#flavors of both sad and bittersweet with a good amount of ambiguity

[akidachi]

me @ all TMA fans now that the show is over

[image ID// photo of bernie sanders with the text “i am once again asking you to watch Yu-Gi-Oh! gx //end ID]

yes yes i know recomending the cardgame anime spinoff is propably the weirdest thing i could be doing but trust me it has a LOT of thematic smilarities and depending on your reason for liking tma you may very well like gx as well

a quick bullet point list of reasons to watch gx from a tma fans perspective:

explores themes of loss, sacrifice, inhumanity, consequences, depression, the inevetability of fate, spitting in the face of said fate and all that fun stuff

subverting the traditional associations of light and dark as good and evil

“you can still be friends with someone you want to use”

(yes i know that one is more a81 but it applies)

GREAT protagonist character development

completely breaking the protagonist down to their bare essentials throughout the course of the series (but especially during s3)

Canon Typical Guilt Complex

strong supporting cast

characters with supernatural powers

canon non-binary character

on that note

canon nblm character

canon (?) mlnb character

european (?) character that ISNT italian, german, french or brittish for once (a personal pet peeve of mine)

the struggles of growing up and the uncertainty and fear of what the future may hold

and last but not least

the slow series long descent into despair that every ygo spinoff has to some extent but damn if season 3 didnt set a high standard it got dark

all that said i do think i should warn you that wheni say the show gets dark i mean it gets dark. the ygo series overall might shy away from a bit of blood but it is not at all afraid of diving into heavier themes and making you feel it. do not be fooled by the lighthearted nature of the first season it is not afraid to make you cry.

 which seems strange for a show thats seemingly just a childrens cardgame anime but when you take into account that ygo started out as a horror manga, and only switched over to the cardgame structure when the duel monsters arc took off, it makes a lot more sense.

(further talking and content warnings below the cut)

all that said heres a couple content warnings (in no particular order):

child abuse

childhood trauma

emotional and financial abuse

less than stellar family members in general

memory loss

medically induced amnesia (yes these are seperate instances)

themes of suicide

themes of depression and isolation (canon typical Lonely content but its all of gx s4)

unreality / dream logic (kinda. again, s4)

cults

brainwashing, mind control and manipulation

loss of physical and mental autonomy (of a sort)

genocide

implied death of children

confirmed death of children

mentions of real world tragedies (offhand once or twice in s2)

significant mental and emotional torment of the main character

temporary character death

permanent character death

(no neither of these are the typical “shadow realm” ygo deaths im talking about regular dying, and not of the fun and peaceful kind either)

(yes several of these are on screen)

also please not that some of these content warnigns apply to all of, or multiple series of ygo

especially themes of suicide, child abuse, and genocide, all 3 of which are covered in every ygo series on SOME level with varying severity

it may seem tempting to skip straight to season 3, as a lot of the more tma esque content is found there (though s2 goes hard as well in my opinion) i really do recomend watching the show from start to finish, as pretty much all the characters experience some level of character development, and seeing them all change throughout the series is an absolute treat.

also on the dub vs sub debate i really do reccoment watchign GX subbed. not bc dubbed anime are nessecatily bad but bc Dub and Sub GX are practically 2 entirely different shows with the amount of changes 4kids decided to make, as well as season 4 not having a dub at all as 4kids wanted to move on to 5ds instead.

(on a semi related note if the anti establishment aspects of tma are more your jam youll propably like 5ds, which has themes of poverty, classism, said eat the rich and litterally abolished the police force by the end of the series while also being about playing cardgames on motorcycles at the same time)

(honestly i could propably make a whole post on the central themes of each ygo series they really take a theme and apply it EVERYWHERE)

also a more recent note

if you like tragedy and big sad

WATCH VRAINS

its like 1 tiny detail away from being a tragedy

i knew what was coming and it still wrecked me