Episode 129 Review

Hey! Listen!

Yeah, that’s right, this episode was a parody of The Legend of Zelda. Zelda is one of my favorite video game series, and I thought it was a great idea to pay homage to it, and it’s upcoming 30th anniversary in this episode. As child, even before I had actually played any Zelda games, I, as I’m sure countless others had before me, realized how similar the Celtic Guardian looked to Link. It’s uncanny. Not only is he a swordsman wearing all green and a pointed hat, but he also had pointed ears and blond hair. Now, all these years later, I was thinking about that again, I thought about how funny it would be to have a character using a Legend of Zelda themed deck that focused on Celtic Guardian. I decided against that idea, but I quickly realized that an even better opportunity presented itself in the form of my upcoming Capsule Monsters arc. I could actually have Celtic Guardian as a character and set up a Legend of Zelda story. So that’s what I did. It’s worth pointing out though that the story was not entirely drawn from Zelda. I also took inspiration from Dark Ruler Ha Des’ group of cards. Opticlops’ lore states that it is a servant of the Dark Ruler. The imps that were the common enemies came from Order to Smash, a card that shows Ha Des commanding an imp to attack. Berserk Dragon can only be summoned by the spell Deal with the Dark Ruler, which shows Ha Des striking a deal to lend out the power of his dragon. The Winged Minions are known as Ha Des’ Minions in Japan. To continue references to both Ha Des’ story and the Legend of Zelda, I originally planned to have a scene where Ha Des was defeated, but then transformed into Revived King Ha Des, similar to how Ganondorf transforms into Beast King Ganon. Sadly, I realized that Revived King Ha Des was a Synchro, which means it came out after original Yu-Gi-Oh, so it wouldn’t make sense for it to appear in Capsule Monsters. Not only was this episode dedicated to Legend of Zelda, but I made two references to Super Mario Bros, Nintendo’s other iconic series. Brutus’ quote about wanting the princess to be in another castle refered to the original Super Mario Bros. game, where it always seemed like the princess was in another castle. Also, the line at the end of the episode by the Mystical Elf about what Yugi did was an indirect reference to Mario. The M-Warrior was Mario, Princess Pireku was Princess Peach, and The Giant Turtle who Feeds on Flames was Bowser.

The list of references I made to Zelda too large to list, but here are some:

• The Characters: Celtic Guardian was Link, Key Mace was Navi, Mystical Elf was Zelda, and Ha Des was Ganondorf.
• The enemies: The imps represented Bokoblins, the common enemy of Zelda, Dark Bat were the random bats, and Skull Servants where ReDeads.
• The Bosses: Opticlops, Berserk Dragon, and Ha Des all represented bosses/sub-bosses in Zelda games.
• The Items: Shooting Star Bow – Ceal was Link’s bow and arrows, Pineapple Blast was bombs, Fairy’s Gift caught in a bottle was a fairy in a bottle, and Divine Sword – Phoenix Blade was the Master Sword.
• The quotes: Many famous quotes from Zelda such as “It’s dangerous to go alone,” were fit into the episode.

Until next time, duel on!