Oh my god this episode…. this episode was insane in the most ridiculous way possible. I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing, it really depends on whether the jokes landed on you. For me, I had a lot of mixed feelings. There were many parts that had be cracking up and others that left me thinking it was starting to get a bit too crazy.
When the episode started off with Goha Corporation having a meeting about Rush Duels, initially I had hoped this meant we were actually going to see plot progression. But as the discussion went on I actually started to wonder if this was another one of Rook’s crazy imaginations, only before long I realized no, this was very much the real deal. Admittedly, it was a letdown because their image as the ‘Antagonists’ wasn’t wasn’t exactly what I had hoped it to be. As they are now, it is impossible to take them seriously.
The reason for that is because for a corporation that has so much control over the public, the Hexagon’s Top Executives, it is appears to be run by a bunch of foolish people. They were going nuts over the reports of Rush Duels spreading far and wide and building momentum of appeal when they cannot find any way to remove it from the system, so when they see Yuuga holding a notebook with “the Secrets of Rush Duels” written all over it on the front page of Goha’s 7th’s newspaper, they immediately think “THIS IS IT” and come up with the plan to steal it from him.
Except there was two problems with this arrangement:
1) It was already obvious from the start that it had no real “secrets”, that’s why Yuuga was happy to share it with others. (Not to mention, if he really wanted to protect it, he probably would’ve have been carrying it around school, much less showcase it when he got his photo taken for the paper!) It didn’t surprise me the slightest to see his notebook full of designs for various robots and machines, as we have seen in his workshop. It also didn’t help how they took the notebook so seriously to the point they even considered it must’ve been written in special ink so they should take it to the lab. That is one example of something I didn’t find particularly funny.
2) They send in one of the Hexagon’s Top Executives Mimi who justifiably calls herself, “The Eternal Elementary Student”. Why is that you ask? Well get this, despite her childish appearance, she is actually 37 years old.
“WOW WHAT. SHUT UP WHAT? WHAT?!?!” was how I reacted. And if you thought that wasn’t crazy enough, they drop us another bomb revealing she has a child of her own, and compared Yuga’s look in his eyes to how her son sees napolitan spaghetti! I actually shouted at my screen, “IS THIS A JOKE?!”
Well in a way, it is a joke because that’s the point of this comedic theme they have been rolling with. Unfortunately, this one didn’t really land with me.
And that joke of trying to buy them off for friendship points, I mean… handing Yuuga a sack of cash! That’s not only insane and hella suspicious! Way to give yourself away!
It is very possible this is how we should expect the antagonists to behave for the rest of the series. Despite their powerful influence over society, the truth is they are a bunch of goofs who are about to get screwed over by some elementary kid because he has been granted the power of implementing his new rules of Rush Duels and is now on the path to forge a new road as the King of Duels. (Though some of us (myself included) are questioning whether Yuuga is actually a kid to begin with… this episode certainly gives some traction of possibility to that crack theory that’s been thrown around…)
But at the same time, I am also questioning whether the Hexagon’s Top 6 Executives are really going to play a more serious role later on. In fact it could very well be an entirely different group of people who will shake things up, potentially by exploiting the use of Rush Duels to chip away at Goha’s Corporation’s influence. There are many ways this could go, but right now with no telling how long this series is supposed to be (especially since they have cut down on the length of the series over time), so it is far too early to judge precisely how things will unfold over time.
However I would like to to point to one thing that was quickly overshadowed by this episode’s insanity: The disappearance of the Relic. Mysteriously, there was no proper follow-up. We didn’t learn anything more from Yuuga’s squad (which I thought was kind of weird given they are puzzled were alarmed by their discovery), nor did Goha Corporation mention it at all, especially when if there was ever a time to bring it up, this would’ve been the perfect way to do so.
This means the lack of response from both parties may be a quiet way of pointing to the third party activity I have speculated about earlier. In fact if there were to be any potential hint of such, we can look to Romin and the other kid she has done music videos with. We saw her again sneaking photos/videos and she’s clearly sending them to him, but for what purpose? But again, I must stress, this may not be the big dramatic coalitions we’re used to seeing in previous series, so take it with a grain a salt. Right now the tone of this series is very light-hearted, and since we have an entirely new team producing this series, it would be wise to not necessarily assume that there will definitely be a dark twist later on. (I am sure I am not the only one who hopes there will be, but I’m no longer holding my breath for it.)
Overall by no means it was a bad episode, but I would say it was probably one of the weakest ones we have seen so far. Mimi’s character just didn’t do it for me. Her drastic actions of trying to buy them off in return for friendship points so she could be close to him, and lack of self-awareness when she’s boasting about promotion at Goha Corp in the bathroom (where there two girls begun keeping tabs on her, wondering if they should report her to a teacher, which I have to admit, that was pretty funny) and the fact they actually made her an adult, a mother no less, was an complete overkill. However in retrospect of that, we did get to see more of Yuuga’s naive side, of blatantly ignoring red flags of trouble, while his friends were very much aware of her suspicious character and were watching his back. It was smart of them to pretend to go with the flow when she brought them gifts and then successfully bait her out to catch her red-handed when she went to steal the notebook from Yuuga’s workshop. But man Yuuga is one little cinnamon who just wants to spread the love and joy of the game far as wide. Even after all that, he still give her his notebook to take home to enjoy. (I wonder if he’s ever going to get it back…)
Next week, I have no idea what the next episode is supposed to be about since the preview didn’t tell us much. Well, we’ll find out what sort of shenanigans will happen soon enough!
I am not so surprised that the Top of Hexagon acted rather ridiculously because the show is aimed for younger children, so I am prepared if it turns out this show will be lacking a serious tone…for the time being.
I gotta agree. Making Mimi an adult with young appearance is certainly an overkill, and she has a child no less. If she’s a middle schooler or high schooler disguising as elementary schooler is still fine, but this is just so…awkward. If Mimi has a son, I won’t be surprised that he’ll appear later to help his mother.
Mimi’s character didn’t hit me at all. The fact she’s an adult pretending to be elementary schooler doesn’t sit well with me. Kinda remind me of a certain antagonist from horror movie years ago. And her deck design is also unattractive.
I am positive there’s a third party and they were the one who took the device to install Rush Duel before. If Goha Corp is the culprit, then they should’ve uninstall Rush Duel already using the machine. My guess would be the Hologram-man (the real person not the projection) was the one who took it after Yuga installed Rush Duel.
Overall, this episode is so so. If it weren’t for Yuga and his friends (especially our precious cinnamon roll Yuga!), this would’ve been much boring. I expect the next episode would still be light hearted. Ah…I’m really weak against cute boys like Yuga. (^w^)
LOL YGO has really built up a reputation where sometimes it may be rather uneventful in the beginning, but then when shit hits the fan that’s usually when the dark twist happens. The only difference this time is that we have an entirely new team working on this series, so it will be interesting to see if they intend to make YGO SEVENS a more comedic series rather than going down the intense dark twists as its predecessors has done. But yeah until then, I am not expecting anything in particular, I am just enjoying the show for what it has to offer, which is the comedy (aside from this episode, but it’s only natural since not all the jokes are going to land) and its fantastic main characters.
It’s also worth noting how Goha’s agents like Mimi are operating under the assumption the people who want to change the rules/disrupt the order are doing it purely for malicious purposes. It would be interesting to see if the reason why they are so overbearing with their rules is that it has something to do with something that has gone wrong before, such as, for instance, creating a set of rules that can be exploited to one’s advantage. But take that with a grain of salt, it’s just something that crossed my mind.
I’m personally quite intrigued to see if Mimi gets more tired up with the group’s shenanigans given that she seems to be sticking at Goha 7th for now (and because her name inevitably makes me draw comparisons with Mimi from Duel Masters). President Goha is still immensely enjoyable for me purely because he doesn’t seem to be fazed by anything, at least if his dialogue so far consisting of nothing but laughter is anything to go by (and goodness only knows what he’ll be like once he does speak, considering the amount of energy Hajime Shacho has in him).