Where I rewatch Yugioh GX, Episode 95
Oct. 20th, 2010 05:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cypsiman2This time we've got subs. They're not good subs, but since I'm watching GX, I'm clearly not very picky about quality. In any event, we open with Shou dueling by the sea against another random Obelisk Blue student...okay, are the characters freeing Obelisk Blue from Saiou's control when we're not looking, or what? Seriously, episode 70, Manjoume defeats everyone in Obelisk Blue, including Asuka. And yet, every so often, we get some random Obelisk Blue running around for no better reason than to get his ass kicked by some random duelist. In any event, Shou attacks directly with Submarineroid, and wins. Also, remember how Shou kept hiding in trash cans and running away from everyone? Well, he's randomly over that. Would have been nice to see how we got from point A to point B, but that would be good writing, and GX does not believe in that sort of thing. But the duel ends on good terms, so I guess that means that Shou was doing that Respect Dueling that was never defined. Oh, and Judai was just randomly watching. Hey, remember how Judai said that the true enemy was still out there, and they needed to fight that enemy? If you're the least bit surprised by Judai's laziness and hypocrisy, you really haven't been watching this show. Shou's got a bunch of GX medals now, but he says its still not enough to face Ryou, and then Judai asks why Shou hasn't been using Power Bond...wait, you mean the fact that Shou hasn't used Power Bond this entire season was supposed to be a plot point? Sure could have fooled me! Shou says that he can't use it until he's ready for a real respect duel, which again means nothing since I've no idea what makes something a respect duel as opposed to a non-respect duel. I mean, it can't just be being courteous and polite to your opponent, because that would just be stupid. Judai thinks to himself that Shou's totally ready, but doesn't actually say it to Shou, because it's more important to look like you know what's going on than to actually do something with it. And now Kenzan's yelling that Edo and Ryou are about to duel. Shou goes off running, and Judai just stands there. Like an idiot. And yes, there they are show. Just like Kenzan said. Woo.
TITLE SCREEN! HONOR-LESS BROTHER DUEL SHOU VS. RYOU please bring honor to us, please bring honor to us, please bring honor to us all.
So Ryou glares at Edo and Edo's all 'I'd heard that you'd completely changed after I beat you, but I didn't really think you were that much of a wuss. So what now, you want revenge?' And now Shou runs up, as apparently he doesn't want Ryou to duel Edo out of revenge, though to be honest it didn't really look like Ryou cared the least little bit about revenge, and why would he? He's embraced his new persona, he likes being a jerkass who only cares about victory and doesn't give a damn about anyone else. Edo's turn for some dialogue, he tells Shou that his brother's eyes aren't those of someone looking for honor or pride, but for something else to come. Again, Edo's doing that whole thing where he psychoanalyzes someone he barely even knows, and the writers back him up despite there being no good reason for him to be right at all. Shou is now confused, and Edo says that he and Ryou can duel anytime, so it's no skin off his back if Shou goes ahead and duels Ryou, and truth be told, Hell Kaiser Ryou doesn't give a rat's ass whether he duels Edo or Shou. Then Judai shows up to encourage Shou, and believe it or not, his absence in this scene up to this point will actually be a decently explained plot point. You hardly ever see that sort of thing in this show. Of course, since Judai just goes ahead and grabs Shou's deck and starts shuffling it, it's pretty obvious what he's doing here, but I'll go ahead and pretend that there's a surprise here. And so Shou formally declares his intent to defeat the Hell Kaiser by respect duel. Ryou is amused, and declares that he'll let Shou experience the real duel of the Hell Kaiser, all while glowing a ridiculous blue Battle Aura. So Ryou opens up a briefcase from out of nowhere, showing everyone the shock collars that were used on him in the Underground League, the ones he blames for his character retooling. He asks Shou if he thinks he can withstand that Hellish duel with life and death on the line, and Shou does.
So after Judai finishes putting on Shou's BDSM shock collar, which is all kinds of weird that I'm not going into, blah blah blah, pep talk, and duel begins. Ryou goes first and summons Hell Dragon in defense, and sets one card to end his turn. Kenzan wonders why Ryou summoned a 2000 attack power monster in defense, for he is a moron, and then Shou takes his turn, summoning Truckroid in attack position. Shou is not a complete moron, and so realizes that Ryou wants his monster destroyed so that it will be in the grave and he can use it to empower his cyberdarks. Fortunately, Shou is prepared for that, because when Truckroid destroys a monster by battle, it is sent to Shou's Spell/trap zone, where it increases Truckroid's attack power by its own. So now Truckroid has 3000 attack points, and Ryou's strategy has been foiled...for now. Shou then sets a card, and ends his turn. Ryou's turn, he summons Bomber Dragon with 1000 attack points, and has it attack Truckroid. Shou is confused, the music director needs to be replaced, and Ryou reveals Bomber Dragon's effect, that it automatically destroys the opponent's monster and when it attacks neither player takes battle damage. Thus, all the monster are now in the grave, and Ryou activates the oh so convenient Quick Summon, and summons Cyberdark Horn to the field. He equips Hell Dragon to it, increasing its attack power to 2800 attack points, and since we're still in the battle phase, he attacks directly.
Now Shou activates his face-down card, Life Force; so long as its on the field, he can pay 400 life points to reduce the battle damage to zero, and does so. However, this still activates the shock collars, so Shou gets shocked. If I at all liked him as a character, or was in any way invested in his supposed relationship with Ryou, this would mean something to me. Incidentally, where the hell is Asuka? You know, one of Ryou's best friends? The person he confided in while Fubuki was missing? The person who was conveniently restored from her brainwashing just last episode, which in the hands of a good writer would facilitate her presence here? Oh, right, good writer...GX doesn't have one of those. They have Shin Yoshida. Anyway, Ryou says that even if Shou blocks his attacks, he can't block the real damage of the shock collars, and ends his turn. Shou decides that the intense pain he experienced must have been what changed the brother he hardly knew, and takes his turn. He summons Submarineroid and uses its effect to attack directly, does 800 damage to him, and Ryou does not even flinch from his own shock collars. In fact, he likes the pain, and laughs at Shou. So Shou uses Submarineroid's effect to switch it to defense mode, sets another card, and ends his turn. Ryou's shock collars are still going off, and Ryou declares that this is the feeling that taught him that victory is everything, respect for the duel is worthless. Shou's shocked expression, and Ryou takes his turn, summoning Cyberdark Edge, equipping Bomber Dragon to it to raise its attack power to 1800. He attacks with Cyberdark Horn, and Shou activates his trap card Cyber Repairer; Ryou gets to draw a card, but Shou's machine monsters can't be destroyed this turn. However, Horn can penetrate defense and Edge can attack directly, so Shou is forced to use Life Force twice, losing 800 life points, Shou suffers intense pain, and Ryou sets a card to end his turn. For no discernible reason Edo is all shocked about the change in Ryou's disposition, despite not only knowing all about it, but not giving a rat's ass about it. Oh, and don't expect him to feel the least bit guilty for his role in Hell Kaiser Ryou's retooling.
EYECATCH!
Shou says that this shouldn't be called a duel, and Ryou agrees, that's how he felt about the pain at first, but all he had to do was throw away all notions of respect, and look at him now! For some reason Shou acts all shocked about what Ryou just said, even though the fact that he no longer respects the duel is the whole supposed point of why Shou is dueling Ryou in the first place. I get the feeling that this episode didn't have an editor. At least not a good one. Ryou essentially says that people change, and Shou says he's wrong, and takes his turn. He plays Pot of Greed, and summons Cycroid, a normal monster with only 800 attack points, and equips it with Training Wheels so that it can attack directly, and after the damage step it gets removed from play until Shou's next standby phase. Now, I know what you're thinking, why didn't the writers just give Cycroid that effect, instead of forcing Shou to equip it with that spell card? Well, if they did that, Shou wouldn't need Pot of Greed, and...well, you'll see. So Shou attacks directly with both Cycroid and Submarineroid, dealing 1600 points of damage to Ryou, Cycroid is removed from play, and Submarineroid is put back in defense position. Shou sets a card and ends his turn. Ryou's turn, he plays Pot of Greed too, because predictable duel writing is predictable, and now he summons Cyberdark Keel, note how Ryou has no dragon in his grave for that one. Cyberdark Horn attacks and destroys Submarineroid, opening Shou up to two more direct attacks, and Shou uses Life Force three times, bringing Shou to 1600 life points, and he collapses. Ryou sets another card to end his turn, so at this point he has three face-down cards on the field.
Shou goes on about how he doesn't even know his brother anymore, not that he ever did, and how he can't respect someone like him the way he is now, and once again, Ryou agrees. He goes on and on about how victory is the only thing that matters to him, and if that means walking all over everyone and alienating them, no problem. More whining from Shou as he no longer believes that his brother will ever go back to the way he was, and now Judai is making noise. He's all 'yeah, you're in real intense pain right now, but you've still got cards, so respect them and keep playing.' Our hero, ladies and gentlemen. What a guy. I mean, I get that he's trying to get Shou not to give up on his brother, but honestly, the bad writing here really wrecks that. So yeah, Shou decides he won't betray his cards, he draws his card, and Shou is all shocked and looks to Judai, and yep, unnecessary flashback to show that Judai invaded Shou's room and ransacked it to find Power Bond so that he could sneak it into Shou's deck. What, just talk to him like an equal and ask him if he wants to use Power Bond? Why, that's for normal people, and as we've long ago established, Judai's far better then mere normal people. I mean, he's got a special cosmic destiny! Judai, being the delusional lunatic that he is, thinks that Power Bond chose Shou, and Shou swears that he'll take up the mantle of the respect duel, which once again, means nothing. Ryou knows full well that Shou just drew Power Bond, and now Cycroid returns to the field. He plays Powerbond, fusing Cycroid with another one in his hand to summon Pair Cycroid, who's attack power doubles to 3200. Also in accordance with Power Bond, Shou will take Pair Cycroid's original attack power as damage during the end phase, so if he doesn't win this turn, he's screwed.
Now Shou activates Pair Cycroid's effect, reducing its attack power by 500 to let it attack directly, and Ryou activates Power Wall, sending 27 cards from his deck to his grave to reduce the battle damage to zero, and wouldn't it have been hilarious if Shou were to have pulled a Ryou and opted to activate Limiter Removal to double his monster's attack power again, letting him do more damage than his Power Wall could handle? Also, Ryou is still doing that very silly drama queen bit where he just tosses his cards all around, not even bothering to put them in his graveyard slot. Shou sets a card, Ryou declares that Shou is now going to lose to Power Bond's effect, and Shou declares that Ryou's in the same boat as he activates his trap card Mirror Damage, equipping it to Pair Cycroid and bouncing the damage right back at Ryou. Dang, that's a trick that Ryou's never done before. Of course, Ryou is prepared for that too, and activates his trap card, Fusion Guard; by randomly sending a Fusion Monster from his deck to the grave, he negates the effect damage he would take. Wow, he just happened to pick Cyber End Dragon. You know what else would have been hilarious? If he'd accidentally sent Cyberdark Dragon to his grave instead. Anyway, Shou now ends his turn, Ryou says he's only got one card left in his deck, so he'll finish the duel this turn.
Ryou plays a really weird card called Warp Beam; he picks two monsters on his field, sends two other monsters on the field to the grave, and attacks directly with their attack powers reduced to 600. He chooses Horn and Keel for this, and with Edge's effect, he attacks directly with all three monsters. Shou activates Life Force three times, more shock collar shenanigans, but Ryou isn't done yet! He activates his last remaining trap card Samsara Dogma, allowing him to change all the monsters in his grave to any type he chooses, so he goes for Dragons. And why does this matter? Because he plays Instant Fusion, combining his three cyberdarks into Cyber Dark Dragon, and he uses the now Dragon-type Cyber End Dragon to raise Cyberdark's attack power to 5000, and since he has 38 cards in his grave, that means another 3800 attack points, for a grand total of 8800. Edo's all 'well, Shou's screwed', Ryou declares his attack, but Shou was one step ahead! He activates Emergency Provisions, sending Mirror Damage to the grave to recover 1000 life points, which incidentally gets rid of Pair Cycroid but its not like that was going to stick around for very long, and now with 1400 life points, he can activate Life Force, negating Cyber Dark Dragon's most powerful possible attack.
And then the writers screw the pooch, as Ryou pulls De-Fusion right out of his ass, letting him attack with all three Cyberdarks once more, and win. Thus, is Hell Kaiser Ryou's character arc stunted, and Asuka was cut out of these proceedings entirely, providing redundant proof that the writers are bastards. Shou collapses, Judai takes hold of him, and Judai yells out Kaiser like he's going to do anything about Ryou. He won't, just so you don't get your hopes up. End episode.
NEXT TIME! Judai duels a parody of Albert Einstein. EPISODE TITLE, RELATIVITY FIELD, JUDAI VS. THE GENIUS DOCTOR card of the week is cyberdark edge, whatever.
The writers probably figured that they were being unconventional, but really, they were just being stupid, and utterly failed to fulfill the plotline that they'd set up, choosing instead an inept anticlimax. I doubt I really need to spell this out, but I'm going to anyway; Ryou's character arc, which is really the only character arc this entire season, is about him dealing with defeat. He is crushed by Edo's defeat, he loses his ability to duel, and ends up descending into hell because of it, and his only escape is win at all costs. So he spurns all his old bonds, abandons all his beliefs, and focuses only on victory itself, hence his strategy of dumping his entire deck into the grave for just a little more power, all so that he doesn't lose again. Then his little brother, who even when he was at his best never regarded as an opponent who could possibly take him on, challenges him. They duel, they pull out all the stops, and as stated above, this is where the writers screwed up. What should have happened at this point is that Ryou should have been left with nothing useful in his hand, the cost of abandoning his deck so readily, and nothing but his fully powered Cyber Dark that had suborned his previous Ace, Cyber End Dragon, to achieve its power. Thus, he would have lost, to Shou. He would then have to face facts; it doesn't matter how good you are, it doesn't matter how ruthless you are, it doesn't matter how desperate for victory you are...sometimes you're going to lose, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. This would force Ryou to face the fact that for all that he'd "changed", he was still terrified of losing, terrified of being seen as weak, and all the lashing out and black leather was just him trying to disguise that. At which point, he could either go on a journey to redeem himself, or just run away, but the choice would be his. But instead, the writers decided to go with an inane moral victory for Shou, squandering all that. Oh, and big shock, that was Shou's last duel this season. Oh, and the Judai vs. Asuka duel? That was Asuka's last duel too. Don't you just hate this show?
TITLE SCREEN! HONOR-LESS BROTHER DUEL SHOU VS. RYOU please bring honor to us, please bring honor to us, please bring honor to us all.
So Ryou glares at Edo and Edo's all 'I'd heard that you'd completely changed after I beat you, but I didn't really think you were that much of a wuss. So what now, you want revenge?' And now Shou runs up, as apparently he doesn't want Ryou to duel Edo out of revenge, though to be honest it didn't really look like Ryou cared the least little bit about revenge, and why would he? He's embraced his new persona, he likes being a jerkass who only cares about victory and doesn't give a damn about anyone else. Edo's turn for some dialogue, he tells Shou that his brother's eyes aren't those of someone looking for honor or pride, but for something else to come. Again, Edo's doing that whole thing where he psychoanalyzes someone he barely even knows, and the writers back him up despite there being no good reason for him to be right at all. Shou is now confused, and Edo says that he and Ryou can duel anytime, so it's no skin off his back if Shou goes ahead and duels Ryou, and truth be told, Hell Kaiser Ryou doesn't give a rat's ass whether he duels Edo or Shou. Then Judai shows up to encourage Shou, and believe it or not, his absence in this scene up to this point will actually be a decently explained plot point. You hardly ever see that sort of thing in this show. Of course, since Judai just goes ahead and grabs Shou's deck and starts shuffling it, it's pretty obvious what he's doing here, but I'll go ahead and pretend that there's a surprise here. And so Shou formally declares his intent to defeat the Hell Kaiser by respect duel. Ryou is amused, and declares that he'll let Shou experience the real duel of the Hell Kaiser, all while glowing a ridiculous blue Battle Aura. So Ryou opens up a briefcase from out of nowhere, showing everyone the shock collars that were used on him in the Underground League, the ones he blames for his character retooling. He asks Shou if he thinks he can withstand that Hellish duel with life and death on the line, and Shou does.
So after Judai finishes putting on Shou's BDSM shock collar, which is all kinds of weird that I'm not going into, blah blah blah, pep talk, and duel begins. Ryou goes first and summons Hell Dragon in defense, and sets one card to end his turn. Kenzan wonders why Ryou summoned a 2000 attack power monster in defense, for he is a moron, and then Shou takes his turn, summoning Truckroid in attack position. Shou is not a complete moron, and so realizes that Ryou wants his monster destroyed so that it will be in the grave and he can use it to empower his cyberdarks. Fortunately, Shou is prepared for that, because when Truckroid destroys a monster by battle, it is sent to Shou's Spell/trap zone, where it increases Truckroid's attack power by its own. So now Truckroid has 3000 attack points, and Ryou's strategy has been foiled...for now. Shou then sets a card, and ends his turn. Ryou's turn, he summons Bomber Dragon with 1000 attack points, and has it attack Truckroid. Shou is confused, the music director needs to be replaced, and Ryou reveals Bomber Dragon's effect, that it automatically destroys the opponent's monster and when it attacks neither player takes battle damage. Thus, all the monster are now in the grave, and Ryou activates the oh so convenient Quick Summon, and summons Cyberdark Horn to the field. He equips Hell Dragon to it, increasing its attack power to 2800 attack points, and since we're still in the battle phase, he attacks directly.
Now Shou activates his face-down card, Life Force; so long as its on the field, he can pay 400 life points to reduce the battle damage to zero, and does so. However, this still activates the shock collars, so Shou gets shocked. If I at all liked him as a character, or was in any way invested in his supposed relationship with Ryou, this would mean something to me. Incidentally, where the hell is Asuka? You know, one of Ryou's best friends? The person he confided in while Fubuki was missing? The person who was conveniently restored from her brainwashing just last episode, which in the hands of a good writer would facilitate her presence here? Oh, right, good writer...GX doesn't have one of those. They have Shin Yoshida. Anyway, Ryou says that even if Shou blocks his attacks, he can't block the real damage of the shock collars, and ends his turn. Shou decides that the intense pain he experienced must have been what changed the brother he hardly knew, and takes his turn. He summons Submarineroid and uses its effect to attack directly, does 800 damage to him, and Ryou does not even flinch from his own shock collars. In fact, he likes the pain, and laughs at Shou. So Shou uses Submarineroid's effect to switch it to defense mode, sets another card, and ends his turn. Ryou's shock collars are still going off, and Ryou declares that this is the feeling that taught him that victory is everything, respect for the duel is worthless. Shou's shocked expression, and Ryou takes his turn, summoning Cyberdark Edge, equipping Bomber Dragon to it to raise its attack power to 1800. He attacks with Cyberdark Horn, and Shou activates his trap card Cyber Repairer; Ryou gets to draw a card, but Shou's machine monsters can't be destroyed this turn. However, Horn can penetrate defense and Edge can attack directly, so Shou is forced to use Life Force twice, losing 800 life points, Shou suffers intense pain, and Ryou sets a card to end his turn. For no discernible reason Edo is all shocked about the change in Ryou's disposition, despite not only knowing all about it, but not giving a rat's ass about it. Oh, and don't expect him to feel the least bit guilty for his role in Hell Kaiser Ryou's retooling.
EYECATCH!
Shou says that this shouldn't be called a duel, and Ryou agrees, that's how he felt about the pain at first, but all he had to do was throw away all notions of respect, and look at him now! For some reason Shou acts all shocked about what Ryou just said, even though the fact that he no longer respects the duel is the whole supposed point of why Shou is dueling Ryou in the first place. I get the feeling that this episode didn't have an editor. At least not a good one. Ryou essentially says that people change, and Shou says he's wrong, and takes his turn. He plays Pot of Greed, and summons Cycroid, a normal monster with only 800 attack points, and equips it with Training Wheels so that it can attack directly, and after the damage step it gets removed from play until Shou's next standby phase. Now, I know what you're thinking, why didn't the writers just give Cycroid that effect, instead of forcing Shou to equip it with that spell card? Well, if they did that, Shou wouldn't need Pot of Greed, and...well, you'll see. So Shou attacks directly with both Cycroid and Submarineroid, dealing 1600 points of damage to Ryou, Cycroid is removed from play, and Submarineroid is put back in defense position. Shou sets a card and ends his turn. Ryou's turn, he plays Pot of Greed too, because predictable duel writing is predictable, and now he summons Cyberdark Keel, note how Ryou has no dragon in his grave for that one. Cyberdark Horn attacks and destroys Submarineroid, opening Shou up to two more direct attacks, and Shou uses Life Force three times, bringing Shou to 1600 life points, and he collapses. Ryou sets another card to end his turn, so at this point he has three face-down cards on the field.
Shou goes on about how he doesn't even know his brother anymore, not that he ever did, and how he can't respect someone like him the way he is now, and once again, Ryou agrees. He goes on and on about how victory is the only thing that matters to him, and if that means walking all over everyone and alienating them, no problem. More whining from Shou as he no longer believes that his brother will ever go back to the way he was, and now Judai is making noise. He's all 'yeah, you're in real intense pain right now, but you've still got cards, so respect them and keep playing.' Our hero, ladies and gentlemen. What a guy. I mean, I get that he's trying to get Shou not to give up on his brother, but honestly, the bad writing here really wrecks that. So yeah, Shou decides he won't betray his cards, he draws his card, and Shou is all shocked and looks to Judai, and yep, unnecessary flashback to show that Judai invaded Shou's room and ransacked it to find Power Bond so that he could sneak it into Shou's deck. What, just talk to him like an equal and ask him if he wants to use Power Bond? Why, that's for normal people, and as we've long ago established, Judai's far better then mere normal people. I mean, he's got a special cosmic destiny! Judai, being the delusional lunatic that he is, thinks that Power Bond chose Shou, and Shou swears that he'll take up the mantle of the respect duel, which once again, means nothing. Ryou knows full well that Shou just drew Power Bond, and now Cycroid returns to the field. He plays Powerbond, fusing Cycroid with another one in his hand to summon Pair Cycroid, who's attack power doubles to 3200. Also in accordance with Power Bond, Shou will take Pair Cycroid's original attack power as damage during the end phase, so if he doesn't win this turn, he's screwed.
Now Shou activates Pair Cycroid's effect, reducing its attack power by 500 to let it attack directly, and Ryou activates Power Wall, sending 27 cards from his deck to his grave to reduce the battle damage to zero, and wouldn't it have been hilarious if Shou were to have pulled a Ryou and opted to activate Limiter Removal to double his monster's attack power again, letting him do more damage than his Power Wall could handle? Also, Ryou is still doing that very silly drama queen bit where he just tosses his cards all around, not even bothering to put them in his graveyard slot. Shou sets a card, Ryou declares that Shou is now going to lose to Power Bond's effect, and Shou declares that Ryou's in the same boat as he activates his trap card Mirror Damage, equipping it to Pair Cycroid and bouncing the damage right back at Ryou. Dang, that's a trick that Ryou's never done before. Of course, Ryou is prepared for that too, and activates his trap card, Fusion Guard; by randomly sending a Fusion Monster from his deck to the grave, he negates the effect damage he would take. Wow, he just happened to pick Cyber End Dragon. You know what else would have been hilarious? If he'd accidentally sent Cyberdark Dragon to his grave instead. Anyway, Shou now ends his turn, Ryou says he's only got one card left in his deck, so he'll finish the duel this turn.
Ryou plays a really weird card called Warp Beam; he picks two monsters on his field, sends two other monsters on the field to the grave, and attacks directly with their attack powers reduced to 600. He chooses Horn and Keel for this, and with Edge's effect, he attacks directly with all three monsters. Shou activates Life Force three times, more shock collar shenanigans, but Ryou isn't done yet! He activates his last remaining trap card Samsara Dogma, allowing him to change all the monsters in his grave to any type he chooses, so he goes for Dragons. And why does this matter? Because he plays Instant Fusion, combining his three cyberdarks into Cyber Dark Dragon, and he uses the now Dragon-type Cyber End Dragon to raise Cyberdark's attack power to 5000, and since he has 38 cards in his grave, that means another 3800 attack points, for a grand total of 8800. Edo's all 'well, Shou's screwed', Ryou declares his attack, but Shou was one step ahead! He activates Emergency Provisions, sending Mirror Damage to the grave to recover 1000 life points, which incidentally gets rid of Pair Cycroid but its not like that was going to stick around for very long, and now with 1400 life points, he can activate Life Force, negating Cyber Dark Dragon's most powerful possible attack.
And then the writers screw the pooch, as Ryou pulls De-Fusion right out of his ass, letting him attack with all three Cyberdarks once more, and win. Thus, is Hell Kaiser Ryou's character arc stunted, and Asuka was cut out of these proceedings entirely, providing redundant proof that the writers are bastards. Shou collapses, Judai takes hold of him, and Judai yells out Kaiser like he's going to do anything about Ryou. He won't, just so you don't get your hopes up. End episode.
NEXT TIME! Judai duels a parody of Albert Einstein. EPISODE TITLE, RELATIVITY FIELD, JUDAI VS. THE GENIUS DOCTOR card of the week is cyberdark edge, whatever.
The writers probably figured that they were being unconventional, but really, they were just being stupid, and utterly failed to fulfill the plotline that they'd set up, choosing instead an inept anticlimax. I doubt I really need to spell this out, but I'm going to anyway; Ryou's character arc, which is really the only character arc this entire season, is about him dealing with defeat. He is crushed by Edo's defeat, he loses his ability to duel, and ends up descending into hell because of it, and his only escape is win at all costs. So he spurns all his old bonds, abandons all his beliefs, and focuses only on victory itself, hence his strategy of dumping his entire deck into the grave for just a little more power, all so that he doesn't lose again. Then his little brother, who even when he was at his best never regarded as an opponent who could possibly take him on, challenges him. They duel, they pull out all the stops, and as stated above, this is where the writers screwed up. What should have happened at this point is that Ryou should have been left with nothing useful in his hand, the cost of abandoning his deck so readily, and nothing but his fully powered Cyber Dark that had suborned his previous Ace, Cyber End Dragon, to achieve its power. Thus, he would have lost, to Shou. He would then have to face facts; it doesn't matter how good you are, it doesn't matter how ruthless you are, it doesn't matter how desperate for victory you are...sometimes you're going to lose, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. This would force Ryou to face the fact that for all that he'd "changed", he was still terrified of losing, terrified of being seen as weak, and all the lashing out and black leather was just him trying to disguise that. At which point, he could either go on a journey to redeem himself, or just run away, but the choice would be his. But instead, the writers decided to go with an inane moral victory for Shou, squandering all that. Oh, and big shock, that was Shou's last duel this season. Oh, and the Judai vs. Asuka duel? That was Asuka's last duel too. Don't you just hate this show?
