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[Good Morning Call/Time Stranger Kyoko VHS cover art]
AKA: グッドモーニング・コール
Genre: Shoujo romantic comedy
Length: OAV, 19 minutes
Distributor: Currently unlicensed in North America
Content Rating: G (nothing objectionable)
Related Series: N/A
Also Recommended: I have three words for you: Read. The. Manga. Or watch Marmalade Boy or Kodocha. You will be a much happier doink afterwards.
Notes: Based on the manga by Takasuka Yue, which ran in Ribon.

This OAV was featured on the same tape as the Time Stranger Kyoko OAV was.
Rating:

Good Morning Call

Synopsis

The original story is about Yoshikawa Nao, an ordinary schoolgirl. Since she lives too far from school, she decides to rent an apartment. But when she comes to the apartment, she finds that it is already taken by Uehara Hisashi, a popular boy at her school! So Nao and Hisashi decide to live together.

In the OAV, Hisashi's birthday is coming up. Nao tries to find the perfect present, but it turns out that Nao had made a big mistake and thought that his birthday was on the 17th when really it was on the 7th! OHNOES! Now what will Nao do? Will she be able to make up with Hisashi?


Review

First off, let me get one thing straight. I enjoyed the original Good Morning Call manga. It was not groundbreakingly original, but it was cute and had fun characters. Apparently many Ribon readers felt the same way, since the manga ran for 5 years and toward the end of its run, this OAV was made. Since I am a fan of the original manga, I decided to find and watch the OAV, thinking it would be really good. Sure it's a Ribon OAV, but not all of them are doinky! - or so I thought...

Apparently since the GMC manga was near the end of the run, Shueisha just decided to get a couple animators, a scriptwriter, and some B-list seiyuu and have them make a quickie OAV to give away through Ribon. And the little kids certainly wouldn't know whether it's bad or not. The problem was...because of this, the OAV turned out to be very, very slapdash.

The OAV assumes you are familiar with these characters already from reading all 11 volumes of the manga, so they just give some exposition on the original story for the first two minutes, and then jumps right into the story of the OAV. And, well, it's a really, really predictable story. Like with most of these things, you KNOW that Nao will get Hisashi's birthday wrong, that Hisashi will get mad, that Nao will angst, that Hisashi and Nao will apologize to each other on a moonlit night and then kiss each other while sappy generic music plays. Admittedly Good Morning Call is aimed at 8-year-olds, but I bet a lot of them would be disappointed in this OAV too. The character development? The only way the OAV comes close to character development is to show the characters' names on screen whenever a new one appears, and have Nao say a few things about them (usually just things like "This is my best friend Yuri-chan" or stuff like that). That's it. If that's character development, then I'm the Maharajah of Mysore.

The art and animation are just as hastily put together as the story. The character designs do not resemble Takasuka Yue's original designs in the least, and many times they are sloppily drawn and poorly animated. There were no ending credits, but I'm betting that Shueisha farmed this out to some really cheapo studio somewhere to animate, that's how bad the animation is. Music? Hah! It's all BGM, and it's all generic, so generic that you barely notice it. As for the seiyuu, they delivered a somewhat competent performance.

Unlike with some other Ribon OAVs, this one was probably not intended to be a pilot for a TV series. After all, the manga was about to end. It was probably intended to be a "treat" for loyal readers of the manga, just like the Full Moon o Sagashite Special. And like that special, this OAV is doinky. Just stick to reading the manga, or find another Sappy Love Story anime to watch.

Apparently Shueisha did not learn a valuable lesson: NEVER EVER TRY TO ADAPT A 10+ VOLUME MANGA INTO AN 18-MINUTE OAV! Add two stars if you really, really, really like romantic comedies. Jennifer Berman

Recommended Audience: This OAV is aimed at little girls. Little girls who were probably looking forward to this OAV as much as doinkies. Since it is aimed at this target group, there is virtually nothing objectionable or doinky.



Version(s) Viewed: digital source
Review Status: Full (1/1)
Good Morning Call © 2001 Takasuka Yue/Shueisha
 
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