• Login
  • My Account
  • Logout
  • Privacy
  • Cookie Policy

THATFILMGUY

Film Previews, News, Reviews and Lists

  • Home
  • Reviews
  • Lists
  • Five Stars
  • News
You are here: Home / Film Reviews / Review: Yu-Gi-Oh! The Movie (2004)

Review: Yu-Gi-Oh! The Movie (2004)

September 15, 2011 by That Film Guy Leave a Comment

yu-gi-oh-movie[pullquote cite=”” type=”left, right”][amazon text=Amazon&template=carousel&chan=That Film Guy&asin=B0006FNWYK][/pullquote] Yu-Gi-Oh! is a Manga and Anime that, for some reason, got a very big following in the West. Mostly due to the English dub, the anime was shown on Western channels (mostly children’s) and was a huge success. However, the show was heavily edited for children’s channels, even though the original show wasn’t all that explicit, which drew heavy criticism from fans of the original Japanese show.  The anime is down there with the worst of the genre (I’m looking at you Vampire Knight), and while you have to have an open mind about these things, some films make it very difficult.

Yu-Gi-Oh! takes place after Season 3, where Yugi Muto (voiced by Dan Green in the English dub, Shunsuke Kazama in the Japanese version) won the Battle City Tournament, and now has all three Egyptian god cards (the rarest and most powerful cards in Duel Monsters, the card game the story focuses around). Seto Kaiba (Eric Stuart English, Kenjiro Tsuda Japanese), disgusted at his defeat, challenges Yugi to a rematch. However, he accidentally uses a card, bringing forth Anubis (Scottie Ray English, Kouji Ishii Japanese), the Egyptian god of death, who wants to destroy the world as he tried to do 5000 years ago.

The whole concept and plot of Yu-Gi-Oh is really baffling. Card games? Mystical powers? Egyptian gods? How on earth can those things fit together? Well, they manage to at least try to make this work, but the key here is execution. This is where the film fails.  There’s no suspense because the villain is revealed right at the start. Several things are never explained, and there are only short breaks before we’re back playing another card game. And the dialogue in the card game (or ˜duel’ as they like to call it) segments is just awful.

The constant ˜I’m going to summon X, which makes you vulnerable to Y’ gets really irritating and pointless. You can pretty much recite word for word what they’re going to say before they’ve said it just by watching one duel. The animation is mediocre at best, with competent art, but some weird David Lynch-esque dream sequences that are more confusing than scary. The voice acting is horrible, the English dub actors especially being annoying and over-the-top.

Overall, Yu-Gi-Oh! fails in almost every aspect, even in it’s premise. The dialogue is annoying and repetitive; the card games/duels are just plain boring, and the idea of ancient Egyptian card games having the power to summon an ancient evil from 5000 years ago that threatens to destroy the planet for some unknown reason is just silly.

James Haves

« Previous
Review: I Don’t Know How She Does It (2011)
Next »
Review: The Change-Up (2011)

About That Film Guy

A new group of film reviewers in the finest traditions of ThatFilmGuy.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Sponsor Website

JEDINET LINK

TOP LIST

Top 30 Christmas Films

Top 30 Christmas Films

  Love Actually (2011) It's a Wonderful Life (1946) Elf (2003) A Christmas Story … Read More

Top 30 Horror Films

Top 30 Horror Films

Our list of the Top 30 Horror Movies of all Time. Do you Agree?.........Horror films are one of the … Read More

Top 30 Comedy Films

Top 30 Comedy Films

Our list of the Top 30 Comedy Movies of all Time. Do you Agree?.........One of the most popular and … Read More

Top 30 Animated Films

Top 30 Animated Films

Our list of the Top 30 Animated Movies of all Time. Do you Agree?.........The animated film genre … Read More

Top 30 Film Trilogies

Top 30 Film Trilogies

Our list of the Top 30 Movie Trilogies of all Time. Do you Agree?.........Before the 1970s a film … Read More

Top 30 Classic Action Films

Top 30 Classic Action Films

Our list of the Top 30 Classic Action Movies of all Time. Do you Agree?.........Catering for the … Read More

© 2022copyright Thatfilmguy.com and Trafford Innovations Limited