Animanga/Manga| Information
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Animanga/OVA| Information
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'' (電影少女 ''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 and many shared characters.
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
DNA&2 and by the straight romantic comedy
I"s in 1997.
The story starts when Yota Moteuchi (弄内洋太 ''Moteuchi Yōta'') finds out that the girl he likes, Moemi Hayakawa (早川もえみ ''Hayakawa Moemi'') is in love with his best friend, Takashi Niimai (新舞貴志 ''Niimai Takashi''). 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 a video starring Ai Amano (天野あい ''Amano Ai''). Ai comes to life with the purpose to brighten up Yota's life and encourage him to pursue his love.
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.
- (天野あい ''Amano Ai'')
- (弄内洋太 ''Moteuchi Yōta'')
- (早川もえみ ''Hayakawa Moemi'')
- (新舞貴志 ''Niimai Takashi'')
- Volume 1 - American Edition: ISBN 159116074X
- Volume 2 - American Edition: ISBN 1591160758
- Volume 3 - American Edition: ISBN 1591160758
- Volume 4 - American Edition: ISBN 1591161045
- Volume 5 - American Edition: ISBN 1591161460
- Volume 6 - American Edition: ISBN 1591166071
- Volume 7 - American Edition: ISBN 1591167485
- Volume 8 - American Edition: ISBN 159116303X
- Volume 9 - American Edition: ISBN 1591163048
- Volume 10 - American Edition: ISBN 1591163056
- Volume 11 - American Edition: ISBN 1591163064
- Volume 12 - American Edition: ISBN 1591163072
- Volume 13 - American Edition: ISBN 1591163080
- Volume 14 - American Edition: ISBN 1591163099
- Volume 15 - American Edition: ISBN 142150295X
