Children's Card Games Saga Part III:
If Monsters Are Real, Does That Mean Card Games Are Real Life?
It's truly been far too long since I last watched Yugioh. Heck, the last installment of the Children's Card Games Saga was back in October, so it's high time to let loose on what was the most kick ass movie of 2004.
Never mind Kill Bill vol. 2, Harry Schlocker and the Prisoner of the Theater, Shrek 2, Spiderman 2 (the last watchable one before that series died), The Aviator, or Mean Girls... Yugioh Pyramid of Light RULED the summer of '04.
At least for this 10 year old, it did. I remember going to see this not once, but TWICE- collecting the promotional cards (still have them too), and crying tears of pure joy whenever I heard that wavering Ney and Arghul (ancient reed based Egyptian instruments) melody and orchestral strings on top of the driving industrial techno beat that the English version used as the main theme. It still brings me great nostalgia. I mean, what was cooler than these cartoons about people with insane, physics breaking hairdos playing card games with sick monsters and people getting sent to the shadow realm??
Not much, when you're 10.
Alas, I am 21 now, and as a reviewer, I must remove the rose tinted glasses of childhood and mercilessly bash Yugioh. I mean, review.
As with any good Yugioh story, it begins with a man. A man so driven by obsession that his ego will never allow him to let go of years of being second best to one Yugi Moto. This man is Seto "Rich Homie Mullet" Kaiba. Armed with his combination of a crippling preoccupation of beating a high school kid at a card game and infinite wealth; so much wealth that he builds a physics breaking VTOL jet that has functional legs for landing gear, after his favorite playing card and also constructs YET ANOTHER CITY FOR THE SOLE PURPOSE OF FIGHTING YUGI!
Kaiba boy, still extremely pissy over losing to Yugi boy in the Battle City arc of Duel Monsters (surprise, an entire city devoted to card games, centered around Yugi boy) strong-arms the fabulous fan favorite snark monster, moe anime obsessed Maximillion Pegasus into giving up his secret weapon to beat Yugi's God Cards.
No it's not his dandy style, red suit, red wine, and vanity.
It's, you guessed it. A heretofore unseen card! (side note: Pegasus really makes the movie though, because his campiness and incredibly sarcastic dialogue is turned up to 11 in this one, savagely mocking Kaiba at every turn and actually being a good sport for once.)
Meanwhile, back at school, everyone wants a piece of Yugi since he's a famous duelist now. So while Tristan and Joey cover, Tea and Yugi go to the one place the gamer geeks would NEVER look for them- a history museum with a very conveniently placed brand new exhibit on ANCIENT EGYPT!
Here's where the story takes a turn for the Scooby Doo, and falls right off. Imagine, if you will, the gang rolls up in the Mystery Machine to this museum that just got a fresh exhibit with mummies, sarcophagi, and all manner of occult and valuable gold artifacts from ancient Egypt. What happens next? Do I even need to say?
You guessed it. As soon as Yugi and Tea and the creepy pervert Grandpa spot the gold sarcophagus and valuable artifact, BOOOOOOOOOOOM! Everyone's knocked out, the mummy has escaped, and stolen the dangerous, priceless artifact! And they would have gotten away with it if it weren't for those... oh wait, it's not over yet.
Cue more mummies chasing Yugi, Tristan and Joey inside of the Millennium puzzle pyramid (which would have been PERFECTLY set to the Benny Hill theme), and even the voice actors recognized how much of a Scooby rip this was, with Tristan letting out a "ZOINKS!" in the middle of the chase! With a bit of dumb luck (read: heart of the cards), Yugi manages to stop the mummies by slicing off a piece of a priceless Egyptian tablet, and returns everyone's souls to their bodies.
The fun ends about there, as the next sequences of Yugi and Kaiba dueling, and then Yugi and the resurrected Anubis were on the verge of boring me to tears. Oh how I yearned for the days when there were clever uses of trap cards, monster effects, and not making up rules or completely cheating on every turn... wait, who am I kidding? This is Yugioh! The only rule is to believe in the Heart of the Cards and to draw the Laughing Man symbol from Ghost in the Shell SAC 1st on your hand... and then you win!
Anyway, time to wrap this ramble up.
I give "Yugi-Doo and a Mummy Too" 5 Blue Eyes White Dragons, because this is basically just a Scooby Doo episode turned into a Yugioh movie.
The glorious English dub is... well, glorious, with Dan Green, Eric Stuart, and Darren Dunstan hamming it up and being fabulously campy. Minus a point here for not using Megan Hollingshead as Mai- a woefully missed opportunity indeed. But, Seto "Screw The Rules, I Have Money" Kaiba himself even directed this dub, which makes it all the better.
"Fighting pyramids and creepy floating eyes, wonderful," says Joey.
"Hey, when you hang around with Yugi, this is par for the course! Tristan replies.
