Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series

The bulk of the show revolved around said card game.

I completely agree that it shouldn't have happened. But Jonouchi winning is still worse than him losing.

Jonouchi winning is illogical both skill wise and thematically. Kaiba losing to Yugi is part of his character arc, dueling Jonouchi isn't going to change that either way.

But having him lose would really overshadow his rivalry with Yugi by dunking on him further and making that his most recent loss. Jonouchi's arc was never about Kaiba, him winning there does nothing but pander.

It just seems like blatantly wanting Jonouchi to be thrown a bone instead of the story developing logically.

If the story was more realistic and allowed people like Yugi to lose against less skilled opponents with some regularity, that'd be fine. But when the story treats a duel result as a true measure of someone's skill, it'd be thematically inappropriate to toss that out for the sake of one character.

Yeah, the tournament and Millennium World both make up season 5, the way Virtual World and Battle City Finals were both Season 3.

Edited by Moth13 on Dec 2nd 2018 at 10:07:49 AM

Of course, his previous incarnation is in the arc so it's not like he was entirely absent. Since he's important to the myth arc it doesn't sound like a bad idea to involve him.

It's funny coz IIRC Kaiba's own past self ALSO does fuck all in the final arc. He finds an albino girl he crushes on and that explains his fetish for that one card. That's it. Like, you expect Priest Seto to have played a key role in the Pharaoh's past? Nah, they dueled that one time and it's it mostly.

I don't know what happens in the anime but in the manga he's pretty active. He's the first one to fight Bakura, he has the whole ka hunt subplot where he rounds up criminals and forces them into death matches to harvest powerful ka (which is where Kisara/Blue Eyes come into it) and is present for the final battle against Zorc, then has his final duel at the end which finishes the arc.

His dad is also the High Priest of Darkness and the major antagonist aside from Zorc.

Man, we've come all this way, and we still don't know what Pot of Greed does. Will we ever learn?

When firewall dragon will be bann- oh shit, that joke expired a week ago.

Edited by Yumil on Dec 3rd 2018 at 6:15:49 PM

x6. Honestly, I think it depends on how you view Kaiba's character arc. I personally think that he shouldn't have won, but I respect your opinion. I will say though that Jonouchi has shown himself to be a great duelist by standing up to Marik and almost winning, so I can personally see him beating Kaiba, but that's just my opinion.

x4. Unfortunately, Takahashi was forced to rush the final arc due to Executive Meddling and illness, which cut down Seto's role (which involved him actually betraying Atem on his own free will). This makes me more annoyed at the existence of the KC Grand Prix arc, since those episodes could have been used to flesh out the Millennium World arc.

Edited by SatoshiBakura on Dec 3rd 2018 at 12:44:26 PM

Manga-Kaiba did show up for the final duel, but he got there too late and arrived as the tomb was collapsing. I like that the anime had him realize/admit that Yugi, not the Pharaoh, was the King of Games, but I'll second that Joey-needs-a-win thing. It made more sense from a story standpoint at that point, as the whole point of Joey dueling him was to show that he needed to loosen up and remember what made dueling fun as well as his relationship with Mokuba, after Kaiba had gotten done telling everyone he didn't need anyone.

It would also gel well with Joey's duel against Yami Marik that even stunned Kaiba; the only reason he lost was due to YM's Plot Armor because he was in the middle of calling the game-winning attack when he fainted/temporarily died. And he didn't even have a Millennium Item, he did it all through willpower. There was an interview where Kazuki Takahashi said that he considers both the Pharaoh and Kaiba weak compared to Joey because Joey can take losses well and get back on his feet, though that kinda becomes a Broken Aesop given how dangerous and Serious Business games are in YGO...

The Bakuras all had the same issues as far as story/screentime goes but Joey, on top of lost screentime, gets humiliated and loses more. In the manga he even got to duel Yami Bakura in the final arc, and while he would have lost, the move Bakura pulled on him foreshadowed Yugi countering it when he dueled Bakura.

I like how the anime gave Tea, Tristan, Serenity, and Kisara more to do. They were just kinda there from Battle City on in the manga, and Kisara was just randomly attacked and died.

Edited by lalalei2001 on Dec 3rd 2018 at 9:53:43 AM

I just find it hilarious that Dark Bakura has a card that kills and possesses the other player if destroyed. Just goes to show how petty he is.

Yeah for me Joey winning against Kaiba would be better or a least making the duel more intense and show that kaiba could have lost, for me that duel show that Joey was serious duelist for now on.

Also Yami Marik isnt a great duelist, he pretty much cheat by using the power of Satan...I mean the shadow realm and force their oponents to move around that, he is pretty the best dickish chararter ever.

Shadow Games aside, it feels like Yami Marik's deck was tailor-made to take down Yugi and no one else.

... how so ?

Jounouchi nearly beating Dark Marik is also a problem: everyone almost beats Dark Marik. For the arc villain he has atrocious duel performance, he would have lost to Mai if not for Ra's bullshit Egyptian text (even worse in the anime, where Mai has a chance to attack for lethal damage but uses Ra anyway) he pulls out a new Ra ability put to beat regular Marik/Bakura - that his main personality didn't know about it!

And then he only beats Jounouchi due to him passing out. In the end, he looks really unimpressive even before his climactic duel with Yugi.

Supposedly, Jou beat the Pharaoh in that offscreen duel at the end of the Battle City arc, considering he has his Red Eyes afterwards. In the anime at least, I don't know about the manga. That means he'd at least have a chance of beating Kaiba, but of course it doesn't guarantee a victory.

Maybe it works like rock paper scissors. Jou beats Pharaoh who beats Kaiba who beats Jou.

Or maybe Yami sandbagged. Or just gave Red-Eyes back to Joey.

That is because Marik wins by cheating, he is the biggest cheater in the entire series, is entire way of playing is using the shadow realm by focusing in ways the other players react to is shadow powers.

May need to conserve monster because otherwise she will forget people, Joey recibe torture, Atem lose yugi and otherwise it would lose Marik.....

Yami marik is a good shadow power duelist but nothing else.

The story makes too big a deal about how Yami Yugi needs to be beaten in a duel to pass on to the afterlife for me to believe that Jounouchi did it off-screen with no-one mentioning it.

Jounouchi just needed to prove his strength, not necessarily beat him.

that just doesn't make him appear to be a threatening villain and doesn't make Jounouchi's almost victory as impactful.

Edited by Saiga on Dec 3rd 2018 at 10:26:37 PM

I'm pretty sure Takahashi stated somewhere that Jonouchi did in fact defeat Yugi. And the anime implied it as well.

I'd like to see that as I've seen no reference to it on the Yu-Gi-Oh boards I visit

I disagree with Marik, from a dueling perpective he is weak but from a narrative perpective he is perfect since he know how to rid stuff in is favor, is not the only to do it: Bakura does as well and Pegasus who use the biggest hax in the series to date.

Joey also summons his Red-Eyes in the Manga during the Millenium World stuff so I mean hey.

Yeah, where he doesn't physically have a deck...

I just found a reference to Takahashi saying in volume 18 of the bunkoban (the manga re-release) that he couldn't say who the winner of that duel was. So there's not going to be any evidence that proves it if he won't say.

I will said that if anything Joey should have corner Kaibe more, even the anime Kaiba one because for some reason Joey decide to not take control of Kaiser dragon(I think that was is name) and all around stupid choice.

For me, Joey is a Rocky-type character; he's admirable because of how far he makes it and the fact that he can put up a good fight against the reigning champ, even if victory is impossible.

It's also worth noting that Kaiba does come to respect him enough to invite him to compete in the Grand Championship.

I wonder how that'll be handled in the abridged considering Kaiba's disdain for Joey is taken Up To Eleven.