Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s Season 2 more card, monster anime kids love

If you have a kid that watches television they’ve probably seen a glimpse of Yu-Gi-Oh! OK, that last exclamation point was part of the show’s title. Yu-Gi-Oh! the card game has been flipping around for more than 25 billion sets sold and the television show has been on the air somewhere on the planet since 2001. It’s Yu-Gi-Oh!’s world and we’re just living in it. Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s Season 2 brings the second season to DVD and digital platforms.

Those that haven’t seen Yu-Gi-Oh! can be excused for not getting it. This anime show is about teens playing cards to summon monsters that fight each other, which is very much like the card game. This is the world’s best selling card game and if you listen closely you can her UNO over in the corner trying to figure out the card combinations and exactly how to play it.

Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s Season 2 originally aired in Japan in 2008. This is the same series, but it’s been dubbed into English and has a slightly different opening.

I am a Yu-Gi-Oh! novice, but here is what I understand the series. Yusei is a motorcycle riding, card playing guy with friends who live in New Domino City that was recently reunited. Now there are parts of the city whose roads are reserved for those that want to duel. You’re riding your motorcycle and suddenly someone comes up and wants to play cards with you, while you’re riding. Then the monsters come out and fight each other, while you have to strategize which cards you pull so that your opponent has a weaker monster than you.

Watching the series for the first time you aren’t sure if the characters are just making up the strength’s of the cards so that the show can continue. I don’t know which card does what. Imagine if you didn’t know how to play chess and suddenly the person teaching you incorporates other playing pieces and tells you that they can impact the game drastically by summoning the counter-attack powers immediately after the third consecutive day of rain. Playing Yu-Gi-Oh! sounds a bit like that.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a very pretty show and I understand how people can watch it hours on end. The animation is gorgeous and the anime sucks you in, even if you aren’t a fan of the medium. Older views will get lost in the card dialogue and its potential cheese. Younger viewers will be enthralled, love every minute of it and want their own robot, slaying dragon that they can summon while riding on the highway.

Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s Season 2 is an 8-disc set and has just over 1,500 minutes of anime madness. It’s rated TV-Y7, but a six year old can watch this and enjoy the action and lessons that it teaches. They might not understand it, yet, but it might also lead them to try the card game.