Trivia / Great Teacher Onizuka

• Adaptation Overdosed: GTO has a 43-episode anime adaptation, a live-action film, and no fewer than 4 live-action TV series. And then there's the spinoff GTO: 14 Days in Shonan and the sequel GTO: Paradise Lost. Its predecessor GTO: The Early Years also has several live-action adaptations and an OVA series.
• Creator Backlash: A panel in 2010 revealed that Kunio's primary English voice, Tony Oliver, didn’t care much for the character due to his Oedipus complex.
• The Danza: Akane Fujita's boyfriend Hideo is voiced by Hideo Ishikawa.
• Directed by Cast Member: The French dub of the anime was directed by Éric Peter, who also provided additional voices.
• Irony as She Is Cast: In the 1998 live-action, Kirari (the singer of the anime's first ending theme) plays Nanako, who shows how Hollywood Tone-Deaf she is when Onizuka considers entering her in an idol contest.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: GTO has been out of print since Tokyopop stopped publishing manga, so the only way to read it is to buy a used copy online or read the scans. Also, the 1998 live-action survives on various websites including YouTube.
• Long-Runners: GTO is an interesting case. The manga itself only lasted 5 years (1997-2002) with 207 chapters, but it continued the story begun with GTO: The Early Years (1990-96), which had 267 chapters (plus the 10-chapter Origins Episode Bad Company). Tooru Fujisawa then took a break for a few years, before returning to Onizuka's story with GTO: 14 Days in Shonan (2009-11, 77 chapters) and GTO: Paradise Lost (2014-present, currently at 144 chapters). This is excluding the non-Onizuka-centric stories GT-R: Great Transporter Ryuji (2012), Ino-Head Gargoyle (2012-2014), and Shonan Seven (2014-2019), which take place in the same universe. Therefore, the "GTO-verse" has run for 24 non-consecutive years over 8 different series (5 of them about Onizuka himself, over 21 years).
• The Other Darrin: Where do we begin with this one? On the Japanese side, when the GTO anime was created, none of the actors from the original Shonan Junai-gumi OVAs returned to their parts. Granted, there weren't many returning characters from the latter besides Ryuji and Onizuka himself, but still. The only returning actors in GTO were Shin-ichiro Miki, Hisao Egawa, Yasunori Matsumoto, and Yuri Shiratori in completely unrelated parts.
  • Wataru Takagi replaced Issei Futamata as Onizuka.
  • Isshin Chiba replaced Hideyuki Hori as Ryuji.
  • Kazuki Yao replaced Ken Narita as Saejima.
  • Kae Araki replaced Megumi Hayashibara as Nagisa for her brief cameo.
  • Plus Kaya Matsutani replaced Michiko Neya as Nao Kadena.
  • Also, in the GTO anime alone, minor supporting teacher Koji Sannomaru was voiced by Tsutomu Tsuji for his first couple of appearances before being replaced for the remainder of the show by Hirohiko Kakegawa.
  • On the English side of things, the GTO anime had many inconsistencies with its supporting cast. Most of the children of Class 3-4 were subject to recasting depending on whether some actors were available or not to record. The only students who didn't fall victim to this at some point were Fujiyoshi, Kusano, Tomoko, and Urumi.
  • In particular, Kirk Thornton was for whatever reason unavailable to record for volume 4, so his roles were filled in by Doug Erholtz (Yoshikawa) and Dave Wittenberg (Kikuchi, Ryuji, and Sannomaru). Kirk would return for the remainder of the series with volume 5.
  • Kunio was first voiced by Bryce Papenbrook in episode 4 (alongside his father who voiced Uchiyamada and some extras) before being replaced by Tony Oliver for the rest of the run. Bryce was a high school student at the time of recording and couldn't devote any more time to the series.
  • Speaking of the fourth episode, another oddity was that Anko and Miyabi's actresses, Dorothy Elias-Fahn and Wendee Lee respectfully, originally had their roles reversed with Wendee even voicing Anko in the preview for the next episode. After this, Dorothy stayed with Anko for the remainder of the show except in volume 3 when she wasn't available, so Cindy Robinson voiced the character for episode 14. Wendee would continue on as Miyabi from episode 7 to the series' end.
  • That was nothing compared to their Girl Posses, who never had consistent actresses in the dub. Poor Saeko had a grand total of FIVE different actresses voicing her across all her appearances! First Christine Ruprecht voiced her in episode 7, next Philece Sampler in episode 9, then Debbie Rothstein was settled on as the de facto voice (with Wendee Lee filling in for volume 4). However, Debbie did not return for volume 7 and onwards, so Cindy Robinson finished up for Saeko's remaining speaking parts. Chikako faired far better in comparison; she was mainly voiced by Sampler with the sole exception of episode 16, where Kate Higgins filled in.
  • As for Anko's lackeys, Mayuko was voiced by Debbie Rothstein for volume 2 but way down the line in volumes 9 and 10, because of the above mentioned with Saeko, was replaced by Kate Higgins. Naoko, on the other hand, had four different actresses. Cindy Robinson voiced her in volume 2, but since she was now filling in as Anko for that volume, she didn't return as Naoko and was replaced by Christine Ruprecht. Since Cindy was already voicing Saeko for the Okinawa episodes, Naoko was recast a third time with an uncredited Lara Jill Miller on volume 9. Miller did not return for the final volume so Naoko had to be recast yet again, this time with Karen Strassman.
  • Two members of the Holy Forest staff also fell victim to this in episode 3, with Brad Rowen and Wendee Lee voicing Sakurada and Kochatani, the latter was especially noticeable since the male teacher was voiced by a woman. Steve Blum, already voicing Onizuka and Fujiyoshi, would take over as Kochatani for the rest of his speaking appearances while Tony Oliver would voice Sakurada in episode 6 only before handing the role to Dave Wittenberg for the rest of the run.
  • Saejima was voiced by Richard Epcar (already Fukuroda) for his first two appearances but was replaced by Skip Stellrecht for his remaining three outings.
  • Finally, there's Uchiyamada's wife and daughter, Ryoko and Yoshiko. Originally, they were played by Debbie Rothstein (Uchiyamada's English voice's actual wife) and Dorothy Elias-Fahn in volume 1. In the second volume, however, while Dorothy was still Yoshiko, Wendee Lee had taken over as Ryoko. It was strange considering that Debbie was in volume 2 voicing Mayuko and Mrs. Uehara. Later still in volume 6, where the vice-principal got A Day in the Limelight, both Uchiyamada women were recast again with Kate Higgins voicing Yoshiko and Philece Sampler providing Ryoko's voice. It's, again, strange since Dorothy was also in the volume voicing Nao.
  • On a minor note, Tomoko's father was voiced by Dave Wittenberg in episode 9 but got replaced by Tony Oliver in the penultimate episode.
• Playing Against Type:
  • Junko Noda, who's usually cast in Action Girl or Cool Big Sis roles, plays the Alpha Bitch Miyabi Aizawa.
  • Tōru Furuya, who's best known for more heroic roles such as Amuro Ray or Tuxedo Mask, is playing the creepy Stalker with a Crush Teshigawara.
• Real-Life Relative: This is only the case in Episode 4's English dub, with Bob Papenbrook as Uchiyamada and his son Bryce Papenbrook as Murai. After this episode, however, the dub voice of Murai was taken over by Tony Oliver.
• Romance on the Set: The live-action actors of Onizuka and Fuyutsuki (Takashi Sorimachi and Nanako Matsushima) ended up together in Real Life.
• Sequel Gap: GTO finished in 2002, and didn't get a sequel until 2009 with GTO: 14 Days in Shonan. This is probably because Tooru Fujisawa wanted to focus on his other series, like Rose Hip Rose, Kamen Teacher, and Animal Joe.
• Star-Making Role: Onizuka was Wataru Takagi's breakout role as the main character.

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