If you like Pokemon you will LOVE Yuugioh. And even if you HATE Pokemon or have lost interests in the show and the game, you will LOVE Yuugioh. Yuugioh is the smash hit shonen (boys) series that has taken Japan by storm.
What makes this 30 minute animated commercial-er cartoon or anime so great is that it is unlike the series from which it was derived (i.e. Pokemon and Digimon), the main character Yuugi (whose name is the Japanese word for play or game) is the possessor of a dark power that allows him to dispense justice by manipulating reality through a myriad of mind numbing, life threatening games, that cause people to go insane. How this will play out by 4 Kids Entertainment version airing this fall on the Kids WB will surely be a disappointment. So make sure you read all the way to the end of this article to find out how you can help get an unedited subtitled Japanese version released here in the States and Canada.
Yuugioh was created by mangaka (manga creator/writer) Kazuki Takahashi in 1996 and is currently running in the famous Shonen Jump, home to some of the most famous manga-to-anime series like Dragonball, Ranma 1/2, and Rurouni Kenshin.
Yuugioh the anime series is actually made up of two different series that began in 1998 and are still running. Yuugioh is based on the first six tankoubon (collection of comics) and Yuugioh Duel Monsters begins from tankoubon seven, and focuses on the card game Duel Monsters, which is known in the manga as Magic and Wizards. Duel Monsters is a combination of Pokemon and Magic: The Gathering.
Yuugioh is an average looking animated series. In my opinion the Yuugi's battles are what totally make the show worth watching. Minus these scenes and the show is nothing more than a regular anime show geared for kids.
The characters start off being you're a typical type anime high school students; nerds, bully's, saucy girls, and strange old people. There is also your deep underlying moral message of love and friendship and need for justice. But what made me like Yuugioh better than Pokemon and Digimon, is that Yuugioh's scenes with his opponent are intense, violent, and thought provoking, and this is the seducing part of the series that will make you kick yourself. Too bad many of these scenes will not be in the Americanized/Canadianized version of the series.
Yuugioh is about a high school freshman named Yuugi who is a nerd. Yuugi is short, shy, and LOVES games. His grandfather Sugoroku, the owner of a cool game shop that sells every kind of game from card games to video games, is the one who gives him the Thousand Year Puzzle. The story behind the Thousand Year Puzzle is that it was used in ancient Egypt to predict people's futures and decide their fates. It is known as the Game of Darkness, because whoever posses it gains this knowledge of Darkness and is able to dispense justice by vigilante means, which might include making the perpetrator insane or even, die.
Yuugi releases the power of the darkness when Ushou, the undisputed law of the school, attempts to extort money from Yuugi by beating up on Jounouchi and Honda, two freshmen who taunt Yuugi. Yuugi who never made an agreement with Honda stands up for Jounouchi and Honda, and ends up being beaten as well. Full of anger and pain Yuugi becomes Yuugioh and takes Ushou into another dimension where they are on a tower. Yuugi's appearance is no longer meek and mild. He seems taller, his voice deeper and his eyes wild and fierce. He challenges Ushou to a card game. The cards are lined up on the tower, while Ushou and Yuugi are held to the top of the tower by a rope. Each must take turns climbing the tower a certain number of steps, depending the on the number on the card selected, each time a person picks a card the other is lowered by the number the other advances. The one to top wins an unspecified prize. Of course Yuugi wins, enraging Ushou who immediately pushes Yuugi off, or at least it seems. The purpose of this game is to show how greedy and underhanded Ushou is, but instead of Yuugi falling, Ushou falls into the mouth of a monster, or at least that is what he thinks, when his classmates find him the next day crying for his mommy in a pile of leaves. That's just great anime people!
Yuugi, after dispensing his brand of vigilante justice is usually unaware of how brave and strong he is during these events.
In episode four, Yuugi meets up with his most formidable opponent Seto Kaiba. Everyone at Yuugi's school is hooked on the new dueling card game Duel Monsters, including Seto, the son of an extremely rich businessman whose company makes the Duel Monsters card game. Seto Kaiba is a master of Duel Monsters, he was won championships all over the country and will go to any lengths to obtain the rarest Duel Monster cards, including having his security guards beat up other kids for these treasures.
Yuugi eager to make friends with everyone immediately befriends Seto, who becomes extremely happy when he finds out that Yuugi's grandfather posses the rarest of all Duel Monster cards, the Blue Eyes Dragon, which he received as a gift from a dear friend when he visited America.
When Yuugi's grandfather declines Seto's offer to buy the card, Seto devises a scheme, and switches the real Blue Eyes Dragon card with a counterfeit one. Jounouchi and Honda realize this and confront Seto who has them beat up by his security guards. Once Yuugi realizes what he has done he becomes the Yuugioh, and takes a daring chance that might end up destroying the Blue Eyes Dragon Card.
Yuugioh challenges Seto to a Duel Monsters game, house rules of course. Yuugioh makes the monsters on the card turn into phantoms that can fight one another. As he and Seto sit at the table, their phantom monsters battle, whoever looses, that card and monster burn up into nothing. Seto, scared but intrigued agrees, and in one of the most intense and daring moves in animation, the creators of this anime actually managed to make a card game exciting. Never in all my years of watching animation, has anyone managed to pull of such a daring feat and succeed. The points were set up behind each character and as their monsters dueled their points decreased.
Yuugioh manages to beat Seto destroying the Blue Eyes Dragon, but he is able to 'resurrect' the card by using an Ankh (Egyptian symbol placed on the dead and will resurrect one in the after world) card and returns the Blue Eyes Dragon to his grandfather. But not without creating a nearly mortal enemy with Seto who thought he was the ultimate Duel Monsters champion. However, Seto rather than being sad, is enthralled because Yuugioh's power to manipulate reality has made the Duel Monsters game more exciting and life threatening.
Yes, friends this is Yuugioh. I only hope that 4 Kids Entertainment allows those of us who are die hard fans not to have to endure the US/Canadian Government's rules which regulate children's programming and sell an unedited version of the series. I hope they do not make the same mistake Viz did with Dragonball Manga and end up basically apologizing to older fans and end up ANYWAY, producing an uncut series for us. I strongly encourage those who are already fans from seeing the fansubs or the original series, and those interested in becoming involved in this phenomenon to sign this petition to have a subtitled, uncut version of Yuugioh released in the States and Canada. Petition for an Uncut English Dub and Subtitled Version of Yuugioh!