Where I rewatch Yugioh GX, Episode 129
Nov. 26th, 2010 02:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cypsiman2Recap of what happened last time, and the Demon thinking of how it crashed back onto Earth after it had been launched into space, its capsule now broken.
TITLE SCREEN! THREAT OF THE THREE LEGENDARY DEMONS! JUDAI VS. MARTIN i'm not sure what the big deal is supposed to be, since judai's already beaten all three demons at once.
Down in the tunnel where the zombies are inexplicably hesitant to drop down into, Judai is going over his deck, people are standing guard instead of advancing towards Martin or the oh-so-precious Rainbow Dragon, and Misawa's trying to figure out what Einstein meant by lots of energy being needed to release Rainbow Dragon's power, because it's just so gosh darn mysterious. Blah blah blah, Asuka thinks this is all a trap, Jim agrees, but since the only way to advance the plot is to jump into Demon Martin's trap is to jump into it, Judai says he has to go. Then Judai tries to be all mopey and deep as he tells everyone that he wants to go alone, since he doesn't know if he can beat the Three Demons that Demon Martin now possesses. Which makes absolutely no goddamn sense and is completely contrary to all of Judai's meager characterization up to this point, since the whole point of his character is his lack of depth or inability to be scared or worried at all. Nothing that has happened in this season could have plausibly changed that, since equally terrible things have happened in past seasons, none of which had any meaningful effect on Judai's characterization. For some bizarre reason, it is Kenzan who reminds Judai that he's already beaten the Three Legendary Demons, and not Asuka or Misawa, who were actually there at the time. But, Judai mopes that the only reason he won was because of the ridiculous Deus Ex Machina card Daitokuji gave him that conveniently disappeared into the ether right after that duel, even though he otherwise has no problem conveniently drawing exactly the card he needs to win over and over and over and over again. Again, all this fear and trepidation rings hollow. It would be like if, after obtaining the Egyptian God Cards, Yuugi were to be scared of someone using Pegasus's deck against him. Makes no sense, is what I'm saying.
But, as the Duel Zombies go down the ridiculously elaborate tunnels, Misawa's figured it out! In order to achieve the tremendous energy necessary to release Rainbow Dragon's arbitrary power to send everyone back to their home dimension, Rainbow Dragon must fight against the Legendary Demons, which are totally powerful and not at all being shilled right into the yawning caverns of the infinite abyss. Again, the only previous "Power" that the Legendary Demons demonstrated was to make all the card art in the world disappear to make one really decrepit old man super buff. Not a great deal of power, no matter how the writers try to spin it. And for that matter, I'm still not clear on why Demon Martin wanted the Legendary Demons to begin with; not only did it already arbitrarily possess Exodia, but it was already winning everything at a pretty quick pace. Also, for that matter, why is Rainbow Dragon even necessary in the first place? The Demon possessing Martin already had enough power by itself to send everyone into the alternate dimension, so all they'd really need to do is to beat the Demon and force it to return everyone back home. But I'm pretty sure I've already said all that before, so moving on. Blah blah blah, Duel Zombies show up, Kenzan, Asuka, and Jim summon monsters to clear the path, everyone goes running, Jim stays behind to block off the very slowly moving Duel Zombies, the group reaches the surface, and Kenzan faces off against Antique Gear Golem. More Duel Zombies, Drillroid shows up, and Asuka destroys it with Dakini. Then the voltron ripoff shows up to blow up Dakini, but it is blown up by Jim, who somehow caught up with everyone. Meanwhile, Johan runs off with O'Brien to go find the all important McGuffin, Rainbow Dragon. Lots of stupid standing around instead of casually shoving the mildly annoying Duel Zombies aside, and at some point Misawa got his deck back, even though it was expressly the case that he didn't have it with him. PLOT HOLE!
Lots of monster summoning, Johan summons Cobalt Eagle to fly over head and find Rainbow Dragon's capsule, and then O'Brien literally shoots down a pair of monsters with his duel disc gun that fires exploding cards. No, that's not crazy awesome, that's just stupid. Blah blah blah, lots of running, summoning, and explosions, and Cobalt Eagle spots Rainbow Dragon's capsule. More running, more explosions, it's all up to Judai as it always is, and in the end Judai and Rei are the only ones to make it up to Demon Martin. I know this is all supposed to be powerful and exciting, but it isn't. Because right from the beginning, as I've been saying this whole time over and over again like a broken record, the Duel Zombies are not credible threats. Even when they do start summoning monsters outside the confines of a duel, there's still no good reason provided for why you can't just punch them in the face and take all their cards from them. In fact, considering that's exactly what Ayukawa did at one point, the fact that everyone doesn't do that every time is, you guessed it, another plot hole. But moving on, Demon Martin looks like a total doofus, Judai wants to know if Demon Martin will keep his word if he wins, Rei demands to know what that demonic left arm is, Demon Martin ignores Rei and tells Judai that unlike him, he's never lied, which is a festering load of shit, not because Judais' never lied, he does that all the time, but because the Demon promised to bring back PROFESSOR COBRA'S son, and instead killed PROFESSOR COBRA once he was of no further use, twisting the promise the way only a disingenuous demon or capricious genie can. Judai even demands to know if the Demon was the same creature that manipulated PROFESSOR COBRA, and the Demon says yep, he used that man to bring back this left arm. Judai now wants to know what all this is about, and the Demon this is all to return the love it received from him.
Oh joy, now we're in the thick of it. Now is the time when the writers belief in the power of telling over showing reaches truly, epically toxic proportions. The Demon then goes on about how Judai's forgotten everything, but this duel will remind him of what he did to the Demon, and then it will do the same to him, proclaiming that it loves Judai more than anything in the whole wide world. Judai then settles for what he can understand in all that inane blather, that the Demon isn't Martin and that he has no need to hold back against such an unforgivable opponent. Remember that for future episodes. And now the duel begins. And all Rei is there to do is watch, since every duel on this show needs a witness. For some reason.
EYECATCH!
Johan and O'Brien finally come upon the Rainbow Dragon capsule, but oh noes, a Doodlebug appears to suck the capsule down into the sand. For some reason O'Brien's exploding cards tactics don't work despite Doodlebug lacking any sort of effect that would make it immune to such, Johan leaps in to take the Rainbow Dragon Capsule, is about to be crushed by the incredibly stupidly designed and named Doodlebug, when Rainbow Dragon's capsule starts to magically glow. Now we can see the outline of Rainbow Dragon against a bright lit background, because the writers think that they're teasing the audience, while the audience is in truth bored, and then Rainbow Dragon eats Doodlebug, like that's anything the least bit impressive. That piece of meaningless padding out of the way, the capsule opens, and now Johan possesses the much hyped Rainbow Dragon. Boy, I sure hope it doesn't prove to be incredibly disappointing when it finally gets summoned! Blah blah blah, now Johan and O'Brien are headed back to Judai. Speaking of Judai, the duel finally actually starts. The Demon goes first, and summons Chaos Core in attack position, with zero attack points. Judai is shocked that he would summon a zero attack monster like that, and then the Demon sets a card to end its turn. Judai's turn, he summons Sparkman, he attacks, but the Demon activates Chaos Core's effect, sending all three Legendary Demons in its deck to the grave to place 3 Phantom Counters on it, and it can remove a counter to reduce battle damage to it to zero. Judai is again shocked that the Demon would send the Legendary Demons to the grave, and sets a card to end his turn. Demons' turn, it sets a card, and ends its turn. Riveting. Blah blah blah, Judai goes on about how his trap card, Heroe's Rule 2, will negate an effect that targets the grave so the Demon shouldn't be able to summon the Legendary Demons from the grave, and takes his turn.
He activates Tag Request, allowing him to special summon an Elemental Hero in his hand to the field, if he controls an Elemental Hero of the same attack power. Sparkman and Necrodarkman have the same attack power, so Necrodarkman gets onto the field, Judai attacks with both monsters to get rid of both Phantom Counters, and then plays Instant Fusion to combine Sparkman and Necrodarkman into Darkbrightman during the battle phase. Blah blah blah, Martin activates his trap card Chaos Burst, sacrificing Chaos Burst to destroy Darkbrightman and deal damage to Judai equal to its attack power, or 2000 points. The Demon makes a crazy face as it asks whether this is painful for Judai, and then says that the pain its tasted is much greater. Umm, didn't you say you were trying to show Judai your "Love"? Because that's not what you're doing, and repeatedly insisting that it is will not work. Then Judai plays Oversoul to bring back Sparkman, and now the Demon takes its turn. It summons Phantom of Chaos, with zero attack power, and is a rather shameless rip off of The Wicked Avatar from Yugioh R, which even though rushed at the end, is still far superior to all this drivel. The Demon goes on about how it will make Judai suffer even more pain, and activates Phantom of Chaos's effect, allowing it to gain the effect and stats of one of the monsters in his grave, so he chooses Hamon with 4000 attack points. Judai activates his Hero's Rule 2 trap card, but the Demon activates its other trap card, Dark Bribe; this negates any spell or trap card, but it does let the opponent draw one card. One ridiculously long and cheap attack animation later, Sparkman is destroyed. However, it turns out that Phantom of Chaos can't inflict battle damage, but with Hamon's effect, he does 1000 points of damage to Judai anyway. Then the Demon sets a card, and ends its turn. Also, I'm sure she's been doing this for a while now, but Rei calls Judai "Judai-sama", which just makes me sick.
Oh, and at the end of the turn, Phantom of Chaos goes back to normal, its attack power dropping back to zero, and Judai is in uncharacteristic pain and despair, despite having faced multiple situations as bad, if not worse, and not being nearly so affected. The Demon says that its too early for him to give into the pain, it will never forgive Judai if he dies now, before he's felt all of its pain. And then Johan shows up. Lots of blah blah blah about how the zombies are passed out for arbitrary reasons, and when Johan reaches the top, Judai's all better now, which is the real reason for Judai's out of character behavior earlier; so that the Demon could be filled with jealous rage at the sight of Johan. Jesus "Duck Fucker" Christ, what the hell is so special about Judai? He's just an inane idiot! Utterly lacking in any sort of ambition or empathy! The Demon can't forgive Johan for getting close to its Judai, and now Johan wants to join the duel against the Demon, while continues to stand there and do nothing, in spite of the express emotional connection that she has to Martin, who the Demon is still possessing. Judai clone with stupid McGuffin, or young woman who wants to save her dear friend from Demonic Possession? Well, I know who I'd give narrative priority to! Blah blah blah, Johan will join at full life points, and will give the Demon 4000 to make the difference and right off the bat Johan's managed to make things much more difficult for Judai. Gee, I hope he can make it all worthwhile! Blah blah blah, and Rei is stuck standing around with her mouth hanging open, her only role in this to have been a gratuitous damsel in distress for a few episodes. End episode.
NEXT TIME! The duel continues, Demon thinks that Judai's sparkly friendship with Johan means he's forgotten all about it, and of course Johan will summon the precious Rainbow Dragon. EPISODE TITLE, THE AWAKENING OF THE RAINBOW DRAGON card of the week is phantom of chaos
Things have been horrifying and terrible for a while. Now is when they start to get really vile. I warn you, what follows is not for the faint of heart, or the light of stomach, and there is no guarantee that you will emerge with your sanity intact.
TITLE SCREEN! THREAT OF THE THREE LEGENDARY DEMONS! JUDAI VS. MARTIN i'm not sure what the big deal is supposed to be, since judai's already beaten all three demons at once.
Down in the tunnel where the zombies are inexplicably hesitant to drop down into, Judai is going over his deck, people are standing guard instead of advancing towards Martin or the oh-so-precious Rainbow Dragon, and Misawa's trying to figure out what Einstein meant by lots of energy being needed to release Rainbow Dragon's power, because it's just so gosh darn mysterious. Blah blah blah, Asuka thinks this is all a trap, Jim agrees, but since the only way to advance the plot is to jump into Demon Martin's trap is to jump into it, Judai says he has to go. Then Judai tries to be all mopey and deep as he tells everyone that he wants to go alone, since he doesn't know if he can beat the Three Demons that Demon Martin now possesses. Which makes absolutely no goddamn sense and is completely contrary to all of Judai's meager characterization up to this point, since the whole point of his character is his lack of depth or inability to be scared or worried at all. Nothing that has happened in this season could have plausibly changed that, since equally terrible things have happened in past seasons, none of which had any meaningful effect on Judai's characterization. For some bizarre reason, it is Kenzan who reminds Judai that he's already beaten the Three Legendary Demons, and not Asuka or Misawa, who were actually there at the time. But, Judai mopes that the only reason he won was because of the ridiculous Deus Ex Machina card Daitokuji gave him that conveniently disappeared into the ether right after that duel, even though he otherwise has no problem conveniently drawing exactly the card he needs to win over and over and over and over again. Again, all this fear and trepidation rings hollow. It would be like if, after obtaining the Egyptian God Cards, Yuugi were to be scared of someone using Pegasus's deck against him. Makes no sense, is what I'm saying.
But, as the Duel Zombies go down the ridiculously elaborate tunnels, Misawa's figured it out! In order to achieve the tremendous energy necessary to release Rainbow Dragon's arbitrary power to send everyone back to their home dimension, Rainbow Dragon must fight against the Legendary Demons, which are totally powerful and not at all being shilled right into the yawning caverns of the infinite abyss. Again, the only previous "Power" that the Legendary Demons demonstrated was to make all the card art in the world disappear to make one really decrepit old man super buff. Not a great deal of power, no matter how the writers try to spin it. And for that matter, I'm still not clear on why Demon Martin wanted the Legendary Demons to begin with; not only did it already arbitrarily possess Exodia, but it was already winning everything at a pretty quick pace. Also, for that matter, why is Rainbow Dragon even necessary in the first place? The Demon possessing Martin already had enough power by itself to send everyone into the alternate dimension, so all they'd really need to do is to beat the Demon and force it to return everyone back home. But I'm pretty sure I've already said all that before, so moving on. Blah blah blah, Duel Zombies show up, Kenzan, Asuka, and Jim summon monsters to clear the path, everyone goes running, Jim stays behind to block off the very slowly moving Duel Zombies, the group reaches the surface, and Kenzan faces off against Antique Gear Golem. More Duel Zombies, Drillroid shows up, and Asuka destroys it with Dakini. Then the voltron ripoff shows up to blow up Dakini, but it is blown up by Jim, who somehow caught up with everyone. Meanwhile, Johan runs off with O'Brien to go find the all important McGuffin, Rainbow Dragon. Lots of stupid standing around instead of casually shoving the mildly annoying Duel Zombies aside, and at some point Misawa got his deck back, even though it was expressly the case that he didn't have it with him. PLOT HOLE!
Lots of monster summoning, Johan summons Cobalt Eagle to fly over head and find Rainbow Dragon's capsule, and then O'Brien literally shoots down a pair of monsters with his duel disc gun that fires exploding cards. No, that's not crazy awesome, that's just stupid. Blah blah blah, lots of running, summoning, and explosions, and Cobalt Eagle spots Rainbow Dragon's capsule. More running, more explosions, it's all up to Judai as it always is, and in the end Judai and Rei are the only ones to make it up to Demon Martin. I know this is all supposed to be powerful and exciting, but it isn't. Because right from the beginning, as I've been saying this whole time over and over again like a broken record, the Duel Zombies are not credible threats. Even when they do start summoning monsters outside the confines of a duel, there's still no good reason provided for why you can't just punch them in the face and take all their cards from them. In fact, considering that's exactly what Ayukawa did at one point, the fact that everyone doesn't do that every time is, you guessed it, another plot hole. But moving on, Demon Martin looks like a total doofus, Judai wants to know if Demon Martin will keep his word if he wins, Rei demands to know what that demonic left arm is, Demon Martin ignores Rei and tells Judai that unlike him, he's never lied, which is a festering load of shit, not because Judais' never lied, he does that all the time, but because the Demon promised to bring back PROFESSOR COBRA'S son, and instead killed PROFESSOR COBRA once he was of no further use, twisting the promise the way only a disingenuous demon or capricious genie can. Judai even demands to know if the Demon was the same creature that manipulated PROFESSOR COBRA, and the Demon says yep, he used that man to bring back this left arm. Judai now wants to know what all this is about, and the Demon this is all to return the love it received from him.
Oh joy, now we're in the thick of it. Now is the time when the writers belief in the power of telling over showing reaches truly, epically toxic proportions. The Demon then goes on about how Judai's forgotten everything, but this duel will remind him of what he did to the Demon, and then it will do the same to him, proclaiming that it loves Judai more than anything in the whole wide world. Judai then settles for what he can understand in all that inane blather, that the Demon isn't Martin and that he has no need to hold back against such an unforgivable opponent. Remember that for future episodes. And now the duel begins. And all Rei is there to do is watch, since every duel on this show needs a witness. For some reason.
EYECATCH!
Johan and O'Brien finally come upon the Rainbow Dragon capsule, but oh noes, a Doodlebug appears to suck the capsule down into the sand. For some reason O'Brien's exploding cards tactics don't work despite Doodlebug lacking any sort of effect that would make it immune to such, Johan leaps in to take the Rainbow Dragon Capsule, is about to be crushed by the incredibly stupidly designed and named Doodlebug, when Rainbow Dragon's capsule starts to magically glow. Now we can see the outline of Rainbow Dragon against a bright lit background, because the writers think that they're teasing the audience, while the audience is in truth bored, and then Rainbow Dragon eats Doodlebug, like that's anything the least bit impressive. That piece of meaningless padding out of the way, the capsule opens, and now Johan possesses the much hyped Rainbow Dragon. Boy, I sure hope it doesn't prove to be incredibly disappointing when it finally gets summoned! Blah blah blah, now Johan and O'Brien are headed back to Judai. Speaking of Judai, the duel finally actually starts. The Demon goes first, and summons Chaos Core in attack position, with zero attack points. Judai is shocked that he would summon a zero attack monster like that, and then the Demon sets a card to end its turn. Judai's turn, he summons Sparkman, he attacks, but the Demon activates Chaos Core's effect, sending all three Legendary Demons in its deck to the grave to place 3 Phantom Counters on it, and it can remove a counter to reduce battle damage to it to zero. Judai is again shocked that the Demon would send the Legendary Demons to the grave, and sets a card to end his turn. Demons' turn, it sets a card, and ends its turn. Riveting. Blah blah blah, Judai goes on about how his trap card, Heroe's Rule 2, will negate an effect that targets the grave so the Demon shouldn't be able to summon the Legendary Demons from the grave, and takes his turn.
He activates Tag Request, allowing him to special summon an Elemental Hero in his hand to the field, if he controls an Elemental Hero of the same attack power. Sparkman and Necrodarkman have the same attack power, so Necrodarkman gets onto the field, Judai attacks with both monsters to get rid of both Phantom Counters, and then plays Instant Fusion to combine Sparkman and Necrodarkman into Darkbrightman during the battle phase. Blah blah blah, Martin activates his trap card Chaos Burst, sacrificing Chaos Burst to destroy Darkbrightman and deal damage to Judai equal to its attack power, or 2000 points. The Demon makes a crazy face as it asks whether this is painful for Judai, and then says that the pain its tasted is much greater. Umm, didn't you say you were trying to show Judai your "Love"? Because that's not what you're doing, and repeatedly insisting that it is will not work. Then Judai plays Oversoul to bring back Sparkman, and now the Demon takes its turn. It summons Phantom of Chaos, with zero attack power, and is a rather shameless rip off of The Wicked Avatar from Yugioh R, which even though rushed at the end, is still far superior to all this drivel. The Demon goes on about how it will make Judai suffer even more pain, and activates Phantom of Chaos's effect, allowing it to gain the effect and stats of one of the monsters in his grave, so he chooses Hamon with 4000 attack points. Judai activates his Hero's Rule 2 trap card, but the Demon activates its other trap card, Dark Bribe; this negates any spell or trap card, but it does let the opponent draw one card. One ridiculously long and cheap attack animation later, Sparkman is destroyed. However, it turns out that Phantom of Chaos can't inflict battle damage, but with Hamon's effect, he does 1000 points of damage to Judai anyway. Then the Demon sets a card, and ends its turn. Also, I'm sure she's been doing this for a while now, but Rei calls Judai "Judai-sama", which just makes me sick.
Oh, and at the end of the turn, Phantom of Chaos goes back to normal, its attack power dropping back to zero, and Judai is in uncharacteristic pain and despair, despite having faced multiple situations as bad, if not worse, and not being nearly so affected. The Demon says that its too early for him to give into the pain, it will never forgive Judai if he dies now, before he's felt all of its pain. And then Johan shows up. Lots of blah blah blah about how the zombies are passed out for arbitrary reasons, and when Johan reaches the top, Judai's all better now, which is the real reason for Judai's out of character behavior earlier; so that the Demon could be filled with jealous rage at the sight of Johan. Jesus "Duck Fucker" Christ, what the hell is so special about Judai? He's just an inane idiot! Utterly lacking in any sort of ambition or empathy! The Demon can't forgive Johan for getting close to its Judai, and now Johan wants to join the duel against the Demon, while continues to stand there and do nothing, in spite of the express emotional connection that she has to Martin, who the Demon is still possessing. Judai clone with stupid McGuffin, or young woman who wants to save her dear friend from Demonic Possession? Well, I know who I'd give narrative priority to! Blah blah blah, Johan will join at full life points, and will give the Demon 4000 to make the difference and right off the bat Johan's managed to make things much more difficult for Judai. Gee, I hope he can make it all worthwhile! Blah blah blah, and Rei is stuck standing around with her mouth hanging open, her only role in this to have been a gratuitous damsel in distress for a few episodes. End episode.
NEXT TIME! The duel continues, Demon thinks that Judai's sparkly friendship with Johan means he's forgotten all about it, and of course Johan will summon the precious Rainbow Dragon. EPISODE TITLE, THE AWAKENING OF THE RAINBOW DRAGON card of the week is phantom of chaos
Things have been horrifying and terrible for a while. Now is when they start to get really vile. I warn you, what follows is not for the faint of heart, or the light of stomach, and there is no guarantee that you will emerge with your sanity intact.
