Last reviewed 6.24.02, by R. Serena Wakefield (rserena@bellsouth.net)

While it's hard to be exactly sure because the storyline develops so slowly (and because the WB Network shows the episodes out of order), Yugi, the main character of the anime Yu-Gi-Oh: Duel Monsters, appears to be multiple -- a pairing at least.  I'm not sure whether it's a good one or a bad one, though.

Most of the time, Yugi is a fairly bland kid who's obsessed with a card game; a nice guy, but not terribly interesting.  He finds out that expert players of the game have some kind of magical powers.  He himself has an artifact that the game's world champion needs, and so the champion uses a spell to capture Yugi's grandfather's soul as a hostage to force him to turn it over.

Once he starts playing his card game for high stakes instead of just for pocket money, Yugi starts to find that when he's duelling he becomes sharper, more focused, and stronger.  He's the Yugi-oh of the title, and is clearly a separate individual with the same goals who gains more and more independence as the series continues.

Seriously speaking, Yu-Gi-Oh isn't that good ... the writing's poor, and while I'm told the manga is better the anime is really just an extended commercial for the card game (available at toy and hobby stores throughout the country).  What's more important is that, at least around here, the game and the series are major hits among the eight-to-ten set ... meaning that the portrayal of Yugi is getting a lot of exposure to children who are too young to have fully developed their prejudices.

Whether this is a good or bad thing should probably be left up to someone who's more familiar with the series, but it's definitely worth looking into!