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So... anyone else notice that the majority of the 'main' YUU*GI*OU villains are foreign? It just kind of occurred to me the other day, and I thought it was interesting. XD
I mean, Pegasus is American, Malik/Yami no Malik are Egyptian, Noa/Big 5/Gouzaburo, though they are Japanese, were living in a virtual world, Dartz was from Atlantis, and in their back stories, it seems to imply that Varon, Amelda, and Raphael are all from western countries. Then there's Siegfried, who's from Germany, and finally all of the villains in the final arc are from ancient Egypt.
At first I vaguely wondered if this implied some xenophobia on the parts of Takahashi Sensei and the anime writers, but then thought that was kind of ridiculous, considering how many of the 'good characters' are foreign as well, and then figured that it's probably a means of getting the main characters to travel to new areas. I mean they went to Pegasus' island, inside the actual virtual world, to America, and to ancient Egypt. I guess it's more interesting for the characters to go to new places. =D Anyway, any thoughts on this? Not really a serious topic, just a curiosity I wanted to discuss.

Yes, I know in terms of ethnicity virtual isn't foreign, but in terms of 'mysterious lands' that the characters can travel to, it most certainly is. I hadn't really thought about considering how characters look for that kind of thing. XD;; I guess I'm just so used to anime that it doesn't occur to me to determine ethnicity based on appearance; everyone looks equally wacky. Except in those occasional series like Azumanga Daiou where everyone has brown/black eyes, so you can tell who the foreign people are by the ones who have blue. XD But YUU*GI*OU seems to always make it a point to point out where their characters come from, so I noticed that most of the villains are foreign. smile

Yeah, the 'racism' thing only really occurred to me for a moment, and then I decided that was pretty unlikely. XD Heehee, I would never change the weirdness of how YUU*GI*OU characters look though. I love it.

Yeah, I mean how great would it be to live in a world where races don't exist? Like, okay, they exist, but you just don't really think about it, because everyone is people? XD That's how I feel with YUU*GI*OU.

EXACTLY!!

eek *brain explodes*
I haven't a clue...Rebecca's American too, isn't she? And Keith"steve" Howard?
I don't think it's racism, but I don't think it isn't.
Is that strange to you? confused

@Akasha: That's a good point; I hadn't really been thinking about some of the more minor villains, but Keith and Rebecca and both indeed American. XD

@JK: You could somewhat consider Rebecca a villain when she first appears, since she's demanding a card from Yuugi and won't let him leave without a duel and such. Not anything major, but she was at least antagonistic when she first arrived. XD
I guess it just seems like the villains are more 'other.' Being foreign assists in making them more mysterious and difficult to understand, but not necessarily in a way that implies their origins are evil.

Same here, though I can see how she could be considered a 'villain.'