The Beauty of Yusaku Fujiki's Revenge

This is going to be a shorter essay, but one I desperately wanted to make. 

Yu-Gi-Oh is one of my all-time favorite anime. I’ve seen the entire show more times than I care to count, and I’ve seen many of the spin-offs as well. However, they seemed to be on the decline after 5Ds. 5Ds and GX were the only spin-offs I watched all the way through, with the others intriguing me for a bit but never having quite the same magic. 

Until VRAINS, that is. 

Now, I could make an entire video about VRAINS, and believe me, I intend to. After I lost interest in the franchise as a kid, then got back into it in my final years of high school, it was one of the only anime I waited each week for. I tend to be a binger, and I usually don’t watch anime as they come out weekly, but I made an exception for this series. Something about the setting and characters really spoke to me, but in particular, I found myself captivated by Yusaku Fujiki. 

From what I can tell, Yusaku has been a bit divisive in the fandom. I’ve seen a lot of people on social media comment that they think he feels too bland or too robotic, while others enjoy his calm, methodical vengeance, feeling like it’s a breath of fresh air after Yuma and Yuya. I fall into the latter camp. I never got the impression that he was bland, simply because he was so unlike anything else in a protagonist. He’s lonely, traumatized, quiet, honest to the point of rudeness, and socially awkward in a way we haven’t seen since the days of Yugi. 

More than that, he’s also one of the best duelists in the entire series, and his motivations for becoming an incredible duelist are fascinating. Today, I’m here to analyze his character, discuss how he breaks the mold of past protagonists, and talk about why I think he has one of the most well-realized arcs in the franchise. 

Part 1: Revenge

As a narrative device, revenge can be incredibly mixed.On the one hand, I see many series glorify it and the violence that comes with it, or, at the very least, use revenge as a way to achieve closure. Kill Bill and John Wick fall into this camp, and they are perhaps the most well-known examples of revenge stories in modern cinema. 

However, as this “revenge genre” grew in popularity and quantity, just as many stories examined how revenge is ultimately pointless, for a number of reasons. 

• In some cases, the revenge--whether it was achieved or not--seems too costly, both mentally and physically. This is how True Grit and The Last of Us Part II both end. 

• Other times, the character will overcome insurmountable odds and achieve their revenge, only to find that they don’t feel any different. They return from their journey, still suffering from grief, unchanged. The Revenant ends on a note similar to this. 

• And even more narratives will have revenge overridden by another desire entirely. My personal favorite manga series, Berserk, has Guts’ immense hatred for Griffith replaced by a need to protect Casca and restore her sanity. 

When I first started VRAINS, I assumed it would fall into the first or third categories. I couldn’t imagine that VRAINS--which is fundamentally a kids show--would actually have Yusaku achieve his revenge, and if he did, I doubted he would come away feeling apathy or emptiness. Even still, the premise sounded fascinating to me. 

After ZEXAL and Arc-V (which, together, comprise 6 years of Yugioh history), it felt refreshing to have Yusaku in the mix. He was everything that Yuma and Yuya weren’t. Stoic, intelligent, talented while still inexperienced, and above all else, tragic from the get-go. 

In the early days of VRAINS, I found myself wondering if Yusaku could even be considered a hero. He was more of an anti-hero. He kidnaps Ai, a being with sentience and emotion, to use as a living hostage and bargaining chip in his war against a cyberterrorist organization. He’s rude, cold and a bit standoffish; not quite to the extent of previous characters like Kaiba or Kite, but definitely more so than any protagonist before or since. 

Most of all, in a series that’s all about the power of friendship and staying positive, Yusaku’s tale is an undeniably grim story about revenge, at least in Season 1. Unlike everyone from Yugi to Yuya, Yusaku finds strength in solitude, not unity. 

Even as I relished in this new story, I was cautiously optimistic, and preparing for disappointment. With each speech about his trauma or his vengeance, I was expecting Yusaku to get a stern, cliche talking-to from someone like Aoi or Kusanagi about how revenge is empty, at which point he would suddenly turn around and become a stereotypical Shounen protagonist. 

And...that. Never. Happened. 

I think it’s safe to say that the main reason I love Yusaku’s arc in Season 1 is because it subverts this trend I keep seeing in modern revenge tales. The twist is that there is no twist. 

I’m so used to getting the wool pulled over my eyes, that having a revenge story get set up and resolved all in one season actually caught me off guard more than anything else. 

To go back to Berserk, the turning point of Guts’ story is the amazing chapter “Cracks in the Blade.” In this chapter, our brooding antihero Guts visits an old friend, Godot. Godot is the man who forged Guts’ sword and crafted his prosthetic arm, the tools of Guts’ revenge. But in this chapter, Godot is no longer enabling such meaningless revenge. Instead, Godot calls out Guts’ behavior as self-destructive and selfish. This conversation prompts Guts to abandon his revenge. 

The writers were smart with the first season of VRAINS. They were aware of this trope, and they crafted a story where no one would reasonably give Yusaku such a talk. 

• Kusanagi has a younger brother who was kidnapped alongside Yusaku. As a mentor and older brother-figure, Kusanagi might have filled a role similar to Godot in any other story, but here, he has just as much investment in revenge as Yusaku does. 

• Aoi is, at best, a distant acquaintance. In this first season, she isn’t aware that Yusaku and Playmaker are one and the same. She has no reason to dissuade Yusaku from his revenge, simply because she cares more about defeating his alter ego and recovering her pride. 

• Go, like Aoi, cares about pride, though I would argue to a greater extent. He really embraces the role of a professional and a performer, and unlike Aoi, he never goes out of his way to do heroic acts for selfless reasons. He’s in no place to talk Yusaku out of revenge, because he doesn’t care. 

• Ema presents herself as an amoral hacker and thief. She doesn’t exactly have the strictest moral compass. She pursues Yusaku mainly because she finds him interesting, and sees no reason for him to abandon his quest, simply because that would eliminate a major source of entertainment. 

• And, of course, Ai wants Hanoi gone just as much as Yusaku, being that they destroyed his homeworld and essentially used him as a lab rat. 

The closest thing we get to VRAINS challenging Yusaku’s revenge is during his duel with Akira, and even then, it’s not the conversation you might expect. Akira is a distant authority figure who’s at odds with Yusaku during Season 1, and when trying to dissuade Yusaku from revenge, he does so in a mechanical, professional way. His argument is simply that Yusaku doesn’t need to defeat Hanoi...because Akira will do it for him. This infuriates Yusaku more than anything, because relinquishing his revenge to another deprives him of the closure he needs for his childhood trauma. 

What I love about Yusaku’s story is that revenge isn’t necessarily framed as a good or bad thing. Ultimately, it’s up for the audience to decide if they think Yusaku is on the right path or not. And, unlike many other Yu-Gi-Oh characters, he actually achieves it. 

Part 2: Closure and Friendship

I mentioned earlier that many revenge stories indulge in revenge not just for the sake of it, but as a means for achieving catharsis. John Wick is one of my favorite movies, and it’s a brilliant example of this. He was already in mourning when the film began and trying to cope with the passing of his wife; the brutal, meaningless death of his new puppy just sent him further over the edge. And, to top it off, the puppy was a posthumous gift from his wife. 

His relentless rampage is not only a way to avenge his dog, but to achieve closure for the passing of his spouse. 

VRAINS takes an interesting spin on this idea, separating Yusaku’s revenge and closure into two linked but separate processes. Yusaku achieves revenge by dismantling the Knights of Hanoi throughout Season 1. Yusaku believes that defeating them will bring him closure. Instead, that closure only comes after he accepts the trauma of the Lost Incident, something that he achieves with Ryoken. 

Let’s look at the final two duels of VRAINS Season 1. It’s between the same two people, Yusaku Fujiki and Ryoken Kogami, yet they couldn’t be anymore different. 

• The first is a Speed Duel amidst a Data Storm. The fast-paced nature of the Speed Duel reflects how frantic both are to crush the other. Both are getting more and more desperate, doing anything to use their Skills. Ryoken knows he’s standing on his last leg, and that his plan is about to fail. This duel is the end of Yusaku’s revenge. It’s a bit of a red herring, because the actual finale is…

• A Master Duel within the Tower of Hanoi. This is a much slower-paced duel, and significantly longer as well, being a 4-part finale. Compared to the frantic Data Storm outside, the Tower is calm and quiet, inviting them to converse and discuss their past. The childhood friendship between the two is reestablished during the final moments, and by defeating Ryoken once and for all, Yusaku achieves closure. 

The difference in emotional state is reflected in their strategies. Yusaku uses the Data Storm (a tool of Hanoi) to draw Transcode Talker, and he develops a beatdown strategy with Transcode that reflects his vengeful mindset. A few hours later, in the Tower, Yusaku has calmed down. He takes advantage of the space offered in a Master Duel and develops a more creative, oppressive strategy using Transcode, Excode and Power Code Talker. By comparison, Ryoken starts off on the defensive, using Mirror Force to throw Yusaku’s attacks back at him, but as he becomes more stressed, confused and conflicted, his strategies become more aggressive, eventually throwing away Mirror Force as fuel for Borrelguard Dragon’s effect. 

In a way, it’s fitting that Ryoken was the final boss, not his father. Yusaku’s story arc is not only about cathartic, unambiguous, straightforward revenge; but also about healing, and accepting that the past cannot be changed. Most revenge stories opt for one of these, but VRAINS does both. 

In that sense, Ryoken is the perfect final antagonist. As Revolver, he is the object of Yusaku’s revenge, a ruthless cyberterrorist bent on the destruction of the virtual world; but he also helped Yusaku when they were younger, and is therefore the object of Yusaku’s closure. 

Closing Thoughts:

This essay evolved as I was writing it. 

I went into this intending to make a short video about how I found Yusaku’s cathartic, straightforward revenge refreshing amidst a wave of media that demonizes vengeance. But, throughout the writing process, I realized that was both 1) dismissive of Yusaku’s subtle character development, and 2) not a particularly nuanced opinion. 

Yusaku isn’t exactly a revenge-driven monster, but he’s also not someone who believes revenge is a futile, wasted thing. He recognizes the value of vengeance and emotional closure, prioritizing both without neglecting either. In the end, his triumph against Revolver is something to be celebrated: not just because he’s moving past the trauma of the Lost Incident, but because he wholeheartedly achieves his goals. 

My name is Jonathan, and thank you for reading this.