Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal

[Hidden Mew]

I agree. I'm interested in how Nasch will pull out all Number C10Xs, a new CXYZ and Black Ray Lancer. Nacsh deck now is already inconsistent with levels but seeing him pull out all that stuff will make it more obvious. I hope he at least Ranks Up Shark Drake but more for my own reasons rather then for plot reasons.

Seeing all of those different Numbers would be cool. I'd kind of like to see a Chaos Xyz version of Black Ray Lancer.

I agree. Mizar kinda had it coming to him bu I wish it was Kite getting trolled like that instead. I just feel Kite got killed off to avoid handing him another defeat.

I don't think that they would have had Kaito lose in one turn to Don Thousand. Even with how little he has done compared to Yuma and Shark, I don't think that the writers would be willing to make him the sacrificial lamb in this case. They didn't even give him more than one official loss, although I guess we could count his match with Mr. Heartland since he was unable to continue by the time Yuma and Astral showed up. Plus, his death was actually handled pretty well, so killing him off in one turn would have been weak. Plus, Misael losing that quickly works due to how it further powers up Don Thousand. I don't think absorbing Kaito would have powered him up. Absorbing Yuma would due to being bonded to Astral and the power of Chaos he has too, but I don't think absorbing Kaito would do anything for him.

 

[Ben 10]

Seeing all of those different Numbers would be cool. I'd kind of like to see a Chaos Xyz version of Black Ray Lancer.

I kinda want to see a Ranked Up Shark Drake, I mean I know he doesn't have much meaning behind him now but he was still Shark's most important ace before he shifted from Avenger to Conflicted Barian and it'll b a shame of everyone but it gets used.

I don't think that they would have had Kaito lose in one turn to Don Thousand. Even with how little he has done compared to Yuma and Shark, I don't think that the writers would be willing to make him the sacrificial lamb in this case. They didn't even give him more than one official loss, although I guess we could count his match with Mr. Heartland since he was unable to continue by the time Yuma and Astral showed up. Plus, his death was actually handled pretty well, so killing him off in one turn would have been weak. Plus, Misael losing that quickly works due to how it further powers up Don Thousand. I don't think absorbing Kaito would have powered him up. Absorbing Yuma would due to being bonded to Astral and the power of Chaos he has too, but I don't think absorbing Kaito would do anything for him.

You're right. I'm just bitter that Kite never got another lose to his resume and I never noticed how meaningless him beating Yuma was at the end of ZEXAL I until I realized there won't be a rematch where Yuma proves he's better. Beating Nasch and Astral should basically guarantee Yuma could potentially beat Kite but seeing Kite lose would have been more satisfying for me.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I kinda want to see a Ranked Up Shark Drake, I mean I know he doesn't have much meaning behind him now but he was still Shark's most important ace before he shifted from Avenger to Conflicted Barian and it'll b a shame of everyone but it gets used.

A Ranked Up Shark Drake would be cool. I actually forgot about it due to how long it has been since he used it, but it would be nice to see that. There might be a good chance that he'll use it at some point considering he's using Black Ray Lancer.

You're right. I'm just bitter that Kite never got another lose to his resume and I never noticed how meaningless him beating Yuma was at the end of ZEXAL I until I realized there won't be a rematch where Yuma proves he's better. Beating Nasch and Astral should basically guarantee Yuma could potentially beat Kite but seeing Kite lose would have been more satisfying for me.

I can understand that. I don't think I would have cared that much to see Kaito get another official life points down to zero defeat due to the combination of finding him so boring and it wouldn't have really changed him. Losing for the shake of losing never really appealed to me. Practically everyone wants the protagonists to lose more. Even with Yuma, he still wins nearly every important duel because of how losing would mean losing Astral for good. Still, it isn't a bad idea if the defeats have any meaning to the characters. If they lose just for the shake of getting another defeat on their record, it really doesn't do much for me. Nearly all of Yuma's defeats at the start of Zexal are like that for me. They serve as a way to establish his more care free attitude, but aside from his near defeat to Kaito, they don't affect him and even then, he bounces back pretty quickly and it was kind of jarring when he had already lost over twenty times and one near defeat shook him up. If his reaction was about how he could have lost his soul, that would have been understandable, but if I recall correctly, he was reacting to how he could become a Duel Champion afterwards. Yusei's reaction to his near defeat/death after his first duel with Kiryu was a better way to handle a near defeat in my opinion.

Anyway, the point I'm trying to make here is that defeats for any of the characters should have more meaning to them than just adding another loss to their record. Kaito losing to Don Thousand wouldn't have meant anything, so I don't see how it would have been any better. At least he actually got more than one turn in his duel with Misael and they put all of their focus on his death, instead of squeezing it in the last half of the episode without any buildup like they did with Misael.

I do agree that it does make it rather meaningless to have Kaito beat Yuma if they weren't going to duel again. I guess they didn't want Kaito to lose there because of how Yuma affected him to keep dueling, even though he could have just found that reason to keep dueling once the Barians were attacking anyway, and to show that Yuma still couldn't reach him. Although, given how they haven't really had much of a rivalry throughout the Zexal II, despite Yuma mentioning that they still need to duel again before Kaito died, maybe they didn't think it was as big of a deal compared to everything else. Losing to Yuma would make more sense than losing to Don Thousand at least, but I'm not really crushed that we don't get to see that. I'd much rather see Yuma duel Nasch and then Astral. At least those matches sound good and interesting, more so than another Yuma vs. Kaito at least.

 

[Zexy]

So, any thoughts on the newest episodes?

Spoiler

I like Number 1000 a lot, although the tricks Yuma/Nasch pull off are a bit cheap, I must say. It's also nice how ZEXAL can't just beat Thousand in a turn, and they get desperate enough to cancel the fusion!

Although it has too much of a final match flair, so seeing vs Nasch and vs Astral later may be anti-climatic. Hope they make those really good as well!

For one, I am happy that no more characters are dying now...

 

[Hidden Mew]

I've been meaning to comment on the last few episodes, but I didn't want to double post and I've been busy.

Anyway, the duel with Don Thousand was okay. It was full of overpowered effects and cards, but considering that they're facing what is basically the god of the Barian World, that was to be expected. It did at least move at a good enough pace to help be a bit more engaging and the music score was good, especially when the defeated him. I did get a kick that he eventually summoned out an Imaginary Number. The fact that he has such a card or could summon out Chaos Number 1000 wasn't unbelievable since it's probably a manifestation of his powers, but it was just seeing that they've gone so far as to include an Imaginary Number that just seems funny to me for some reason.

I liked seeing Yuma and Nasch work together. Despite what he went through and what he has said regarding his humanity, Nasch still clearly cares about his friends if his reaction to Astral planning to sacrifice himself was any indication. Plus, they worked well off each other and Nasch especially had some good strategies, like using Numeron Network's effect to his advantage prior to its destruction. I also was not expecting Kaito to reappear in order for Numeron Dragon to finally be summoned. That was less expected than appearing via flashback. I guess that they wanted all three of them present facing Don Thousand, but in different forms than they normally have.

Don Thousand does feel like an underwhelming villain. There clearly has been build up for this match and he does fit within the context of the storyline that they've presented, but he's not really much of an interesting villain. He's the typical god figure who looks down on humanity and wants power. To be fair, I have seen a few villains like that and that wouldn't be so much of a problem if there was something a bit more interesting about him. Still, the information on the Numbers we got from him was interesting. Apparently, after his first fight with Astral, fifty Number cards were shattered, which would explain why the Legendary Numbers were present well before Yuma opened the Door. I guess the other Numbers were scattered after Astral bonded with Yuma. The duel ended in a pretty good way all things considered.

I'm also liking the start of Yuma vs. Nasch. I was worried that Nasch would be completely under Don Thousand's influence after his powers were absorbed, but that doesn't seem to be the case, at least for now. Nasch's claim that he chose to be a Barian is interesting, but it seems unlikely to me. He's altered the memories of all of the other Barians, so even if he did choose to become a Barian somehow, I don't see why Don Thousand wouldn't also alter his memories. Besides that, Don Thousand said something like Nasch would soon learn why he was revived as a Barian after those brief scenes showing how he manipulated Durbe and Merag's deaths, so there has to be something more to it than that. I also liked that Yuma and Astral contemplated using the Numeron Code as a giant reset button to revive everyone. Granted, I don't think that they would go that far considering that it would mean that none of them would have met and Yuma wouldn't have met Astral, which is something he wouldn't want, but it was still a nice moment where they actually have to still think about what they'd want to do to save everyone.

The duel itself was a bit too rushed, especially with Nasch summoning out all of the Chaos Over One Hundred Numbers with cards that seemingly came out of nowhere, but they're clearly pressed for time given that the series only has a few more episodes left. Still, all things considered, the duel is off to a good start.

 

[Litten]

The newest ZEXAL episode was kinda boring in my opinion. I thought the finale of the Yuma vs. Nasch duel would be more monumental, but the way Nasch lost left a bitter taste in my mouth. I suppose it was dramatic and emotional, but I wasn't completely satisfied.

 

[Zexy]

I agree, it could and should have been more emotional. I can see the end of the Duel having a point, but the words exchanged after the Duel were just not enough for my liking.

 

[Muur]

I don't get how the dub's so far behind.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I actually really liked the conclusion to Yuma vs. Nasch, including how it ended. The duel moved at a fast pace, which helped to make it engaging despite all the situational cards. It was also really cool to see Black Ray Lancer and Aero Shark again. It felt like ages since they were played. At least Nasch takes advantage of the various Xyz monsters he has, which is a lot more than I can say for Yuma. I understand why he was playing Hope here, especially when they were going for Hope vs. Black Ray Lance to tie into his second duel with Shark, but it does say a lot when the antagonist has more variety in his deck than the protagonist. At least Beyond the Hope looked pretty cool compared to most of the other Hope upgrades.

The price for the Door was also apparently brought up. From what I've heard, the price was Yuma's sense of identity and he was about to lose it when he almost defeated Nasch. That's why he broke out of the Zexal III form. He realized that he would have used that power to basically kill Nasch, who he still saw as his friend Shark, and that would take away his sense of self. He even questioned if it is worth creating a better future at the cost of your friends. I was expecting something completely different for the Door's price, like losing Astral or all of his friends, but that really caught me off guard. It was surprisingly deep and I liked that they pulled it off pretty effectively.

As for how Nasch lost, he was going to lose regardless if he took himself out or not. The trap card that he activated that allowed both him and Yuma to draw, Draw, Reset Battle, said that if they didn't use the card during that turn, then they lose. I don't think he played the card, so he was going to lose either way. Honestly, it makes perfect sense that Nasch would defeat himself. Yuma stopped himself from defeating Nasch since he realized that it would kill him and was determined to keep dueling until they could find an answer to help everyone. Nasch, on the other hand, wanted a more clear victory for an answer, rather than than constantly fighting. He was also dueling for the Barian World, as opposed to Yuma who was dueling to find a way to make everyone happy. The fact that he kept the overlay units for that Barain, King of Wishes Xyz at the cost of his life points in the previous episode showed how determined he was to fight only for them and the other souls in the Barian World, even though it was kind of strange that he included Vector. Sure, Don Thousand influenced him the most out of all of the other Barians, but it was still kind of strange after all he did. Speaking of Don Thousand, his claim that his memories weren't altered and that he chose to become a Barian were apparently true since that didn't come up again during the duel. It would have been nice to get a flashback as to how that happened exactly if that really was the case, but it still shows how determined he was to fight for that world and that world only. If he couldn't do that, then taking himself out in the duel would be the next option, especially if Yuma wouldn't do it.

Besides all that, it kind of ties back to the end of his duel with IV. I thought that they kind of hinted at Nasch basically killing himself after everything was said and done with both IV's dialogue and what Nasch thought to himself afterwards. Given all of the emotional trauma he went through in reliving his memories, remembering all of these other people in his past lives that were important to him and he felt at least partially responsible for their deaths, realizing his whole life as Shark had basically been a lie, throwing away his humanity and dealing with fighting off his friends, it's not too surprising that he would consider doing something like that after the conflict was settled. Despite his claims that he threw away everything that came with his humanity, he clearly still cared about his friends, so just fighting them probably tore him up inside. His last few words to Yuma were pretty sad. I'm sure that he'll be revived with the other Barians, as well as Kaito, sometime after Yuma vs. Astral, but it was still a pretty sad note to leave the episode with.

While I still feel that the special ending montages are overused, this one didn't bother me as much since they gave Nasch a lot of good focus so that his death had emotional weight to it. Plus, he's my favorite character and the best one in Zexal in my opinion, so I was going to feel sad for his death anyway. This was probably one of the best episodes in the series for me.

 

[Muur]

Took me a long time but I've actually caught up to where the dub is (well I'm one episode behind but it's a 2 parter and I'd rather watch the 2 parter than wait for the second part to come up). The dub is on episode 99 and there's 146 (well there will be) so I guess it'll be a while before they're done and move on... unless they do a GX and skip the last 50 or so episodes.

 

[Ben 10]

The dub is onto Vector's ruins now and oh boy am I worried bout how they might censor Vector's ruins a bit too much.

Anyway anyone notice how the last few ZEXAL episodes parallel the original series manga more then it parallels the anime? I men think about it

Vector Don Thousand's biggest tool is defeated before Don Thousand's full revival just like Thief Bakura being defeated before Zorc could fully be revived then Yuma and Nasch defeating Don Thousand is similar to Atem and friends defeating Zorc due to how Donny is basically ZEXAL's equivalent to Zorc and how both lost before the main characters had to face their toughest rival. Yuma VS Nasch is similar to Atem VS Priest Seto because of how it is the true finale to their conflict against evil with the rival being defeated after the power of friendship gets through to them and snaps them out of their previous influences/beliefs. Then I don't think I have to go into detail about Yuma VS Astral paralleling Yugi VS Atem.

This weeks episode was good. Takahiro Kagami animated it and made it such a delight to see and Astral really did become a major badass which is expected due to being at full power. I think he may very well be more powerful then both Nasch and ZEXAL III. I'm gonna enjoy seeing how Yuma defeats him. I think he might pull out a ultimate Syllabe monster similar to Yugi's Gandora Dragon of Destruction.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Took me a long time but I've actually caught up to where the dub is (well I'm one episode behind but it's a 2 parter and I'd rather watch the 2 parter than wait for the second part to come up). The dub is on episode 99 and there's 146 (well there will be) so I guess it'll be a while before they're done and move on... unless they do a GX and skip the last 50 or so episodes.

The official Yu-Gi-Oh! site said that Zexal will have a complete dub a few weeks ago, so they aren't going to leave it incomplete like 4Kids did with GX and 5D's. The main reason those dubs were unfinished were due to 4Kids' poor financial conditions over the years, especially during 5D's when they were going through bankruptcy and dealing with the legal issues over the Yu-Gi-Oh! license. Even though they already announced Arc-V on their website and said that it would be released this year, a recent interview with Konami said that they weren't sure about when an English release would be available. They have plans to wait another year to air it, which would be a shame, if only because of the large gap that would result from going that route. They could still hopefully start the dub this year like originally planned.

The dub is onto Vector's ruins now and oh boy am I worried bout how they might censor Vector's ruins a bit too much.

Well, they already danced around the issue of how Durbe and his Pegasus were killed by saying that they kept fighting together forever, or something like that, so I imagine that we'll have something event stranger for Vector's ruins. Pretty much all of the legends need to be altered since they're about how the Barians died as humans. I'm curious as to how they'll handle Shark and Rio's parents being killed and the fact that they were also killed only for Nasch and Merag to take over their bodies.

Anyway anyone notice how the last few ZEXAL episodes parallel the original series manga more then it parallels the anime? I men think about it

Vector Don Thousand's biggest tool is defeated before Don Thousand's full revival just like Thief Bakura being defeated before Zorc could fully be revived then Yuma and Nasch defeating Don Thousand is similar to Atem and friends defeating Zorc due to how Donny is basically ZEXAL's equivalent to Zorc and how both lost before the main characters had to face their toughest rival. Yuma VS Nasch is similar to Atem VS Priest Seto because of how it is the true finale to their conflict against evil with the rival being defeated after the power of friendship gets through to them and snaps them out of their previous influences/beliefs. Then I don't think I have to go into detail about Yuma VS Astral paralleling Yugi VS Atem.

There have been parallels between the two series for quite some time now and pretty much everyone expected Yuma vs. Astral to happen before the series began.

As for this week's episode, I thought it was okay. I was confused about Tron disappearing at the beginning though. Did he die? He wasn't with his sons while they were watching the duel and he said farewell to Yuma's father, so it was kind of unclear. Although, I'm still wondering what Yuma's mother is doing in the Astral World and how the heck she got there in the first place and that's even more unclear. Everyone aside from the Barians and Kaito being revived would be a lot nicer if I cared for even half of them. Besides Gauche, IV and III, I couldn't care less about the characters that were revived. I also didn't understand why Anna and Fuya were included in watching the duel. I'm pretty sure that neither one of them even knew about Astral, let alone the whole conflict with the Barian World, so including them as cheerleaders seemed really strange to me. They might be able to see him after being exposed to Barian energy like what happened with other characters, but it seemed so weird to throw them into these episodes when I think every other character has been aware of Astral's presence much longer than either of them. Even the Numbers Club members, most of which are also full of unnecessary characters, knew about Astral before this episode. It doesn't help that both of them feel like over-glorified one shot characters, both are pretty unnecessary in the grand scheme of things and Anna is especially unlikable, but at least they won't get much focus during these last couple of episodes.

I have a feeling that Astral doesn't really plan on destroying the Barian World like he initially said to Yuma. I can't really see him being in favor of going through with that plan after what they just went through with Nasch, especially when he was apparently fine with fighting forever with Yuma until they could find an answer. Plus, he has the Numeron Code now. He could just restore the Astral World so that it wouldn't disappear once it and the Barian Worlds merged together. Then he can bring back all of the Barians and Kaito. They did discuss briefly before starting the duel with Nasch if they should use it in that way, but it sounded more like reversing everything as if it never happened rather than just restoring everything and everyone. At the very least, there's probably another reason for it, like maybe it's the only way to completely get rid of Don Thousand.

The duel itself was okay. Although, it was kind of funny how Astral claimed that he was unbeatable with all one hundred Numbers only to proceed spamming Hope throughout the duel. That really shows how Zexal has used the Number concept. They have access to so many cards, but play nothing but Hope and the one time he used a different Number, it was to summon Hope again. I understand that it's the marketable ace monster and bringing out five Hope monsters showed how serious Astral was right off the bat to create more tension, but it just got really boring to see him spam Hope really fast. Hopefully, the duel will get more interesting within the next couple of episodes.

 

[ionlyknowenglish]

Are you guys watching the raw? Or are there subs floating around? I'm still stuck at 137.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Sorry for the double post, but I wanted to comment on the series finale. I'll put it in spoiler tags in case anyone hasn't seen it yet.

Spoiler

It was a surprisingly satisfying finale. At first, I was disappointed that the thing that Yuma forgot he lost that Astral was trying to remind him about basically was having fun while dueling. I can see why they'd go that route when the duels for this arc basically left Yuma crying for understandable reasons, but he looked like he was having fun dueling against Astral in the previous episode. It didn't really seem like an act either. He tried to bluff Astral a couple of times, but his enjoyment didn't seem like an act. I was hoping for a bigger twist too, especially when they already mentioned that the price, or one of the prices for the Door, was Yuma's ideals and I thought that they were going to refer to the fact that Yuma opened the Door twice.

I was also hoping that Number 00 would be Astral's Number form since he's been referred to as the original Number before, so yet another Hope monster was disappointing. I liked the whole future aspect of the monster that they were going for with Yuma saying that his future isn't defined yet, which ties back to being a Rank zero monster, so that was nice. Yuma is also apparently a piece of Astral that he lost during his first fight with Don Thousand reborn as a human. I kind of like the twist because it does add more of a connection between the two of them, it would kind of explain how his parents knew what he was going to do when they were talking to Akari in that flashback and I didn't see it coming at all. Although, I'm still confused about how a piece of a being from a different world could be reborn what looked like to be thousands of years later. It would have been nice if they explained that a bit more instead of throwing it as a means to explain why Yuma could use Shining Drawn outside of the Astral World.

Number 99 had a really cool design, which almost made up for being another Hope monster. Seriously, despite having every Number, Astral just used Hope monsters. I understand why from a symbolic point of view, but after the whole series has been primarily about spamming ace monsters and especially Hope, seeing the last duel of the series coming down to two different Hope monsters is rather annoying. Still, the duel was engaging and it had a pretty good conclusion. While I had a strong feeling that there would be something more after Astral left, his farewell to Yuma was pretty touching.

I knew that the Barians and Kaito would be revived, but I thought it was pretty lackluster. They just appeared back at school or helping Dr. Faker in Kaito's case. I thought that they would make a bigger deal about them being revived, or at least with Shark and Kaito given how their deaths were handled. While Yuma's parents returning off screen was kind of cheap, I'm more annoyed with how they never bothered explaining anything about Yuma's mother. Why was she in the Astral World? How did she even get there in the first place? Honestly, they barely made a big deal about Yuma's mother, especially compared to his father, so they could have easily cut her out of the series. Nothing would be lost. There would be just be one less glaring plothole.

I also really didn't care for Kotori's semi-confession about loving Yuma's smile. It just kind of happened with no buildup because they wanted to provide one more cute scene for Kotori. It would be cuter if their relationship felt like it had drastically changed over the course of the series or if Kotori was interesting in the slightest. Plus, it made me a bit upset that they could do something with that pairing for the finale, but they didn't have some nice moment between Jack and Carly in the finale for 5D's. I'd still say that their pairing is still canon and they actually did declare their love for each other, rather than just saying something like "I love your smile" to get a semi-confession, but they couldn't be bothered to do something with them at the end of the series and yet they did that for Yuma and Kotori's relationship here. Granted, Carly's character was pretty much ruined at that point, but some nice scene between her and Jack would have been better than nothing.

Although, I did like that they were going to the Astral World to help fight against a new threat. The whole adventure continues on vibe actually worked pretty well. Even with the Numeron Code, they didn't find a way to get rid of the power of Chaos affecting the Astral World. I also didn't think that Yuma and Astral would be separated for good for a lot of reasons. Throughout the series, they have stressed on Yuma and Astral's dependency on each other, rather than the need for them to separate eventually like they did with Yugi and Atem. Yugi and Atem still depended on each other, but they knew that once Atem gained his memories, he would leave, and Yugi wanted to become more confident without Atem as well. Honestly, I don't think that they ever mentioned in the show that Astral would leave once he got all of the Numbers, at least not before the flashback in this episode, and there wasn't really a reason given in the show. I think most people watching the series came to that conclusion that he would leave, much like everyone knew Yuma vs. Astral was going to happen, but I don't think that really came up during the show. Despite how Yuma vs. Astral was clearly their own kind of Ceremonial Duel, it wasn't really about seeing if the two were ready to separate. It was more about Astral trying to make Yuma happy to duel again before leaving for the Astral World. Plus, after being separated from Astral during the previous arc and all of the heartbreak Yuma went through in this arc, I didn't think that they would go for a sad ending with the two of them being separated for good.

Yuma, Shark, Kaito, Rio, Kotori, the Arclights the rest of the Barians traveling to help the Astral World to go help Astral gave pretty much everyone a happy ending and it seemed like a pretty fitting conclusion to the series. I prefer the finales for the original series and 5D's primarily due to liking the characters more, the duels being more engaging and being more emotionally touching for me. I haven't seen GX's finale yet, so I can't compare it. I will say that Zexal's finale is less rage inducing than the 5D's finale was. I didn't mind Jack losing, even though that would have been fine by me, but it was the whole issue with his relationship with Carly that bugged me.

In regards to the series as a whole, I think it was okay. It still isn't my favorite series and despite the improvements it made in the last two arcs, I think that it's still my least favorite of the four completed Yu-Gi-Oh! series. Even so, I can understand why other people would consider it their favorite because it does have strengths, there were some good characters, it had the most solid storyline structure out of all of the spin-off series thus far and it did improve as it progressed. Zexal I was really shaky for me with really terrible pacing and writing for most of the characters. I don't know if I'd feel differently watching that part of the series now, but that was a pretty heavily flawed aspect of the series for me. Zexal II was a pretty solid improvement. The pacing for the first arc of the second season was a bit off, but once Vector showed up, the storyline got a lot more interesting. The Legendary Number arc was my favorite arc for its good pacing and most of the subplots were good as well, especially Shark and Yuma's subplots. While the pacing was a bit too fast in this arc for my tastes, most of the deaths lacked emotional weight to them and Don Thousand was a boring villain in my opinion, it did have some good moments and the last two duels, especially against Nasch, were good notes to go out on.

Honestly, if the series had better pacing, better writing, especially for the first season, a few more interesting characters that had depth, which is probably why most of the cast as it was didn't appeal to me, cut out the unnecessary characters, didn't include Kotori in every episode for no good reason, had better writing for the duels and was basically more like the last two arcs have been for me, I would have enjoyed Zexal a lot more than I did. I'm not sure if it would have become my favorite series since in spite of the problems the later arcs had, I still enjoyed 5D's. I think it could have given GX a run for its money though. A part of me now wants to buy the Zexal manga after being that satisfied with the finale. I have heard better things about the later chapters, so I'll probably do that eventually.