The PUZZLING World of Yu-Gi-Oh! (Part 1)

Yu-Gi-Oh has turned into a massive franchise that all started with small and very different beginnings. Today we start our journey of looking back at the original series of Yu-Gi-Oh, from the weird origins in the Manga and Season 0 to the main anime and movies featuring the original cast of characters.

Written By: Jordan Fringe
Edited By: Jordan Fringe, David Strickland & Jackson S.
Channel Art By: Jerry Meehan

[JordanFringe]

(Promotion for free samples w/ free shipping has ended, you sold them out)

[doubledamn]

Would have been hilarious if Pegasus screwed with Kaiba by just printing a ton of new copies of Blue Eyes.

[draculemihawk]

The dub VAs are iconic. They're pretty much the only part of 4Kids that have stood the test of time while all the VAs from their other anime were recast.

[blakethebeast]

I laughed uncontrollably at the line, "Once again, Mokuba is taken captive." I blame Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged and LittleKuriboh.
Man, I read the manga on my lunch breaks and it was wild how dark the early stuff was. I actually worried I could get in trouble for things like dudes being burned alive and Anzu's bikini (or at least get weird looks.)

[thehonoredone]

Even more than Pokemon Yu-Gi-Oh was my childhood. And rewatching the 4kids dub version to this day is still a treat. Knowing about all the nonsensical rules, censorship, Yugi plot armor and everything else in-between. I think it's makes the dub version even more special and hilarious.

[UncleJrueForTue]

When your anime has demon lords, isekai vr mmo revenge plots, eldritch gods, duel school, duel school space energy cults, yandere sadomasochist demons, the late stage capitalist hell of 5Ds, South American earthen deities, and the subsequent interdimensional split to avoid the cyber apocolaypse(with a bit if time travel), as a fraction of your story, you've cooked something insane.

[hikupptheoverthinker]

Joey and Kuwabara from Yu Yu Hakusho are my reason for loving underdog characters so much. That feeling of having a heart of gold just means so much to me.

[sotavent]

Damn, because of LittleKuriboh, I hear Duke Devlin’s “theme song” immediately as from his name is mentioned…

[hctaz]

Honestly though, I actually really enjoyed the original season 0 concept.

The horror game manga was really interesting to me. I also think the manga does a much better job of setting up Bakura as the main villain. I kinda feel like the anime didn’t realize he was a super important character for a while into it.

But I really loved the idea of there being this spirit who wasn’t exactly a nice guy but was, at least, a just guy. He really felt like a pharaoh. He deals with liars, cheaters, and thieves harshly, but he gives them an opportunity to redeem themselves in the process despite how dark the punishments might be.

Like that’s the kind of guy I’d want as a king for sure. He seems to have an intuitive idea of who is good and who is evil. Like how he could have easily let Millennium Key dude fall to his death, but realized he wasn’t there for malicious reasons and saved him while warning him not to enter his mind again.

Very interesting character.

[Lucario]

I used to not be a fan of Duelist Kingdom till recently when I learned that the official rules of the card game itself wasn't even thought of yet during that time, it wasn't till Battle City started where some sense of the card game was made. When YGO came to America, the official rules were already established and set in stone, which is why so much kids were confuse as to wtf was going on in that season

[MartinThePolarBear]

Man Yu-Gi-Oh was my first anime. I still keep up with it having seen everything episode from Duel Monsters to Sevens. Still waiting on Go Rush to be available in English to binge through though 😅

[adultnewborn]

I don’t think I’ve ever clicked on one of your videos as fast as I did this one. I absolutely loved Yu Gi Oh as a kid

[florence]

Rip to the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh who died saving someones life

[mgrega]

I watched your entire Pokémon series from start to finish. I remember coming home from school in the early 2000s and watching Static Shock, Pokémon, Jackie Chan, and Yugioh.

My brothers and I would play yugioh and Pokémon, but lost interest in yugioh after maybe 5 years.

As per usual, this was very nostalgic and entertaining and made my brain happy thank you ❤

[MrGeorgeFlorcus]

Dan Green as both Yugi and Atem is so iconic; the contrast between the wimpy, soft-spoken Yugi and the cool, confident, heroic Atem is so pronounced you can hardly believe its the same guy. And he's really able to pull out some strong emotional beats too, great voice actor who never got as much work as he deserved (I know he had some extremely unfortunate personal life stuff that stifled his career, which is tragic for multiple reasons).

I honestly think it's insane that, to my knowledge, he was never called in once to voice any incarnation of He-Man; he would have destroyed that role so hard

[hikupptheoverthinker]

Fun fact for me: Back when i was reading a manga called Samurai Deeper Kyo, for some reason whenever the character Benitora was speaking, I heard Joey's 4kids dub voice in my head. Then when i watched the Samurai Deeper Kyo anime like a year later...Benitora's dub voice was Joey's 4kids voice. Wild.

[garbageGothic]

LET'S Season 0 supremacy! Always so nice seeing people talk about it so lovingly

[Pwrplus]

The bit about it being a gateway unto manga resonated with me hard, on my 9th birthday I saw issue 9 of Shonen Jump at a store in 2003 and begged my grandpa to get it for me because I saw Yugi on the cover, and was greeted with a story about Yugi's friend dressing up as a superhero, getting beat up and his life threatened by thugs to extort his father, and Yugi playing tag with them and a can of spray paint which resulted in a lit cigarette torching all of them and I was hooked for life

[mxhughes]

Pokémon, Digimon and Yu-Gi-Oh were my starter pack shows introducing me to anime.I didn't grow up having cable all the time so catching those shows on antenna tv was everything.I definitely liked Yu-Gi-Oh the most from the cards, the characters, the arcs, the action, the different ways every situation connected to the pharoah's past plus it being the firstvanime I seen where the power of friendship was a emphasized trope nonstop in a series.Even with me watching way more anime now then I did as a kid I still hold Yu-Gi-Oh in high regard as one of my all time favorites and every blue moon on random I watch some classic battles from the series

[tv_tim]

My favorite part about season zero is that Trudge actually comes back in 5D's as an antagonist at first, but he comes around and sticks around as a side character on the side of the protagonists. While I've never seen season zero, I do have the manga and it is really a trip compared to the main manga and anime most will know and love. My first exposure to this series was when it started airing in the US and it instantly hooked me and I started buying cards, mainly just to collect as I had no idea about where/how to join any tournaments and that I had no real interest in competitive Yu-gi-oh!. I still actually have old 1st edition Legend of Blue Eyes cards (nothing rare) and the original Kaiba and Yugi starter decks in their original boxes. I've been a big fan of this series ever since it came over to the U.S., still got some of the old PS1, PS2, Gameboy and DS games.

And can we talk about Pegasus's amazing drip in the episode in which he duels Yugi through the television? I don't know why, but that outfit just looks good on him.