History NightmareFuel / YugiOh

** There's also Weevil's Insect Queen. Her giant spider-mantis body is frightening enough, but her [[http://yugipedia.com/wiki/Insect_Queen almost human like]] face is truly the stuff of nightmares. Want more? She gets stronger by eating the other cards Weevil places on the field.

* Despite theoretically being holograms, Duel Monsters respond like actual living monsters in some situations. For example, in "Master of the Magicians", Arkana's Dark Magician looks genuinely terrified when Arkana casually sacrifices it for a cheap shot at Yugi's life points. Think about what that implies for every monster that's ever been destroyed in the game.
** In the same episode, one of Arkana's cards has Yugi's Dark Magician chained up and taken out of the action, allowing Arkana to attack Yugi directly. The camera even takes a moment to focus on DM's face as his master is attacked and he's unable to protect him. Imagine how he must be feeling, especially since he's actually the reincarnation of the Pharaoh's most loyal protector--the same Pharaoh who's currently under attack.

* The very first chapter has Ushio beating Jonouchi and Honda up and forcing Yugi to pay him or he'll do the same to him. When Yami Yugi awakens, he challenges Ushio to a game involving money and a knife. They'd take turns stabbing the bills, balanced on their hand, and whoever stabbed their hand first would lose. After fighting the urge to swing the knife as hard as he can, Ushio tries to stab Yugi, but is given a penalty game where ''everything'' he sees looks like money. He's seen the next day happily playing with leaves and trash.
* The ZTV director filmed a documentary about bullying by making his assistant director beat Yugi and Jonouchi up. His Penalty Game was to see everything as a pixelated mosaic, which is represented by his eyes becoming pixelated. The digital coloring of the manga makes it even worse, as the colors are bright and full of static.
* For Sozoji, simply being a horrible singer wouldn't be too bad a character trait, but in his attempts to get people to listen to his horrible singing, he committed extortion and beat up an innocent person before deliberately tormenting him with horrible singing while having the gall to blame it on Yugi. Sozoji's Penalty Game was to be deafened by the sound of his own heartbeat.
* Kanekura's Penalty Game is disturbing. Ammit towers over him, preparing to eat his heart, and the shock gives him a heart attack. Neither Ammit itself or Kanekura's shocked face is decent to look at, to say at least.

* Hirutani's gang tries to hang Yugi with a chain, and would have if Jonouchi hadn't saved him.

** And that is just the context of the Japanese version where Yami is feeling like the name of ''[[UnstoppableRage Berserker Soul]]''. The English Dub makes this worse by [[TranquilFury making his anger more controlled]] and '''[[PayEvilUntoEvil takes sadistic pleasure in punishing Weevil]]'''. This side of Yami is the closest thing that the Western Hemisphere gets to having a ''Season Zero'' Yami Yugi.

* Sozoji's Penalty Game was to be deafened by the sound of his own heartbeat.

* Normal Bakura under the control of both Yami Bakura and Marik in Battle City is very unsettling in the manga. The sheer fact that Bakura has essentially no free will at this point and is not even aware of it is already bad in itself, but his [[DullEyesOfUnhappiness general expressions]] [[StepfordSmiler and behavior]] also sends him straight to the UncannyValley. There's a scene in the anime of Yami Bakura [[ItMakesSenseInContext messily eating a steak]]. In the manga, however, it's ''normal'' Bakura who's eating... with an unnervingly vacant expression.

** There's also Weevil's Insect Queen. Her giant spider-mantis body is frightening enough, but her [[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/yugioh/images/8/89/InsectQueen-JP-Anime-DM-NC.png/revision/latest?cb=20140806000305 almost human like]] face is truly the stuff of nightmares. Want more? She gets stronger by eating the other cards Weevil places on the field.

** Obviously, Yami Yugi does not let Panik do as he pleases. In the anime, Panik gets punished with a Mind Crush. In the manga, it is much more horrifying. In the middle of their duel, [[BreakThemByTalking Yami Yugi mocks Panik's defensive tactic by calling him a coward multiple times]], which angers Panik. Yami Yugi knows he already get under Panik's skin, then proceeds to provoke him by [[YouHaveNoChanceToSurvive saying "(insert number here) turns left until your life ends!" anytime Yami Yugi ends his turn]], which frightens Panik, no matter how much he tries to hide it. When Panik eventually loses all his Life Points, Yami Yugi then inflicts his trademark penalty game: [[AndIMustScream an illusion where Panik gets hanged in the darkness for eternity]]. It is only an illusion (albeit a gruesome one), but [[AssholeVictim knowing Panik's track record of ambushing and bullying Duelist Kingdom participants, it is safe to say that nobody is willing to help him out]].

** Obviously, Yami Yugi does not let Panik do as he pleases. In the anime, Panik gets punished with a Mind Crush. In the manga, it is much more horrifying. In the middle of their duel, [[BreakThemByTalking Yami Yugi mocks Panik's defensive tactic by calling him a coward multiple times, then proceeds to provoke him by saying "Your life will end in (insert number here) more turns"]]. When Panik does lose all his Life Points, Yami Yugi inflicts his trademark penalty game: [[AndIMustScream an illusion where Panik falls into dark abyss for eternity]]. [[AssholeVictim With Panik's track record of ambushing and bullying Duelist Kingdom participants, it is safe to say that nobody is willing to help him out]].

** Obviously, Yami Yugi does not let Panik do as he pleases. In the anime, Panik gets punished with a Mind Crush. In the manga, it is much more horrifying. In the middle of their duel, Yami Yugi mocks Panik's defensive tactic by calling him a coward, then proceeds to [[BreakThemByTalking provoke him by saying "Your life will end in (insert number here) more turns"]]. When Panik does lose all his Life Points, Yami Yugi inflicts his trademark penalty game: [[AndIMustScream an illusion where Panik falls into dark abyss for eternity]]. [[AssholeVictim With Panik's track record of ambushing and bullying Duelist Kingdom participants, it is safe to say that nobody is willing to help him out]].

** Obviously, Yami Yugi does not let Panik do as he pleases. In the anime, Panik gets punished with a Mind Crush. In the manga, it is much more horrifying. In the middle of their duel, Yami Yugi mocks Panik's defensive tactic by calling him a coward, then proceeds to [[BreaksThemByTalking provoke him by saying "Your life will end in (insert number here) more turns"]]. When Panik does lose all his Life Points, Yami Yugi inflicts his trademark penalty game: [[AndIMustScream an illusion where Panik falls into dark abyss for eternity]]. [[AssholeVictim With Panik's track record of ambushing and bullying Duelist Kingdom participants, it is safe to say that nobody is willing to help him out]].

* Panik/the Player Killer of Darkness, who threatened to burn Yugi alive in the anime and hang him in the manga. His strategy revolved around using the Castle of Dark Illusions to conceal his entire field in darkness and launch attacks where no one can see them. When he lost the duel to Yugi in the anime, he tried to kill him with flamethrowers.

* The apparent explanation why Atem is so [[AxCrazy dangerous]] when he first starts possessing Yugi is pretty scary. In the Memory World arc, we see he UsedToBeASweetKid. But then when he starts possessing Yugi three thousand years later, he's basically a sadistic vigilante. Apparently it's because the whole time he was in the Puzzle, [[AndIMustScream he was conscious]]. And all alone... for three thousand years...
** Both sensory deprivation and long-term isolation are known to quickly degrade one's sanity, as discovered by psychiatrists looking into how solitary confinement affects the mind. After only hours of isolation, an inmate can experience hallucinations. Sensory deprivation can cause similar effects even quicker, thought to be because the mind tries to stimulate itself in the absence of external stimulation. Mere ''weeks'' living in these conditions can drive a person completely mad... 3,000 years is a hellish ordeal that can barely be comprehended properly. It's frankly a miracle that Atem was able to recover ''any'' semblance of psychologically coherent or stable behavior at all, and his initial ability to function (if unstably) probably has a lot to do with the implication that he borrowed and copied aspects of Yugi's identity and mind.

** Both sensory deprivation and long-term isolation are known to quickly degrade one's sanity, as discovered by psychiatrists looking into how solitary confinement affects the mind. After only hours of isolation, an inmate can experience hallucinations. Sensory deprivation can cause similar effects even quicker, thought to be because the mind tries to stimulate itself in the absence of external stimulation. Mere weeks living in these conditions can drive a person completely mad. 3,000 years is a hellish experience with no psychological precedent, but all shorter known durations are extremely horrific in their effects; it's frankly a miracle Atem was able to recover any semblance of psychologically coherent or stable behavior at all, and his initial ability to function (if unstably) immediately upon his release probably has a lot to do with the implication that he borrowed and copied aspects of Yugi's identity and mind.

* Then there's the scenes where the Egyptian Gods attacked the members of Pegasus's excavation team for daring to find them. The photographer winds up trapped in the same room as Obelisk, but the cameraman decoding the hieroglyphs is attacked in his hotel by Slifer/Osiris, and we get a lovely shot of Slifer being revealed in the lightning as it coils around the building and snarls at him while he screams in terror. Think of it as a slasher movie where the killers are the freaking Egyptian Gods. The dub cuts out a shot of the photographer being defenestrated.

* The scene of Pegasus [[EyeScream receiving the Millennium Eye]]. In the manga, the scene itself is more ambiguous, Shadi's men merely approach Pegasus with the Eye and what seems to be a knife, and the next thing we see is [[ShadowDiscretionShot Pegasus' silhouette and his screams]]. The anime is much more blatant with Shadi pushing the artifact into Pegasus' eye socket whose face obviously shows pain and ''then'' hear his scream. The anime even adds a scene of him trying to get back on his knees, groaning, while holding the left part of his face. Then there's the scene with [[spoiler:Dark Bakura taking his Eye out, licking the blood off it. Also, unlike the anime, Pegasus ended up ''dead'' from this, and we're treated to a shot of Pegasus' corpse, with blood coming out where his eye used to be.]][[note]]Manga only, the anime only shows [[spoiler:Dark Bakura licking a bloodless Millennium Eye, which was removed from the dub entirely.]][[/note]]
** Then, in the movie, there is a scene where Pegasus pulls back his hair, [[GoryDiscretionShot and all we see is Kaiba's horrified reaction.]] Just in case you were in any doubt as to what [[spoiler:Dark Bakura did to Pegasus]].
* The Millennium Items themselves, thanks to their evil intelligence and their possession of an independent mind to a degree. When Shadi puts on the Millennium Ring on a graverobber, it [[spoiler:''stabs him in the chest and burns his body to the bone'']] because it deemed him unworthy. Pegasus' reaction at the scene speaks for itself.
-->'''Shadi:''' The Millennium Items' ownership is for those whose soul is worthy... Therefore the souls of those who don't deserve them will be [[spoiler:burned to death]]...
* The creation of the Millennium Items. [[spoiler:Who would want to wear something made of gold and the melted remains of 99 massacred villagers?]]
* An early scene in Millennium World has Thief King Bakura march into the throne room with [[spoiler: Atem's father, who is a mummified corpse, and Bakura is dragging him along the floor with a rope around his neck. Atem then shoves Bakura away from him, and lifts the corpse in his arms, looking at the thin slit that reveals his eyes. Naturally, his sadness turns to anger pretty soon after.]]
* Given there's never so much as a panel showing it, [[spoiler:Atem]]'s death and sealing in the Puzzle. Likely in the middle of battle, but the real terror is how young he was, and that his body was annihilated, leaving his soul to be trapped a tremendously long time in the darkness.
* Dark Bakura and the Millennium Ring are terrifying. Just think about it. You're a shy, quiet, good kid. Then one day, your AdventurerArchaeologist father gives you a shiny little trinket from ancient Egypt, and suddenly, everything changes. You find yourself with strange gaps in your memory and people around you start going into comas for no apparent reason. And most of the time, these victims are your friends, who you were just playing a friendly tabletop RPG with the day before. Then you finally make a new friend with a similar pendant, and then [[FromBadToWorse you start hearing a voice in your head]]. And it wants to skip the comas this time and outright kill your new friends. Oh yeah, and that voice also turns out to belong to [[spoiler:some twisted combination of the vengeful spirit of an ancient tomb robber that looks a lot like you, and an EldritchAbomination]]. It can [[DemonicPossession take over your body at will]], [[SpotTheImpostor flawlessly imitate your voice and behavior]], and do all sorts of horrible things and leave you to suffer the consequences. And no matter what you try to do about it, that accursed pendant of yours just ''[[ClingyMacguffin Won't. Go. Away]]''. This thing has you at its mercy, and there is absolutely ''nothing'' you can do to stop it.

* Dark Marik was [[spoiler: created by the hatred and pain Marik had to go through as a child when he was forced into the tomb keepers ritual by having the sacred script ''knifed'' into his back]]. The dub said it was tattooed, but that made it ''worse''. To achieve that level of detail in a tattoo without the aid of modern needles, it's most likely that [[spoiler:Marik's was inflicted using a method that the Inuit people used; taking a needle and thread, dipping it in ink and sliding it through under the skin like you're sewing. It leaves nice clean lines and it's reasonably hygienic, but it ''hurts so much''. To prevent the ink from fading you need to get it quite deep under the epidermis. In amongst all the nerves. Seeing the level of detail in the thing, it's a safe bet that it would have taken ''days'' to do it. Most likely with a handmade needle, much thicker than the one in your sewing kit, with rough jute thread to pick up the ink, and the ink itself would probably be some horrible concoction. Sandpaper string. Covered in caustic ink. In the soft skin on your back. For days.]]

** Yami Marik killed Marik's father in the dub by sending him to the Shadow Realm (where he died) and stabbing him to death in the Japanese version of the anime. All of that pales to how he killed him in the manga, where he [[spoiler:skinned him alive]]. Even worse than how Marik's father was killed in the manga is why. [[spoiler: He brutally tortured and then murdered (or so he thought) Rishid in front of Marik to punish him for sneaking outside, all while laughing and taunting his son about it like a psychopath.]]

* Right after Bandit Keith loses to Jonouchi in Duelist Kingdom, Keith decided to confront Pegasus in the hall. He held out a knife and demanded that Pegasus give him the prize money. Pegasus' guard prepared to take out a gun, but Pegasus insisted there was no need for a weapon. Pegasus said that he was aware Keith had cheated against Jonouchi and that he intended to punish him. Pegasus inflicted the "Hand and Gun" Penalty Game on him. [[spoiler:Keith's hand was then slowly turned into a gun, which he was forced to use to play Russian Roulette with, killing himself.]]
** This was changed in the anime, in which [[spoiler:he was thrown out of the castle and into the ocean hundreds of feet below.]] Not initially as scary, until a flashback in a later episode shows him almost drowning.

* When Black Magician is possessed by the Orichalcos, he struggles against it for awhile before giving a sinister grin as he enjoys the power-boost. Given that he's the spiritual remains of a priest who could subdue the part of [[spoiler: Zorc Necrophades]] that was sealed inside the Millennium Ring, this speaks volumes of how dangerous this kind of magic is. Orichalcos doesn't force you under its power, it ''tempts'' you.

* In the manga, Japanese anime, and English dub, at the start of the Memory World arc, Yugi's grandpa gives us a flashback of when he took the Millennium Puzzle out of the Pharaoh's tomb. But in every single version, the puzzle is the ''only'' thing that's in the burial chamber of the tomb. The Pharaoh's body isn't there. [[spoiler:One of the beliefs of ancient Egyptians was that the body needed to be intact to allow a spirit to enter the afterlife, so if something happened to the Pharaoh's body he shouldn't have been able to enter the afterlife]]. That was the reason the Pharaoh couldn't pass on in the first place. In the manga, it was confirmed that [[spoiler:sealing himself in the Puzzle destroyed his body. He was ''already'' trapped forever between life and death, sealed in the Millennium Puzzle. The Ceremonial Battle was what was needed to allow him to pass.]]

* [[spoiler:Thief King Bakura's death]] in the manga and anime. Yami Bakura disposes of him by turning his entire body to sand, and in the anime he's conscious enough to realize what's happening to him and cry for help before he collapses.

* [[http://56.media.tumblr.com/a9851e57d938b4fabcc9af98babb330c/tumblr_nskqhyyMhN1u76hl0o1_1280.jpg This face]] Yami Bakura makes as he gloats that the Pharaoh's life is under his control in the Memory World RPG. It comes out of ''nowhere''. His facial expressions become increasingly more unhinged as he gets closer to defeating the Pharaoh in the RPG. Not even the three Egyptian Gods can faze him, given that he knows for a fact that Zorc can defeat them, which he knows because [[spoiler:part of him ''is'' Zorc]].

** Just the reveal itself is Nightmare Fuel in of itself. The menacing and malicious Yami Bakura isn't just the soul of [[spoiler:Thief King Bakura]] but also a fraction of [[spoiler:the ancient evil God]] that nearly tore apart all of the, at the time, known world and likely would have continued after destroying all of [[spoiler:Atem's]] kingdom. It brings to mind how he mentioned back at Duelist Kingdom that Yugi had no idea what kind of danger he was facing and now you realize just how right he was.
* When Yugi and his friends attempt to find the Pharaoh's name, they learn [[spoiler:the wish made on the Puzzle must be returned to it in order to pass--meaning Yugi's friends must fall into the abyss]]. Thankfully, everyone manages to survive, but Yugi's anguish when he tells them that ''they'' were his wish really hurts to see.

* They ''killed Grandpa and Pegasus'' with a falling building, although [[spoiler: it's all undone by the time Yugi, Yusei, and Jaden defeat Paradox.]]

* Dark Necrofear. Even in the dub, that thing was creepy as hell. In the Japanese version, when she dies, the viewer is treated to a lovely shot of Dark Necrofear's [[EyeScream eyes burning out of her head]]. This was, understandably, cut out of the dub.

* In the manga, Marik hypnotizes Anzu and forces her to take a pill, presumably a CyanidePill, between her teeth. If Yugi does not duel Jonouchi, Marik will force her to swallow it. In the anime, he made her handcuff herself to a seat, with a giant block of concrete suspended above her head, and then released her so she'd be ForcedToWatch the duel itself. What's more is that this was one of the rare instances in the [=4Kids=] dub where NeverSayDie is averted, so the audience knows that Marik's not playing around anymore.

* The scene of Pegasus [[EyeScream receiving the Millennium Eye]]. In the manga, the scene itself is more ambiguous, Shadi's men merely approach Pegasus with the Eye and what seems to be a knife, and the next thing we see is [[ShadowDiscretionShot Pegasus' silhouette and his screams]]. The anime is much more blatant with Shadi pushing the artifact into Pegasus' eye socket whose face obviously shows pain and ''then'' hear his scream. The anime even adds a scene of him trying to get back on his knees, groaning, while holding the left part of his face. Then there's the scene with [[spoiler:Dark Bakura taking his Eye out, licking the blood off it.]][[note]]Manga only, the anime only shows [[spoiler:Dark Bakura licking a bloodless Millennium Eye, which was removed from the dub entirely.]][[/note]]