GTO

GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka
GTO: Tomoko's Big Adventures

Manga8.972442 votes25 volumes · 208 chaptersFinished

ActionAward WinningComedyDramaEcchiDelinquentsSchoolWorkplaceShounen

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About this title

Synopsis

22-year-old Eikichi Onizuka: pervert, former gang member... and teacher? Great Teacher Onizuka follows the incredible, though often ridiculous, antics of the titular teacher as he attempts to outwit and win over the cunning Class 3-4 that is determined to have him removed from the school. However, other obstacles present themselves throughout—including the frustrated, balding vice principal, Hiroshi Uchiyamada; old enemies from his biker days; and his own idiotic teaching methods. But Eikichi fights it all whilst trying to help his students, romance fellow teacher Azusa Fuyutsuki, and earn his self-proclaimed title. [Written by MAL Rewrite] Also contains the gaiden "GTO: Great Toroko Oppai♡" (Tomoko's Big Adventures).

Publication notes

GTO won the 22nd Kodansha Manga Award in the Shounen category in 1998. The series was published in English as GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka by Tokyopop from April 23, 2002, to August 9, 2005. Kodansha Comics USA republished the series digitally on February 1, 2022. It was also released in Polish by Waneko from June 2004 to June 2010. Several live-action adaptations of GTO were made. A 12-episode television drama was broadcast from July 7, 1998, to September 22, 1998. A revival of the drama series aired on April 1, 2024. It was followed by a live-action film released on December 18, 1999; the film became the 10th highest-grossing Japanese film of 2000. A second drama adaptation was broadcast from July 3, 2012, to September 11, 2012. A joint project between Japanese and Taiwanese productions called GTO in Taiwan aired first in Taiwan from March 22, 2014, to April 12, 2014, and later in Japan. Another GTO drama aired from July 8, 2014, to September 16, 2014.

Published

Dec 11, 1996 to Jan 30, 2002

Authors

Fujisawa, Tooru

External links

MyAnimeList page KodanshaKodansha USA Wikipedia Wikipedia

MAL rank: #30
Members (MAL): 190,052
Favorites (MAL): 11,892

Related titles

Prequel

Adaptation

Great Teacher Onizuka (anime)

Side Story

Spin-Off

Main characters

Eikichi Onizuka33587 fan favorites
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Birthdate: August 3, 1975 A 22-year-old, hormonal, blonde-haired biker and virgin, Onizuka Eikichi graduated from a bottom-rung university by cheating and, as such, cannot get a decent job. His main way of spending time is peering up girls' skirts in a local mall. He is very athletic, as he can bench press 150 kg (331 lbs), has a second dan black belt in karate, and even claims to perform 500 push-ups, 1000 pull ups and 2000 squats daily. Through the events explained in the Great Teacher Onizuka manga, Onizuka decides to become a teacher, even though it is later implied that he has an IQ of about 50 (Though not necessarily true). His initial teacher training is in the Musashino Public High School, where he meets Nanako Mizuki. His experience taming the rowdy gangs in his assigned class hardens his convictions that teaching is the way to go, and when he learns of Mizuki's problems, he also decides to abstain from sexual experience with his students, opting to solve their personal issues for them, instead. Unfortunately, he nearly messes up by forgetting to take the public teachers' civil service exam. As a result, no public high school will take him, but he is still eligible for a number of private schools. He manages to get a job at the upper-crust Holy Forest Academy, despite the objections of vice-principal Uchiyamada Hiroshi, whom he continues to aggravate well into his tenure. Of course, one of the conditions of having the job at Holy Forest is that he must sleep at the school—in the storage room at the top floor, with roof access—and it is here that Onizuka officially starts his career in teaching, when he stops Yoshikawa Noboru from committing suicide. Onizuka is put in charge of class 3-4, a class so bad it has already driven several teachers insane. Not only does he survive the class's brutal bullying tactics, but he also befriends his students, and the backbone to the story of Great Teacher Onizuka consists of his unique experiences in turning his students around and learning lessons of his own. It is later implied again, during the National Exams, that Onizuka might actually be some sort of genius. His exam results were swapped: once for full marks, and once for just short of full marks. However, when Yoshito Kikuchi is asked whether he is curious about Onizuka's true results, he checks the answers himself and the result amazes him. He checks with Onizuka, who states that he definitely got perfect results from his own effort (which would be incredible, since he did a 5 hour exam in 1 hour, bleeding, and having 4 bullets in his stomach). Onizuka has incredible physical resilience. On more than one occasion, he has fallen from heights that would instantly kill most people and claims to have a sort of healing factor, as he healed from a broken arm in less than a day, and even endure multiple gunshot wounds, in a short period of time. Onizuka often presents his strength in unintentionally flamboyant ways, such as arm wrestling over 100 men of exponential strength in a row and winning (including the character Heihachi from the Tekken series of fighting games, and Jason Voorhees from the films called Friday the 13th (series)). His fighting abilities are not to be taken lightly either, as Onizuka is capable of fending off multiple opponents, even if they are well-armed, and almost never receives any physical damage. In spite of his impressive fighting skills, Onizuka is often roughed up by his students, and others, whenever he behaves badly. It could be speculated that deep down, Onizuka knows when he's acting immature, and allows others to keep him in line. An example of this is when he forces his students to dig the earth for buried treasure during the Okinawa trip. Kanzaki Urumi kicks Onizuka into a hole, and later forces him to wear S&M garb and has him crawl around on all fours, with Urumi riding on his back. Yet another example is when Principal Uchiyamada has Onizuka over for dinner and hits him upside the head with a wooden bench after finding out that Onizuka was acting a bit of a letch with his daughter one day (Onizuka was playing "where's the nipple" with his daughter, at a karaoke bar in town). His personal mode of transportation is a Kawasaki Z2 motorcycle 750cc type S. The bike itself is also featured heavily in the prequel series to GTO.
Urumi Kanzaki1927 fan favorites
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The antithesis to the "dumb blonde" stereotype, Urumi Kanzaki is a prodigy with an IQ over 200. She also has heterochromia, possessing different colored eyes: one brown and one blue. However, she is psychologically disturbed, having her fair share of hate toward teachers. Her genius is displayed repeatedly by such abstract actions as the detonation of time bombs (i.e. firecrackers in disposable boxes) and making a harmless snake look like a cobra using paper cutouts. Her intellect is also shown through actions, such as shouting curse words in French and being able to speak fluent Mandarin. On the trip in Okinawa, Toshito Kikuchi noted that she can speak 5 languages, but ironically, she doesn't understand what her Gundam otaku roommates say. (Source: Wikipedia)
Hiroshi Uchiyamada207 fan favorites
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Yoshiko's father and Vice Principal of Holy Forest Academy. He is a very strict man who readily blindly follows the school rules and places them on top of anything else. Also he doesn't have much patience. And loves his Cresta very much. Hiroshi is easily enraged by Onizuka's behavior basically always. He shows to have no respect for school delinquents or anyway rebels guys during the series. He believes that Onizuka is the evil root of all his misfortunes. He was visibly against Onizuka's hiring, but had to accept Principal Sakurai's positive decision. Uchiyamada is always yelling at Onizuka's behavior and argues with him a lot.
Yoshito Kikuchi163 fan favorites
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Yoshito Kikuchi is one of Eikichi Onizuka's students. This computer prodigy (scoring the highest without certain "aid" in the country, on a standardized test) serves as class president and is also notorious for making pornographic composite photos, during Onizuka's arrival at the Holy Forest Academy. He tries to blackmail him into resignation with several pictures posted all across the school for everyone to see. Onizuka catches Kikuchi and instead of punishing him, hires him to make composite pictures of Azusa Fuyutsuki and other female teachers, much to his surprise. Kikuchi eventually befriends Onizuka, and later helps Noboru Yoshikawa prevent Anko Uehara's mother, the president of the local Parent-Teacher Association, from getting Onizuka fired. Kikuchi is an amateur martial artist, having prior experience in judo and other techniques learned from Mayu Wakui (in the live-action, he claims he only knows it, and does not demonstrate this claim). It is revealed after the examinations that he was the one who switched Onizuka's test papers for a perfect score. When questioned about the actual results that Onizuka has, Kikuchi calculates it himself, and is thoroughly surprised at the score (it is unknown whether Onizuka actually did score perfect, or a score befitting his intelligence), and asks him directly, to which his teacher replies that he definitely received a perfect score. In the manga, a possible relationship is hinted between him and Ai Tokiwa, after some intervention and a forced embrace from Onizuka. In the live-action, Kikuchi has a long distance relationship with Tomoko Nomura. (Source: Wikipedia)
Tomoko Nomura106 fan favorites
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Birthday: September 25, 1985 A student in Eikichi Onizuka's class, Tomoko Nomura has a large chest (her cup size is F), but is not too bright, leading to people calling her Toro-ko (Toro meaning "slow" in Japanese; she is nicknamed Slo-mo-ko in the English version). After initially messing up her role in one of Miyabi Aizawa's plans to get Onizuka fired, she is cut off from Miyabi's group. Seeing her rather slow, clumsy nature, Onizuka enters her into a local beauty contest. He even arranges two porn producer friends to dress her up for the competition. Rather than read the given script for the acting category, Onizuka gives her a couple of action figures and she ends up doing an excellent improvised piece (with Vice-Principal Uchiyamada getting an accidental role). In the anime, Onizuka throws a cellphone on stage and she leaves a sentimental message on Miyabi's answering machine instead. She doesn't win, but she gets noticed by several television producers and begins starring in various commercials. Her young male manager, impressed with her natural beauty, and after falling in love at first sight, makes it his lifetime goal to help her succeed. She was friends with Urumi Kanzaki since childhood, and their close bond likely arose out of their opposite personalities (Tomoko is clumsy and rather docile with a heart of gold, compared to Urumi's intellect and potential to be savagely cruel). A side-story in the manga features Tomoko and her manager, also called GTO, only it stands for Great Tomoko Oppai (Oppai meaning breasts). In it, Tomoko's manager embarks on one very madcap adventure to save her from her dubious producers. In the live-action, instead of her succeeding dramatically in subsequent episodes, she would part for an Okinawa acting school.
Azusa Fuyutsuki101 fan favorites
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A 22-year-old beautiful female teacher. Unlike Onizuka, she led a relatively normal life, graduating from Waseda University. Her quiet manner and moderate ideas are misleading as she proves to be very tough on her own sometimes scaring even tough Onizuka. To prepare him for the test which would determine his teaching career, she prepares a mountain of jelly with eyes of Maguro tuna fish as fruits and imposes impossibly tough schedule that would have killed anyone or drove them mad. Her field of teaching is Kokugo or Japanese language (English in the Live Action). She, not that surprisingly, falls in love with Onizuka, but as both are quite reluctant to admit their feelings and show them in the open they claim that they are just "friends". It's not really a major matter to anyone else except Suguru Teshigawara, who finds it most aggravating that a woman with her qualifications would fall in love with one with such a crude background as Onizuka. She has difficulty with the female students in her class due to all the boys in her class having crushes on her but brings them around fairly quickly after Onizuka's advice. She has a younger sister named Makoto. The Azusa Fuyutsuki portrayed in the live action drama differs greatly from the anime and manga versions. In that version, Fuyutsuki became a teacher because she felt she was forced to, and envies the life of her sister, who became a stewardess who frequently dates male celebrities (and receive some fancy gifts as well.) She eventually decides to remain a teacher thanks to some convincing from Onizuka, though the two are continuously depicted as at odds with each other with love strongly implied. The live-action version of Fuyutsuki also has a dislike for men in general, finding them too possessive over women, though Onizuka also convinces her that she too is guilty of that same sin. Interestingly, she is also present to many of the "lessons" that Onizuka personally teaches his students.
Noboru Yoshikawa60 fan favorites
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A student at the Holy Forest Academy, and did not have a good time before Eikichi Onizuka arrived, being the victim of bullying, mostly from Uehara Anko and her group (Miyabi Aizawa replaces Anko's role in the live-action). He is extremely good with video games and is somewhat of an otaku, but proves to be quite handy with making things. Anko's bullying is so bad it makes Noboru attempt to commit suicide twice, both times by leaping off the roof of the school, and both times resulting in him being saved by Onizuka, at the cost of Vice-Principal Hiroshi Uchiyamada's car. The two strike a quick friendship, which works for Onizuka, as Noboru has plenty of items that he wants to "borrow". His loyalty to Onizuka is by far the strongest, seen when he willingly sells his game collection to help cover Onizuka's debt. While on the school trip to Okinawa, he gets room assigned with Anko and her friends by Onizuka. In retaliation for Onizuka and Noboru's antics, he gets tied up and led away into the dense jungle by the girls, but they all end up getting lost and rely on him for help. Despite the abuse, he saves Anko's life after she falls off a cliff, getting separated from the others. As the rest of the events of the manga unfolds, Noboru begins to enjoy Anko's company enough that she begins to feel affectionate to him.
Kunio Murai52 fan favorites
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The class "jock bully," Kunio Murai is not very bright and loses his temper easily. When Eikichi Onizuka arrives at the Holy Forest Academy, Kunio and his gang (consisting of Kouji Fujiyoshi and Tadaaki Kusano) attempt to kill him several times with seemingly innocent pranks, such as a cockroach planted in his school lunch. The plans backfire (such as Kunio eating the cockroach, instead) and he goes insane, nearly ending up with his face impaled on a pair of razor-sharp scissors. Onizuka then takes advantage of Kunio's 27-year-old mother, Julia Murai, after trouncing Kunio at several arcade games. It is later revealed that Julia was carrying her son at the age of 13, and her parents and boyfriend abandoned her, making Kunio overprotective of his mother. Kunio and his gang befriend Onizuka, after he saves them from a group of ruffians, but not before Onizuka joins the ruffians and has Kunio bungee jump off the Tokyo Bay Bridge. Kunio still gets very angry when Onizuka tries to make a pass at his mother, especially with the possibility that Onizuka may well be his new stepfather. His fear of a new father also rears its head when he suspects his mother may be marrying a man who resembles Dr. Elefun from Astro Boy. (Source: Wikipedia)
Miyabi Aizawa20 fan favorites
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In the anime, Aizawa began not to trust teachers anymore when one of her classmates got involved in a scandal due to an affair of their former instructor. From this, she and her cohorts began their quest of kicking out any teacher who will be assigned to their class. They were successful in making these teachers resign, but Onizuka...