation has taken a step forward from older series, such as Gundam Wing. CG has been used moderately (such as the coloring effect for the Phase Shift armor) to supplement the slicker animation quality, which will help gain new and younger fans to the franchise. Many of the mecha designs however are derivatives of older, existing units from previous Gundam series. The music takes a cue from Gundam Wing and other alternate universes: a lot of catchy J-pop themes are incorporated into the soundtrack. The score remains good and appropriate.

Personally I enjoyed SEED a lot. Despite seeing blatant ripoffs I am glad to see Sunrise integrating them very well into a new alternate universe. It has to be said that SEED is the only alternate universe to receive a full sequel series, Gundam SEED Destiny. That alone is proof that like me, a lot of people have positive comments for SEED.

Individual Rating: Art/Animation 9; Story 8; Characters 7; Sounds 8

Genre: Action / Mecha
Parental Guidance Recommended
Credits: 1995 © by Sunrise, TV Asahi, Sotsu. Fuji TV. Screenshots courtesy of DVD Emporium
Shop: Gundam Wing Artbooks and Manga, DVD, VHS, Game Shop, Toys and Accessories, Music

Cover Description:
In the year AC (After Colony) 195, humans on Earth have colonized space into five humanly-habitable colonies. Since the main planet is usually terrorized by war, a world government called the Alliance was established to form peace on earth and the colonies. The Alliance is manipulated by institutions like Romefeller Foundation and OZ, who use robotic fighting machines called mobile suits against all those oppose them. Because of this, five scientists developed a new kind of mobile suit created from a powerful metal called gundanium alloy. Thus Gundams were created to protect the five colonies from Alliance domination. What follows is a complex story full of political twists, complex emotional ideologies and intense character studies.

(50 episodes)

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NOTE: This description was written sometime in 1999 and was recorded in the classic Otaku Fridge as ??.??.1999. Unfortunately the database would not accept non-numerical values, so this review is now dated January 01, 1999 by default.