Video Girl Ai

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Video Girl Ai
Volume 1 manga Cover
電影少女 VIDEO GIRL AI
(Den'ei Shōjo)
Genre Comedy, Drama, Romance, Science Fiction, Shounen
Manga
Authored by Masakazu Katsura
Publisher Flag of Japan Shueisha
Flag of Brazil Editora JBC
Flag of France Editions Tonkam
Flag of Mexico Grupo Editorial Vid
Flag of Germany Carlsen Comics
Flag of Hungary Semic Interprint
Flag of Italy Star Comics
Flag of Poland Waneko
Flag of Spain Planeta DeAgostini
Flag of Canada Flag of United States VIZ Media
Serialized in Japan Weekly Shonen Jump
Original run 1990 – 1993
No. of volumes 15
Movie: Video Girl Ai
Directed by Ryū Kaneda
Studio Toho
Released June 29, 1991
Runtime 95 minutes
OVA
Directed by Mizuho Nishikubo
Studio Production I.G
No. of episodes 6
Released 1992

Video Girl Ai (電影少女 VIDEO GIRL AI Den'ei Shōjo?) is a manga series created by Masakazu Katsura and published by Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump. It also has an anime adaptation. The manga is published in English by Viz Communications. It was formerly published in the anthology Animerica Extra by Viz.

It was started in 1990 and continued until 1993, and fifteen manga volumes were produced. The first 13 volumes tell a story about a video girl named Ai Amano. The last two volumes, which came years later, focus on a video girl named Len, hence the new name for these two volumes - "Video Girl Len". In fact, a pun is present here which is lost in translation; the two video girls' names "Ren" and "ai" combine to form "renai"- a Japanese word used to describe the type of romantic comedy that Video Girl Ai is. Although they have different protagonists, the "Ai" and "Len" sub-stories are not entirely unrelated; they take place in the same setting, with a similar premise. Two characters from the first 13 volumes also appear in volumes 14 & 15. Volume 15 concludes with a bonus chapter about Video Girl Haruno. Her story is totally separate from the stories of Ai and Len.

A live-action movie of Video Girl Ai was released in 1991.

The Video Girl Ai anime is a six part OVA series which was produced by I.G. Tatsunoko. The series was released in 1992 by Jump Video. It roughly covers most of the material found in volumes 1 and 3 of the manga (and some of Volume 2). The character designs for the anime remained faithful to the manga style and the overall animation is excellent.

It is commonly speculated that the author, Masakazu Katsura, used this series as what could be described as a pilot; although he wanted to write a straight romantic comedy, he included sci-fi and action elements, so that the series would guarantee to be a success with both his publishers and (teenage male) audience.

Video Girl Ai was followed in 1993 with another sci-fi/romantic comedy manga DNA² and by the straight romantic comedy I"s in 1997.

Contents

[edit] Story (manga)

The story starts when Yota Moteuchi finds out that the girl he likes, Moemi Hayakawa is in love with his best friend, Takashi Niimai. Disappointed by this fact, he decides to rent a video from a mysterious video store that appeared in front of him on his way home. The video store was called "Gokuraku" ("Paradise"). The unique thing about this video store was that the videos in the store contained "video girls", girls which come out of the television to cheer the renter up. Not knowing about the video girls, Yota chooses to rent the video 'I'll Cheer You Up!', starring Ai Amano. Ai comes to life with the purpose to brighten up Yota's life and encourage him to pursue his love.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

However, Yota plays the video on a broken video recorder, which causes Ai to come out "broken"; among other effects she has the ability to feel emotions. This additional feature of Ai causes her to eventually fall in love with Yota; a feeling which, after giving up on Moemi, Yota begins to return. However, a mysterious man related to Gokuraku known as Rolex enters the story and tries to recall Ai as she is faulty.

From this point on, the story changes focus slightly and concentrates on Yota and Ai attempting to overcome the difficulties presented by Gokuraku. Various other complications come into the story; for example Yota's continuing love for Moemi, and his relationship with a new character, Nobuko Nizaki.

Initially, Ai spends some of her time teasing Yota mercilessly in various sexual manners i.e. pretending to initiate intercourse, or joining Yota "innocently" in the bath "to help him wash". Yota's resulting embarrassment and attempt to extricate himself from the situation results, as always, in some slapstick humor and more resulting sexual tension. The brief series also relies heavily on ecchi, choosing not to get too carried away with direct male audience targeting, and allowing real emotion to show through.

[edit] Characters

  • Ai Amano (天野あい Amano Ai) Beautiful, full of boundless energy. Hard to say what she is really like, versus what she was intended to be. Video girls are generally supposed to be comforting, nubile, excellent cooks, and socially graceful, but the malfunction of Yota's VCR has made her tomboyish, at times rude, prone to violence, a terrible cook (actually, she learns to cook all by herself), but full of heart and able to feel human emotion. Her chest endowment has also shrunk considerably due to said VCR malfunction. Seiyu - Megumi Hayashibara
  • Yota "Dateless"* Moteuchi (弄内洋太 Moteuchi Yōta) Yota is the stereotypical loser, unable to declare his feelings to his unrequited love, Moemi, socially awkward, with a tendency to get nervous and clumsy around women.
  • Moemi Hayakawa (早川もえみ Hayakawa Moemi) An attractive girl, though almost hopelessly moon-eyed over Takashi, who is too popular and self absorbed to take notice or appreciate Moemi's affectations.
  • Takashi Niimai (新舞貴志 Niimai Takashi) Your typical "tall dark and handsome" popular guy.
  • Nobuko Nizaki (仁崎伸子 Nizaki Nobuko) A girl, one year behind Yota, who developed a like for him in art class two years earlier and now, with Moemi and Ai temporarily sidelined, can pursue romantic ties with Yota.
  • Natsumi Yamaguchi (山口夏美 Yamaguchi Natsumi) A girl, an orphan and a runaway, who had played with Yota in kindergarten. Her family then moved away. Her theme is misfortune. Her attribute is a hand extended to help one up.

* This nickname is based off of a pun with the Japanese verb 持てる (moteru), which means to be well-liked or popular. A second way to read Moteuchi would be "Motenai," which is the negative conjugation for moteru. An attempt to get the joke across to English speaking audiences was made by Ai, who reads his name and declares, "Motenai?!? As in LOSER?" Yota corrects her, but the image has already been planted into the audience's mind.

[edit] Len story characters

  • Len Momono Star of 'Let's Fall in Love.' A new and untested video girl.
  • Hiromu Taguchi and Toshiki Karukawa The boys who rent the tape. Hiromu is the center character of this new story arch, and is pretty much as shy as Youta used to be. He has a keen interest on Ayumi, but this is hardened both because of his shyness and because of the bad reputation students think she has. Later, they engage, but Hiromu gets too happy to pay attention to Ayumi, and they break up temporarily until he can "find her again" in his memories. Toshiki, on the other hand, is more expansive and prone to teenage-typical reactions, like spying on Len (what makes her angry).
  • Ayumi Shirikawa The girl Hiromu wants to love. However, their approach is made difficult because of a rumor spread out by her ex-boyfriend, which made her badmouthed in her school, and beyond (Hiromu and Ayumi attend different schools). Len then devised a plan to reapproach them, just to make Ayumi see who she was dealing with all along. She breaks up with him for good and starts dating Hiromu.
  • Yota Moteuchi Eight years older than above. He teaches an afternoon art school, which Hiromu and Ayumi attend. He is quite a counselor to Hiromu about Len, as both went through the same experiences.

[edit] Volumes

ISBNs are for the 2nd edition

[edit] External links

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