History Anime / YugiohZEXAL

* CallBack: There are many of these to ''{{Anime/Yu-Gi-Oh!}} Duel Monsters'', such as Astral's relationship with Yuma paralleling that of Yugi and Dark Yugi.
** Many of the ace cards of the previous characters and protagonists of the previous series show up again as statues in the Duel Lodge in episode 15. Yuma even briefly becomes the Black Magician, similarly to Yugi in the duel against Bakura.
** When an underwater Field Spell is activated, Yuma thinks he's drowning. This is a reference to Juudai doing the same in episode 38 of ''Anime/YuGiOhGX''. Yuma does it again when an outer-space Field Spell is activated.

* MythologyGag: There are many of these to ''{{Anime/Yu-Gi-Oh!}} Duel Monsters'', such as Astral's relationship with Yuma paralleling that of Yugi and Dark Yugi.
** Many of the ace cards of the previous characters and protagonists of the previous series show up again as statues in the Duel Lodge in episode 15. Yuma even briefly becomes the Black Magician, similarly to Yugi in the duel against Bakura.
** When an underwater Field Spell is activated, Yuma thinks he's drowning. This is a reference to Juudai doing the same in episode 38 of ''Anime/YuGiOhGX''. Yuma does it again when an outer-space Field Spell is activated.

* CallBack: There are also many, intentional one to the ''{{Anime/Yu-Gi-Oh!}} Duel Monsters'', such as Astral's relationship with Yuma paralleling that of Yugi and Dark Yugi.
** Many of the ace cards of the previous characters and protagonists of the previous series show up again as statues in the Duel Lodge in episode 15. Yuma even briefly becomes the Black Magician, similarly to Yugi in the duel against Bakura.
** When an underwater Field Spell is activated, Yuma thinks he's drowning. This is a reference to Juudai doing the same in episode 38 of ''Anime/YuGiOhGX''. Yuma does it again when an outer-space Field Spell is activated.

* ShoutOut: Episode one has many to the ''Yu-Gi-Oh!'' Card Game itself. The cards themselves look near identical to the cards printed in Real Life, using the brown-and-black spiral vortex instead of the previous series' brown-with-black-dot. In Episode 2, Yuma's Monster Reborn card seems to have come from a Gold Series pack, judging by its distinctly dark yellow border.

* MagicSkirt: Kotori's is looking like this.

* ShoutOut: Episode one has many to the ''Yu-Gi-Oh!'' Card Game itself. The cards themselves look near identical to the cards printed in Real Life, using the brown-and-black spiral vortex instead of the previous series' brown-with-black-dot. In Episode 2, Yuma's Monster Reborn card seems to have come from a Gold Series pack, judging by its distinctly dark yellow border. There are also many, intentional references to the ''Yu-Gi-Oh!: Duel Monsters'', such as Astral's relationship with Yuma paralleling that of Yugi and Dark Yugi.
** Many of the ace cards of the previous characters and protagonists of the previous series show up again as statues in the Duel Lodge in episode 15. Yuma even briefly becomes the Dark Magician, similarly to Yugi in the duel against Bakura.

** There's also an episode that shows old cards that were ace monsters from the DM and GX era.

* WhenAllYouHaveIsAHammer: '''Yuma'''. "Monster with massively powerful effect and stats in the way? Just call 1-800-Utopia!"

* DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: "No. 39 Hope, King of Hope." The English card's name changes it to "Number 39: Utopia."

** The trash robots of the city, which are first seen straight from episode one. One of them called Obomi gets the focus for an episode, however, the most notable part is [[spoiler:the robots dump the trash they receive into a large hole like a garbage dump, where the torrents of trash are used to cause destruction to beings in another dimension(s)]]

** Astral> Nelson

** Also, the Numbers cards, which Astral absorbs and adds to Yuma's deck when he beats them. Kaito Tenjo does the same.

** There's also Yuma and Takashi's off-screen duel where Takashi wins without losing any of his lifepoints.

* {{Expy}}: Yuma looks like a cross between Jaden of ''Anime/YuGiOhGX'' and a ''{{Beyblade}}'' hero.

** Astral looks like Neo Spacian Twinkle Moss from ''Yu-Gi-Oh! GX'', with a relationship to the protagonist not unlike Yubel.
** Yuma's relationship with Astral seems to be intentionally designed to draw parallels to that of Yugi and Yami Yugi from ''Yu-Gi-Oh''.

* [[MatryoshkaObject Matryoshka Card]]: Housaku Yasai uses a move called "Tomato Matryoshka" which allows him to summon another "Tomato Matryoshka" from his hand or deck when it is Normal Summoned.

* ProtagonistCentredMorality: Tokunosuke/Flip makes fake [[PlotCoupon Heart Pieces]] out of candy and trades them with an innocent bystander for the real thing, then makes up the difference in numbers with more fake pieces in an attempt to make the second round. Why does he escape being expelled from the tournament for life? Yuma, his friend, jumps in and champions his cause, regardless of the punishment both being appropriate for the crime and sounding [[DoubleStandard rather similar to the one used in real-life tournaments]].

* MatryoshkaObject: Housaku Yasai uses a move called "Tomato Matryoshka" which allows him to summon another "Tomato Matryoshka" from his hand or deck when it is Normal Summoned.

** Yuma duels someone on top of a moving train, just like in [[Anime/{{Yu-Gi-Oh}} the first series]].

* HoYay: Yuuma and Astral, also called keyshipping, complete with tentacle porn (thanks No. 96)

** Good GOD. The last few episodes established him as a completely worthless moron who couldn't beat an egg without Astral holding his hand the whole way.
*** Episode 12 finally shows him using his brain a bit (with help from one of Shark's cards) without Astral needing to tell him everything to do...

* ThePowerOfFriendship: This is a Yu-Gi-Oh! series; it's to be expected.

* BoatLights: By virtue of their D-Gazers, ''everyone'' gains two eye colors. It seems like this was intentional on the part of the producers.

** In the dub, it's "I'm feeling the flow!"

* GamblersFallacy: Astral commits this fallacy during Yuma's duel with Charlie. He continually points out the low odds of Charlie rolling a six, given that he has already rolled so many in a row. While it is technically true that rolling a high number of sixes in a row is very unlikely, the odds of rolling a single six never change, so his chances are the same as always. [[spoiler: barring his ability to manipulate the roll.]]

** IV looks [[http://img402.imageshack.us/img402/7207/ivgingabishonen.jpg oddly like]] the Galactic Pretty Boy of ''StarDriver''.

* ForgottenChildhoodFriend: Anna [[spoiler: Subverted, it turns out the guy she was friends with, who she thought was Yuma, was actually some other kid named Yuya.]]

* LighterAndSofter: Compared to ''[[Anime/YuGiOh5Ds 5D's]]'' pre-episode 64 setting, Zexal's Heartland is a SugarBowl.

** A commercial promoting the dub pronounces the "X", time will tell if it sticks though.

* DoesNotLikeSpam: Yuma does not like Tomatos. To the point he would duel someone to prevent them from making a Tomato theme park. [[spoiler: Then he eats a tomato and loves it, teaching Yuma about the importance of not hating vegetables he doesn't try now and again.]]

* DrivingStick: Episode three had nearly anything electronic shut down or BSOD because of a virus started by a hacker VillainOfTheWeek, which include electronic cars, Akari is then shown driving a Manual Car complete with gratuitous screentime to the transmission.)

* {{Expy}}: Yuma looks like a cross between Jaden of ''Anime/YuGiOhGX'' and a ''Anime/Beyblade'' hero.

* Chekhov'sGunman: Cathy shows up in the background of a number of shots [[StalkingIsLove quietly watching Yuma]] before her formal introduction.
* CurbstompBattle: [[spoiler:Shark utterly destroys Yuma, even after Yuma breaks his word that wouldn't use Numbers in the Duel. He ends up making a costly mistake and losing when Shark eggs him on about it.]]

** In the Emperor's Key, Number 39: Utopia pulls this when Number 96: Black Mist attemps to attack Astral.

* LaserGuidedAmnesia: The number cards all carry some of Astral's memories, and he will not have them all back until Yuma gets all 100. When he first appears, Astral has only No. 39 Utopia and only remembers Duel Monsters until No 17. Leviathan Dragon comes into Yuma's procession, after which he remembers his own name, and each new Number Card allows him to remember a little bit more every time.

** Ghosh and Droit

* [[SuperpoweredEvilSide Superpowered Chaotic Side]]: [[http://images.wikia.com/yugioh/images/1/15/ChaosNumber39UtopiaRay-JP-Anime-ZX-Sealed.png Number C39: Utopia Ray.]]

* UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans: In episode 13 [[spoiler: we see the trash robots dumping the trash of the SugarBowl-like city of Heartland into inter dimensional portals causing pain and suffering to the beings on the other side. However this is averted; as this is the antagonist's decisions and we as viewers know that Dr. Faker's actions are not going to go unchallenged by Yuuma.]]