Predictions and Observations:
Yusei's Last Stand

Episode Aired: July 30, 2011
This Post Posted: August 6, 2011

I think I die just a bit every time I give in to peer pressure like this, but it seems most people are spelling it Halldor, with two L's instead of one. As of now, I'm changing the way I spell it, and the transcripts will be altered accordingly. It's actually a very nice spelling, which I think is why I'm giving in on this sooner than with other spellings I could name that seem to be in contention. As I understand it, for instance, we still spell Deevac/Devack/Devak/etc. pretty much any way we please.

Lester says the Circuit's booming in this duel and should be just about ready to unleash its own special brand of armageddon when Team New World takes the field against the team that's fighting tooth and nail right now to be the ones to try and stop them. How convenient is that? It's almost like they already saw the future and planned it out in adv-- oh, right. But there's no way they're going to see *this* coming-- Team 5D's is going to cream them good.

Finding out that Sebastian was the one who got Halldor started on this quest, I've got to wonder; do we really know Sebastian? Is there more to him in this story than immediately meets the eye? We *might* be expecting more surprises from him; he's been here at the match, in Ragnarok's pit booth, in the background, this entire time.

Halldor's journey for wisdom. I'm still wondering; how did his view change, and what did he learn? Something tells me that he doesn't mean he found the good person deep within every human being. Does Halldor believe, with his deep and profound wisdom about the human condition, as we know Yusei does without claim to any such thing, that every person endangered by this threat is worth defending with everything he's got? Does he believe that he's fighting for a world full of good people that don't deserve to be run over by the next apocalypse? Or is he just fighting because he believes it to be his calling?

Halldor doesn't know the first thing about dignity if he thinks there's any in surrendering a duel. Then again, he's probably talking about the limp home after getting attacked directly by three Nordic Gods, even if Yusei wins after getting thus attacked. Hey dude, threatening your opponent with gratuitous duel violence is not a world-saving kind of strategy, by the way!

"Ya see, I was born on the same day this city nearly perished." Impossible; he wouldn't have survived without the care and nutrition every newborn needs, even if he had, he wouldn't have grown up *nearly* as well-adjusted as he is, and he looks much older in the flashback, six months at least and probably more like twelve or eighteen. That's my child development and psychology classes talking, by the way. It may be more of a symbolic thing; even though he was born to respectable parents in the city, Yusei is a child of the Satellite, and relates to it as his home. There is also a certain element of symbolic birth to his journey through that escape tunnel, which makes him born of the Reactor, of Zero Reverse, itself, just like the Satellite. And that birth, the Reactor and the journey through the tunnel, was begun and created by his father, not his mother, which may explain why we've never really wondered about or gotten to know Yusei's mother, though we've seen a picture of her. When it comes to the birth of Yusei as himself, as a satellite, as a hero, as a Signer, this 'second' birth is the one that matters.

Majestic Star Dragon! Will we see Shooting Star in the same duel, or is that just getting greedy? Incidentally, both dragons represent what it looks like when Yusei's dueling at the top of his game, right now; both are cards that he does not pull out every day or against just anyone. But they represent different facets of Yusei's next level; they aren't interchangeable. What I'm trying to put my finger on is what will have us see one and not the other. Why did Yusei go Majestic here, not Accel Synchro?

Broder's not suspicious and Dragen smells a rat? Isn't *Broder* supposed to be the one with the twisty mind?

This seems like as good a time as any to tell the story of Odin's missing eye, if I haven't yet. I'd mentioned it, but here's the story. So there was this magical well, that would gift any individual who drank from it with great wisdom. But the well was guarded, by a giant or possibly by Mimir himself (depending of course on who you ask), and only those he permitted to could drink. Odin, wisdom-seeker that he is, journeyed to this well, and its guardian demanded of him the following price in exchange for a gulp from the fountain of wisdom: he must pluck out one of his own eyes and hand it over. And Odin did it, with barely any hesitation. What he learned from that gulp of magic water was so incredible, the well's guardian almost tempted him into trading his other eye for one more drink; but he refused, because to him a blind king of the gods is not a very powerful one at all. In other words, the power gained from wisdom in leadership meant even more to him than wisdom for wisdom's own sake. And what happened to the eye he traded to the well's guardian? It was placed in the bottom of the wisdom pool, to warn away any others who come seeking wisdom, with the disclaimer that the price is likely to be steep.

Odin's Eye is a trap that cannot be negated if there's a God Card in play; and it allows knowledge of either facedowns or the opponent's hand in exchange for negating a God Card's abilities. This card reminds me of that myth I just recounted, which is why I did so. Odin gave up an ability-- 3D vision and depth perception (which requires two eyes; luckily, his sacred spear, Gungnir, aims *itself*...)-- and in return gained the kind of information that sight alone doesn't give.

When he saw Yusei's trap coming, Halldor declared that he had 'seen the future'. I tend to notice statements like that. Just on a matter of principle. It's a strong 5D's theme to keep an eye on.

Halldor opines that "the very best part of a chess match, is when the players just sit and strategize." He likes the part of a duel the audience doesn't go as nuts for; the back-and-forth beneath the surface, the part that's just between the duelists themselves. The half the game that's psychology. Gotta say, I'm sorta with him on that; for me character and plot dynamics beat explosions any day. But explosions are pretty cool sometimes, don't get me wrong. Anyway, what I'd really want to say about this would be about what this tells us about Halldor; it's fitting for the wielder of a god devoted to the pursuit of wisdom as a means to power as well as for its own sake. I wonder, always-thinker that he is, if Yusei doesn't somewhat agree with him on this point?

Gjallarhorn is Heimdall the watch-god's special horn, which he blows when Ragnarok's final battle is about to begin. Now, I've been noticing for a while, Ragnarok has named their team after the end of the world. Usually if Ragnarok prevails, it's bad news, see? It seems like stating the obvious just to say that; but here Halldor has again equated his team's victory with the end of the world, in saying that the toll of Gjallarhorn is the sound of his team's victory. I still find myself wondering, the Ragnaroks are eager to prove themselves as world-savers, especially Halldor; the closer he's come to armageddon, the more he's come into his own. Yusei's path has been similar, but he's never been excited about the end of the world approaching, if you get what I'm saying, whereas Halldor can't wait. I'm just not sure the Ragnaroks want to actually put a stop to all this badly enough, you know?

Is it just me, or has all Yusei's damage so far this duel been self-inflicted? Look at that, it *has*; it's all from that Stay Force card, to keep Majestic Star Dragon on the field. I highly doubt he's just stalling for time by keeping it there; Yusei wouldn't stall with that many lifepoints. He has more plans for it; he's got too much hope riding on it; it won't go down unless he does, if he's already spent half his lifepoints like that to keep it at his back.

-----> THIS SECTION CONTAINS SPOILERS ON THE TWELVE SKIPPED EPISODES!!!!

Well, as promised, ladies and gentlemen, I've gotten myself caught up on the twelve skipped episodes, in subbed format. I think the most ironic part of all of this is that since Team New World messed around with the past *anyway* and no one remembers what actually happened except the Signers, in a way it's no continuity problem at all that we skipped over a few things that, in theory, never provably happened. In other words since Iliaster is monkeying around with things that have already happened anyway, keeping track of what happened before at all is kinda pointless in a certain way. In the dub version, it could simply be said that Iliaster edited out those twelve episodes and it would entirely fit within the existing storyline without being any more of a plot device than it was already.

But *why* would 4Kids skip these episodes though? Jack's Red Nova adventure has some hell, demons, desert (man, what is it about the desert in this series?) and so forth, but Crash Town was stronger even when dubbed in terms of that sort of thing. Then there's the Lezar plot, which, if my sisters thought the idea of Lezar having a wife and child was disturbing... but the Lezar plot is quite harmless and a lot of fun. Lezar's snack fetish is not just a comedic device, it's an entire backstory! Then there's the Moment Express Development Organization, which doesn't frighten us all *that* much after we've dealt with Arcadia; I can see the defenestration causing some problems, possibly, but even in the sub it was only implied that she might've died and she came right back a few episodes later. Then there's the great time-wedgie, which has still left me smarting even though technically speaking it's not exactly my headache, per se. And then, after a brief, interrupted glare-off between RDA and Thor, we have Team Taiyou. A couple violent moments in their flashbacks, I could see creating issues for the dub. But really, Team Taiyou are sweet, and harmless, and reaffirm the sort of underdog spirit that characterized Duelist Kingdom. My point is, I can't see any real, solid reasons why this material wasn't dubbed, based on existing precedents for what has and hasn't been dubbed in this show before and what's been skipped and returned to. It's possible, also, that 4Kids is hurrying up the end of 5D's because they want to start ZEXAL, 'cause it's common knowledge by now that ZEXAL *is* getting dubbed. I suppose there are certainly worse reasons, but come on; new episodes only get to be new one time, and these are good ones that deserve to be shown in order and appreciated properly.

Dream? What dream? In fact, all of this, great big what the deck? Is that in the twelve episodes we missed? Yeah, it was. And why did Yusei refer to it as a "dream" when he wasn't asleep? It could be he doesn't want to reveal his hand; you don't tell just anyone you've been time-traveling. It may be that it's too long a story: "well, you see, there were these instant noodles, then we infiltrated a dangerous Iliaster affiliate, then they tried to not-kill-but-kill us by dumping us into this wormhole..." Or it could be continuity-patching on 4Kids' part, making it such that that long story is unnecessary for *us*, the audience, in the matter of that vision, which is one of two points of the narrative since the skipped episodes that suggest to me that we might not be going back for them. The other is that, at the beginning of "Eyes On the Prize", the Signers are acting like they haven't met Team Ragnarok before.

Especially having seen Team Taiyou, I'm really getting the sense now that our WRGP opponents are finding out what it truly means for their team to win at any cost; like Team Unicorn, Team Taiyou found out that that wasn't in winning the match, but in battling with pride and pulling off their miracle. It was even admitted that perhaps Taiyou won more from that match in the end than 5D's did even though 5D's was moving onward. I'm wondering if the Ragnaroks will similarly discover what that means for them. If they are truly committed to saving the world at any cost, that may include standing aside when 5D's proves itself more fit to do so.

Okay, not sure if there's a new episode tomorrow; TV Guide won't tell me up or down. But if there is, I will find it and post on it. Until then, that is the end of this post; goodnight! -Clio

READ A TRANSCRIPT OF YUSEI'S LAST STAND