GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka, Vol. 1 [Paperback]

Tohru Fujisawa (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 23, 2002

Meet Eikichi Onizuka, a 22-year-old virgin and ex-biker. He’s crude, foul-mouthed, and has a split second temper. His goal: to be the Greatest High School Teacher in the World! Of course the only reason he wants to be a teacher is so he can try and score with the hot students Before he can become a teacher, he’s got to work as a student teacher to earn his credentials. Onizuka may think he’s the toughest guy on campus, but when he meets his class full of bullies, blackmailers, and scheming sadists, he’ll have to prove it.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Eikichi Onizuka is a 22-year-old high school dropout in need of some direction. He has a black belt in karate, a Kawasaki bike, a porn collection and a habit of squatting at the bottom of escalators so he can look up skirts. Not an obvious choice for the moniker "Great Teacher." But the seemingly unlikely premise of this manga is that these qualities are precisely what will make Onizuka a success. He might be misguided-he wants to become a teacher so he can meet young, impressionable high-school hotties-but his struggles to find a path to adulthood through the wilds of hormones and violent impulses are not unsympathetic. In fact, the book is wildly popular and has been made into a Japanese live-action TV drama, a film and an anime series. If this first volume doesn't quite explain the work's popularity, it does aptly outline the issues that will operate throughout the rest of the series (sexual frustration, and the tension between Onizuka's tough-guy biker past and his hidden good-guy persona). Tokyopop's English-language version remains faithful to the Japanese original, reading from back to front and from left to right. The drawings are serviceable, with comically dead-on depictions of sweaty-faced guys in various stages of anguish, surprise or shock. Unfortunately, the females are given less subtle shadings of expression-they range from cute and perky to forlorn and perky-and the printing is sometimes difficult to read. However, like Onizuka himself, the writing is breezy and unaffected, and therein lies a good deal of the book's charms.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Publisher

Fujisawa has been a manga artist since 1969 and GTO is the 3rd series with lead character, Eikichi Onizuka.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: TokyoPop (April 23, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1931514933
• ISBN-13: 978-1931514934
• Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #156,293 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars REALITY MANGA STYLE, September 22, 2003

By 

Sesho "www.sesho.libsyn.com" (Pasadena, TX USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka, Vol. 1 (Paperback)

Great Teacher Onizuka, or GTO, for short, is one of the most popular mangas going, with over 37 million copies sold worldwide. I wouldn't really expect that, seeing as how it focuses on the life of a teacher. If you can imagine a cross between Marlon Brando as the Wild One and the beatnik attitude of Jack Kerouac along with the cool hipness of Japanese youth as a teacher. While being brillantly subversive, GTO succeeds as both entertainment and satire of the teaching establishment, much as Chaucer lampooned the Church in his Canterbury Tales.

Eikichi Onizuka is the 22 year old ex-leader of a biker gang who has found out that he's not going to be able to goof off his whole life. He has to find a job. Having a fetish for young girls in uniform, he decides to become a teacher. He finds out that his impulsive decision is going to take a lot more courage than he thought. This first volume is basically his origin story as he is disappointed by his dreams of becoming something great and having to reevaluate his life as he begins his teacher training. It also begins a pattern that will continue in the following books, namely that he has to use his wits to escape the plots of hateful students and a vice-principal who would like nothing more than to fire him.

This book was great. What can I say? If you are a teacher, you'll really get a kick out of seeing a cartoon character fulfill your wishes. Who doesn't want to karate kick their bonehead students sometimes? While Onizuka's attraction to high school girls seems lurid, we find out that he becomes overwhelmed with trying to help his students rather than wanting to seduce them in the end. I think it's just a Japanese thing to be attracted to girls in school uniforms. I think anyone with a sense of humor and semi-lewdness would find these manga entertaining and funny. I would especially recommend it to teachers.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Original and Entertaining, April 19, 2002

By 

Joshua Macy (Havertown, PA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka, Vol. 1 (Paperback)

GTO is quite unlike any comic (manga or otherwise) that I've ever read. It starts with an unlikely premise: that a 22-year old former gang member and street-brawling ruffian decides one day to become not just a teacher, but the greatest High School teacher in Japan. His reason: to be close to all those nubile young High School girls. Not exactly the most admirable or likable character to come down the pike, but there's a lot of humor to be found in the "fish out of water" aspects of the story, and by the end of volume one I found myself warming to him. He's a letch, but he's a harmless letch, easily manipulated by the girls he lusts after, and as the story progresses you come to see that he has a heart. He may turn out to be a great teacher after all.
I'm really looking forward to future volumes of GTO.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Better than expected, January 24, 2003

By 

Zack Davisson "japanreviewed" (Seattle, WA, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka, Vol. 1 (Paperback)

"GTO (Great Teacher Onizuka)" is a fun comic, with more heart than I expected. The premise, a tough, go-nowhere 22 year old bosozoku deciding to become a High School teacher in order to pick up girls, at first seems like a recipe for fan service and lewd humor. And it is. However, like the best of Japanese comics, this rather sketchy plot develops into something a little more personal and respectable. Onizuka, as he can relate to his pupils and is a tough guy in his own right, becomes "Great Teacher Onizuka."

The art is great, and flows easily between two distinct styles, a classic Japanese cartoon style and a more expressive, violent style in some parts. The characters are fun and multi-dimensional. I can see why this series is so popular in Japan.

Also, this is a comic where my experience teaching in the Japanese school system has richened the outcome. I "get" several of the jokes that I might have missed before, and I recognize the stereotypes. Good fun all around, and I will definitely be picking up the rest of the series.