Yu-Gi-Oh! GX (Anime Review)

All right, so, continuing on with my new anime series reviews is my one for the second Yu-Gi-Oh! series, Yu-Gi-Oh! GX. This is another Yu-Gi-Oh! series I remember a lot of from when I was younger. I didn't watch the whole thing, but I did watch pieces of it here and there and I remember some scenes I saw when I was younger even if I didn't understand it. The scenes I saw were just cool and so, two years ago, I started collecting the DVDs and I learned there was actually four seasons. I always thought there was just three. And I then learned that it was never dubbed. I mentioned this before about how the fourth season of this and the third season of 5D's were never dubbed for some reason and, as I said, it said it may have been due to some licensing problems. Whether or not that's true, I don't know, but that's the only thing I have to go on. But, as for those first three seasons I've seen, I really like them. Yeah, the Yu-Gi-Oh! series does get kinda weird and silly sometimes and this series does have a lot of those kinda episodes, but the actual plot for these shows always interests me and I usually find them really entertaining. And I'll be doing review for this series as well as 5D's since they're the only other ones I've seen besides the original. And so, this'll be the review for the second Yu-Gi-Oh! series after the original, GX. So, the plot of this series is that it focuses on a boy named Jaden Yuki who's hoping to attend Duel Academy, which is this literal academy that teaches everyone about Duel Monsters and all the workings of it. So, when he's accepted, he meets friends there like Syrus, Chumley, Alexis and Bastion and meets a rival named Chazz. And so, he goes through the year dueling and not doing that great in classes, but still being one of the best duelists in the school while a whole bunch of different situations happens. Also, I did with my Hunter x Hunter review, I'll be going through the story and giving my thoughts as I'm going. So, immediately, I will say, the series doesn't start off that great at the beginning. I mean, the set up with the Duel Academy is cool and I like the idea since it means it'll be different from the original. But, for the most part, a lot of the episodes are filler with just a few episodes giving some hints of what the real plot for Season 1 is. There are different instances that hint at what's gonna happen towards the end. For the most part, a lot of these episodes might be a bit pointless because there's not much to them. Not to mention the fact that a lot of them have really silly stories like the whole dueling monkey episode or the crazy guy who steals lunches. Yeah, it's pretty insane a lot of the time. But I do like the episodes that do have to do with the main plot. And the main plot of Season 1 is cool with having these three cards like the Egyptian Gods called the Sacred Beasts. Yeah, it's kinda weird no one makes that point of how they're exactly like the Egyptian Gods, but it's still a cool idea. And, like I said, some earlier episodes had hinted at some of the events that happen like when Alexis is talking about her brother Atticus being missing and then we find out what happens and then he becomes kinda like a main character. And, then, it's cool as it gets to the end because we see different things happen like Jaden having to duel against Professor Banner and then it's revealed the main villain of the season is the superintendent named Kagemaru. And it's pretty nuts when he duels too with being this old man in a tube and using some machine to play the duel. But, at some point, he's able to sorta regain his youth and use the Three Sacred Beasts. And then, when Jaden is able to beat him, it's really cool. And then, at the end of this season, it's cool when we see Jaden duel with Zane, as in Syrus's older brother, and it make sense that it would end in a draw considering we spent the whole season establishing just how great duelers they both are. But, yeah, that whole part is really nice to see, especially the end when they show their respect for each other. And, as for the rest of the season, I also like when we see different references to the previous series like the mentions of Yugi here and there like Jaden admitting Yugi's his hero. Just different moments like that are cool to see spread out throughout the series. So, yeah, the first season is definitely weird in some cases and has its really weird episodes, but in terms of the plot for what it's all leading towards by the end, I really like it. Then, for the secondseason, this one is also pretty much the same in the sense that I like a lot of stuff involving the main story but still has some weird moments here and there. For one, we learn more about things like Jaden talking to duel spirits which are basically the spirits of the duel monsters they have and there's a lot of cool moments with that. And we're also introduced to a guy named Aster who has a deck similar to Jaden's with his being the Destiny Hero cards. And we see this effect Jaden a little bit when he loses to Aster and sorta goes off by himself to kinda reevaluate himself. I really like this because it shows him maturing a bit and it helps make him more likeable and not like a joke all the time. But, not only that, we're also shown the villain of this season named Satorius who's kinda like Aster's guardian who's trying to corrupt the students of Duel Academy and turn this into slaves for his Society Of Light. And this is the part I meant at the beginning of this about this season having some weird moments because this whole plot about the Society can get kinda weird sometimes, especially after Chazz gets corrupted. But we also gets a lot of cool moments like when Jaden gets new cards called the Neo-Spacians who act as like guides for him with them being Duel Spirits he can talk to. And we also meet some other new characters in this season like Hassleberry who always acts like this soldier kinda person and he's really likeable when he befriends Jaden and the others. And, I suppose this might be a good time to talk about the characters themselves. As I said in my top 10 favourite characters for this series, I really like a lot of them and my favourite is still Jaden. Not just because he's really likeable and fun, but because he does show maturity through the series and the rest are the same as well. Some of them can get a little annoying sometimes, but they're mostly really likeable. And then, we move onto my absolute favourite part of this series and still a really underrated arc in all of anime in my opinion, Season 3, A.K.A, The Other Dimension Arc. I absolutely love this part of the series. Yes, it may have its weird moments as well, but, overall, I really, really love rewatching this. I know I've mentioned things about this arc a ton of times already before, but I want to try to explain things a bit more and talk about things I haven't spoken about before. First, I really like the set up with having new characters like Jesse, Jim, Axel and Adrian being introduced and the set up with Viper is interesting with him being a side villain who's doing the things he's doing to try to bring his adopted son back but is being used by Yubel. And, again, I know I've talked about Yubel a lot, but I still think she's a great villain and I love how she's presented and built up with knowing more about her. First we see her as kinda like a lump of flesh with eye in some tube and then she begins to possess people and then she appears for real after a while. I do kinda wish we saw her more in real body because we don't see her that much. But, anyway, I love a lot about this season like in the beginning when Jesse and the others arrive at Duel Academy and there's already something off with Viper having everyone wear some bands that causes their energy to be drained and sent into Yubel and I like how they begin to suspect that something's going on and they they try to stop him. Again, there's just something about the way this story is told that makes it so enjoyable to me. And then, at the end when they catch Viper, Yubel kills him and sends them all to some other dimension. And it just keeps getting better and better with them trying to survive in this new dimension while trying to find a way back and Yubel has taken over a student's body named Marcel. And, we gets more duels between monsters there and everyone turning into monsters called Duel Ghouls. We even see an appearance from Pegasus again. Again, it's cool to see crossovers from the previous series and it's cool to see Pegasus as a good guy. It's just cool to see these different events unfold the way they do and it's great to see these characters doing different things and I like when some of these characters team up like Jesse and Jim becoming part of the main group and Axel slowly doing the same. And, by the end, it's awesome to see Jaden and Jesse team up to fight Yubel in Marcel's body and then she finally reveals herself but then Jesse uses a new card called the Rainbow Dragon to get everyone except himself home. It's also great when we see Yubel's backstory with her being a card that Jaden owned and she thinks he betrayed him by sending her away. I also like how it's Chancellor Sheppard who tells us this. And we then see Jaden try to go back to that dimension to save Jesse because he had to stay behind for all of them to be sent back. And this part with Jaden and his friends in the dimension is mostly really good. I will say, the whole first part with all of them together does kinda go on a bit too long in my opinion, but it does help show that Jaden's changing and not for the best because he's becoming so focused on finding Jesse that he's kinda ignoring everyone else around him. And, not only that, but if you lose a duel in this dimension, you get sent to the stars as everyone says which is basically you die or just get sent to some other dimension, it's kinda confusing. Anyway, Jaden's friends begins to get set to the stars and Jaden is partly to blame for it. And this causes everyone left to lose faith in him and leave him which causes him incredible despair and this leads to him becoming The Supreme King, which is basically this other personality inside him. And, I gotta say, it's interesting seeing Jaden as a villain for a while. It's not actually him, but The Supreme King in control of his body and he just begins to kill a bunch of people until Jim and Axel try to stop him. Jim gets set and Axel does manage to beat him but at the cost of his life as well. And so the last few episodes are Jaden, Syrus, Ojama Yellow and Crowler trying to find Jesse and stop Yubel. And, I especially love watching these last few episodes with Adrian fighting Yubel and losing but then Jaden fights her and frees Jesse from Yubel's control but then they fight again. I will say, while the duels themselves are definitely entertaining, a few times, they're not as interesting as the actual character stuff. I mostly like just watching these characters interacting stuff like that. But they're still fine and the final duel between Jaden and Yubel is really cool, especially when we see Yubel herself transform into Yubel: The Ultimate Nightmare. And then we see a backstory for Jaden and Yubel in that they're both reincarnated version of a prince and guardian from a long time ago. Yeah, it's pretty insane, and kinda weird that it's kinda thrown in at the last second in the last episode, but I still think it's pretty cool. And then Jaden kinda sacrifices himself to fuse his spirit with Yubel's. It's a little confusing as to what happens after this because the two of them then disappear and everyone who was sent to the stars return and everyone except Jaden returns Duel Academy. I know there was a Season 4 that explained it but I haven't seen it and so it's a little odd. But not bad at all. It's still a cool season finale and I love so much about it. So, yeah, this may have come off as kinda confusing but all that is how I view the series and I really like it. I think the series as a whole is really good and it's awesome that this is part of the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise. I really like the characters in this and there's a lot of  really awesome moments in my opinion. I do wish they dubbed Season 4 because I feel like that would have been awesome to see, especially since there's a point where Jaden fights Yugi as part of some exam or something. But, speaking of the dubbed, that's done really well here as well, I especially love Matthew Charles as the voice of Jaden himself. And the animation's also really good. I don't entirely think people's thoughts on this are all positive. I know there are people who enjoy it and some probably don't, but I personally really do. Yeah, there are some things about it that don't work for me, but the positives definitely overshadow the negatives in my opinion. So, yeah, especially if you're a fan of the Yu-Gi-Oh! franchise, I would say check this out. And so, everyone, that's my review for Yu-Gi-Oh! GX. Thank you all for reading and please comment down below to tell me what you think.