Character Study: Mai Valentine

AUTHOR'S NOTE: There is a possibility I'm coming back to change bits and pieces of this later, as it was posted when I was short on time and was written a while ago. I don't think so, though. Also, as a reminder, these character studies follow mixed continuity. In any event, Happy Valentine's Day!



Character Study: Mai Valentine

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Twenty-three to Twenty-four
Character Archetype: The Femme Fatale crossed with the Good Goddess, seasoned with a touch of Mentor.
Probable Element and Alignment: Wind/Air, swings between Chaotic Good and Evil.
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: She's overly familiar, and is very outspoken.

Mai is another one of those characters who is much deeper than the casual fan gives her credit for (If I find another reference to her being an anime Paris Hilton, or any other vapidly chosen blonde flavor of the month... Raar. I may have to start injuring people.) Most fans find her very hard to hate, even when they don't want her to "steal" Joey. It's possible that she's just the kind of female character that American audiences have an easier time accepting-- while highly atypical of such, she's an obviously feministic character. She's also someone who's been around the block a few times, and spends most of the series wrestling with old scars.

Mai got out into the world at a fairly young age; according to the Japanese, she was orphaned, while the dub implies that she was neglected and says that her parents were never home. This is one of the few times I prefer and defer to the dub version of a backstory: beyond Mai making for one too many orphans in the cast, her frivolous behavior in Duelist Kingdom reminds me of a person whose parents tried to buy her affections, and that shot of a little girl alone at a window late at night doesn't seem at all like an orphanage setting to me. (An orphanage would have had a strict curfew. And probably wouldn't have been a mansion.) At any rate, Mai seems to have ended up on her own as soon as she was an adult, possibly younger, either because of "unfriendly" caregivers dumping her out as soon as they could, or because she was desperate to get out of an enormous empty house.

In order to support herself, Mai seems to have chosen a path that required wit and wiles: she becomes a house gambler on a casino ship of some kind. Whether she took this path because she was working with what she had in brains or in beauty is impossible to tell, but it would have forced her to become good at manipulating people, and fast.

I tend to suspect that if Mai had any friends at this point, they would have been other casino bunnies taking her under their wing, because of Mai's consistent behavior with the younger female members of the cast: despite having reason to fight with Téa, she was kind and offered advice, while Serenity was quickly under her wing and stayed there. I think that Mai sees this as the thing women do for each other: they protect and help one another, and if they have to, they beat a little toughness into each other. Mai doesn't believe in deep friendship at her first appearance, but she does believe in Sisterhood. (One wonders if, in Serenity, Mai saw a little bit of the scared girl she used to be. She definitely likes Serenity very well, regardless.)

As for the men, Mai clearly found them generally disappointing. She probably had good reason to, as well- there were surely other Jean Claude Magnums back there, all egotistical and shallow, crazy in their own ways. At a casino, regardless of whether she was in a place where gambling was legal, shady characters would have skirted the edge of Mai's life on a regular basis. So not only were the men shallow and annoying, they were probably often dangerous, and there was no way of telling who was and who wasn't. Little wonder that Mai would be constantly on guard, moving among people like this.

Once she got out of the casino, there's some indication that Mai then dueled in some less "family friendly" tournaments, making enough money to live comfortably and shining enough to attract the attention of I2's talent scouts for Duelist Kingdom. I highly doubt that Mai started as a Duelist: she's the same age as Pegasus, probably was in the casino before he got Duel Monsters off the ground (might have been out on her own before Pegasus even aquired the Millenium Eye) and probably picked up Duel Monsters later because it struck her as more challenging and interesting. I don't know if she started the game before or after leaving the casino, or if it was a catalyst for her being able to get out of the casino. I doubt that it matters much outside of speculative fanfiction. In any case, at this point the game is just that; a game that happens to rake in enough money for her to exploit it. If it means anything deeper to Mai, she hasn't realized it yet. It would have been during this time period that she met and shot down Jean Claude.

Thus we come to Duelist Kingdom. Mai is a hardened warrior in many ways now, clever, tough and dangerous. But I wouldn't say she's all the way grown up. In a lot of ways, especially socially, she's still that little girl standing alone by the window in the middle of the night. Yugi and company are the most sane and decent people she's been thrown in with in a long time, and she's not entirely sure what to make of them.

She's puzzled at how Joey treats her, perplexed that Yugi can be both gentle and strong enough to stand up for both himself and other people, and shaken, because she didn't really believe that decent people exist. She also realizes for the first time, when Joey beats her, that yes, she IS proud of her dueling skills, dammit, and yes, this game does mean something to her! (We never hear of her cheating after dueling Joey, so it's possible she's decided that cheating at the game means she's treating it too frivolously.) And when Yugi helps her, he helps her out of the simple compassion out of his own heart, and Mai is stunned. How, she wonders, can people be this way? How could someone like this even survive?

Mai says it herself: Nobody's done anything for her like what Yugi does by dueling Panik on her behalf. Nobody's ever potentially risked his life for her, and nobody's ever done anything out of simply caring about what happens to her. Mai has eight star chips the evening of the first day, and Yugi wins them back for her. She could have easily been in the castle before noon of the next day, and the old Mai would have been waiting for them with a smug grin and a flirtatiously unsettling wave. But the new Mai doesn't even arrive at the castle until the sky is starting to go scarlet: She spent the entire day getting eight star chips she didn't need, not even knowing that Yugi would potentially need them himself. Moreover, she also earned herself two more stars, meaning that Mai could have been in the castle the first night, if she'd only worked hard enough. She goes to quite a bit of trouble to repay her debt, and turns her matronly "tough love" on Yugi in the meantime. (She's been turning it on Téa since Day 1; it's actually during their duel together that Mai realizes that Téa is plenty tough and really doesn't need Mai's wing.)

So Mai is maturing into a more rounded person, taking what she already knows about tough love and learning how to tell when someone deserves it, and combining that with the new generosity of spirit that Yugi has shown her. (How far she's yet willing to go, we don't really know; after all, she didn't need the entry card she gave Joey anymore, but what it represented to her was still pretty powerful.)

Something that makes Mai already more mature than most of the cast is that she knows when to quit. Mai is one of maybe two characters to surrender in a duel, and the first that we see. She knows Yugi has her outmatched, she knows that she's been drawn into an inevitable checkmate by someone she can accept as a spectacular duelist, one she "can't even keep up with on the sidelines." And instead of pitching a fit or swearing revenge, like at least half of Yugi's other opponents, Mai cedes the duel. This could be a sign of new maturity, but I think it's a facet of maturity that Mai already brought to the tournament. Yugi has also treated her with respect she's rarely gotten from a man, and Mai returns it with interest. (So, okay, she might not have surrendered like that to any other man, but I doubt she would have needed to. I mean, really.)

During the first VR arc, Mai seems more comfortable than during Duelist Kingdom, possibly because being part of an active team is something she finds appealing. She instantly agrees to help, both showing her continuing gratitude and the fact that it's Not Okay with her if her bosses start kidnapping teenagers. (That would be Seto, btw.) Mai is very kind to Mokuba, displaying none of her usual animosity or guile toward males she's not familiar with; this is probably because Mokuba is a child, and one that she knows has already been through quite a lot. Mai is downright maternal with Mokuba (who doesn't seem to quite realize.) She treats Yugi as a friend and equal, and the two admire their new outfits together. (XDDD)

And last but not least, she's all over Joey in these episodes. She jokes that Joey isn't noticing the "real woman" right next to him when Joey charges after Adina. She even hugs him enthusiastically, jumping on the poor boy when he's half naked in a bearskin (no wonder Joey freaks out, when I say it like THAT. XD) And she's so inflamed with rage, passion and pain when Joey "dies," that she charges in completely without thinking, which is absolutely nothing like Mai.

Mai during Battle City is slightly more guarded again. She's back into her Tournie Mode, and though she seems to have been keeping out of her old circles, she doesn't waste time any more than she did in Duelist Kingdom. She was probably on her way to the Finals location even when she almost ran over Duke and Serenity. (Either that, or she was looking for Joey and Yugi, intent on giving them a ride because she knew they'd need one. Which is an entertaining thought.) A lot of what we get on Mai here is backstory, and the fact that Mai is now weary of her old life and willing to leave it behind in favor of new memories.

Then Joey inadvertently hurts her feelings by lying about his dream-- and then Yami Marik hits her with a Shadow Game that turns out to be one of the most violently traumatic things she's ever gone through, followed up by a Punishment Game that is slow torture and by its very nature meant to shake her very being to the core.

I tend to think, while parts of it were a touch clumsily done, that what happened with Mai during the Oriechalcos arc was actually the result of post-traumatic stress. She chose to act like everything was fine when it wasn't, and things that might not have bothered her in the past are now crushing. Valon's method of "therapy" is to play into her depression and anxiety, and while he loves her, he's exactly the opposite of what she needs, despite being a listening ear. He maneuvers her into blaming people for not giving help she didn't ask for, and encourages her to stir her own anger and lash out. Mai IS brainwashed, just not by magical means.

It's understandable, then, that Joey has to work so hard to remind her that yes, he does care about her, that her passion for him is love, not hatred, and that he'll do anything for her, even give up his soul.

So what does Mai do? She charges right into another confrontation without thinking, just like when Joey "died" against the Ultimate Dragon. Mai is a reasonable, level headed, calculating woman, but her raging love throws all of that right out the window. And like after Duelist Kingdom, Mai takes off to sort her own heart out. (You can keep your "She wants to be a better Duelist!" comments to yourself, thank you. She wants to be a better duelist? Yugi has taught her that a duelist has honor, strength, gentleness and love. She wants to be a better person. That's what she leaves to work on.)

I tend to think Mai will do better this time, even though I have to wag a finger at her for just sprinting off again (with Valon it's probably for the best, since he needs to do some sorting out of his own, but Joey is very connected to her best potential support group: Téa, Serenity and Yugi.) If the epilogue with Vivian is any indication, she's already better off than at the end of Battle City.

Final Distillation:
Mai's story is about breaking through jadedness into wholeness.
Mai is not only clever, she's very intelligent.
She became who she is in order to survive.
Mai forgets herself when her temper flares up enough.
Mai is a feminist, and held Sisterhood above any other bonds prior to Duelist Kingdom.
She still holds Sisterhood very high.
Mai has a motherly side, which she turns on random women and specific men in the form of tough love.
Mai is totally unabashed about using the tools at her disposal, and is a master at manipulating people.
Mai wants to be whole very, very badly, and spends most of her life (all of her life up until the end of the series) trying for it.

Character Study: Yami Bakura

Character Study: Yami no Bakura

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Terribly ancient for a sixteen to eighteen year old. (Ha, she thinks she's funny.)
Character Archetype: The Demon in the Dark, the Dark Avenger
Probable Element and Alignment: Dark, changes from Chaotic Good to True Evil
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: Forceful and self-important.

The most difficult thing about getting a handle on Yami B is trying to figure out exactly who he is and how many of him there are. I'm going to tackle him as a combination of Thief King Bakura with some massive Zorc taint and assume that, during some of his stranger moments, Zorc was actually driving the boat. (The Spirit of the RIng is sociopathic, yes, but he's still too quirkily human for him to be Zorc itself- which is essentially hunger and malice personified.) I'm also going to continue calling him Yami Bakura through most of the essay, for the simple fact that there are two characters named Bakura, and "Dark Bakura" is the closest thing he has to his own name.

As with many of the focal characters in Yugioh, Yami B has a drastic character arc and changes quite a lot over its course. One of the things that makes him unique is that we see him first at his ending point, and it takes the entire series before we see that he started as more than a sociopathic Geistermench. At his beginning, he is noble, fierce and very much a man of his own time period. He's a good man, although a bit mistaken about who his real enemies are and much too willing to do anything in his crusade for justice. (Ancient peoples tended to place a lower value on other men's lives, especially where vengeance was involved, but also it's pretty clear to me that Yami B didn't see Atem's subjects as anything beyond Atem's subjects, and a way to hurt him.) He's also in intense emotional pain, for obvious reasons.

I see the "king of thieves" as being a dark knight, although unlike Batman and the criminals of Gotham, the monster Yami Bakura was fighting is the country that exerted authority over his loved ones by murdering them viciously. Diabound's terrifying power developed because Bakura himself was filled with the most hardened resolve, and because he had survived a childhood of horrible trauma and solitude, sharpening him into a steel blade.

Several things might have happened when Bakura aquired the Millenium Ring, some of which are more clear than others. First, he started to honestly go insane. The Items themselves are seething and surrounded with evil; they connect Zorc more tightly to reality and were created by horrific means. More importantly, those horrific means were witnessed by Bakura when he was young and vulnerable, and they involved killing everyone he'd ever been close to. The Ring tapped into this deeper vulnerability, and thenceforth Bakura's motives began to blur with those of Zorc in a way that I'm not sure he even realized was actually happening. Diabound began to twist and darken, a symptom of the infection.

For me, Yami Bakura attacking Aknadin and turning him into what would become Zorc Necrophades is the strongest evidence that he was no longer acting merely as an avenger. Aknadin is the one truly responsible for the massacre of Kul Elna; indications are that Yami Bakura at least sort of is aware of this. Why, then, did Bakura simply pass on the infection, instead of messily dissecting Aknadin while the older man was still breathing? There were other ways "in" to the Pharaoh's court. The most logical answer is that Zorc is happily directing his behavior, whether he realizes it or not. Aknadin was the best suited to Zorc's purposes, and therefore Bakura leaves him alive and doesn't redirect his vengeance from Aknamkanon's son. (Atem, for those of you I've lost.)

In the modern era, Yami Bakura has been driven further insane by the mere fact that he's been aware this entire time, stuffed inside the thing that drove him crazy in the first place. He's also become more demonic in nature, especially since he must act using the bodies of others. The already considerable skills he possessed when he was more truly alive have sharpened over a period of several thousand years, and Yami Bakura now clearly fits the name of "monster."

Yet a ghost of his noble origins as avenger remains, twisted into almost a parody. This is where Ryou comes in. Maybe being stuffed into a Ring has let Bakura's social skills atrophy, maybe he's just forgotten how to identify with other human beings. In any case, he's fiercely protective of Ryou, and determined to keep the boy's friends close at hand while punishing anyone who even looks at the kid funny. As manga readers know, this often means sealing people into game pieces, or killing them, depending on his whim. He's impatient with Ryou's apparent softness, probably because of how he himself has been hardened into steel. He doesn't understand why Ryou gets so upset over little things like "belonging." Being disconnected from a body for so long, and having lived through a terrible solitude before that, Yami B also doesn't grasp that part of what Ryou enjoys about human interaction is the actual physical presence of another person.

In other words, Yami Bakura's method of "protecting" Ryou is actually perfectly logical, in Yami B's own mind. He's not exactly trying to be cruel, he doesn't understand how he IS being cruel, and the fact that Ryou responds poorly to his efforts annoys and frustrates him, and fills him with disdain for his host. Think of the hardened soldier who served in World War 2 trying and failing to identify with a sensitive hippy child. The two Bakuras come from drastically different worlds, and they'd have a hard time identifying with one another even in the best circumstances.

It is definitely real protectiveness on Yami Bakura's part, as opposed to the simple self-serving "kill em for the lawls" it's usually explained away as. There is one incident in the manga that makes this absolutely clear: when Bobasa chases Ryou out for having an "impure soul," and Ryou is sobbing by himself, Yami Bakura is shown to be thinking, irritably, that he'll have to "deal with this fool's feelings later."

He should know that this is the endgame, and he's plotting vengeance on Bobasa for making Ryou cry? What the hell, man. You've got it bad when you're doing stuff like that. (Whatever "it" is, I leave to interpretation.) He's irritated no end with how soft he perceives Ryou to be, yet he clearly cares that said soft little boy has gotten his feelings hurt. And he will kill over said soft liitle boy's tender feelings, even though he wishes the kid weren't so sensitive. (I'm not saying I see Ryou as soft. See Ryou's character study.)

It's probably because Ryou fought him for their sakes that Yami Bakura harrasses Yugi and company only minimally as the series progresses. He wants something from them, yes, but he's going to avoid giving them undue grief until absolutely necessary. After all, this is the first time he can remember Ryou showing a spine, even if it's in a direction he dislikes. If Ryou hadn't actively fought Yami Bakura, and Yugi and the others had escaped the first attempt he made to trap them in game pieces, there's a good chance he would have kept trying to ensnare them, harder now that they had escaped once. Instead, he only actively fights them when they're standing between himself and his goals, and even helps them more than once. Bakura has decided to let Ryou "keep" these people, under conditions.

Even in the modern era, Yami Bakura doesn't trust that Atem carries any honor, nobility, or even compassion at all. He knows that Atem will fight for who he cares about, but obviously that doesn't mean THAT much, because everyone does it, right? Through Ryou's eyes he witnessed Atem's willingness to let Seto Kaiba throw himself from the roof of the Duelist Kingdom castle, if it meant Atem would win the duel. This is why he saves Ryou from Slifer; unlike Kaiba, he can't trust enough to throw this particular life on Yugi's mercy. (Yes, it is totally possible to be less trusting than Kaiba.) If it had been his own life, of course, he might have been more willing, but Ryou, however irritating Yami Bakura finds him, is the only living being he actually cares about.

One of the sadder aspects to the series for me is the idea that Yami Bakura apparently "dies" while still twisted up with Zorc taint. One can hope that the defeat of Zorc in the Memory Arc blasted him clean, but whatever truly happened to him isn't entirely clear. (Takahashi would probably tell us he "went away to heaven," the silly old bear. XD) There is plenty of room, however, for his potential survival-- the main suggestion of this has to do with the way he sealed up a portion of his soul in one of the Millenium Puzzle pieces. All that he was doing there was gaining access to the Puzzle's intricacies, but if he could seal part of himself in a mystical Puzzle piece, he could easily seal a part of himself in something else, keeping that part, and himself, safe. A canny fanfic writer can take this and run with it in any direction. I tend to believe that he at least temporarily left an anchor within Ryou, which is how the Millenium Ring kept finding itself back in Ryou's possession, and how he didn't actually die in his first defeat.

The mere fact that he did things like this also shows that Yami Bakura had a much sharper understanding of how to use his own shadow powers than most of the other characters that possessed them. He would seem to have had a natural talent for magic, even before he aquired the Millenium Ring, and existing aware within it for so long would have given him plenty of time to adapt to being a bodiless soul. This probably is a large part of why he could face being eaten up by shadows (within Ryou's body) when defeated by Yami Marik; the other reason is that, while he didn't trust Atem to have compassion for Ryou, he DID trust Atem to defeat Yami Marik, and knew that his condition would be temporary if the pharaoh succeeded.

Several people have complained about the Oreichalchos arc within the anime, because Ryou isn't seen and Yami Bakura doesn't act. Surely, with all this insanity going on, Yami Bakura would try to take advantage of it, right? And if not, he'd try to fight Dartz and keep Atem out of his clutches, so that he could have his own vengeance, right?

Maybe not. First of all, Dartz talked about knowing of Atem since Atem was actually alive, and indicated that it was because of Yami Bakura that he didn't act (I suspect he also just wasn't really ready to take on such a strong opponent.) It's possible that canny villains know better than to get underfoot of one another. It's also possible that the Leviathan and Zorc, wanting something similar, were either in cahoots with one another or were actually the same thing. If that's the case, Zorc may have held Bakura back. Even if it's not the case, Zorc may have held him back in order to see how the Leviathan's gambit would play out.

Secondly, in the anime Yami Bakura informs Ryou that it's time to stop fooling around. I've talked about how Yami B may have been nursing Ryou back to health in the immediate aftermath of Battle City. I've also talked about how Ryou was probably in much worse shape than he appeared to be during Battle City. I'm inclined to think that Yami Bakura was granting Ryou a convalesence period, and didn't want to risk reinjuring him so soon. (He may have, however, clung close by when the God Cards were stolen, and decided that the situation was too much for him to put Ryou through at the time.)

Another aspect I want to emphasize about Yami Bakura is that he's most assuredly human, even though he no longer knows how to act human, or how to relate to other people on a human level. He displays a sense of humor and a sense of amused bewilderment during his duel with Bonz. (I also like his "there is no way there is something more dangerous than ME in this graveyard" attitude.) Despite his annoyance with Ryou Bakura, he desires to protect him on a level that goes beyond conveniance. And his understanding of Atem's own human nature is something an eldritch god would be too large to grasp-- even with the fact that he takes a dim view of human behavior (I see him as adhering to Hobbes's philosophical assumptions: "Humans are evil by nature.")

Invid has suggested one other thing regarding the more savage side of Yami Bakura's nature that I feel should be mentioned for the sake of completeness, and which I find rather appealing: an explanation for his blood fetish. It could easily be written off that he's just crazy, and it is likely that Takahashi just wanted him to be as creepy as possible to the modern mind.

But this is the important part: To the modern mind. Many cultures surrounding ancient Egypt believed in blood sacrifice, and more importantly in the idea that by consuming blood, one brought the life of something into oneself. (This is why consuming blood is considered not to be kosher.) Bakura was very much a man of his time period; it's not unreasonable to assume he spent some time among people of non-Egyptian culture during his childhood and absorbed part of that attitude.

Which is one of the many reasons I go weird about trying to write people with their cultural background in mind.

Final Distillation:
Yami Bakura transforms from a noble avenger to a demonic monster.
He is very much a man of his time period, which involves a certain amount of natural savagery.
He has been hardened into steel, although he does have his vulnerabilities (which were much more obvious when he was fully human.)
Yami Bakura is extremely skilled at magic, but he also has good natural aptitude.
He is protective, even at his most demonic.
He no longer understands human interaction on a human level.
Yet at the same time, Yami Bakura is human.

Character Study: Ryou Bakura

Character Study: Ryou Bakura

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Fifteen to seventeen
Character Archetype: I hate to say it, but he plays the Damsel in Distress quite well. He's also, to a certain extent, the Wise Wizard, or the Paladin.
Probable Element and Alignment: Dark, Neutral Good
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: Polite and soft-spoken.

I've always had a rather strange relationship with Ryou Bakura. He was the first Yu-Gi-Oh! character I ever did fanart of, as well as the first I worked with in comic format. (They were kind of... strange... gag things.) Yet I can't be sure I'd call him my favorite character, or even a character I know very well.

Of course, Ryou is something of an enigma. Through most of the series, he's being possessed by one of the following: An ancient, vengeful thief or an eldritch god-- possibly something that is a combination of the two. Dark Bakura is a very convincing actor, and therefore we really can't tell all the time which Bakura is steering the body. (We do know that in the manga, he can be very sensitive about the things Yami B does, especially if he's accused of being evil himself. It's pretty clear that he's the one who broke down in response to Bobasa chasing him away at the beginning of the Memory Arc.) (That incident, by the way, is part of why I like the anime better. I hate to see Bakura cry. :P)

We know that he's fairly polite and quiet, yet the quiet behavior might really be a reaction to the fact that he can't be sure what's going on all the time. He seems like he's probably socially inept, yet how can he be otherwise, with a demonic being chasing anyone who even sort of hurts his feelings into hell, and trapping anyone he acts like he might like into cards and figurines? Ryou can't help but be socially damaged and emotionally shackled; it's a survival trait. (The way he seems to hold himself quietly aloof when being shown around the school by obviously enamoured girls is interesting-- has he simply decided to reserve judgment until they stop fangirling, or is he used to being treated like a doll by the opposite sex and has just learned to put up with it?)

Bakura is also in a state of mourning, which will also skew how a character behaves. He writes letters to his dead sister, asking her how she "and mother" are and telling her what he's been doing. I've seen people call this creepy, but I disagree. If you're going to write a letter to a person, you're going to act like you're having a dialogue; that's how letters are written. He's not any creepier than people who leave flowers and gifts at memorials or stand talking to gravestones in the rain. Grief makes people do odd things.

One thing I know for sure about Ryou Bakura is that I like him when he's angry. We only see a glimpse of this, too; in the manga, during his first appearance, in the anime, during the Duelist Kingdom Soul Card duel. Yet we do see it, and what we see is a frightening determination and resolve, combined with eerie calm. "I will do anything to screw you over, Spirit of the Ring, even if it means I have to die for it." (And yet he'll say it with calm eyes.) Granted, he's in a state of sheer desperation. But perhaps that is something important to remember about him: Ryou Bakura knows what it means to be pushed to the emotional limit, and he's survived it.

I do believe that Ryou is a good person, whatever else he is. If the first RPG that Atem played with Yami Bakura was intended to be symbolic, which it most certainly was (because Takahashi loves that sort of thing) then the white wizard Yugi's character yanked out of Zorc's arm was intended to show Ryou Bakura's truer nature. That character, who was an extension of his will and yet, wasn't quite Bakura himself, not only displayed the same calm anger, but casually gave his own life to restore Ryou's. The total lack of fear he shows in the face of a meaningful death is either something that shows Ryou to be somewhat unhealthy, or far braver than he's given credit for.

During Duelist Kingdom, too, he's the one that puts his hands on Yugi's shoulders after Yugi throws the rooftop duel, in a way that can only be described as protective. It's probable that he understands better than any of the others what's really bothering Yugi (Atem being willing to kill without Yugi's consent), and silently, he reaches out to let Yugi know he's there. This is more likely Ryou acting than Yami Bakura, because Yami B wouldn't think to do it. It's just a sweet, sensitive gesture. In a way, Ryou simply has insight into Yugi's head that the others can't fathom, and that even Yami Bakura probably doesn't understand, because otherwise he would have exploited it.

(I've always suspected that Takahashi intended to give Ryou more character development, btw, he just never got around to it.)

There's no way of telling who's talking through most of Battle City, although I'm quite certain Ryou was totally unconscious from some point while he was in the hospital up to the end of the duel with Yugi, and that Yami Bakura was just pretending to be his host. It seems strange that he would react so poorly to what appears to be a mere gash in the arm, and many people just attribute it to his general tenderness. I'm inclined to think that he must have lost a lot of blood, that the wound was much worse than it looked (we never do see the gash itself, only a bandage and bloodstains) and that the hospital pumped him full of painkillers. Yami Bakura seems to thrive on pain, not to mention he went around eating heavy, rare-cooked foods and doing a lot of other things that the hospital probably wouldn't have approved of. XD

So during Battle City, that body underwent a lot more punishment than just a gash on the arm, and what it really means is that Yami Bakura has a freakish pain tolerance. Meanwhile, all Ryou knows is that he woke up with a gashed apart arm, a roiling stomach, with the strong sense that he's been running around with something very heavy on his injured arm doing only Yami B knows what. He's confused, he's in pain, and there's a damn big red dragon getting ready to snort lightning on his head.

Yeah, I'd freak out (and fall over) too.

The next time we see him, we once again can't be sure it's really him. After all, he just woke up in a strange place. We don't know that his arm is healed or that the drugs have worn off, we don't know that his blood's replenished itself. He's hungry, so he cleans out the kitchen. This could be a sign that Ryou's very practical, or it could be a sign that Yami Bakura is in charge, quietly nursing him back to health.

(One assumes, however, that Ryou probably IS a fairly practical person-- he can't get rid of the stupid Ring, so he just deals. He can't control his situation, so he doesn't get overly upset about it. He lives practically on his own, so he'd have to have a sensible head on his shoulders when it comes to this kind of thing.)

Another side to Ryou that is very firmly his is that he's probably the best duelist we never see play. I don't believe that he had any say in the deck he carries; that belongs to the Spirit that enslaves him, and he doesn't throw it away because he can't. But when Yugi isn't there to explain things (usually because he's the one dueling), Bakura fills the role of ringside commentator, especially during Duelist Kingdom. Other characters sometimes fill the role (Duke is his official pinch-hitter when it comes to this), but Ryou is better at it than most of them. During the duel with Panik, he very clearly has a better grasp on what's happening than Mai, and is the first person to pick up on Yugi's strategy. (Which is a pretty insane strategy, so yeah.) He is similarly canny during the Ceremonial Duel, keeping up at least as well as, if not better than, Kaiba.

The only other character I have seen display such a keen understanding when discussing duels from the sidelines is probably Yugi's grandfather. (Not counting Pegasus.) Ryou does claim to enjoy playing the dungeon master, and this might be a sign of why: he enjoys deep-trenched and insane strategem. I'd hate to play chess with him, but I'd love to play one of his RPGs. (WHY would I hate to play chess with him? Because half the time you'd be clueless as to what the hell he just did to snare you in that checkmate, that's why.) (He'd probably be a good sport about it, but that doesn't mean I'd enjoy it.) So Ryou Bakura is definitely very smart, and is at least capable of seeing through other people's deviousness, through their strategy and machinations when even their opponents can't.

Lots of people like to write Bakura as extremely clumsy. I feel that the clumsiness is a combination of a lowered confidence (due to the nature of his possession) and Yami B amping it up deliberately so that Ryou himself seems even less of a threat. So I, at least, am less inclined to writing him as clumsy post-possession.

I mentioned earlier that I dislike the scene in the manga in which Bobasa declares that Ryou can't help with the Pharaoh's Memories because he carries darkness within him. It's not because I don't like what it does with his character, I just found it kind of mean. :P I think that Ryou had really come to consider himself a part of this group of people, that it was the first time in a long time that he felt like he belonged anywhere, and that Bobasa really shook that feeling. (He probably felt a lot better later when he realized that, yet again, it was all Yami B's fault. Yami Bakura, you jerk. XD)

So even though I don't like the scene, I think the way Bakura reacts there is understandable and within his previously established character, and not wussy at all. XD (Gives Ryou a hug)

Final Distillation:
Much of Ryou's behavior is a result of his being possessed. :P
He is emotionally shackled, due to his possession.
He is very calm about his own anger.
He is fearless at the idea of dying in a meaningful way-- he's very brave.
He actually can take care of himself, when he's keeping out of trouble.
He is intelligent, and has a keen understanding of strategy.
He is a good person, and sensitive to other people.
He values the sense of belonging highly.

Character Study: Tristan

Character Study: Tristan Taylor

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Fifteen to seventeen
Character Archetype: The Pinch Hitter, the straight man (As in comedy, not as in sexuality. :P)
Probable Element and Alignment: Earth, Lawful Good
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: Sort of a "cool tough guy" lilt.

Poor Tristan. Poooor, poor Tristan. When he's not being ignored, he's being made fun of for being boring. They really could have put more about the poor guy in the DM anime; he has more backstory than Téa does.

For example, we know (mostly from the manga) that he has an older sister, who married a guy with a motorcycle, and that their son, Johji, is already a disturbing little pervert before he can walk. We also know that Tristan's sister probably picks on him, because he was apparently bullied into watching said nephew. His brother-in-law apparently trusts him enough to let him borrow said motorcycle, indicating that he's pretty trustworthy.

We know that Tristan has a dog and that apparently he never thought to get her spayed. We know that he's a fairly sensible guy who doesn't see the point to overly expensive shoes just because they're the cool thing. We know that he used to look up to Joey and that he apparently used to hate himself before he really became friends with Yugi, at one point telling Yugi he didn't want him to fight gang members "because even though you're my friend, I don't want you falling to my level." Like with everyone else, Yugi was a good influence on him.

We know that he tends to like shy girls (because the other girl he's crushed on is Miho, who in her appearance in the manga never is seen directly face on, only from the side) and we know that he's usually ready to get caught up in Joey's enthusiasm when it involves either fighting or flipping skirts. We know that he's a crack shot, and that he likes Westerns.

From the anime, we know that he's always ready to step up when no one else is there, that he's got a better sense of how to carry a souless shell than Kaiba does (Fireman's carry, Kaiba, not bridestyle! XD) that he's a bit more skeptical than Yugi, Joey OR Téa as well as a bit more realistic, and that he's willing to lie his head off to impress a pretty girl (Serenity.) We also know he's about as shameless as Duke.

Just by looking at him, we know that he's the kind of guy to get a crew cut. Because I'm fairly sure that's what that's supposed to be. ^_^''

(I've heard SOMEWHERE he wants to be a pilot someday, but I know not where I heard that, and he apparently doesn't mention what KIND of pilot, of which there are many.)

Point is, we know a lot about this guy, and he presents himself as pretty likeable, when he's not chasing after redheads. The thing about Tristan is that he's a fairly believable, ordinary kid. Aside from everything else I've listed, he's probably from a family that's comfortably middle-class, because his clothing is always neat and looks like his mother picked it out to make him look handsome. His family life is probably boringly stable, and so it's possible he got caught up with Joey more because of Joey's charisma and his own boredom than because of any dramatic strife in his own life.

All of Tristan's major flaws come out more strongly when he's crushing on someone than at any other time. I've mentioned he seems to crush on shy girls (obviously this isn't as true in Season 0, but I don't count it in my canon because Season 0 was totally insane.) I suspect this is because Tristan is essentially looking for someone to protect. But if there's anyone I tend to feel should try to date outside his own type...

In order to impress Serenity, Tristan puffs himself up by lying about his own abilities as a duelist. As I've mentioned, he's already got plenty of good qualities, and if he was just himself Serenity would probably be plenty and appropriately impressed with him. But for whatever reason, Tristan decides being a crack shot and a pretty sensible guy aren't good enough for this girl. Perhaps he's been luckless enough in love that he feels the need to lie, or maybe he's decided she wants a good duelist because her brother is.

He also lies because he's trying to protect Serenity from the reality of who Joey really is: a kind of goofy guy who doesn't really manage to look cool all the time. Tristan doesn't understand that Serenity doesn't expect Joey to look cool, that's not why Joey is her hero. He assumes he knows what she wants, and he's dead wrong. The worst part is, even after she calls him out on the lying, he continues trying to protect her, from Duke, behind her back. As Duke points out, Tristan really doesn't know what Serenity wants, he's just being possessive.

So yeah, when it comes to Serenity, Tristan lies to her, assumes too much, and acts way more possessive than he has the right to (the girl never ONCE said she liked him like that), and I have to admit I don't care for that. (I'd prefer to see him with a woman who will tell him in no uncertain terms what she wants out of him, see how he likes THAT. XD) When it came to Miho in the manga, he was far too eager to have Yugi write the love letter he was going to give her, once again showing that he just doesn't seem to think he's good enough to win a girl on his own.

Despite this, he does at least want very earnestly to fill the role of "shining knight" for someone, and if he just were himself, Tristan wouldn't be half bad at it. As I noted, he's very capable and responsible. He can take on two to five thugs alone (as long as he doesn't have to worry about innocent bystanders) and can still grin while he's doing it, a prerequisite for many young women when it comes to "my hero."

I don't tend to think he's a very good judge of character, though. He assumes, because she is a quiet and polite girl, that Serenity is "sweet Serenity," pure and innocent and easily broken (a lot of fans make the same mistake), but she's actually canny, surprisingly resilient, and likes the idea of nobody being able to push her around. He mistrusts Mai as a femme fatale for much longer than the other characters do, when Mai is actually sensitive, good, and sad. In other words, Tristan takes people at face value, and has a hard time getting past that first impression, even with his friends.

Another sign of his "rescuer" trait is the fact that he's the one who trotted all over Pegasus's castle looking for soulless bodies. He's also the one who dragged Bakura and Téa all over selfsame castle trying to prove that Pegasus was cheating, he's the one who offered to carry Bakura after Yugi had to blast him with Slifer, he's the one who tried to shake Joey out of a coma during Battle City, and he's the one who carried Joey when Joey lost his soul during Waking the Dragons. Tristan is proactive, and he's not only unafraid to shoulder the burden of an injured friend, he's eager. He's also apparently got some wisdom with regards to how to do that, since you'll notice that he almost always resorts to fireman's carry, which is considered the "proper" way to carry another person.

Of course I haven't really mentioned the fact that Tristan is kind of a pervert and used to pick on people. They're part of his character, yes, and yet somehow they feel kind of incidental; he'll read dirty magazines and appreciates Serenity's body because he's a man, he used to pick on Yugi mainly because he used to be angry all the time and it was a way to vent his frustration at the world.

And hey, also because Joey did it. He's something of a follower, at least when Joey is concerned. It's not that he can't think for himself (because obviously he can) it's that it's so easy to get caught up with whatever Joey wants to do. Often when Joey's not around, Tristan is much calmer, and steps up as the point man, even when Yugi's there (especially when a situation requires a certain kind of action.) Tristan's parents probably see Joey as a bad influence on him, which admittedly Joey sort of is. XD (If there's any reason at all that Tristan fights with his parents, this is it.) Tristan is a second-in-command sort; he can lead, but if his chosen leader's there, he does what the leader wants, even when he's trying to be a voice of reason.

(At one point in the manga, Joey decides he needs new shoes-- and not just new shoes, super special awesome air pump sneakers. Tristan complains through the entire story that this is just ridiculous, and even offers Joey a pair of his own shoes, but he still goes with him to the crazy scorpion shoe store, is still willing to beat the crap out of the guys that steal the shoes later, and doesn't exactly try to stop Joey from stomping his foot into a sneaker that allegedly has a scorpion in it. Joey, by the way, continues to wear these shoes for pretty much the entire rest of the series.)

Tristan is only a piece of the unit that makes up Yugi's core group of friends, and he's a piece that tends to fade into the larger picture. But if he wasn't there, the series would sorely miss him, and the support, reason, and stability he adds to the cast.

Final Distillation:
Tristan is capable and responsible.
He's Joey's wingman, and therefore picks up any slack in the group.
He also keeps the other characters on a straighter course. He's stable.
Tristan is a "rescuer." His taste in women reflects this.
He tends to take people at face value.
He gets caught up in Joey's charisma very easily.
Tristan is proactive.

As always, comments can be made either to the DeviantArt journal, here, or through our Gmail, I'd be happy to hear them.

Character Study: Téa

Character Study: Téa Gardner

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Fifteen to seventeen
Character Archetype: The Sensible Love Interest (XD), The Childhood Friend, the Diplomat
Probable Element and Alignment: Air/Wind, Neutral Good
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: She usually speaks in a way that rises above all the other voices in a room, without actually shouting. (Btw, I don't want to hear any wisecracks about that description, people, because that's also how I talk... when I actually talk at all.)

Oh, Téa. Why does such a large chunk of the fandom hate you? Is it because of the friendship dialogue getting so dialed up in the dub? Then why don't they hate Yugi? He was worse. Is it because they're just not paying attention? One hopes not, when they spend so much energy on you. Or is it just because you're an incredibly sexy woman, and they rather perversely see you as a threat?

Téa is not that girl that picked on you in high school. She may dress like that girl, she may have a figure rather like that girl's, she may even have cut her hair to exactly the same length. But she does not act like that girl. She hangs out mainly with that punk delinquent Joey and that screwy little nerd Yugi, who happens to be the school punching bag. She's the girl I wish I knew when the girl that picked on ME in high school was at her worst, because Téa's the girl that steps in, stands up for you, and makes you feel like you're worth more than shoe gum.

Téa is golden. I'm not saying she's a flawless person. But she's definitely not the person I keep hearing she is. The person that Téa bashers say they hate is a "bitch," a "slut," a "whore." That person supposedly is trying to "seduce" Atem, or Yugi, depending on who you ask. That person is "weak," she's a "shrew," she's "nasty." That person is not the character I know and love.

Téa could seriously use some better press, is all I'm saying.

First of all, I have to ask if any Téa bashers who call Téa a slut actually know what a "slut" IS. Do you? I'll explain, for our younger peeps. A "slut" is a person who is very sexually active, and not very sexually discerning. A slut, by the end of the series, would have at least tried to sleep with most of the male members of the cast, which would have given Téa plenty of opportunity to be one, with so many men around. (Yet we can't PROVE she slept with ANYONE.) A slut would not have latched on to one man, declared that she had "fallen in love" with him, and then followed him, supportive and uncomplaining, into some of the most dangerous situations she'd ever been in in her life.

And a whore would have been actively hitting the male characters up for money in exchange for sexual favors.

As Yugi would say, Téa's "not that kind of girl!!" She'd rather get a job at Burger World.

Then there's the accusations of weakness and cowardice. And here I have to ask, "What the hell do you want, Supergirl?" Because then she would have been criticized as a Mary Sue, for one thing. Téa hits people with globes, bites creepy gym teachers twice her size in the arm, kicks mummies' heads off, and will stand up and scream to Yugi to run away after a guy with a gun tells her to be quiet. Examples appear in every single different sub-continuity. Téa kicks ass. She ain't Supergirl, but she doesn't let that stop her. If a situation needs a crowbar, she'll use the crowbar, whether it means for prying or cracking heads.

Is Téa trying to "seduce" anyone? Ehhh, I'm not sure, and even if I was, I wouldn't be sure that's such a bad thing. What difference is there between seduction and expressing love, when you're trying to get a man to love you back? More importantly, she goes from trying to get Atem to stay with her, spend time with her, to giving him the key that sends him out of her reach forever. Téa, like most of the core cast, is dynamic and grows up as the story progresses.

She begins, in the manga, as an over-righteous "good girl" who plays big sister to Yugi, is intoxicated by the mystery and dangerous allure of Atem, and as the sort of girl who believes true love means happily ever after. Her main character flaws are, quite simply, that she's a little too quick to correct, and that she's got something of a Pandora complex (Pandora the Greek chick, not Pandora/Arkana.) You can see the Pandora complex several places besides her crush on a guy she doesn't know, by the way: directly after being told "Opening this jar will either get your soul eaten or all of Japan will be destroyed," what does she want? To open the jar, of course. She had no interest in the thing until she knew it was dangerous. (She's also a bit reckless early on, just in general.)

She has absolutely no sexual interest in Yugi at all at this point, even when she finds out he's possessed by the being she's "in love with." He's her "little brother," a little brother who needs her protection. She simply isn't attracted to him. Atem, on the other hand, saves her life several times, becomes her protector and defender of her honor. She thinks of him as her superhero, or her knight in shining armor (there was a picture in her soul room at one point before she realized who he was in which Atem was represented as a faceless man with a suspiciously Superman-like costume. XD)

And here she is, with a "little brother" and a knight in shining armor, and they happen to be two different people cohabiting one body. Talk about frustrating. However, she's genuinely happy for Yugi when he starts to stand up for himself ("He's not a scared little boy anymore!" *happy tears*), and decides eventually that it doesn't matter, that Yugi and the other Yugi are close enough to the same person, and she's close enough to him, that it's okay for now.

This is where she is when Battle City starts, and she discovers that her knight in shining armor is actually an amnesiac pharaoh, not just a shadow that crosses her friend's face. And suddenly everything is thrown into confusion again. Does she love the pharaoh, or does she love what he brings out in Yugi? And what will she do when Yugi-- Atem?!-- has to face his destiny?

Because she doesn't know what else to do, Téa chooses to support both of them. After all, whether she loves them this way or that way, they are her friends, and one thing Téa knows is that friendship means supporting someone, no matter how hard it is.

And I think that's when something new about the relationship between love and friendship enters Téa's head and begins to solidify: Sometimes when you are in love with someone, you think about what's best for that person, not what's best for you. She slowly begins to transition from girl to adult once this enters her mind.

During the Waking the Dragons arc, Téa finds herself dealing with Atem alone for the first time. Not only that, but he's in a bad way. Suddenly, she's seeing him at his absolute lowest. And she finds she still loves him. She learns what hurting for your man's pain feels like. That superhero-worship kind of dies, falls by the wayside in the face of the fact that Atem, for all his godlike power, is human. In the anime at least, her love for Yugi softens back into the background of her heart for a while. As far as she's concerned, she's figured it out. Personally I suspect she's got it less figured out than she thinks she does, but that's life. XD

And then comes the Memory arc, and Atem facing his destiny. Téa knows the purpose of this is finding his name. She probably has a feeling of what's coming after that, that he's going to essentially die. But instead of sabotaging what she knows will take him away from her, she buys him a gift: A cartouche, to carve his name on. So he'll never forget it again, so he can keep it with him.

That's a long way away from the girl who'd hop into a potentially bomb-ridden carousel to make him be with her, and a long way away from the girl who longed for something dangerous to happen so that she could hear that voice again. This is the woman who, knowing that goodbye is soon, chooses to do something meaningful for him, and to help him face his destiny in any way she can. It's pretty beautiful, and I'm sorry all you bashers are missing it.

By the way, that over-righteous streak sticks around. Kaiba gets the brunt of it (which is hilarious), although she does let up a little after Duelist Kingdom's "What do you have at the end of the DAY?!" speech (shortly after giving it, you know, she finds out she was totally off-base in yelling at him. XD) although she also yells at Joey during Battle City for not "just saying Mai was in your dream." She's a little too eager to explain other people's motivations (Joey stops her from telling Kaiba about Serenity, and you can bet if she'd been anywhere near Alister during Doma Kaiba would have had to tackle her to get her to shut up about how Gozaburo treated his own sons...)

Téa is always the person in the back ready to tell the villain why his behavior isn't kosher. It settles down a bit into simple vocal righteousness, but she continues to feel strongly about everything, and she continues to be very willing to say so. She's a lady that speaks her mind, and most of the time, it works out for her, so she's not going to stop doing it any time soon. (And in most cases, it's not really that much of a FLAW, just a TRAIT.)

Outside of her love for Atem, which shifts from selfish to selfless, Téa is generally just a very kind sort of person, although quite a bit less self-crucifying than Yugi. Her first inclination at meeting someone new is to make them feel welcome in her life. (Except women who throw themselves on Yugi and go on about being awesomer duelists than him. XD) Even when she has a bad first impression with someone, she doesn't necessarily give up on that person; she's willing to be friends with Rebecca and comforts her when she needs comfort, she does similar for Mai, and she becomes an "irritated mother" figure in Kaiba's general direction, calling him "Kaiba-kun" in the Japanese (for those of you unfamiliar, that's a friendly/familiar-to-a-male suffix, and more importantly, she's one of the only characters who bothers calling him "kun," including his own brother, who uses the highly respectful "sama") and trying very hard to rein him into the rest of the group, not caring that he'll bristle and wanting very much to help him when he needs it. I think she's too abrasive to be quite the right person to drag him into the group, but it helps that Mokuba likes her.

(In my humble opinion, Mokuba probably likes her because she DOES speak her mind, and also possibly because he's just about that age, ha ha. That doesn't mean I think he has a crush on her. O_o)

Besides telling Kaiba off, she also treats herself as the "mama" within the group in general. She gives Joey relationship advice. She provides comfort where she sees it needed. She tries to provide a reasonable and cool voice when things get heated. (She doesn't always succeed.) (Okay, she doesn't USUALLY succeed, but this is Yu-Gi-Oh!, AKA Testosterone Land for Nerds.) Téa probably would make a good (although somewhat authoritarian) mother. XD

I have one final thing to say, and that's that if you're going to hate a character, hate them for traits they actually have, and don't let it affect how you write them. (Maybe it sounds hard to YOU, but if I can do it, you can. I ain't THAT amazing.) Your story will be more enjoyable to more people for the effort, whether you're working with Téa or anyone else.

Final Distillation:
Téa changes from loving selfishly to selflessly.
She's unafraid to use whatever force a situation needs.
She feels strongly about right and wrong and is unafraid to speak her mind.
She is kind, and willing to extend her kindness to people she doesn't necessarily like.
When she says "Friends help each other," she MEANS it.
Which means she'll end up mothering most of her friends some way or another.
She's mostly reasonable, most of the time.
But she will totally kick your ass if she thinks it needs to be kicked.
She's got a touch of Pandora complex, although she can rein it in if necessary.
She's not afraid to hang out with the unpopular guys.

As always, comments can be made here, at the DA journal, or through the G-mail.

Disclaimer: In case you my readers have not yet noticed, I often tackle the character studies beginning with the way that a large portion of the fandom reacts to a character. I am not accusing any one fan in particular of anything regarding any character, especially not Téa. But it is an inarguable fact that, especially in the early days of English speaking fandom, and even now, there were a lot of fans who absolutely demonized this particular character, in the general way that I have described and for those general reasons. It is that nebulous creature that I address, not any one person, even though I admit to having encountered more than a few people who did, word for word, say such things, and even a smaller number of people who admitted to the reasons.

So I'd appreciate not getting a dozen defensive comments about how you never said anything like that, whether you liked her or not. I understand. Please approach the essay as what it is, which is not a criticism of any one real person, but an evaluation of one fictional person and, to a lesser extent, of the fandom that she finds herself in.

(To be quite frank, I'm actually horribly fond of Téa bashers. They're like a milling horde of annoying kid siblings, and this essay wouldn't have had much direction without them. I wrote a large section of it by going into a basher forum and poking the hive until they all started buzzing at me. XD)

Character Study: Atem

Character Study: Atem

Approximate age: (by the Japanese anime) Ancient.
Character Archetype: Ancient Evil/gambler/Wise King (Yes, I know that's a lot.)
Probable Element and Alignment: Dark, Lawful Good
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: The rather bad habit of phrasing requests as orders.

Before we get too deeply into this, know that I consider the names "Yami Yugi," "Mou hitori no Yugi (the other Yugi)," "Atemu," and "Atem" to all refer to the same person. The Pharaoh formerly nameless and the "spirit of the Puzzle" are NOT two different people. For some reason, there are people who think they are. I'm not sure why, although I suspect it's got something to do with the confusing way the Memory storyline was presented in the manga (darnit, Takahashi).

Atem IS a fairly fractured character, however, and this has made him somewhat difficult for many fans to get him in any kind of character (although it's much easier to get close to the mark than with Kaiba. I'm also not sure why THAT is, although maybe I just have an easier time finding good writers that like Atem.)

This is partly because he changes almost as drastically as Kaiba does throughout the series. When he first pops out of the Puzzle, he's utterly insane, probably due to the fact that the thing was shattered into a gazillion pieces, and in turn so was he. He calms down relatively quickly, all things considered, but that might say more about Yugi's good influence on him than anything.

At the beginning of the manga, Atem isn't just a crazy amnesiac-- he's not even human anymore. Why should he be? He doesn't remember having a human body, only that he was part of the Puzzle before possessing Yugi. He's essentially a demon, a malicious soul bent on the defense of his host.

That sounds a bit familiar? Of course it does, Yami Bakura is played that way for a good chunk of the series. One could argue several reasons Atem eventually calms down and rejoins humanity, while Yami Bakura doesn't seem to. My main theory is that Atem is a more fundamentally human soul, while Yami Bakura was too filled with Zorc taint. Zorc is essentially an animal when it comes to its levels of complexity, so it's harder to turn from a particular path.

And here we come to why I like that the Oriechalchos plotline was written into the anime, and why I suspect it was written by someone who felt the manga was sorely missing something: Atem has been going along, slowly regaining his humanity. In the manga, he stops using punishment games after Duelist Kingdom because he doesn't like how similar it makes him to Pegasus (this is never stated directly in the dub, but there's no reason to believe it doesn't happen there, since Atem DOES stop mind crushing and obliviating after Duelist Kingdom, and doesn't deliberately inflict harm on an opponent again until Waking the Dragons.) But the manga never asks the question this so-called "filler arc" asks: "Are you a good witch, or a bad witch?"

Now, yeah, we're supposed to assume he's a good guy after we see him not punishment gaming anymore. But he only stops, in the manga, because he's seen how it hurts to have it done back. That doesn't make you a good guy, it makes you afeared of Karma. And though I do see him as a good guy, in basic principles, I also recognize that he has one very deadly character flaw, one the Oriechalchos arc exploits to its fullest potential: He's arrogant. He greets the news of "You're supposed to save the world" with "DUH." He's a bit surprised about the idea that he used to be a pharaoh, but probably because he never realized before that he really was human once. He's aware, I think, or thinks of himself as, the main character, and he struts it. Cross his path, and his response is "How DARE you! KNEEL, PEASANT!" (If he's never said the second part aloud, it's because Yugi would die of mortification.) The guy was raised to be a god, and in some deep shadowed part of himself, he's aware of this. His arrogance is the very ugly side of his confidence.

Atem WANTS to be good, make no mistake. I think part of this is wanting to live up to Yugi, and while he was alive, it would have been from wanting to live up to his father. And who doesn't like to think of themselves as being at least partly "good?" The Oriechalchos arc is good because of how it humbles him. Claiming this "filler arc" has no bearing on later story is silly, because the entire Memory arc was rewritten. Atem would not have asked Mana if he was "a good king" if the Oriechalchos arc hadn't made him worry about it.

Many fanfic authors seem to forget about his arrogance, and the ones that don't will often embrace it to the point of it becoming his only trait, aside from his very Egyptian brutality.

Something else that a lot of people tend to overlook about any of the Egyptian characters, from Atem down to Ishizu, is that they come from a different time period's frame of thinking. The people of that time had a certain vicious nobility to them, and the people of Egypt had a deep love of ironic justice-- making the punishment fit the crime. This is why many of the manga's punishment games fit whatever "wrong" the punished had commited; Ushio was blinded with his own greed, a television director blinded with mosaic, and the Kaiba brothers trapped (for a while) in nightmare versions of the games they played. On the other side of this, being from such a brutal time period means that Atem values his honor sometimes more than his life, and this is why he never backs down from a challenge.

Atem considered Yugi and his friends to be his "jurisdiction," so therefore he was justified, if only in his own mind, of the ironic justices that he meted out. There's a certain possessiveness to Atem that probably comes, once again, from his upbringing as pharaoh: He was intended to be god and protector of an entire people, so once he becomes a nameless king in a strange land, he just goes on doing what he'd always been trained to do, adopting a "kingdom" out of the people around him. (In fact, he's so protective that Joey has to talk him into letting Joey do his own vengeance taking-- although to Atem's credit, once he's promised Joey that it's in Joey's hands, it STAYS in Joey's hands.)

I love the relationships he develops with these people, most especially Yugi and Joey themselves; they become his brothers, and even with his statement to Mahaado that "we are of the same blood," I don't think he ever had people quite that close to him. After all, it was his new friends that made the difference in the Memory Game, not the old ones.

As the series progresses, Yugi and Atem begin to blur toward each other in personality. Yugi, of course, develops the confidence that before only Atem could give him, and proves that he can soldier on alone. Atem learns Yugi's endless compassion. Toward the beginning of the manga, he's cursing and burning and electrocuting his enemies left and right. Yugi stops him when he nearly kills Kaiba, which Atem perhaps has trouble with because "Come ON, Yugi, two chances to change are enough, aren't they?"

For Yugi, forgiveness twice isn't enough; Kaiba needs his compassion, and Yugi has compassion in him to give. This is a foreign concept to Atem; in dynastic Egypt it wasn't about whether you needed forgiveness but about whether you deserved it, and as far as he's concerned, Kaiba's out after three strikes. But he comes to reconsider his position when he sees how it affects Yugi, and is willing to even forgive Pegasus when he hears his story, despite everything that the man's done to him.

And when Marik comes along, compassion isn't even a question. This boy tries multiple times to kill him and nearly succeeds in killing Joey, his "brother." But when Marik needs their help, their compassion, Atem and Yugi give it, as one. This is probably one of the best across the board (that is, it happened in both manga and anime) pieces of character development that Atem gets, and it's in Battle City that he proves his own humanity.

Most of all, Atem truly loves Yugi. This isn't about sexual love or brotherly love; Atem loves Yugi as his son and ALSO as his brother. He is truly happy when Yugi surpasses him, even though it means he has to move on to the afterlife. He accepts his final fate calmly not because "the dead should stay dead" but because he knows Yugi's going to be okay.

The way Atem should be written depends strongly on the time in his life a story takes place in. In Egypt, he was probably very similar to his saner self toward the end of the series, but likely less forgiving and perhaps a bit less sure of himself. Directly after the Puzzle's solving, he's an amnesiac demon, the only parts of himself recognizable being possessive protectiveness and ruthlessness. But toward the end and after the end, Atem becomes the god-king he ideally should be-- brave, wise, confident, and compassionate.

Final Distillation:
Atem changes- from human to demon to human to god.
He is both ruthless and compassionate, in varying measures.
He loves Yugi selflessly.
He is confident to the point of arrogance, but he's working on it.
He is protective to the point of possessive, but he's working on that, too.
He values his honor deeply, not only honoring his word but never backing down.
He's both ancient and young- very wise, but vulnerable to the arrogance and uncertainty of youth.

I'm not as certain I've covered everything on this one as with the previous character studies. (Atem is just a character I have worked with less over the years.) Comments and criticisms are welcome through either here, the DeviantArt, or Gmail.

Not the Chicken Dance!

We watched "Steppin' Out" just last night, actually. It is just as weird an episode as it was the first time I saw it.

A theory on Johnny Steps: Johnny equates being good at games with manliness. He also equates being TALL with manliness. So the reason he freaks out and runs away when he finds out who Yugi really is? All the foundations of his worldview have been utterly shattered.

XD That is the closest to a character study on Johnny ya'll are ever getting out of me. :3

Character Study: Joey Wheeler

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Fifteen to seventeen
Character Archetype: The Open-Hearted Hero, twisted into a supporting role.
Probable Element and Alignment: Fire, Chaotic Good
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: Typically, an inner-city sort of accent and rather odd twists on common phrases, like "Smell ya later."

Like most of the main characters, Joey suffers from a lot of mischaracterization and misunderstanding, which could be seen as odd as he's a basically straightforward person. But straightfowardness and simplicity are not the same as being a flat character-- Joey is equally as complex as Yugi or Kaiba (albiet much less fractured than Kaiba). Joey's most common plague is the label of "the dumb one." He's also shown as the "girly one" in a lot of puppyshipping fics, which quite frankly is beyond me, since Joey is also one of the most, if not THE most, masculine characters in the series. (Invid comments, "He is less masculine than Rafael, and... um... and Panik. Maybe Mako.")

What people who label Joey the "dumb one" tend to miss is that he's actually the leader of the group. Yugi is the main character and the Chosen One, certainly, but he's perfectly happy to stand in back and let Joey take point. In group shots, there are always two characters leading the stroll-- Joey with Yugi slightly behind him. Joey almost always enters a room first. Joey usually speaks first. It usually means something is up when anything different happens.

This is because Joey's base character is that of the typical shonen hero: hot-headed, good-hearted, too quick to speak and act. The man always says the first thing that comes into his head (and speaking from experience, that usually ends with you saying many very strange or stupid things.) Compare both Yugi and Joey to the first other shonen heroes that spring into your mind-- Ash Ketchum. Naruto. Goku. Luffy. Who resembles them more? (Hint: It's not the short one.)

This does not mean Joey is stupid. He's merely much, much less reserved. When he does take the necessary time to think things through (and this is difficult for him mainly because he has too much energy and can't calm down enough most of the time) he's easily as strategic as Kaiba. If there's anything "wrong" with Joey per se, it's that he has ADD.

Joey is, in his own way, a crazy sort of ingenius. Because Yugi stands beside him, we tend to overlook his incredible accomplishments. Even with Yugi there, no one else would have had quite the fire and ability to come in second at Duelist Kingdom despite having had no name for himself before (and Joey did give Yugi a run for his money, so to speak.) Yugi doesn't assist him once during Battle City, but once again Joey excells despite occassionally thinking too fast. Pegasus displays genuine admiration for him during the duel with Bandit Keith (and in the dub, tellingly, Joey is never called "Joey-boy" by Pegasus. He gets "Joseph," which for Pegasus is much more respectful.) In the Oreichalchos saga, he finds himself with the most difficult of the three dragons to use (Hermos, who needs not one but two monsters on the field AND you have to figure out what the heck your new toy DOES) and yet uses it skillfully after only one "trial" duel (the one with Mai, interrupted by Valon.) Joey's growth as a duelist is also another sign of the fact that he's a more traditional shonen hero than Yugi is-- Yugi already had his skills, just not the confidence. Joey had more confidence than he had skills in the beginning, but his mastery of those skills is quick and incredible.

Beyond all that, Joey has a very strange collection of skills. Most of these are best on display during the early manga and the anime's Duelist Kingdom, in which Joey avails himself as
1. A carpenter
2. A locksmith (or a lockpick, but they're essentially the same thing)
3. A pickpocket
4. and a cook.
For whatever reason, Téa refuses to eat Joey's cooking during the Oriechalchos saga, but I suspect that either the writers or Téa forgot that, during Duelist Kingdom, he was the only one who bothered making their dinner outside the castle worth eating. (Probably the writers, as Téa is infallible. XD [/joke]) Joey's purpose within the gang, as a team, is to take point and to take care of random needs presented to the group. Because of this he's sort of a Swiss Army knife when it comes to his abillities: they're small, but numerous and practical. (He's a good fighter, but an unskilled one. This is why Kaiba always wins.)

Probably Joey's skills come from his background: he's the son of a divorced alchoholic who essentially grew up on the streets and had to fend for himself. He spent a lot of time in gangs before coming to high school and terrorized a lot of other kids. Before becoming friends with Yugi, his main prospects for the future included armed robbery and carjacking. One wonders how he ended up at Domino High instead of Rintama High-- potential reasons include a falling-out with Hirutani or the realization that this path was no way to keep his promise to his sister (in Japan, remember, students have some choice in what high schools they go to.) My personal favorite theory is that Tristan had something to do with it. Most likely, it was a combination of all three. Joey is one of the only characters whose direct relationship with his father is vital to his character. Though his father's neglect almost ruined Joey's life, Joey actively continues to support him financially throughout the series. (This is probably the real reason he continues to hold a job after getting the Duelist Kingdom money, at least so far as the dub is concerned. If papa knew Joey had money, he might drink it all up.)

Not that I'm sure Joey suffers from active physical abuse from his father. He probably has been hit with the occasional beer bottle, and most certainly has obtained a few bruises over the years, but it occurs to me that Joey might not even realize he's being abused, seeing that he himself is very rough when physically affectionate. If anything, "That's just how Dad is when he's drunk." He does love his father, which the early manga makes clear, and at least at that point, is convinced that just obtaining financial security will "fix" their relationship (he probably already feels otherwise by the end of the series, though. Kaiba is living proof that money does not equal happiness. XD) Being a top duelist makes money less of a worry later on, I imagine, but as part of his early character money is a constant struggle and source of envy for him.

One of his greater accomplishments as a man is proving himself capable of earning, winning and providing for his loved ones, something his father failed to do. The actual most likely source of the family's falling apart, and even the most likely source of his father's alchohilsm, were struggles with Serenity's medical issues. Joey solved the problem. Part of the reason for his success was learning to accept the help of others. Joey's father probably never learned that, and I can imagine him having once been a very proud man.

Another oft-overlooked aspect of Joey is that he is an awesome judge of character, once he's past that first impression. Out of the characters in the series, the ones who understand Kaiba best by the end of it are Mokuba, Yugi and Joey. When Mai needs things said to her, it rarely takes him long to ferret out the best thing to say (even though, as noted before, all the wrong things to say come out first, because he always says the first thing that pops into his head.) He also has slightly better social skills than either Yugi or Kaiba, at least in that he's unafraid to approach people he finds interesting and presents a more approachable manner himself. He's definitely better-adjusted than Kaiba is, although their respective characters share a lot in common. (This isn't surprising given their respective archetypes, which are two sides of the same coin.)

Something that most people DO understand about Joey's character is that he's almost everybody's best buddy, although I don't think most of them quite realize how far the series pushes this. Yes, he's Yugi's best friend, but he's also Tristan's best friend, and he's Bakura's pretty darn good friend, and Téa's best (platonic) friend, and his sister's best friend, and he sure does get along with Duke quite well. Mako likes him, Mokuba likes him, Pegasus respects him, Valon likes him (eventually), Mai falls in love with him. Marik likes him, and he's seen exchanging rough affection with Odion at one point in the manga. And, of course-- Kaiba likes him, too. As I noted in Kaiba's character study, Kaiba picks on Joey because Joey is funny. More importantly, by the end of Battle City, Kaiba even respects Joey, although obviously that doesn't stop him from teasing Joey. Kaiba doesn't have very many friends at all, much less ones he can tease. Joey fulfills an important role for him, and in turn, Kaiba gets Joey mad enough to stand up and excell. If Yugi, Tristan and Téa provide Joey with the support, and Serenity provides the motivation, Kaiba stokes the fire and acts as the grinding stone to sharpen Joey's determination. (wow what a mixed metaphor.) By the end of the series, Joey is one of Kaiba's closest friends, even if Kaiba isn't one of Joey's. (Although I do believe Joey considers Kaiba to be a friend. Just not the kind you borrow money from. XD)

Earlier in the study I commented that Joey is one of the most masculine characters in the series. People familiar with the cross-dressing fiasco from Series 0 may feel otherwise, but one thing to remember about that is that Joey IS Japanese. Before becoming infused with Western culture, the Japanese wore what was essentially unisex clothing, the main differences being in how people tied their kimonos. I tend to think this makes the average Japanese person more comfortable in his or her masculinity or femininity, and Joey is one of the most comfortable people in the whole series-- if he does things like that, it's because he's comfortable enough in his masculinity that it's not a big deal to him. Out of the male characters, Joey's body language is among the most masculine, when he's not effecting someone else's. (He's also got that horribly terrifying "macho" face he and Tristan both do, but I'm not going to go too far into that.) For Joey, much of the series involves his proving himself as a man. The first time I watched the scene where he and Mai part after Battle City, I felt like he had "arrived." The "final duel of Battle City" scene only solidified that. (Invid disagrees: he feels Joey "arrived" during his duel with Yami Marik. I'm cool with that, but his parting with Mai made it feel more sealed and permanent to me.)

Joey is boisterous and immature at the beginning of the series, wandering aimlessly through his life. By the end of it, he's still energetic and boyish in the best ways, but he's also become the man his father never managed to be, with drive, purpose and yes, even dignity.

Final Distillation:
Joey is the leader.
Joey has a lot of crazy skills, many of which wouldn't seem to have anything to do with each other.
He's brilliant when he thinks things through.
But he rarely thinks things through, because he has too much energy on his hands.
He's incredibly masculine, and very comfortable in that.
He always says the first thing he thinks of-- his heart is on his sleeve.
Eventually, everyone likes him.

Character Study: Seto Kaiba

Approximate Age: (by the Japanese anime) Fifteen to sixteen
Character Archetype: The Wounded Antihero
Probable Element and Alignment: Light, Chaotic Evil (pre-Mind Crush) Lawful Good (post Mind Crush.)
Most Obvious Vocal Quirks: He tends to have somewhat clipped speech, and he also tends towards rude manners of address. He's not very good at talking to people.

Kaiba is one of the easiest characters to write out of character. He's one of the (cough) most studied characters in the fandom and one of the least understood ones at the same time. As Eric Stuart would say, he's a pretty deep guy. It's interesting that we the fans, who supposedly have deeper insight into the world of Yugioh than the characters should, don't seem able to understand him any more than the other characters do-- he's often cast as either evil, the romantic "bad boy" or simply as the prick everybody loves to hate, but he isn't actually any of these things.

I tend to see Seto Kaiba as being one character very slightly fractured into two, in the way that Bruce Wayne and Batman are presented as being the same person but act very differently. In the case of Batman, Bruce is the mask, Batman the brutal true personality. In the case of Kaiba it's a bit different, because both aspects of his personality are equally himself.

I will refer to the two halves as "Seto" and "Kaiba," which is what I do when writing narratives anyway. XD

Seto is a tortured, frightened child. He's terribly sensitive, easily hurt, insecure, and extremely needy. Kaiba is the mask, the protective, badass outer layer that takes on a persona not unlike that of James Bond-- without the sex, because even loveless sex would allow another person too close to Seto. People can have relationships with Seto Kaiba based on one of the two personas or both. They aren't totally separated from each other but they're different enough that he can switch back and forth to an extent.

This can easily be traced to his chaotic childhood-- He grew up crooked because somebody kept breaking him bit by bit as he went. (I actually have this theory that his biological father accidentally started the process by constantly telling him to buck up and be strong.)

His only adult relatives (so says the manga) basically threw him and his brother away the minute they had gotten through the money his parents left behind. It's possible-- and sadly, somewhat probable, that they didn't even get through the money. He lived daily with the constant threat of separation from the last person left to him (it's little wonder he was desperate enough to cheat Gozaburo in order to get adopted.) And then it turned out that the man he himself had chosen was a psychotic and abusive jerk, if not a sadist. Who wouldn't be a little twisted after all that?

The other aspect of Seto Kaiba's character that makes him difficult to pin down is this: He's dynamic, and part of that changing character shows in that his two halves slowly meld together as the series progresses.

In the beginning of the manga, the only part of "Seto" that we see is the oversensitive part. "Kaiba" is almost entirely driving the boat, and that's what makes early manga Seto Kaiba so insane and bloodthirsty. What I find fascinating about early manga Kaiba is that Atem-- psycho, wrathful Atem, not the noble king he is by the end of the series-- has mercy on him TWICE. Yes, first he made him "experience death" and then he tears the poor boy's mind into pieces, but both times it's something he intends his adversary to learn and grow from. This is the man who came closer than anyone (excepting a certain gunman) to actually MURDERING Yugi and his friends, and Atem still has pity on him.

Because by the time Atem applies the "Mind Crush" (or whatever you choose to think of it as), Seto Kaiba is such a scarred and twisted human being that the only way to fix him is to shatter him, so that this time maybe he heals right. (This is even pretty close to what Atem tells Mokuba in the comic.) Even in the Duel Monsters anime, this is more or less accurate. As Atem says there, Seto is searching for himself.

In Duelist Kingdom, he's balanced more between the two (and this is fairly clearly authorial intent, if you HAVE read enough of the manga to be aware of the "inner puzzle" symbolism that originally went with that.) But we see much more of "Seto:" we see him hurting, loving, and even trusting Yugi so far that he's willing to risk death for it-- and also suicidal, since he doesn't seem to mind the idea that Atem MIGHT kill him after all. I personally think that one of the factors that brings Seto out so much more strongly in Duelist Kingdom is that Pegasus somehow got more past "Kaiba" than anyone before Mokuba, and so his betrayal hurts more deeply. (Consider how important Duel Monsters was to young Seto, and the fact that Pegasus essentially allowed this broken child to directly influence the way the game itself was played. That must have meant a lot.) I tend to see Kaiba's reaction to Pegasus later as that of someone deeply dissappointed in a personal hero.

In Battle City, he's starting to settle into being both Kaiba and Seto at once-- and the Kaiba aspect of himself is also a bit calmer, the Seto aspect a bit stronger. We see a lot less drastic switching back and forth. He doesn't scream or yell or throw people around when he's ticked off at them, either. (Except when they need it.) He has fun from time to time. During the anime's Noa arc and with the destruction of Battle City Tower, he symbolically and literally defeats Gozaburo and leaves him behind forever. During the Noa arc, the anime watchers get to understand why he is what he is, and his relationship with his brother becomes stronger than ever. (I'm sure I haven't gone enough into his relationship with Mokuba, so far as certain of you are concerned, but I feel that's actually better discussed in Mokuba's essay.) As far as the comic is concerned, this state of affairs is enough to let us, the readers, know that he's going to eventually be okay.

In the anime, of course, we get about two seasons more of Seto Kaiba character development, and for those of us who enjoyed that part of the anime (for one, me) Kaiba's behavior was one of the main points of enjoyment. He becomes closer to Yugi and company, for one, and betrays the fact that maybe, just maybe, he actually has warm human feelings for them. Note the scene in which the Yugi clan is running away from the possessed rats. Several times he keeps Tristan from dropping Joey's soulless body, at one point even dragging Joey onto a fire escape and then holding Tristan up long enough for the rats to pass by. His hissy fits are also wonderful-- the hissy fit about Yugi losing to Raphael (so that's how Kaiba acts when he's dissappointed in people), the panic attack at the discovery of Paradius (what else would you call that?), and that last delicious, encouraging jab at Atem from the dub-- "You'd better not screw this up." YES, it's a jerky thing to say, but it's also a word of encouragement. Kaiba's not very good at talking to people, remember. And, of course, the subplot involving Alister, deliberately set up to be Kaiba's mirror, is terrific. Kaiba displays pity and compassion for Alister-- not because he deserves any compassion, but because he needs compassion, and Kaiba has compassion in him to give. He's not a romantic hero, but he's hardly evil, and he's much more than just a mouthy prick.

The most important piece of character development in the anime after the Atlantis arc, I feel, is the reaction he has to Yugi's proclaimation that Yugi will be dueling Atem. (I am glad he's in the AE arc in the anime, of course, but mostly because that gives a sense of closure in that he finally understands his role more fully.) He wants to duel Atem, he says, because he was the one who should beat Atem. But what Kaiba says is rarely exactly the way he feels. He wants to duel Atem because not dueling Atem feels like he won't have properly said good-bye. Atem is as important to him as Atem is to the rest of the group, and his behavior here is what proves it.

This brings up one more important aspect to Kaiba when it comes to writing him in character. Kaiba almost never says what he feels. He keeps silent at times that most people would feel a need to say something. When he does say something, he often sounds like a jerk even when he's not trying to be. This makes his facial expressions fairly important, and I personally often finding myself writing what I WOULD have him say, if he said things, and then taking it out, simply because it works better when I know what's going on in his head but don't reveal it.

One last note, and this being on the interaction between Kaiba and Joey: I get the very strong impression that Kaiba thinks Joey is hilarious. This is why he picks on Joey; not because he hates him, but because Joey is fun to pick on. Except when he landed at Duelist Kingdom, and then he was picking on Joey because, quite frankly, Joey was being a jerk at the wrong time. Eventually he and Joey are essentially friends; more on this in Joey's entry, I'm sure.

Final Distillation:
Kaiba is a collection of extremes.
Kaiba is dynamic and becomes a more stable person through the series.
He is a jerk partly because he has no social skills, but also partly because he really is just a jerk.
He still has warm human feelings anyway, and can be somewhat needy.
He's actually rather fragile, at the same time that he's tough as nails.
He rarely says what he means, and often says nothing when most people would.



Feel free to comment on this and tell me whether you feel I've left something important out, or if you think I'm completely off base, or even if you agree with me. Comments can be made through email or right here, since I do believe anon-comments are enabled.