Thoughts on Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Dark Side of Dimensions

[bnomiko]

Yeah, I'm late to the show. I really didn't want to watch it until a subbed version was available and I was too lazy to go search for one : ) But better late than never!

I was running a live stream of commentary at Nenya85 while I watched (and she apparently didn't mind sitting through me babbling nonsense), so I figured I'd share some (many) of the

Comments

[blue_eyesgirl]

I just wanted to mention about Shadi (maybe you already got it and I misread your point wrong, apologies if so!) but in DSOD that was Shadi actually dying as far as I can tell. Yami Bakura kinda implied in his duel against Yami Malik that Shadi was dead (he was surprised that Malik had seen Shadi) so that seems to be this event. Though then it starts getting confusing because in DSOD the Eye was gone but Shadi was wearing the turban but it seems that Pegasus met alive!Shadi and every manga appearance after that was spirit!Shadi

[bnomiko]

My understanding with Shadi is that he serves as the eternal guardian of the Items. So he's essentially been a ghost or a spirit throughout the entirity of the story and well before that, or was... because... can the dead die? So I was surprised to see him not-so-dead here, even if in a flashback

[blue_eyesgirl]

To be honest now, whilst DSOD gives us more story on Shadi it still doesn't explain him at all! With the cube obviously working for him and us not seeing it in the Memory World does that mean it's not from YGO's dimension? Did Shadi hop from another one and bring the cube with him? Why? Like seriously Shadi what are you motivations? iirc he's supposed to be a tomb keeper but ?? Takahashi give me more *grabby hands

[bnomiko]

Re: the cube - they pulled this bullshit "8th Sennen Item" on us at the last second. It's not the "8th Item." There IS no 8th. The whole thing with the cube is bad fanfiction, really

[nenya85]

The whole Shadi thing is a convoluted mess because if he’s been running around as a ghost for 3,000 years or so, how did impossibly cute Mini-Bakura kill him again? Also we know he’s still making life miserable for everyone in Domino, so why didn’t he pop in on his grieving orphans? (Not to mention he seems to hand out powerful magical artifacts pretty casually!)

My theory on Kaiba: throughout the series we see Kaiba repeatedly using technology to replicate or try to replicate) magical powers. I think he studied the cube and learned enough to replicate its powers in the high tech whatever-it-was he designed. My only complaint is that it should have been dragon shape. This is mainly because I’m a sucker for metaphor and I like the idea that technology itself is his magic.

I agree with Mai - I’m not talking romantically, but for a show centering on friendship, it kind of bothers me the way she gets dropped like a hot rock and pretty much forgotten once Battle City is over.

[bnomiko]

Well I understand that Shadi's job was to find the next wielder of each item, regardless if they were "good" or "evil" - but that contradicts what he was doing by trying to save these unfortunate kids. Certainly he had no issue threatening to drop Anzu off a building or whatever it was that he was doing very early on in the manga, and you can't say she'd done anything to deserve that.

Or to put in a more straightforward way, they needed a trigger to get this set of antagonists to pop in and give Yugi a reason to summon Yami to do his magical thing, and they chose Shadi.

Another thing I realized with Kaiba, as much as he used to (famously) mock Yugi and Yami for talk about the heart of the cards and of magic, he quite obviously believes in magic here (believing that Yami was still inside the Puzzle somehow, believing that Yugi could summon him, even if only a moment, believing that he could simply pull Obelisk out of the ground).

[nenya85]

Yeah, it felt like... hmmnnn we need someone to start the bad guy off who ties into the original series... paging Shadi... paging Shadi. Actually, now that I think of it, that's what bothered me with Otogi and his father and the ice cream shop - it felt like they included it just so they could have a cameo with Otogi.

These are quibbles, though. I love the movie.

[bnomiko]

Otogi's appearance at the end felt far more random to me. It's nice that he joined the rest of the guys in seeing Anzu off at the airport, but... seriously dude, you were in the movie for 5 seconds, delivering ice cream. Didn't duel or show up for the tournament. Why bother having him show up at the end?