Love can be found on a Videotape?!     Aug 28, 2007     reviewed by Ricardo Peña    

This is my favorite Love-comedy manga... And it wins big time. First of all, though it does have a lot of fan-service, this manga doesn´t focus on it (Like a lot of other love-comedy mangas do) but in giving us an excelent love story that focuses on a lot of characters relations... Not just Yota´s, unlike many love mangas.

Now, something I really liked about this mangas is that is not your typical Love-Comedy in which the main character is surrounded by beautiful girls that like him, NO, Yota is everything but that, he is called Motenai Yota (Dateless Yota) because he is... Dateless! The character development is also very good and it explains most of the things.

The art is stuning, you could just watch the character expresions and know what he is feeling in that moment, without the need of reading what the says.

This manga has a lot of action and Sci-Fi, since the first manga chapter you can tell that. Ai isn´t a human, she is a Video Girl, Video Girls are made to make men happy, but they can´t fall in love with them... What would happen if a Video Girl falls in love with someone? Well, I won´t answer to that question, go read this manga.

Ricardo Peña also recommended: I´s, Chobits.,
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Saying goodbye     Jun 07, 2007     reviewed by Deejay_Beta    
(Video Girl Ai Vol. 11: Farewell Scene)

Yota's deadline for submitting artwork for the children's book he's working on is tomorrow, but he feels it won't be up to snuff unless Ai is helping him out with the coloring. Which is probably true since there's always an aspect of being lost surrounding Yota when Ai isn't around. He's also still trying to work out who he really loves. Is Moemi just a consolation prize because he didn't want to get involved with Ai, who he knew was always destined to disappear eventually? But now he knows that Ai can become a real girl if a human falls in love with her so what's stopping him now? I'll tell you. He's a wuss! Meanwhile, his childhood friend Natsumi is laid up dying in a hospital and Ai has made it her mission to find the boyfriend that dumped her and caused her to come to Tokyo in the first place.

Video Girl Ai is suffused with too many characters that are afraid of rocking the boat, so they all just tend to wallow in misery. Yota is afraid to hurt Moemi's feelings by dumping her and going for Ai, while Ai is waiting for Yota to choose herself as the one he loves and get the courage to break up with Moemi. Natsumi has given up on seeing the guy she loves again. The only character that seems to be doing anything to improve her situation is Moemi. At least she hasn't given up on Yota and pursues him passionately even though she perhaps doesn't use the best methods. Video Girl Ai is probably a series that has gone on too long but it's still entertaining if frustrating to read. The side story with Natsumi's boyfriend was actually more intriguing than the main storyline. Still an ok read.

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Tape erasure and picking a girl     Jun 07, 2007     reviewed by Deejay_Beta    
(Video Girl Ai Vol. 04 Offline)

Nobuko has decided it's time to raise their relationship to the next level. Even though the two lovebirds have never kissed, she wants to spend the night with Yota at his house. But at the most inopportune time, he gets a call from Ai and has to go to her emotional rescue. Ai, while still suffering from amnesia, is drawn inexplicably to Yota but she doesn't want to hurt Nobuko. And besides that, she has bigger problems when her creator arrives on Earth, his mission to erase Ai! Yota is at a loss since he still cares for Ai but feels he had to move on because of her lost memory. Even the girl that started all this mess, Moemi, is wanting more than just friendship from our once Dateless hero.

This manga has evolved from a once comedic formula of boy meets tomboyish fantasy girl to a romance in the space of the last two volumes. It's hard to sympathize with Yota at times because of his embarrassment of riches. It seems like all the girls want him now but he's having a hard time doing what has to be done. Mainly, picking one! Katsura did a better job in this fourth volume of making Yota's decisions based on his unwillingness to hurt anyone instead of portraying him as a sort of caddish gigolo in the last volume. But most of the time, a failure to express your feelings in a relationship leads to trouble. If only Yota could learn this lesson. This is turning into a fine series.

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Your not a real girl!     Jun 07, 2007     reviewed by Deejay_Beta    

Yota is desperately searching for Ai in the city streets, but he's never going to find her. She has been summoned back to the Gokuruku videostore, in what looks like another dimension, by the man(?) who created her. He threatens to erase her because she's not supposed to fall in love with Yota herself, she's supposed to FIND his true love. She's letting her own feelings get in the way of Yota's happiness because Ai can never live a normal life since she only has three months of life. She is able to convince him to give her one more chance, but she cannot show any personal feelings for Yota. If she does, she might just disappear! And what's the deal with Moemi? She seems to spend an awful lot of time talking to Yota, even though her boyfriend is Takashi. This volume also introduces the incorrigible pervert and Ai-admirer, Takao Sorayama, president of the school art club and son of an important PTA member.

This volume had more emotional heft than the first volume and was the better for it. It has a lot of shojo elements but more in the male role as Yota can't really decide who he really loves, Moemi or Yota? I guess he wishes he could have both, but in the real world that never works. And is Takashi only dating Moemi to galvanize Yota into taking action with his feelings, hoping he will become jealous or angry at least? Or does Takashi like Moemi himself? There's all kinds of good emotional interplay here between the main characters, with noone really taking a dominant role in the manga. That's not a bad thing. I've even got over the late 80s horrible fashion sense that bothered me in Volume 1. Good book

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Ai gets her memory back!     Jun 04, 2007     reviewed by Deejay_Beta    
(Video Girl Ai Vol. 09: Cut Scenes)

In Volume 9 of Video Girl Ai: Cut Scenes, Ai finally gets all her memories back of her love for Yota. She kinda already suspected that in her past life she was in love with him, but now all her suspicions are confirmed and she's in a bind as to what to do with them because Yota is finally realizing his dream of being Moemi's boyfriend. Ai doesn't want to ruin anything that could develop between the two, but not only does she have to fight against her own selfish desires for Yota, her tape is rapidly running out of time. Her creator had given her additional playing time and even said he would make her human IF she could make a man fall in love with her. Perhaps getting to work one-on-one with Yota as she helps him finish a submission for a children's book contest might give her the opportunity to grow close to him again.

Volume 9 was one of the more enjoyable installments of this series because we get back to the root conflict that started it all. Namely, the fact that Ai, instead of helping Yota get the girl of his dreams, falls in love with him instead and complicates the whole situation. I always felt a little uncomfortable with the amnesiac Ai and was glad to see her go back to her old self. Without her presence, Yota had become a playboy jerk whose affections were pretty much blowing in the wind. I'm really curious as to how it will end. It's too bad it took about 5 volumes to get back to the main plot line instead of dwelling in shojoesque relationships without any advancement of plot.

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Mai, The video eraser     Jun 04, 2007     reviewed by Deejay_Beta    
(Video Girl Ai Vol. 05 Spinoff)

The fifth volume of Video Girl Ai starts of with a cautionary tale as Ai's creator makes her witness the birth of Mai, a non-defective version of Ai who will do his bidding and not fall in love with the person she's supposed to help. But in a sadistic moment of experimentation, he gives Mai to someone unpure of heart, Naoto, who supposedly is in love with Nobuko. Besides bringing happiness to her master, Mai has another mission....to kill Ai! As Noboku and Yota continue to drift apart, Ai's memories begin to return and along with them, her love for Yota. But with Mai roaming around, will they have time to renew their relationship?

When Yota isn't busy stringing along 3 girls at a time, he can be quite likable. At times though, his failure to commit to any of the girls in his life make him very annoying. Ai's creator is especially intriguing because we still haven't really got an explanation of who he is or what his purpose in creating video girls really is. Masakazu Katsura's art is beautiful and realistic and painstakingly drawn. His fondness for accentuating adolescent angst can get tiring sometimes but when you have 14 volumes you can drag things out as much as you want, for good or bad. The lack of Yota's decisiveness does create an element of suspense though for future volumes. A good read.

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