ARC-V Episode 137 Discussion: Servants and RUM

[KingJinzo]

Last episode, Edo Kaworu Phoenix and Sora Crimson Viper Shiun'in were defeated by Zarc Potter's "Odd-Eyes Evangelion Dragon", but that was only the start of Haou Judai vs Jim/O'Brien 2.0. Well, nobody is going to die by losing to Zarc, so the heroes have luck that they aren't sent to the stars. Last time that happened to Edo, he lost to Exodius and Exodia and still came back to life regardless. While Jim had little impact on Judai, Edo and Sora totally fail to shake Zarc's inner light. Well, let's see if the rebel and the light of hope can do something about our evil-turned/overtaken protagonist.

Kaito and Kurosaki witness the absurdity of a duelist being fused with a monster. Well, since you hate Fusions with guts, just use De-Fusion or something to split him from his monster. It totally worked with Ra back then. What is even the benefit of fusing with your monsters? Unless it's a kind of armor or it is Ra that gets powered up by your life, monsters like Sin Truth Dragon or Haouryuu Zarc have no benefits from fusing with their owner. Except you can argue that the fusion represents Zarc's close bond with his dragons or that the reason the dragon is so powerful is because it's fused with Zarc. Obviously, the dragon is Zarc. Remember the series' motto of fighting together with your monsters. Zarc might took that to his heart.
By the way, isn't it weird that Kurosaki is all fucked up by dueling Ruri, while Kaito who lost to Yuri is perfectly fine? The same goes to Edo. He was fine despite losing to Yuri, while Sora was fucked up by Yuri who used a weaker deck. I guess being a legacy rival makes you tough. And thanks to Edo and Sora being alive, Kaito doesn't have to fear about dying like he last time did when he had a trip on the moon. Surprisingly, despite ARC-V being probably one of the darkest YGO series, nobody seems to die in this series, except Sergey and the people from the original dimension (I highly doubt that anyone eaten by Starve Venom survived). Carding isn't death.

Kurosaki begins his turn by summoning King's Lanius, a new Ra**raptor. Its effect is basically Vanishing Lanius's in real life and Kurosaki uses it to summon...Vanishing Lanius. Then he Special Summons Fuzzy Lanius from his hand and overlays the three birds to summon, you guessed it, Rise Falcon. Intrigued by this Xyz Summon, Zarc overlays his two Darkwurm (or should I say Darkwürmer) during Kurosaki's turn thanks to the monster he is about to Xyz Summon: Haoukenryuu Dark Rebellion. (Has no "Xyz Dragon" in it.) Now that Kurosaki is sure that his best buddy who punched him in his gut is inside the devil, he jumps on Rise Falcon and activates its effect to boosts its ATK up to 6600. And the flames surrounding its body don't affect Kurosaki at all. He is either a badass (what he already is) or his monster is just really nice. But remember that Avenge Vulture only pecked on Kurosaki's helmet and nothing more, so I guess that all of his monsters wouldn't hurt him. Funny enough, Kurosaki even remembers how his best bud punched him in his gut and that happens after I've written that line above. That punched brought Kurosaki more or less to his senses, and he attempts to do the same on Yuto and Yuya. Rise Falcon targets Haouryuu Zarc for an attack, but Dark Rebellion's effect says that the only Xyz Monster that can be targetted for battles is itself.

Edo and Sora comment that since Zarc is the integration of Fusion, Synchro, Xyz and Pendulum, Zarc counts as an Xyz Monster on the field. At that time, Gongenzaka and Sawatari appear for the first time since episode 122...with horrible art! Come on, Gongenzaka deserves more respect. Since they were gone for 15 episodes, Sawatari demands exposition.

Kurosaki resumes the battle and attacks Dark Rebellion instead. However, Zarc activates Dark Rebellion's second effect and basically pulls a Quick-Effect version of Dark Requiem's Requiem Salvation, which turns Rise Falcon's ATK to 0 while Dark Rebellion's ATK become 9100. Kurosaki reacts by activating the Quick-Spell Card Over Ray Burst Armor; he detaches all of his Over Ray Units to negate Rise Falcon's destruction and take no battle damage. He then sets two cards and end his turn. By the end of the turn, the effects of Rise Falcon and Dark Rebellion ends and their ATK return to normal.

Kaito begins his turn, jumps on the Action Platforms like Mario and draws. And strangely enough, the moment Kaito gets his turn, the art has improved...a lot. So, do you expect him to play new Cipher monsters? Hell, no. He summons two Cipher Wings, overlays them into Galaxy-Eyes Cipher Dragon and do the Cipher Projection shenanigens. However, thanks to Haouryuu Zarc's effect, all of his monsters are unaffected by the effects of the opponent's Fusion, Synchro and Xyz Monsters. (So, you're telling me that Sawatari can do more on Zarc than everyone who isn't named Reiji? Gongenzaka, maybe.) I like how Zarc says that it is because of his own power. Kaito's plan to overtake Dark Rebellion fails and since he can't just battle it, he sets three cards and end his turn.

Spoiler Alert!

Remember last episode where Layra ran off to see the Professor and Reiji ran after him. Now they go in walk pace and on equal foot. Even though they don't actually have time for that, since, you know, the dimensions are fusing right now. We see transparent people (not ghosts) wandering between the dimensions and wormholes sucking people, including Allen and Sayaka...are you telling me there is the slight chance of Roget's return? Conveniently or not, Allen and Sayaka land on a rocky platform right behind Kurosaki and Kaito. Oh, please, don't tell that is going to happen with Shinji, too? Unlike Kurosaki, Kaito has no time to worry about those two.

Zarc's turn; he attacks Galaxy-Eyes Cipher with Dark Rebellion and uses its Requiem Salvation-like effect to gain advantage, but Kurosaki activates RUM Devotion Force to Rank Up his Rise Falcon into Blaze Falcon while he is falling in mid-air. In reaction to Blaze Falcon's summon, Kaito pays half of his Life Points and activates RUM Limitover Force to Rank Up his Galaxy-Eyes Cipher into Neo-Galaxy-Eyes Cipher whose ATK are multiplied by the number of RUM used during this duel until the end of the turn. In short, Neo-Galaxy-Eyes Cipher's ATK are doubled. Then Kurosaki activates his own Limitover Force to summon Revolution Falcon and triple its ATK...which ironically and hilariously is still lower than Neo-Galaxy-Eyes'. Kaito then activates his Continuous Trap Card Rank-Up Gravity. As long as Kaito controls an Xyz Monster Special Summoned by a RUM, the opponent cannot attack except Xyz Monsters Special Summoned by RUM. And the opponent's monsters that don't battle are banished at the end of the Battle Phase. Since Dark Rebellion has 5500 ATK and Haouryuu Zarc has 4000 ATK, they can't just beat Neo-Galaxy-Eyes's 9000 ATK or Revolution Falcon's 6000 ATK.

However, Zarc laughs and is unimpressed. Zarc activates Dark Rebellion's third effect and returns it to his Extra Deck and revives his two Darkwurm from his Graveyard and all of his opponent's Xyz Monsters' ATK become 0. Then, Allen and Sayaka are unceremonically sucked by another wormhole (did they even notice that their friends are dueling a Yuya look-alike, not to mention that evil Dark Rebellion being present?). At least, Gongenzaka and Sawatari got their plot update. Gongenzaka is heading towards Zarc and tells Sawatari to take care of Sora and Edo. And Sawatari hears the sound of a D-Wheel (Wheel of Fortune, I guess).

Zarc orders his two Darkwurm to attack Revolution Falcon and Neo-Galaxy-Eyes Cipher, and Kurosaki and Kaito jump to add Action Cards to their hand...except that Haoryuu Zarc's last Monster Effect destroys the cards they added. At that moment Gongenzaka and the former King of Riding Duels join the duel, and conveniently, the Duel Courses from the Synchro Dimension are there, too. Kurosaki and Kaito however lose the duel, but Gongenzaka saves them from their fall by simply catching them. Kurosaki apologizes to Sora and gives Gongenzaka the Pendulum pendant. Now Haoryuu Zarc has to face the two most manliest men.

I like how Zarc is still using his other monsters and doesn't rely too much on himself to gain advantage. Only an idiot would rely too much on a single monster...I look at everyone who isn't Reiji, Layra or Sora.

Edo and Sora's part last episode was kind of lame. Kurosaki and Kaito are big step forward. Let's see how epic it can become next episode.


Preview:

Spoiler Alert!

-Better art.
-Either Gongenzaka is using a Superheavy Samurai equipped with a Soul monster or he is using a new Synchro Monster.
-Jack's Burning Soul and he is Double Tuning his Red Daemon's Dragon Scarright.
-Zarc tunes his Darkwurm with Darkwurm.
-Haoukenryuu Clear Wing destroys a card.
-Haouryuu Zarc attacks Jack's Red Daemon's Dragon Tyrant.

[yshipster]

Holy shit, Shun's first turn relly gave me the chills. Probably because of the music, but it also was a huge upgrade to last week. Also they actually played as a team.

Sayaka and Train guy's (forgot the name) appereance in this episode was kinda random though. What did they actually do, despite showing that people can be teleported randomly through the fusing dimensions?

RUM - Limitover Force seems to be a printable generic RUM, with an additional advantage for those who utilize RUMs in general, so I'd appreciate that (and it's a Quickspell!). Speaking of cards: Why did we need RR - King's Lanius? He basically adds nothing to RRs irl, and in the anime he could have just used 2 Vanishing Lanius. So are they going to print it with an additional effect? Gimme all ze RRs!

SKSD - Dark Rebellion is basically Dark Requiem, but with a Quick-Summon(?) effect, and a general Quickplay effect, as well as some self-recycling with an additional advantage. I guess Zarc summons his other SKSDs this way as well, though that would make SKSD - Clear Wing a level 8. But Darkwurm isn't a Tuner anyways, so who knows. I'm actually interested in SKSD - Odd-Eyes though, since he is a Main Deck monster.

Looking forward to The King's and The Man's duel next week, since it finally places Gongenzaka in an actually good spot.

[KingJinzo]

Sayaka and Train guy's (forgot the name) appearance in this episode was kinda random though.

His name appears several times in my post above.

[yshipster]

His name appears several times in my post above.

Your post is a bit long, and even if i red it, i don't recall every side caracter's name after it, nor do I want to search it out.

[KingJinzo]

Your post is a bit long, and even if i read it, i don't recall every side caracter's name after it, nor do I want to search it out.

It's a review. More like a live reaction, so they are supposed to be long. Even then, if I mention Allen's name along with Sayaka, you know who Allen is. And there aren't even many side characters, anyway. There is no need for research in the first place. It's not like I'm mentioning Sakuragi or something.

[Comun]

This chapter was a painful reminder of how much of a bad character Arc-V Kaito is. Also, Gongenzaka and Jack's intrusion was even dumber than Shun and Kaito's. The Xyz guys couldn't predict Z-arc's winning effect, but the Synchro guys actually saw Z-arc declaring the final attack before joining.

At least Shun's part was really great.

[Eternalight]

Again, Shun missed the opportunity to summon (an additional) Force Strix there. Even if it probably wouldn't matter.

Allen and Sayaka's scene was so random. WTH was that? A foreshadowing of something?

[J. D. Guy]

Again, Shun missed the opportunity to summon (an additional) Force Strix there. Even if it probably wouldn't matter.

Allen and Sayaka's scene was so random. WTH was that? A foreshadowing of something?

Symbolic character inclusion. It makes sense from the perspective of who they are to the people Dueling (the good guys, that is). It was a friendship thing, and for all it's worth at that time, the arguably best two Duelists from rival schools Dueling together and sealing their comaraderie puts a little bow on that little subplot. I loved that they actually did this, and it's another point to Arc-V in general towards making it my second fave series. In a "cheating sort of way, this also counts as those two going to the Fusion Dimension, which is what I had wanted back then to have happened, so it's a small closure for me on that idea. Lastly, them getting sucked back into another wormhole was equally symobolic as the doom harbinger to the Xyz Land characters' defeat. Though I guess I'm dead alone on these particular fronts, as everyone else, particularly elsewhere, had a problem with it and/or otherwise didn't get it.

All in all, a grand way to send off these 4 Xyz characters. Though I didn't have an issue with Sora and Aster's part, other than that I wished they used more new stuff, but that's a given, I do feel that Shay and Kite got off better overall than their predecessors in this guantlet. I also feel that Zarc did more against them, despite the fact that he technically did less, but that's another story.

[melcarba]

So why don't they just wait until the Duel is finished before they challenge Zarc?

[Volteccer]

So why don't they just wait until the Duel is finished before they challenge Zarc?

Has anyone been carded yet? Maybe they figure that they won't die as long as the duel is ongoing.