GTO: Shonan 14 Days

As I said in a previous post, Great Teacher Onizuka will be returning in a brand new series. Well, the first chapter of GTO: Shonan 14 Days is finally up. While a judgement can't be made after one chapter, we might be able to predict the direction Fujisawa decides to take the sequel in.

Rather than a year or two time skip like I was predicting, the new series takes place only two weeks after the orginal series ended. Onizuka is up to his old antics again, escaping from his hospital bed so he can get on a TV program that asks teachers to remember pranks they played as a student. Knowing Onizuka, he was bound to offend a few people if not lead to the questioning of his own sanity. Of course the "prank" he remembers is almost burying alive one of his students after thinking he killed her (a humorous yet touching scene from GTO). This of course leads to Onizuka being thrown out of the studio. Eventually, he decides to lay low in Shonan for a few weeks. After a series of events involving a shoplifter and a run-in with the cops, Onizuka meets another teacher that offers a job at a school in Shonan with another "problem class". And thus, the cycle begins again.

Like I said before, it is impossible to determine where the series will go after only one chapter, but it seems to have already cemented itself as a reboot. While I don't really have a big problem with this, there was something that I thought could've been executed better. The fiasco at the TV studio pales in comparison to the trouble Onizuka was faced with almost every chapter back in GTO. It just seems like a cheap way to reboot the series. Other than that, I really had no problem with the first chapter.

One thing I am legitimately worried about is the length. The title makes it seem like the series will only encompass the two weeks Onizuka spends in Shonan. GTO took place over a whole semester (6 months), which spanned 200 chapter. If the same day:chapter ratio exists in this sequel, it will be nothing more than a series of long one shots rather than a completely new series.

I'm also worried most of the old cast will not be returning. Being in a new area, a new cast will be introduced, which I'm sure I'll like over time, but I'm still used to the quirky students and angry princpal from GTO.

I'll have more on the series when we get a bit further in. Let's hope it lasts a while.