Arc-V: A (Brief) Retrospective

 Yugioh Arc-V is the installment of my franchise that, in my opinion, had the most missed potential. But at the same time, I do still feel like there’s a certain brilliance to it. Maybe it’s just my nostalgia talking, or maybe it’s the fact that it’s a celebration of a franchise I love so much; but I think Yuya, his counterparts, and their connections to the previous series are genius. 

Do you guys remember how The Last Airbender and Legend of Korra had a lot of emphasis on the “Avatar Cycle”? The gist is that it was the order in which the Avatar had to learn the elements, the order in which Aang traveled through his adventures, and (as we learn in Korra Season 2) the order in which bending was discovered. 

The Cycle goes Air-Water-Earth-Fire, and it’s interesting in that it loops around back to Fire-Air-Water-Earth and can still make sense in this order, as seen with Wan and Roku. 

With Aang, he visits the nations in this order (being born and raised in the Air Temple, ending up at the Southern Water Tribe, sporadically visiting the Earth Kingdom, and finally coming to the Fire Nation in Season 3), and learns the elements in this order. This really emphasizes the ideas of destiny and fate within the show, demonstrating how this cycle cannot and will never be broken. 

It took me months to figure out what this was, but Arc-V has it as well. 

Within the context of the story, the order goes Xyz-Synchro-Fusion (this is notably the newest to oldest summoning methods). This is the order in which we are introduced to: 

• the dimensions (you’ll recall that Yuya and the Lancers didn’t make it to the Xyz dimension until Season 3, but it was firmly established before the existence of the Synchro and Fusion dimensions)

• The Yu-boys

• The Dragons

• The summoning methods in-universe (not counting LSD)

• *in addition, this is also the order in which Reiji often uses all three summoning methods, and the order in which Zarc broke out the Supreme King Servants in the end of the show*

However, like Avatar, when this order is reversed, it still makes sense. Fusion-Synchro-Xyz is the order in which we are introduced to:

• The bracelet girls (Serena, then Rin, then Ruri/Lulu)

• The antagonists from each dimension (Sora and the Obelisk force, then Roget, then arguably Kite and Aster)

• And the summoning methods in real life (not counting Rituals, as it is not an Extra Deck method)

In addition, this got me thinking: where do Pendulums fit into this? Then it hit me. If we add the Pendulums before Xyz, then it still makes perfect sense within the context of the story (for example, the order in which the dimensions, Yu-boys and dragons are all introduced remains unchanged if we were to add Pendulums before Xyz). 

Speaking of which, one of the more striking aspects of the Yu-Boys is how they relate and compare to the previous protagonists. While originally, I was researching this and couldn’t find any comparisons, it hit me: this is entirely intentional. 

Let’s go in the aforementioned “Summon Cycle” and start with Yuto. His entire deck is “Phantom Knight” monsters, which not only foreshadows his eventual transformation into a ghost-like figure after Yugo pretty much kills him; but it reflects his overall playing style. The Phantom Knights often prefer spells, blocking and dodging attacks, and setting up monsterless combos using only what’s available; in this sense, they reflect Yuto’s desire to not hurt anyone and his generally pacifistic nature. 

*This in of itself is so interesting to watch because of how genuinely angry, frustrated and enraged he is for most of the show*

Yuto himself is a competent and battle-hardened stoic, generally bitter towards the world around him. 

Everything I just said is the opposite of Yuma. 

Yuma is an impulsive, reckless teenage boy who is sometimes downright lacking in common sense and foresight. The opposite of Yuto in every way. His deck is extremely straightforward, often giving away his plans early on in the duel because he makes no attempts to disguise them. He’s an absolute bafoon and idiot at the start of the show; by comparison, Yuto’s introduction Arc-V might be one of the greatest and quickest wrap-ups in a duel in the franchise’s history. 

Similarities: Both of them duel have “darker” forms that they take on during the series; for Yuma, it is his Dark Zexal form, and for Yuto, it’s when he’s possessed by Zarc on numerous occasions (notably when he takes over Yuya for the first time, and then when they summon “Odd-Eyes Raging Dragon”). Furthermore, their ace monsters are both Rank 4 cards (“Utopia” and “Dark Rebellion), but they have a Rank 5 Rank-Up Xyz form (“Utopia Ray V” and “Victory” for Yuma, and “Dark Requiem” for Yuto). In addition, both have predominantly Warrior-type monsters in their decks. 

Let’s move on to Yugo, a hotheaded, brash, trigger-happy teen with a short fuse, who is literally always willing to pick fights with someone. Most of his arc in the show is about trying to find Rin, similar to Yuto with Ruri. He is incredibly young for a turbo duelist at only 14, and claims to have been using his D-Wheel for turbo duels for quite some time. (Jack, Shinji and Crow are all around 19 or in their early 20s; this is the norm for most turbo duelists, as Kurosaki later gets a D-Wheel and is 18). 

Yugo is shown to slip up numerous times in his dueling because he gets too excited or too angry at the very beginning of a match; against Selena, he almost lost right away because he was so pumped up at dueling Selena (who he mistook for Rin) that he summoned a single, weak monster in attack mode and laid no face-downs. When Selena wrecked him during the next turn, it put him at a severe disadvantage and nearly cost him the duel. 

Let’s compare him to Yusei, an intellectual and analytical (and older) duelist who thinks everything through, and pretty much never loses a duel in his entire series for this. He’s able to stay extremely straightforward in his dueling, and his tendency to focus on summoning out monsters like “Shooting Star Dragon” and “Majestic Star Dragon” often helps him win matches. 

Furthermore, Yugo seems to generally be more social, maintaining a good relationship with Rin and Yuzu throughout the show and quickly befriending Sawatari. While Yusei also has many friendships (his ones with Akiza, Jack and Crow in particular); these don’t sink in until late Season 1. Before then, his lack of formality and bluntness is borderline off-putting to some of the other characters. 

Similarities: In spite of radical personality differences, these two have some of the most apparent similarities. “Clear Wing” is almost identical to “Stardust”, the latter just has legs and is skinnier, and Yugo’s “Speedroids” greatly resemble Yusei’s “Synchron monsters. Furthermore, Yugo’s desire to duel Jack is an obvious allusion to Yusei’s rivalry with Jack. Furthermore, a singular, quick visual is used for both of them when formulating a plan: the classic 5Ds animation of a line of light connecting various key cards. 

Finally, we’re going to Yuri. This sociopathic teenager is definitely one of the most terrifying characters on Arc-V, and for the sole purpose that he has no remorse or apathy for others whatsoever. 

Yuri uses the plant-type “Predaplant” archetype, and its monsters generally require nonspecific materials for Fusion summoning, but he has few of them; as a result, he generally focuses on using his ace monster, “Starve Venom Fusion Dragon”, a terrifying and disgusting-looking monster with anti-Special Summon effects. 

He is, essentially, the antithesis to Jaden/Judai. Jaden is a fun-loving and kindhearted teenager, but one who is relatively low on the totem pole (a Slifer Red). By comparison, Yuri is one of Academia’s top agents, not even being defined by any sort of house (though he would undoubtedly be an Obelisk Blue if he was). 

Whereas Yuri’s ace monster is a DARK effect fusion monster with nonspecific fusion requirements (“Starve Venom”); Jaden’s is a main deck normal LIGHT monster, but one that need specific fusion requirements for the fusion summons that it preforms (“Neos”). Starve Venom also has a single upgraded form, Greedy Venom; whereas Neos has multiple upgraded forms. In addition, most of Yuri’s Predaplant’s are unremarkable monsters with little Spell Card support, and therefore, he relies almost exclusively on Starve Venom; but Jaden has a variety of Elemental Heroes he uses on a regular basis, each with plenty of support, and therefore, he’s extremely flexible due to the many strategies he’s developed. 

Similarities: It occurred to me while writing this that they probably have one of the more unsettling similarities: they both enjoy dueling, but for Jaden, it’s because it brings him closer to other people and is used for friendly competitions; but for Yuri, it’s because he can take advantage of Solid Vision to severely injure his opponents and fulfill his sociopathic tendencies. Yuri is, essentially, the result a more sadistic variant of Jaden’s “Supreme King” persona being his default personality, right down to the extensive use of Super Polymerization.

So I know what you're asking: where does Yuya fit into this? Yuya is a kid who loves dueling, but as the show goes on it becomes clear that he uses dueling (and entertaining people in general) as a way to repress his unprocessed emotions about his father abandoning him. Yuya's story is one of abandonment: his father abandoned him, Yuzu was taken away from him, Yuto was killed mere moments after meeting him, and many of the friends he makes along the way are taken from him by Duel Academy. Moreso than any other protagonist before him, the stress of the conflict completely overwhelms him. All the other protagonists had their dark side, and all of the other protagonists had their depressive episodes, but Yuya is the only one who actively struggles with both rage and depression throughout the show due to a lack of a sufficient support network. Effectively, he's exactly the sort of anxious, emotional, traumatized kid Yugi would have become if he didn't have Atem by his side to support him.

On a thematic level, that's why Yuya is such a crucial character in the second and third seasons despite not hailing from the XYZ, Fusion or Synchro universes. As he tries to get Yuzu back, he confronts his own abandonment issues, his depression and his rage, and he sees those traits reflected in people like Crow, Jack, Shun and Kaito. By dueling and healing these fractured societies, Yuya can begin to heal the rage and grief within himself.

In this regard, we can think of Yuya as playing a role similar to Aang in Avatar. He exists in the intersection between all four universes, and it's only by emotionally understanding himself and the inhabitants of each universe can he solve their problems. His usage of all four Dimension Dragons in the final fight against Reiji definitively proves once and for all that he's conquered his demons, and he's become whole in his travels across the multiverse.

__________

Before going into Arc-V, I had heard about how it was essentially a miniature crossover of the various settings and ideas of the previous series, and how it had cameos from many other legacy characters. This idea was massively appealing to me…until I realized that there were only five characters (Kite, Edo, Asuka, Jack and Crow) and all were generally underutilized and/or underdeveloped in the narrative, and that all of the previous series protagonists were missing entirely. 

However, once I started to actually watch the show and the narrative began to switch to the other dimensions, then, in a way I can’t really describe, the entire universe seemed…off. 

I hope I’m not the only one that felt this, or else this would be a very strange analysis, but something felt constantly out of place with the non-Standard characters and settings. However, in hindsight, this all seems intentional. 

The ideas I just presented (how Yuto, Yuri and Yugo all have some similarities to their protagonists, but their fundamental differences are nonetheless off-putting) is one of the examples that I noticed. The interpretations of Heartland and Duel Academy also add onto this idea, specifically making Duel Academy the bad guys compared to its collective role in GX; converting such a heroic group into an organization of war criminals seems extremely gutsy, especially for Yu-Gi-Oh.

In hindsight, the ideas of Fusion, Synchro and Xyz-summoning being used by (and apparently only by) the LDS school in Standard also heightened this. We’ve never seen any kind of monopoly on these methods based on the other shows. (GX, 5Ds and Zexal had an extremely prolific amount of each of these methods, so it seems odd that only a few handfuls of teenagers are even permitted to have these cards in Arc-V). 

It seems even weirder now that many fans have pieced together the timeline connections of the series, which include:

• GX clearly being stated as taking place 7 (10 in the dub) years after Duel Monsters 

• GX featuring the return of Kaiba, the Paradox Brothers and Pegasus (who even compares Jaden to Yugi)

• Jaden encountering Yugi in the series premiere and finale

• 5Ds having references to Joey Wheeler, the Truesdale brothers and the “Kaiba Dome”

• Bonds Beyond Time solidifying the fact that Yugi, Jaden and Yusei’s adventures are within a few years of each other

• Zexal showing statue versions of Dark Magician, REBD, BEWD, Neos and Rainbow Dragon

• Trudge having made an appearance as a teenager in the original manga 

• Fusions appear in all four series (it is obviously a major plot point in the first two series, while 5Ds features Dragon Knight Draco-Equiste, and Zexal has Kite and his Photon Twin Lizard)

*This would make things super weird with the legacy characters, seeing as Kite, Edo, Asuka, Jack and Crow all seemed to be the same age despite coming from different eras in the franchise*

Basically, this whole Arc-V multiverse situation felt eerily similar to the idea of DC Rebirth, with a bunch of ideas, characters and settings taken from different points in time; characters having different ages; popular characters being removed from the time stream…etc. 

That’s when it started to hit me: the United Dimension that had all three extra deck methods and Pendulums was the timeline we’ve come to know and love several years in the future, i.e. the future of Zexal and 5Ds (and by extent GX and Duel Monsters). 

The inception of Zarc is what caused it to separate into the four dimensions, and Yusho theorizes that Yuya was chosen by Zarc to be his adoptive son, meaning that Zarc could control the fate, setting and circumstances of his reincarnations to a degree. Now everything make SO MUCH SENSE, and now we know why we had: twisted and perverted versions of Heartland and Duel Academy, an extremely strict class system in New Domino (now just “the City”), a notable absence of the previous protagonists, and only a select few legacy characters that don’t actually affect Leo’s plans all that much, as well as a sudden monopoly on the Extra Deck summons. 

That's why Yuya is such a crucial character in this show. As Zarc, he was the reason that the universes separated in the first place, but as Yuya, he could reunite the fractured universes into a whole.