Predictions and Observations:
A Sight Unseen II

Summary: As the duel rages on, Axel realizes that if Jim loses, he’ll have to face the Supreme King next, and at the prospect finds his hands trembling. However, Jim is far from done. Meanwhile, Syrus journeys through the forest, now with a mustard-yellow cloak of his very own, and, after helping a mother and child find safety from the fiends, arrives to watch the end of the duel from a distance. When Jim gets knocked down, he has a dream, a flashback in which he’s fossil-hunting on Academy Island with Shirley. When Jaden showed up, Jim confided to him that he takes his fossil-digging seriously because he sees in his finds the spirit of what they once were. Of course, they might be cranky to get woken up. Jaden replied, of course not! He thought they’d love it, because it means they aren’t forgotten. Getting back up, Jim sees Jaden himself as a trapped fossil, just waiting to be free! He gives all he’s got and more, and in the deep recesses of his mind, Jaden almost hears him. Then the Supreme King shows him what Superpolymerization can do, and fuses Jim’s huge and powerful monster with his own weaker one; Jim is defenseless against a 4400-attack-point-monstrosity, and there’s no escape. Shirley comes forward, either to try and protect Jim or to join him, and they are both sent to the stars together. Jim turns to Axel, and asks him to take up where he left off, and save their friend. He vanishes, except for his duel disk and the Eye of Orichalcum. Axel is paralyzed with fear, and, grabbing the Eye, runs for all he’s worth out of the Supreme King’s lair, followed by the fiends’ laughter. Syrus stands atop a spire of rock, hidden in the ramparts, surveying the fortress of the Supreme King…

Everybody’s got a cloak. To me, it seems, that the cloaks represent shifting perspectives. People who aren’t in cloaks are the focus of the plot, the characters whose hearts we understand fully at that time; and people in cloaks are spectators, characters of mystery, whom we may be familiar with, but if we didn’t know about them before, they’re a mystery. For instance, we first saw the cloaks in The State of Syrus, when Zane and Aster wore them. Zane took off his hood right before he asked Ojama Yellow what had been going on—when he became more than just a figure in the distance or whatever—and put it back on when he left Syrus again. Aster had his hood off sitting in the clearing waiting for Zane, and Zane had his on, contrasting that Zane was being very cryptic; just like Aster, we’re left in the dark. Jim and Axel wore cloaks at the very beginning of The Darkness is Revealed, representing that the old man and the little kid didn’t know these two strangers coming to their fireside, and strangers are dangerous here. The cloaks were quickly forgotten as Axel and Jim took center stage as the two characters we know being at the center of the plot. Now, in this episode, Syrus wears a cloak (note the subtle yellow shade mimics his blazer, allowing him not to seem to have abruptly changed; same tone, different appearance), symbolizing how Axel and Jim, not he, are central to this battle just now and he’s watching, unseen. I’ve noticed that, especially with Jaden gone, all characters are sort of equally worthy of focus. As the main character and the de facto leader, Jaden tied everything together; by following him, the story encompassed all of them. Not so anymore, hence the perspective-shifting with the cloaks.

“The SK has the power to unite this world…” For some reason this line struck me. I think it was because I remembered this line: “he who is deserving of the power to unite mankind can do so without it.” It’s from Capsule Monsters (The True King II), and it refers, of course, to Atem. Now, this year, we’ve seen flashes and snatches of Jaden being such a leader: Jim commented that everyone seems to be able to connect with Jaden (The Darkness is Revealed), “I know they’d follow ya down here, ‘cause they’d follow your lead anywhere.” (A Snake in the Grass I), and so on, and Jaden doesn’t want the responsibility of being such a leader, but he’s shown that not only is he a leader whether he likes it or not, but that he’s quite capable of it. He inspires everyone he meets, and this very adventure is proof that people are willing to take on the impossible because of him. He’s people’s hero, just like his cards, and the sooner he realizes that that doesn’t mean he has to give up having fun and being himself, and realizes that it’s that very thing that makes him a leader, the better for everybody.

“And you’d do the same, Jaden: Until the last card’s played, a duel’s not over.” It's the Jadenism, but a bit different. And Jaden *would*, too.

I noticed in this episode that a lot of Jim's monsters were guardian spirits instead of the usual warriors. Jim's here fighting for Jaden, not himself; he's Jaden's guardian spirit. I also noticed the contrast between the SK's bantering, "Fossils should stay in the ground!" when he destroys Jim's monster, and Jaden's assertion in the flashback that fossils love to be unearthed because it means they aren't forgotten. These two differing lines tie into Jim's saying that Jaden himself is a spirit trapped in rock: if Jaden were himself, he wouldn't be the SK's pawn for a second!

Why is Axel afraid? He'd be alone, and it would be high stakes, but that's nothing new. Axel's the cool head, the strategist; I could see him backing out of this because it's strategically unsound to take on an enemy on his own turf unless you have to, but not because he's really, really scared. I noticed that he started worrying when the SK conjured that wind; what if he cast a spell on Axel?

Once again, I’ll note that Syrus has stopped wishing to be the hero and started being the hero. He certainly was to those people he met. He was the cool warrior guy who kept them safe. Rock on, Sy!

Jim’s saying that he digs fossils because he wants to rescue their spirits brings me back to his duel with Hassleberry: there seemed to be a lot of difference between them because what one duelist appreciated alive, the other preferred dead, but actually, not so much.

What’s with the great big fissures and plateaus and stuff? Apparently these monsters mean business!

“Stop calling me that! I am fear! I am your undoing! I am the timeless curse, the end of all things!!” For some reason I liked this quote. And this sort of kind of a little bit reminds me of Yubel. Just putting it out there. We’d wondered where Jaden relates to Yubel…

So, now we know what Superpolymerization-expealidocious does (sorry, couldn’t resist). Need I note we’ve had our suspense-building demonstration, a la Full Armor Gravitation in Deck of Armor or Ride of the Valkyries in Child’s Play.

“Feel that? It’s hopelessness. It’s fear and panic and terror! It devoured your little friend Jaden, and shattered all the good! But unlike your little friend, the darkness has no use for you!” So, does that mean that Jaden cares about Jim but the darkness doesn’t, or that the darkness has a use for Jaden but doesn’t give a darn about Jim? It could mean either, but I tend to suspect the latter. But why, we then must ask ourselves, *is* the darkness so interested in Jaden specifically? Probably because he’s a mine of duel energy, but he wouldn’t be at the moment, unless he just is naturally, which would mean that it’s taking a whole lot to keep him down.

Was Shirley trying to do what Yugi did in Fate of the Pharaoh, and spare Jim? Or did she just not want to get left behind?

Has Jim’s defeat strengthened the SK’s grip on Jaden? Proven that Jim was wrong and the SK’s right? If so, Sy’s definitely got his work cut out for him.

The Eye of Orichalcum was talking to Axel. Did he just imagine that, or can Jim actually talk to him through the Eye?

It’s gonna be Sy! Kick his tush, Sy! You rock!!!!

But no, seriously: Who Will Win? I know who I’m rooting for. More standardly, Power, Skill, Plot, and the Heart. The Heart goes to Sy, absolutely and by definition, and Power goes to the SK. Similar to Jim’s duel, really. Skill could go either way; Jaden tends to be the stronger duelist between he and Syrus, but this isn’t Jaden. The SK is so powerful he doesn’t quite need strategy, so it’s a bit of a moot point. As ever, Plot’s the kicker here, and it’s essentially the same as Jim’s duel, up to and including the more-than-two-combatants scenarios. If Sy’s bold enough to challenge the SK, he’s got what it takes to win; what’s really going to be awesome is to see him try: Rock on, Sy!!!!!

I get the sense, almost, that the prophecy isn’t over yet. “A comet turns, a friend walks lost, a bandage falls, the Eye sees the truth, a friend shows us the way.” The comet has turned; there are a couple friends walking lost, both down there and among the constellations; a bandage—the only bandage we know of at the moment—has fallen, and its owner along with it; does the Eye have any more truth left to reveal?; and a friend has shown us only the way to the stars. Syrus is walking into this battle with this prophecy possibly still happening; I’m keeping in mind that prophecies only work if they’re interpreted the way they’re supposed to be interpreted, instead of the way they are.

Uluru. Yup, I looked it up. Mostly found GX sites, but also got a site with a bunch of Australian artwork. Uluru is the original name for what the English named Ayers Rock. http://aussieart.wordpress.com/
I did a search for guardian spirits having to do with Ayers Rock. Again, GX sites. Look out for a card called “Guardian Spirit of Ayers Rock” which apparently has something to do with Ayers Rock Sunrise, that card Chumley made that won him a job as a card designer.
The main myth I’m finding that has to do with Uluru is fairly general: the Aborigines believe that, before humans walked the earth, there was an era called Dreamtime. During this time, tribal practices were established by the first people, ancestors of the Aborigine people, and their doings, the same as the way things are traditionally done in the tribe, left visible impressions on the land in the form of rock formations and other natural constructs.  Uluru itself is a sacred site to the Aborigine people because it’s one such formation, the site of many myths and a sort of center of the world, in addition to the wealth of natural resources and shelter that make it a great place to camp out. Drawings are still made in its caves today.

Did anyone else get a silent spot in act 2?

The next episode is called What Lies Beneath I. Sorry about the lateness; I almost lost my only complete copy of this post and had to start from scratch. That’s my excuse, but still, I do hope to get more on top of it with these. Time was, I had them out before 1pm the day they showed. However, it was somewhat worth the wait, so if you’ll pardon the brief detour, I’d like to tell something I realized working backstage at a performance of Peter Pan tonight. I noticed some definite parallels between Peter and Jaden: a free-spirited assurance that can be mistaken as selfishness or conceit (the basis of the song “I Gotta Crow”; Peter delights simply in who he is and being able to express it, and for Jaden, dueling is the same sort of expression), and the paradox of being an inspiring leader but being unwilling to accept responsibility for the same. This is a bit of a tragic flaw in the both of them, because either the Lost Boys or Jaden’s friends, respectively, look to them for leadership, and they automatically set the agenda but don’t want to have to worry about whether those in their care are safe or not, which is also part of being a leader; they don’t think they can handle *anyone* being in their care, and so they don’t want anyone to be. As Jaden once put it: “I wish he could just see what *I* see, that the only thing holdin’ him back is himself!” (Duel and Unusual Punishment)

‘Til tomorrow, everyone! -Clio