Let's Talk About... Yu Yu Hakusho

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

On anothet note, as a kid I was kind of stupid and didn't understand the concept of how one voice actor could play multiple characters on the same show, so based on the same voice and a similar design, I always used to wonder what the hell Mr. Iwamoto was doing in the tournament as a trained assassin while not acknowledging Yusuke or Kuwabara from his school, or even making mention of his alter ego as a school teacher.

Needless to say, I didn't really put much thought into how fucking stupid and nonsensical that assumption was, on my part.

[talonmalon333]

Did Kibano say the helmet enhances his strengths or anything along those lines? I honestly can't remember. But if he did say something along those lines, I'd imagine the ability to see someone in the dark is merely a benefit of the ability to see someone's spirit power. I'm not sure. As for how he carries it, maybe it's able to be folded together.

[talonmalon333]

Also, Baldoc might be the best one shot character in this whole series.

If I remember correctly, the people who made the anime did a lot with him compared to the manga. And I think they even redesigned him.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Welcome to the next week of discussion! I'll be your host this week as Avaitor finds himself a little busy to contribute right away, but what a week it is!

Last time we left out hero alone in the dark, being pounded into pulp. Yusuke has never been a very lucky guy, but now he has to fight an opponent who can not only see in the dark, but can anticipate his every move. How can he beat something he can't even see? Well, we find out this week in the first of our double header! there isn't much story, per say, to talk about this week, but four good fights that should soak up much discussion.



Hard Fights for Yusuke closes out the previous fight against Kibano where Yusuke finds himself outmatched by both experience and skill, not even able to land so much of a hit on Kibano. Of course, Yusuke is not anything if he's not clever, and while he is being beaten on finds his way out of the match in the most clever way possible.

I have to say, this was a very cool match. Yusuke uses his head for the third time this series in a fight (the first being with Gouki and the second with Hiei) and manages to clinch a victory out of the jaws of defeat. Of course, Yusuke's cleverness and resourcefulness will be tested in future episodes, but for now he's lucky that Genkai has a nicotine obsession.

Speaking of luck, Yusuke's second fight is against HanzoKazemaru gives him a similar disadvantage. Twice he has been paired with the toughest (or are they?) fighters in the tournament, and one right after the other! This time not only is he outmatched, but has no room to think of a plan. In a final gamble he charges at HanzoKazemaru and, well, the result isn't pretty.

The second fight this week is another great one. Last time Yusuke was outmatched by brawn, and this time by spirit energy. But like the last time, he is able to use his opponent's cockiness against them, resulting in a narrow win.

But now there are only three fighters left, Yusuke, Kuwabara, and Shorin, and one of them is the demon Rando. At this point it isn't hard to guess who it can be.



Or is it? Shorin seems like a wimp. Not much physical strength and he seemed to win his quarter-final fight by luck, not skill. Kuwabara mops the floor with him until Shorin seems to have had enough and unveils something that . . . well, he probably shouldn't be able to do.

The episode isn't called Rando Rises, Kuwabara Falls for nothing, because Shorin isn't what he seems at all. After taking a sound beating from Kuwabara, he reveals that holding back any longer is not something he can afford to do. With one psychic ability, Shorin defeats Kuwabara so badly that he may have left Yusuke's friend as a cripple, but Yusuke has reached his limit and jumps into the fray for the final match.

This match is fairly creative despite the apparent difference in strength between the two opponents. Kuwabara's spirit awareness enables him to dig deep for his Spirit Sword's abilities and as a result he is slowly turning into a real warrior. Unfortunately, Shorin has more than enough tricks to deal with him. The final moments where Kuwabara is defeated are still cringeworthy moments so many years later. Shorin is not the simple boy he claims to be as he sadistically tortures Kuwabara to near death before the fight is finally called.

The final match this week is between Yusuke and Shorin, and it's a slobber-knocker. Yusuke is mad, really mad. He won't give Shorin an inch, and doesn't let up on him. Despite Shorin showing yet more impressive techniques that he shouldn't know, it simply doesn't matter to Yusuke who is running on pure adrenaline and spirit energy, and charges full tilt through all his attacks. He takes Shorin apart, bringing the sadistic boy to the ground and to his defeat.

Or is it?

This fight is proof positive that getting Yusuke mad is probably a bad idea. Shorin is destroyed in this fight, it isn't even a contest. But then Genkai won't call the fight after he takes him down. Mostly because while Shorin is beaten, Rando is not. He sheds his form and reveals who he really is, and now he's ready to give Yusuke a real fight.

We end our week as Rando is finally revealed and the real final match is about to begin.

So those are our episodes this week. What did you think?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Great input, Spark! I've been busy with both studying as well as trying to finish watching all of season one of Daredevil, so I might not get a chance to post my detailed thoughts on each episode until tomorrow, but I definitely will get to it.

[Avaitor]

Yeah, sorry, I had a movie premiere that I was working last night, so I didn't see it as feasible to do the weekly post. Thanks, Spark!

These were both damn fine episodes, closer to the show we're going to know and love! Yusuke's current skills contain a combination of skill and good luck, so it's fun to see how he uses this to win his fights. And the ending to the latter episode is a great way to set up for the fight between Yusuke and Rando!

[Spark Of Spirit]

These fights really were awesome, and we still have one left (which is, in my opinion, top notch) to go. Togashi really seemed to get into the groove with this arc and really solidify his style. Smart fights with cool powers, and a hero with more guts than muscle.

Also, I think Chris Sabat really seems to be finding his groove with Kuwabara. His performance in the fight against Shorin was far more flexible than the early episodes.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Sorry, but I had my hands full today again. I'll definitely write something up on these episodes by tomorrow, though.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, it looks like there are only three of us discussing this now, being that CX hasn't posted on here in the past two weeks. Oh well, I plan to go all of the way through this series, myself, regardless of how many other people do. It's still my favorite anime of all time, damnit!

11. Hard Fights for Yusuke

We're still not quite there yet, in terms of the show truly living up to its potential. That said, this was a strong entry (as are the next two episodes), and it really shows how resourceful (and lucky) Yusuke can be. In the conclusion to his fight with Kibano, we see a minor scene from earlier, in which Genkai throws her cigar into the darkened fighting arena, pay off when Yusuke manages to spot it and slip it onto Kibano without him noticing, giving him the perfect marker for his location. It did rely on luck since Yusuke hadn't planned for Genkai to do that, but it also takes a great opportunity to capitalize on that luck in the first place.

Next he takes on Kazemaru (Desensitized already used the Hanzo joke, so I'll refrain from it, myself), which is especially bad for Yusuke since, not only did he just barely survive a fight with Kibano, but without having any real time to recover, he is basically being forced to fight another opponent who is far more skilled and experienced than himself, and on top of that has little to no spirit energy left to work with. Of course, he does pull through and win this fight by luck, but pay careful attention to how he originally planned to win the fight, in that he was prepared to sacrifice himself to take out Kazemaru, and leave Kuwabara to fight Shorin who it is obvious at this point is Rando in disguise. This time, Togashi is very cleverly setting up an important character flaw for Yusuke that was also hinted at in earlier episodes: he doesn't think things through. All throughout the Spirit Detective saga, pay closer attention to how Yusuke gets out of tough situations. He does use strategy, yes, but he also takes a lot of risks that, quite frankly, could horribly backfire if he didn't luck out with
Togashi pulling the strings and saving him since he's the protagonist. This will eventually culminate in something, but I won't say what, right now, even though the only people following this show in these discussions have already watched it before. I'm still going to avoid spoilers and pretend like people are going in blind, just to give me more stuff to say later on. What I can point out is how much more desperate and dangerous a situation Yusuke continually finds himself with each new fight.

In his fight with Gouki, he ended up using up his only Spirit Gun on a gamble that his insides were vulnerable, though to be fair, he could have presumably escaped that situation if he was wrong and found another way to defeat him (although, at the cost of losing the souls that Gouki had already consumed). In his confrontation with Kurama, he chooses to blindly trust Kurama because he told him an affectionate story of his past. In this case, the trust is well placed, but it could have easily gone bad for Yusuke had Kurama been a more shady character. Finally, in his fight with Hiei, he not only gambles his own life but that of Keiko's as well, and in this case on bouncing his Spirit Gun off of the Forlorn Hope (without really knowing whether it would work or not), and not to mention that he just rushed into fighting Hiei without a plan since he was very hot-headed after he kidnapped Keiko. In all three situations, he was taking big risks that could have easily gotten himself or other innocent people killed.

This theme continues in Genkai's arc, what with how he rushed through the center of the forest and almost lost due to not making the time limit, and I already covered how his recent fights just went. If he had really died and left a very oblivious Kuwabara to deal with a deadly foe that he was not prepared to battle in the least, well....we would see how that would have basically would have ended up in the next episode. And yes, Genkai could have still stepped in, but the bottom line is that right now she's not really on Yusuke's side or anything, so he still could have basically destroyed his future as a Spirit Detective and Genkai would have just been neutral to the whole situation outside for taking down Rando. The bottom line is that, Togashi is presenting Yusuke with escalating stakes and showing how Yusuke is outmatched in all of them, and that he's been getting using luck to get by a bit too much. Eventually this is going to catch up to him and he will encounter an opponent who is so much stronger than him that it would be hopeless for him to try and defeat them without being properly prepared to take them on. But, we'll get to that when it comes.

12. Rando Rises, Kuwabara Falls

Yet another good Kuwabara episode, and a solid one overall. Now that we know for sure that Shorin is Rando, we get a good dose of how Togashi loves to play with expectations. Rather than having him cream Kuwabara right away, we see that, in accordance with his physical appearance, Kuwabara can beat the crap out of him with ease. Clearly he can't physically overpower the guy. So then he starts using spirit-based attacks, and even then Kuwabara seems to have the upper hand....until it becomes apparent that Rando is just warming up. He's playing around, testing some of the older abilities that he has learned. To him, Kuwabara isn't nearly significant enough of a threat to fight him seriously. This is shown in how he eventually hits Kuwabara with a shrinking spell and quite literally toys with him as if he were an action figure that he could dismantle. The way that he slowly snaps Kuwabara's arm is downright sadistic. It also does a good job of setting up how Kuwabara will need to do a lot of growing of his own in the future.

This of course forces Genkai to call the match, and now it's Yusuke's turn to take out Rando, as was his original assignment. We didn't get to see too much happening in this episode as Rando only just revealed his true form by the end, but keep in mind what I said about Yusuke's previous fights and apply it to this battle as well once we get to the next episode. Other than that, I honestly don't have too much to add in this case. It was a good episode, but also a very straightforward one, and more of a transitional piece into Yusuke's fight, rather than one to be analyzed as heavily as I have done for some of the other episodes so far.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Sorry I haven't been chiming in lately.  I've just been swamped with a lot of work/personal things, so I haven't been able to make time to rewatch these. It's unfortunate, since I really do like this arc and these episodes and would probably have a lot to say about them if I could refresh myself on them. In any case, I'll probably resume participating when school's out for me in early May.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

That's fine. I've been in your shoes before, so I know what it's like.

[talonmalon333]

What I like about Rando is that he does feel like a big deal at this point. The moment when the pieces start to come together, particularly in that spooky moment of Shorin chanting, is very effective. Then there is his entrance at the end of the episode which is actually exciting and makes him seem intimidating, even if it's a bit over the top (which I don't even care about) and his voice is still pretty lame. Really, the buildup to Rando starts when his energy destroys the compass, which worked perfectly fine for Hiei. At this point, Hiei and his little gang suitably seem like small fries, even if it doesn't totally make sense how...

Spoiler

In Maze Castle, Hiei and Kurama are on par with Yusuke in strength.

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[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Actually, Rando is much stronger than Yusuke. Don't forget my point about how most of Yusuke's opponents in the Spirit Detective saga are stronger than him and he has to rely on a combination of both strategy and luck to defeat them.

Spoiler

In the case of Rando, Yusuke accidentally blocks out his ears unbeknownst to Rando, which reverses his chant onto himself and shrinks him to a size easy enough for Yusuke to crush. Yusuke won because of luck, not because of skill, strength, or overall spirit energy.

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Also, the Maze Castle stuff takes place a couple of weeks after Genkai's tournament, and through training Yusuke has become stronger than he previously was. Since they never directly confront each other, it is never made clear whether Hiei and Kurama are on par with Yusuke, but if they are by that point, it'd only be because Yusuke worked his way up to their level, because (once again) they were clearly stronger than him as it was during their first encounter, as evidenced by Kurama taking a stab wound that would have presumably killed or incapacitated Yusuke, and the aforementioned fact that Yusuke beat Hiei based on strategy rather than power.

[talonmalon333]

Actually, Rando is much stronger than Yusuke. Don't forget my point about how most of Yusuke's opponents in the Spirit Detective saga are stronger than him and he has to rely on a combination of both strategy and luck to defeat them.

I wasn't denying that. What made you think I was saying that's not the case?

Also, the Maze Castle stuff takes place a couple of weeks after Genkai's tournament, and through training Yusuke has become stronger than he previously was. Since they never directly confront each other, it is never made clear whether Hiei and Kurama are on par with Yusuke, but if they are by that point, it'd only be because Yusuke worked his way up to their level, because (once again) they were clearly stronger than him as it was during their first encounter, as evidenced by Kurama taking a stab wound that would have presumably killed or incapacitated Yusuke, and the aforementioned fact that Yusuke beat Hiei based on strategy rather than power.

True. Though it does make the first three Saint Beasts seem pretty weak since they were beaten by Kurama and Hiei, who I think were stated to be D class demons. But then again, maybe those Saint Beasts were, too. After all, Suzaku seemed to think little of them. I wouldn't be surprised if he chose to work with them because of reasons beyond strength, such as Genbu being able to communicate with demons outside the castle.

[Spark Of Spirit]

The Genkai Tournament is a surprisingly good arc for what amounts to a short tournament. Togashi and Toriyama seem to be the best at tournament style arcs, I don't think I've read a bad one from either. Three Kings manga aside, anyway.

Spoiler

The Saint Beasts apparently went soft for staying so long separated from everything else. Both Genbu and Byakko were stated to not be as good as they once were and Seiryu was sloppy and arrogant. I would say Suzaku and Rando were around the same general power. Yusuke was outclassed by them both, but he was better trained to deal with Suzaku.

Rando's loss was his own fault. He kept mindlessly grabbing power without even considering what it was that he was grabbing. He fell on his own sword and that is why he lost. It was a good way for him to lose as an opponent who had 99 techniques yet didn't really understand any of them.

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