Every dubbing company has their golden goose: FUNimation has Dragon Ball Z. ADV Films had Evangelion. Animaze had Cowboy Bebop. 4KIDS had two: Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh!, although it was the latter that defined their dubs.
Yu-Gi-Oh! is most well-known for being about card games, although the series originally was just a dark shounen that used games in place of the typical shounen battles. Indeed, “Yu-Gi-Oh!” directly translates to “King of Games!”, and arguably it's kept that title, at least when it comes to game-related anime. The franchise as a whole had been in Japan for a few years before the second anime was brought over by 4KIDS, the first episode airing on Kids' WB just mere weeks after 9/11. What does this have to do with this show? Nothing, really, but I thought the timing was oddly interesting. Kids take comfort in their favorite things, cartoons being one of them, and it was a scary, confusing time for children; I know it was for nine-year-old me, and Kids' WB was one of my escapes. The voice actors had to have at least known of this, so perhaps this could explain the influx in performances, in how this was the best we've heard from them at the time. So tuning in that one Saturday morning and watching the premiere had to be mesmerizing to children from how over-the-top everything was next to the cool monster designs and the Egyptian themes (at least in the beginning), and big hair. Not to mention the friendship and “heart of the cards!” speeches, which had some actual meaning at that time in the anime.
And then, with a cry of “Yu-Gi-OHHHHHHHHHH!”, Dan Green climbed his way to stardom, and Yu-Gi-Oh! quickly became a smash hit—while not to the same worldwide phenomenon as it was with Pokémon, it was just as a big name on the playground, even more-so once the merchandise (e.g. the actual card game) was released. It enjoyed that luxury for a few years, but it made the rest of my elementary school years a little bit interesting.
STORY: The first episode begins with a narration about how 5,000 years ago (from the original 3,000), a pharaoh sealing away dangerous “shadow games” using Millennium Items, and how a boy named Yugi Muto (well, Moto in the dub) solved the Millennium Puzzle that houses a spirit that now shares his body. But outside of that, it's... hard to pinpoint a story for Duel Monsters as it goes through different changes in narrative with each new arc.
The anime picks up where Toei's anime leaves off—somewhat—meaning it completely ignores it ever happened, forcing Yugi's story to be shoved into condensed flashbacks throughout the Duelist Kingdom arc. It's also why Seto Kaiba has a bland brown mullet instead of his vibrant green in the original, though his psychotic nature carried over in the beginning because he still had a hate-boner for Yugi, but since the Death-T arc wasn't included, no one who hasn't read the manga noticed it. Besides, all everyone remembers from the first episode is “Exodia, OBLITERATE!” and Kaiba screaming as his three signature Blue-Eyes White Dragons explode and he gets a mind crush which allowed him to heal his heart over time—somehow, since the anime didn't bother explaining it.
But basically, the bare bones of the story is about Yugi Moto and his friends, the delinquents Joey Wheeler and Tristan Taylor, and his best friend and crush Téa Gardner, playing a card game called Duel Monsters in such seriousness against other duelists who range from just wanting to be the best duelist in the Duelist Kingdom or the entire world, to those who legit want to take over the world (or even destroy it in severe cases). They sometimes befriend these duelists such as Mai Valentine, Duke Devlin and Maximillion Pegasus (oops, “spoilers” I guess), or become enemies like with Rex Raptor and Weevil Underwood, two characters who honestly don't have much importance after the Battle City arc, but the Waking the Dragons filler arc tried to give them something.
Anyhoo, moving on, the main catalyst for why these duels keep happening, however, is because of the Millennium Items, such as the Millennium Puzzle Yugi has. At first, he was unaware of the spirit, later to be known as Yami Yugi, possessing him in times of need, but eventually, Yugi and his friends come to terms with and get to know Yami more. Duelist Kingdom puts more emphasis on the Duel Monsters card game than with the Millennium Items, but it gradually brings them into the plot and sheds more light on their secrets, what happened in ancient Egypt, and Yami himself. It just takes a good 200 episodes and lots more characters and monsters (such as the Egyptian God cards) to get to that reveal.
Needless to say, as interesting as the plot can be, and some arcs are better than others, be prepared to go through some silly bullshit with some occasional good twists (if you call them that nowadays). Hope you like holographic card games and endless prattling on of how cards work in play, because there's enough to drive you mad.
CHARACTERS: For a show about card games that was an advertisement for merchandise, the large cast of characters are surprisingly diverse (mostly in design as this show practically popularized anime hair—intentional on the creator's part, funnily enough) and well-remembered, for better or for worse. The main cast seemingly have one-note personalities, but they show hidden sides of themselves through backstory or when they're pushed into a corner during a duel. Yugi, as the main character, has motives and developmental growth as the plot was essentially kicked off (via backstory) because he wanted to make friends, and also to become independent. Yami was essentially his “alter ego”, a way for Yugi to be someone he could never be, but could strive to be (once he stopped using the mind crush penalty game as a direct result from being influenced by Yugi's compassion). However, Kaiba is the one who changes the most. Compare from when he literally hospitalized Yugi's grandfather just to get revenge on Yugi to when he had to team up with Yugi to save the world from destruction (at least twice, but fillers “don't count”)—although this was the result of Yami's mind crush taking effect.
Joey gets his fair share of character development, particularly when it comes to being a duelist as he was one of the worst from the start. But with Yugi's help in learning how to make a good deck and strategies, he becomes one of the best duelists in the show, and his duels have the most emotional—to an extent—and meaningful impact as a character. This is due to his determination and eagerness to learn so he could climb to the top in Duelist Kingdom for the sole purpose of getting the prize money to pay for his little sister's eye surgery. As for Tristan and Téa, they can duel, but they're delegated to being cheerleaders instead and they don't get out of that role. Outside of Yugi's circle of friends, we get recurring characters such as Bakura Ryou, Duke, and Mai, though their roles are different depending on the arc.
The antagonists are some of the most popular of the series, starting with Maximillion Pegasus who has remained the most well-known to this day, even if it was only because of how charismatic and foppish he is. Each has their own motives for why they went after Yugi, but they all stem from wanting possession of the Millennium Items. Marik Ishtar was the first in which a villain was legitimately threatening (Yami Bakura would take his place later, though he was basically the driving antagonistic force throughout the series), although his presence also was what changed the tone of the series and foreshadowed what was to come.
(The Virtual World/Noah filler arc interrupted the dark tone—and the Battle City arc in general—to put space between the anime and manga, but did so by bringing back the Big Five, the executives of KaibaCorp who were defeated in a small anime-only arc called “Legendary Heroes”. At the end of it all, it just gave the other characters such as Téa and Tristan one last chance to show them in a duel before they were pushed to the sidelines for the rest of the series. The Waking the Dragons filler arc had a more interesting villain in Dartz and brought in the Orichalcos to keep things tense, but it was dragging itself through the mud at this point.)
But of all the characters in the show, the real stars (let's call them what they are: promoters) are the Duel Monsters themselves, even though they rarely talk. More and more selections are created as the series goes along that there's literally hundreds of monster designs to choose from, many of them unique, and some play actual roles in the plot. Characters have their own signature monsters such as Yugi's Dark Magician and Kuriboh, Kaiba's Blue-Eyes and Battle Ox, Joey's Flaming Swordsman and Red Eyes Black Dragon, and Mai's Harpy Ladies, while Pegasus has a one-of-a-kind deck of toons you don't see anywhere else. In a similar vein, some duelists have themed decks such as Weevil's bug deck, Rex Raptor's dinosaur deck, and one minor but recurring duelist named Mako Tsunami with a water-based deck. If the human characters don't do it for you, perhaps the monsters will, though some monsters do show up less overtime such as Summoned Skull.
ART/ANIMATION: Duel Monsters aired alongside shows like “Love Hina”, “Sakura Wars”, and “Ceres, Celestial Legend”, and it definitely looks like it came from the 2000s. The show became digitally-colored as the series went on without losing its style, even when the designs were updated to the creator's own evolved style where appropriate. Studio Gallop was fresh off of previous projects such as “Kodocha” and “Rurouni Kenshin”, which from a glance, makes sense as to why the style looked the way it did.
Even so, the 2000s was an awkward transition period from cel to digital, and Duel Monsters is a poster child for 2000s anime. Animation bumps did happen in later seasons, but there's honestly nothing special about it. The stilted, oft-times recycled animation and off-model moments have made it an easy target for mockery from just a single screencap, which isn't a positive by any means, but it can entertain the easily-amused. At the very least, I liked the attention to the hair and eyes; again, nothing special.
SOUND: I'm willing to bet you were thinking of the abridged series at this point—if not, you are now. LittleKuriboh may have done a fantastic job, but this isn't about the abridged series. Think back and remember the iconic 4KIDS dub. Where Ash defined Veronica Taylor's career, Yugi defined Dan Green's career, though Eric Stuart has the best of both worlds for having been cast as Kaiba, and he hits it out of the ballpark from the very beginning. The other voice actors can't be left out, either: Wayne Grayson as Joey, Amy Birnbaum as Téa, Frank Frankson as Tristan, Ted Lewis as both Bakuras, Tara Sands as Mokuba, Maddie Blaustein as Yugi's grandpa, Darren Dunstan as Pegasus, and Jonathan Todd Ross as Marik to name a few. Regardless of opinions, they grew into their roles and made them as iconic as they are in the States.
Dan Green in particular is pretty much the voice of the show, it's hard for English-speakers to envision Yugi without him. The magic of editing/different takes be damned, the way he could go from being a young, timid boy to having powerful vocals at the drop of a hat was like whiplash, but only because the deep voice can always turn heads. The first few episodes don't really prove this (this goes for most of the cast regardless), but as it went on, the more in control and iconic he then became. He is solely he reason why Yami Yugi was my first anime crush.
The music gets a brief mention at the end here because yes, the dub replaced the music—but this is where it manages to stand on its own, thanks to being composed by Joel Douek, and the unreleased scores can be heard on YouTube. The opening theme is as iconic to the dub as it gets, though the scores “Transformation”, “Kaiba Hacker” (which became Kaiba's theme music in the dub), “Arise! Blue-Eyes Shining Dragon!”, and the aptly-named “Orichalcos” are up there as well.
ENJOYMENT/OVERALL: Let's be honest here: this show has not aged well. In hindsight, with the rise of the Internet and forums and availability of original footage, 4KIDS' dub of Duel Monsters was what brought attention to their infamous editing before One Piece came to the States. It didn't hurt the popularity, however, and if anything, all the attention that was brought to it was what got people interested in it. At the very least, it was 4KIDS who made it the powerhouse it became in the States, and that can't be taken away from them—except by legal force.
It still doesn't make the show easier to watch, however. While I can't speak for the original Japanese, as the series went on, despite the voice-acting becoming more tolerable (with a few exceptions such as Weevil), the script got... wordy. As episodes dragged, the less fun the duels became, and explaining how the cards worked each and every time in between “You just activated my trap card!” or a “Not so fast, I activate this card to counteract your card!” took up too much time that could've been spent on just seeing the cards in action. This could just be the fault of the filler arcs, but character motives didn't have meaningful impact on who they were and why they had to duel—even with the main cast. Though I don't know why I'm complaining about the lack of proper character development in an anime about card games that was designed to sell merchandise. Probably because the characters are some of the more interesting characters in any merchandise-driven show and I hated seeing them going to waste at times.
The nostalgia might just be strong with this one, but even when it was about to crawl to a stop, Duel Monsters still found a way to pick things back up and make duels fun again. Sometimes, an entire episode would go by without a single duel, or at least not with Duel Monsters, and it was just about the characters being themselves. They have a life outside of games, and it's easy to forget Domino City is just a regular, bustling city that HAPPENS to have residents interested in seeing duels and partaking in it themselves for the fun of it. Although we see less and less of Domino High as the series went on, but when you're saving the world with the heart of the cards, school's just not high on the priority list.
It was a long time coming (even after knowing of the ending for a number of years before seeing it for myself), but I'm glad Yu-Gi-Oh! left an impact on me as a child, silly as it may be. The characters make me think of old friends, and I feel welcome in Yugi's own circle of friends, I do have a lot of fun watching them. The outcome of many of these duels are so obvious it's eye-rolling, yet I still like seeing how they turned out. The victories don't feel cheap, and the losses feel like a punishment for not taking the stakes seriously. Some of the monsters are cool, and some of the strategies are clever. Makes me wish I still had kept my deck so I could've learned how to better at being strategic and planning ahead.
It's easy to get into Yu-Gi-Oh! for sure, just like it's easy to fall out of it, but the journey is worth it if you're willingly determined to stick with it to the end, if only to get some closure. Or you can watch it for the memes, whichever works best for you.
