"Any card—so long as it exists—has a power that is needed."

The One With the Evil Final Exam - Part 1

Six of the keys to the seven Spirit Gates have been used.  Judai heads to the Abandoned Dorm, where he finds Daitokuji’s mummified corpse.  The last of the Seven Stars, Amnael, shows himself, and a duel between Judai and Amnael begins.  His foe has a deck based around alchemy, and each time Judai attacks with his multi-Attribute E-Heroes, he’s stopped by the Permanent Trap Elemental Absorber.  Monsters also continue to emerge from Alchemic Kettle - Chaos Distill, waging direct attacks on him…

GX Episode 46: An Earth/Water/Fire/Wind Fusion! Elixirer 

(The One With the Evil Final Exam - Part 2)

The duel between Judai and Amnael continues, and it turns out that Amnael is Daitokuji, as is the mummified corpse.  He confesses that his current form is the result of the power of alchemy allowing him to attach his soul to a doll body.  The field of battle changes as he uses his Macrocosmos Permanent Trap and Helios the Primordial Sun and his second Sun, taking them into outer space, where the planets surrounding them have Asuka, Manjoume, and Fubuki locked away.  Judai takes hits from Planet Alignment just as the third Sun shows itself…

Here’re episodes 45 and 46! If you haven’t already seen, I posted 44 yesterday.  Here, we see the Judai/Amnael duel play out, as Judai deals with the issue of Elemental Absorber blocking his attacks, the revelation that Amnael’s the professor they’ve been worried sick about, and their duel reaching new heights–literally–as things burn up in outer space.  It’s a pretty fun duel, Amnael’s Alchemy Beasts are neat, the whole duel is chock-full of alchemy references–for those newer to the fandom, I recommend some of The Mad Poet’s writings on alchemy references in GX from *checks notes* nine years ago whaaat for some fun trivia–right down to the name Judai gives Elixirer’s attack, “Fusionist Magistery” (”Magistery” referencing the Philosopher’s Stone in meaning, and when attached to “Fusionist” completes Daitokuji’s attribution of alchemy to fusion).

The animation work in 46 is also good, and the episode feels like it gets better once they’re in space; things seem pretty well-paced, the music is on-point, and with the lessons Judai’s made to take in from the duel, this duel stands out among those in Season 1.

However, the dub seriously did this series of episodes dirty–most notably in 46.  Where Amnael here is relating alchemy to Judai’s use of Fusion and alluding to his making friends as a form of alchemy, dub!Amnael plants the idea of Jaden’s duels being fixed to get him to this point where his key would be on the line.  It’s a bad writing change because, despite his life being on the line, Daitokuji is still there and is still a Professor to Judai, and he wants to see him do better; 4Kids instead ends up making him look much more antagonistic only to try and undo it towards the end (writing out Daitokuji’s explanation of alchemy’s true use in the process).  I’ll have to get around to a dub/sub comparison for this one…

Some other Translation Notes that aren’t necessary but do enhance the viewing experience:

Amnael’s attack name for Helios Duo Megistus, “Flames of Vulcanus,” refers to Vulcan, “the god of fire (including the fire of volcanoes, deserts, metalworking, and the forge) in ancient Roman religion and myth.”

“What lies below is as above, just as what lies above is as below.” was me making a more aesthetically pleasing subtitle out of “as above, so below,” which is a phrase from Hermeticism; “The actual text of that maxim, as translated by Dennis W. Hauck from The Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus, is: “That which is Below corresponds to that which is Above, and that which is Above corresponds to that which is Below, to accomplish the miracle of the One Thing.” Thus, whatever happens on any level of reality (physical, emotional, or mental) also happens on every other level. This principle, however, is more often used in the sense of the microcosm and the macrocosm. The microcosm is oneself, and the macrocosm is the universe. The macrocosm is as the microcosm and vice versa; within each lies the other, and through understanding one (usually the microcosm) a person may understand the other.^[36]“

As I said in 44′s post, the animation fixes I was working on for 45 were part of the reason these were delayed (along with SOCIAL ACTIVITY), but it was good to get them done; 45 saw five fixes (three card-related), while 46 had three (one card-related).  List below the cut, as usual. (EDIT, 2021: Two new fixes applied in 46, listed in bold under the cut!)

Enjoy, everyone! Thanks for your patience if you were looking forward to these.  With these done, I’ll start prepping a few things for 47 now, but I’ll actually take a little break to work on the next 5D’s Dub-Uncut for episode 22 (I may squeeze in some scripting here/there tho).  Let’s see how I can improve that mess…

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