Yugioh Zexal Episode 57-73 Review

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This concludes the last quarter of the first season of Zexal. I enjoyed the duels, though I hated how Shark got possessed and had to be restored in his duel with Yuma. I don’t really like the brainwashing thing, but if it works, it works.

The IV vs Shark duel was a bit sad since Tron’s status as a crap dad is shown. IV’s breakdown was so sad to see.

Yuma vs Gauche was a bit underwhelming since it was only one episode, but I enjoyed it regardless. I do like how he got Excalibur.

Yuma vs Shark Round 3 is okay, but I really don’t like how Shark is brainwashed by Tron. I do like the ending where Shark uses a spell card to make himself take damage. That was cool and it shows that he does care about his friendship with Yuma.

Tron vs Kaito was a duel that left a bad taste in my mouth for the sheer fact that Tron CHEATED by using Haruto as a meat shield of sorts. I felt sad when Kaito lost D:

Tron vs Yuma was actually pretty nice to watch, actually. I liked how more of the Numbers were utilized since Yuma kept using Hope rather than his other numbers. I did like how Yuma’s words got to Tron as he started remembering some of his past with his sons (baby III was so cute!). Eventually, the Sphere Field was a trap and Tron releases all the souls he took after he got a change of heart (in the end, he really did love his sons for he held their souls separately and then asked for their forgiveness mentally as he gives up his life to stop the Sphere Field (spoiler: he’s not actually dead).

I know that Kotori might get flak, but I like her. She’s level-headed and keeps Yuma in check. I loved her part in episode 68 where she runs to the collapsing Heartland Tower to look for Yuma and finds Kaito under the rubble, which leads to Shark finding her. Since the rubble blocked many paths, she was quick enough to rely on her resources and called Akari to help her navigate. She also quelled the argument between Kaito and Shark.

The final battle with Yuma, Shark, and Kaito was actually interesting to watch. Yuma has to duel without Astral for Astral is stuck inside the Sphere Field Cannon. Yuma does good without Astral’s help for he negates and halves battle damage (the three have to share 4000 while Dr. Faker has 12000). Heart-eartH was quite the interesting monster. The twist with the Barian controlling Faker towards the end was quite the shock.

The final showdown between Yuma and Kaito (Yuma wanted to duel Kaito as his wish after becoming the WDC champion) was actually intense. Kaito had no more purpose, but Yuma’s optimistic personality made him realize he does love dueling and vows to duel for himself now that Haruto is safe and restored (Also, Kotori, Shark and Kaito all can see Astral now).

Also, the Arclight brothers’ real names are revealed: V is Christopher; IV is Thomas; III is Michael.

It seems that the Barians are going to play a bigger role in the second half of Zexal. I can’t wait.

Top 5 characters for Zexal:

  1. Astral
  2. Shark
  3. Kaito
  4. The Arclight family (sorry, I love them too much to put them in an individual ranking)
  5. Yuma

Yugioh Zexal Episodes 46-56 Review

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Episodes 46-49 marks the end of the WDC preliminaries and episode 50 starts the finals. The three-part duel with III was quite outlandish but it shows how desperate III is because all he wants is for his family to be the way it once was–happy and harmonious. III, so far, takes the record for being the first to “kill” Astral and severely weaken Yuma. To sum up, this duel was basically cheat vs cheat. Yuma manages to go to the finals thanks to him, though.

The finals are quite interesting. CARD GAMES ON ROLLER COASTERS! I do like the interesting rules–lose LP with traps and gain LP with spell cards. The Yuma, Anna and Gauche duel was a bit of a cluster since Anna isn’t even a finalist. It was unfair at first, but I was glad to see there were people kind enough to help out Yuma and even out the disadvantage.

Once the numbers dwindled to top 8, we get to see individual duels. The Tron vs Droite duel was very brutal. I always thought Droite and Gauche had something going on, but they’re best friends. Droite likes Kaito and Tron uses that to his advantage and wins the duel and takes her soul. Poor Droite D:

Kaito vs V was basically exposition dump with V’s family history revealed–Tron is their father, Byron Arclight, who got sent to a parallel world with Yuma’s father Kazuma Tsukumo, but he came back in the form of a child younger than III. V was once Kaito’s mentor, Christopher Arclight, who taught him how to duel, but then abandoned Kaito once he learned of Kaito’s connection to Dr. Faker. Kaito’s father is revealed to be Dr. Faker and Kaito manages to win with a card Faker gave to him as a child.

I do love the parallels between III and Yuma and V and Kaito. III and Yuma are the youngest in their family but live opposite lives. Yuma’s parents are gone but he lives the most of his days with his sister, grandmother, Astral and his friends. III only has his father and brothers, but the harmony is no longer present due to Tron’s vengeance against Dr. Faker.

V and Kaito’s parallels are that they’re the eldest in their family with younger brothers but the only difference is that Kaito is super protective and is like another father for Haruto while V had to be separated from his own brothers for a while after their father disappeared. Seeing how he is 20, his father disappeared 5 years ago, making him 15 at the time–he was too young to be their guardian at the time most likely. V loves his father very much and wishes for him to revert back to the way he once was while Kaito hates his own father–though, I’m feeling that Dr. Faker might have been once a kind father seeing how Kaito looked very happy when he got the Message in a Bottle card from his father at a young age but changed. I wonder what could be the reason for the change….

I felt sad when III and V got defeated, they ask their opponent to stop their father. It’s very tragic. I just feel so sad for the Tron family since they lost all sorts of happiness and became filled with revenge.

These family dramas are so wild. I wonder how they’ll all be resolved in the end. All I want is for the Tron family to be happy again D:

Top 5 Favorite characters so far:

  1. Astral
  2. III
  3. Yuma
  4. IV
  5. V

Yugioh Zexal episodes 26-45 Review

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I don’t know how long the second arc is, but I’ll review a bunch of episodes whenever I can.

The second arc is a tournament arc where Yuma begs to enter since he forgot to register (silly Yuma). Also, a bunch of characters are introduced in this arc. The most interesting bunch are the Tron family who seems to have a vendetta against Dr. Faker. Tron’s underlings, V, IV and III are all brothers (with very wacky genes), which makes me think Tron is a family member too since he kind of looks like V and IV.

Shark gets some backstory as Yuma learns who he was facing before getting disqualified: IV. Shark and IV have a personal vendetta against each other since IV was the reason his sister was hospitalized after receiving severe burns. He then pushes Yuma away as getting revenge is his motive now.

Kaito gets characterization as we learn that the person he’s working for is Mr. Heartland (who’s obviously sketchy) and seems to be also working for Dr. Faker too. He has two allies in Gauche and Droite, but he doesn’t seem to care much for them. Gauche and Droite are interesting characters too for they seem to be good-natured villains. Gauche is quite silly compared to his brash personality and Droite is calm and collected.

The first ten or eleven episodes are mainly duels. They were quite fun to watch since all of them have different ways of dueling, but if I had to pick the ones I liked, I’d pick the duel between the construction boy and the vegetable man were the best of the “fillers”. I did not like the duel between Cathy and the dog girl (it was kind of pointless) and the duel between Yuma and Charlie (the whole luck thing was ridiculous). Out of the plot-relevant duels, I really liked the 2-vs-1 duel with Yuma, Gauche and Droite and the tag duel between Yuma, Kaito, III and IV. I found them the most entertaining.

Speaking of duels, episode 40 was the only episode (of 26-45) that did not feature a duel and only had story. Haruto escapes his room and Yuma finds him and cares for him. Haruto gets major characterization for he is the only character other than Yuma to see Astral completely. He also cares deeply for Kaito as much as Kaito cares for him. He’s such a tragic character that it made me smile when he ate the food at Yuma’s house after Astral shows him how to eat (it kind of makes me wonder if there are some foreign blood in Kaito and Haruto since Haruto doesn’t know how to use chopsticks). Unfortunately, Haruto gets taken by V and Yuma realizes he screwed up since V was a stranger.

Now that Yuma needs one more Heart Piece, I wonder who will be his final opponent for the preliminaries.

Top 5 favorite characters so far:

  1. Astral (episode 40 raised him up a lot since he was really sweet to Haruto)
  2. Kaito (Loved the tag duel and his bond with Haruto)
  3. IV (Quite an interesting character despite my disdain for his nightmare fuel deck)
  4. III (He seems like a sweet boy–different from his cold and ruthless brothers)
  5. Shark (Didn’t get a lot of focus, but I do like the conflict he has now that more of his backstory is revealed).

(Gauche and Droite are honorary mentions because I like them too.)