With Jaden (Judai) Yuki, Yu-Gi-Oh as a franchise began its tradition of male protagonists, but he has more going on with gender than meets the eye. Although Jaden has a passion for a male-dominated game like his predecessor Yugi Mutou, he does not share his displays of heterosexuality. Jaden shows no attraction to his female peers, in contrast to how his classmates Syrus Truesdale, Chazz Princeton, Bastion Misawa, and Tyranno Hassleberry become fixated on at least one girl over the course of GX. Whereas the original Yu-Gi-Oh manga begins with boys sharing porn video tapes and Yugi harboring a crush on Anzu Mazaki (Téa Gardner), Jaden’s thoughts on romance range from obliviousness to discomfort. His Tag Force profile states, “his thoughts on girls are a mystery. At times a girl may have a crush on him, but he has rarely, if ever, shown any interest.” In Tag Force 2: “when it comes to girls, you’d expect him to be really outgoing, but he’s actually fairly passive. When dueling he shows all of his feelings so freely, but, with girls, he’s the exact opposite.” He often misunderstands romantic intentions, such as unknowingly dueling for the right to become Alexis Rhodes’s fiancé in episode 15 or giving game advice to another student instead of the romantic guidance he hoped for in 81. This obliviousness includes interactions with boys, seen in episode 40 when he interprets Pharaoh Abidos’s offer to join him in the afterlife (with a more romantic sentiment of “staying together” eternally in the Japanese version) as strictly about dueling.

These instances portray Jaden as “pure-hearted” or a “late bloomer,” unconcerned with romance in favor of his enjoyment of Duel Monsters that can veer into a boyish disdain for “cooties.” His gender and age play into this characterization, whereas Alexis Rhodes disengages from heteronormative courtship fully aware of romantic context and the elder Zane Truesdale prioritizes dueling because of his aloofness as a whole. When Blair Flannigan becomes increasingly verbally and physically affectionate with Jaden, he recoils. While Blair’s heteronormative flirting reinforces her femininity, Jaden’s disengagement from heterosexual courtship distances him from mature masculinity. In the Japanese version of season 3, his bond with Johan (Jesse) further disrupts the heterosexual matrix by taking implied romantic interest in another boy.

Above all else, Jaden’s interests lie with card games and making friends. His refusal to climb the social ladder of Duel Academy by staying in Slifer goes hand in hand with his indifference to gender roles, another hierarchy in society. In the Japanese version of episode 20 when Hayato Maeda (Chumley Huffington) speculates about Rei (Blair) being a girl disguised as a boy, Judai (Jaden) shrugs it off with his belief that “people come in all shapes and sizes.” Jaden’s acceptance of others and enthusiasm for fun endears others to him regardless of their gender, unlike Chazz’s posse of male fans or Alexis’s camaraderie with the Obelisk girls.

Jaden’s deck initially consists almost entirely of male superhero-themed monsters, with the notable exception of the female “Elemental HERO – Burstinatrix.” Jaden’s signature monster card, “Elemental HERO – Flame Wingman,” combines “Burstinatrix” with the male “Elemental HERO – Avian” into one being through the game mechanic of fusion. With “Flame Wingman,” Jaden defeats Crowler in episode 1 and proves his worth as a duelist despite running late to the Duel Academy entrance exam and having no claim to fame, establishing fusion as one of his defining traits as a player. Although “Flame Wingman” combines a man and a woman (even more obvious in Japanese with their gendered names “Feather Man” and “Burst Lady”), he has a male name and appearance rather than something androgynous. He inherits the color red from “Burstinatrix” more than anything, but the components listed in the trading card’s text serve as a reminder of his origins. As such, “Flame Wingman” symbolizes power gained through blending of gender, which Jaden harnesses for the finishing move in countless episodes. Not every formidable player in GX has gender non-conforming traits, but duelists like Jaden who blur the lines between binary gender draw unique power from doing so.

Other characters find success through different symbolic means, such as Jaden’s “HERO” player counterpart Aster Phoenix introduced in season 2. The power of Aster’s signature “Destiny HERO” cards comes from the emotional connection to his father who designed them (making them the only copies in existence), as well as time-based effects that reflect Aster’s belief in predetermined events. In Japanese, the name of almost every “Destiny HERO” ends in “Guy” to reflect the archetype being made up entirely of men. Hypothetically, Aster couldn’t defeat Blair’s “Maiden in Love” deck that manipulates male monsters, whereas Jaden won by countering with “Burstinatrix.” Most duelists with humanoid archetypes utilize monsters of a single gender, and Aster’s company of male “Destiny HEROes” shows that Jaden’s mixed-gender cards sets him apart even from similar “HERO” players. Like Chazz and the Ojama spirits, Jaden’s use of the womanly “Burstinatrix,” the girlish “Card Ejector,” and the transfeminine “Neo-Spacian Glow Moss” signifies gender variance without necessarily being characterized as feminine himself.

Along with power through combining masculinity and femininity, GX season 1 introduces alchemy as another theme that becomes more important to the series. In the Japanese version of episode 46, Professor Daitokuji (Banner) likens dueling to alchemy, in how duelists use fusion to transmute common normal monsters into rare effect monsters. He accepts the impossibility of turning lead to gold, but encourages Judai (Jaden) to make hearts purer and more noble by befriending duelists and spirits. In other words, he can literally make friends by fusing his monsters. 

In season 3, the duel spirit Yubel puts Jaden’s happy-go-lucky approach to dueling to the test by inflicting pain on him through the game as an expression of love. The English dub writes Yubel as a neglected friend or forgotten toy rather than a jealous lover, which minimizes the queerness of their character and their bond with Jaden. (Most of my analysis from this point comes from the original Japanese version of GX, so this will refer to characters by their Japanese names from here on.) Judai and his friends cannot understand Yubel’s sadomasochistic mentality, which vastly differs from dueling for fun or glory–not to mention the heteronormative vanilla romance fostered at Duel Academy. Yubel’s desires also differ from Johan and Judai’s fondness for each other expressed in sportsmanship and physical affection, making their queerness even more “deviant” from the boys’ homoeroticism.

At first this paints Yubel’s evil as integral to their queerness, directed at tormenting Judai through violence and possession of Johan, until episode 155 reveals Yubel’s history as the lover of Judai’s past life who willingly became a monster to protect him. Episode 130 already reveals how Judai owned a copy of “Yubel” and communicated with the spirit as a child, but the past lives put Judai’s gender and sexuality in conversation with theirs rather than juxtaposed. Yubel’s backstory also includes how Judai inadvertently exposed them to the Light of Destruction that caused them great pain, which Yubel rationalizes as a romantic gesture from him to survive the experience. The classic “Yubel” cards cannot be destroyed in battle and inflict damage to their opponent equal to the striking monster’s attack points, reflecting Yubel’s belief in welcoming pain and returning it in full as love. The newly released “Spirit of Yubel,” which depicts them above the castle seen in their mortal life, does not cause burn damage because it represents Yubel before their subjection to the Light of Destruction that led to that mindset. The revelation of Yubel’s suffering and Judai’s misunderstanding shifts Yubel’s motivations from sinister to sympathetic, similar to how Judai becomes the Supreme King in episode 136 due to the trauma of Johan disappearing and his friends losing faith in him. In both cases, their descent into evil and madness comes from unfortunate circumstances, which avoids portraying Yubel’s villainy as innate or equating it to their queerness.

GX lures the audience to believe Yubel’s monstrously genderqueer appearance represents their opposition to the heroes who attend the heteropatriarchal Duel Academy, then makes them a beloved ally to the protagonist who reflects Judai’s own gender variance. Yubel appears demonic, with talons and bat-like wings, in sharp contrast to the gallant “Elemental HEROes” and Ultraman-inspired “Neo Spacians” in Judai’s deck. Yubel may not be a literal fusion monster like “Flame Wingman,” but their design combines the body of an archetypal man and woman (split down the middle similar to an animal with gynandromorphism). Yubel’s design has more visible femininity than “Flame Wingman”–colored lips, full eyelashes in one eye, an unclothed breast, the voice of Hiromi Tsuru, etc. Their figure moreso resembles “Evil HERO Inferno Wing,” the alternative fusion of “Avian” and “Burstinatrix” created through “Dark Fusion” by the Supreme King. “Inferno Wing” and “Yubel” have more feminine appearances than “Wingman,” as their villainy and femininity both differ from the traditional masculine hero. In the new card “Yubel – The Loving Defender Forever,” Yubel gains a dragon head as their arm like “Wingman” through fusion with an effect monster, taking on a more heroic appearance without altering their androgynous gender expression. “The Loving Defender Forever” inflicts burn damage, indicating their point in the timeline as post-Light of Destruction, but now beside Judai and compatible with his effect monsters such as the “Elemental HEROes.”

Yubel’s character design makes their gender expression (in the Japanese version) androgynous, not solely feminine, in homage to the antagonistic bigender Baron Ashura from the manga Mazinger Z by Go Nagai. Yubel’s gynandromorphism manifests as a breast and full eyelashes on their right side with a flat pec and plain eyeliner on the left. At times, they speak in a deeper voice played by Hisao Egawa. These bodily traits make their duplexity more literal than other GX gender nonconforming characters, and their appearance all the more unnerving and frightening–which symbolizes a power greater than anything found at Duel Academy. Yubel the entity not only has the power to possess humans and manipulate reality, “Yubel” the trading card has unique properties that make it nigh indestructible in gameplay.

When destroyed, “Yubel” can be replaced by the two-headed dragon “Yubel – Terror Incarnate” and subsequently when removed from the field by the demonic “Yubel – The Ultimate Nightmare.” They become increasingly monstrous, losing their humanoid appearance (with the exception of the scowling face on the chest of “Nightmare”) and thus their genderqueer appearance. The loss of human features leaves Yubel without gender expression, compared to their default state that embodies multiple genders. All Yubel’s forms pay homage to the manga Devilman by Go Nagai, in how “Terror” and “Nightmare” resemble the demons Caliorruar and Zenon respectively, while default “Yubel” looks like a demonic version of the fallen angel Satan. While “Terror” and “Nightmare” borrow the aesthetics of the demons as extensions of Yubel and Satan, the homage to Satan themself goes deeper. Devilman depicts Satan as two-sexed and attributes their love for the protagonist Akira Fudo to them being “both male and female,” which enriches Satan’s character through queerness rather than vilifying them. Transformation into “Terror” and “Nightmare” literally dehumanizes and demonizes Yubel, while Judai empathizes with their visibly nonbinary self. Through Judai accepting Yubel as worthy of love, GX accepts its gender nonconforming characters as a whole. Like Satan, Yubel’s queerness makes them sympathetic despite their misdeeds.

Conceptually Yubel also draws from the mythical Rebis, the idealized human that alchemists believed formed when creating a philosopher’s stone: “The alchemists, in their quest for philosophical gold, considered the world to be influenced and manipulated by a multitude of paired forces: wet and dry, cold and hot, sun and moon, male and female, proton and neutron, etc. When these opposing forces are harmonized and balanced through synthesis, creation is commenced. The Great Hermaphrodite is an amalgam of this union.” As art historian Leah DeVun explains in this article, alchemist Richardus Anglicus posited that the indeterminate substance “rebis” found in Arabic records referred to “res bina” (Latin for “two thing”) and thus a two-sexed being. From this interpretation, the Rebis came to symbolize the synthesis of man and woman into something greater in Western Europe.

In Yubel’s mortal life before becoming a duel spirit, alchemists transformed them from a human into a shapeshifting dragon to protect their lover and prince. Young Yubel’s eyes resemble the masculine half of their current form, implying they were assigned male at birth. As part of the process to imbue Yubel with power, the alchemists also transformed their body into a more androgynous one through feminization. Like the Rebis, combining masculinity and femininity unlocked new abilities, making Yubel the prime example of power reflected in gender variance in GX. When Judai accepts Yubel into his heart (and his deck), their power becomes his. Yubel becomes one of Judai’s boss monsters, symbolizing a change in his gameplay as well as gender.

The English dub of GX loses this nuance by portraying Yubel as a woman rather than a nonbinary character. Other characters refer to Yubel as solely “she” and “her,” while a cloth covers their upper body and gives the appearance of two breasts. With that said, the dub retains the transfeminine implication by casting young human Yubel as a different actor with a deeper voice. This implication likely wasn’t lost on the 4kids staff who employed trans voice actress Maddie Blaustein, who played a number of Yu-Gi-Oh characters including GX’s Sartorius. Yubel and Jaden/the Supreme King still fuse into “one spirit” in the dubbed final episode of season 3, creating a combination of man and woman, but the lack of dub for season 4 leaves them ostensibly dead “among the stars.”

Art historian Arturo Schwarz argues that “the Great Work is but a metaphor” in which alchemists don’t create a Rebis but become a metaphorical Rebis themselves, as Judai does over the course of the series. By joining his soul with Yubel’s through “Super Polymerization,” he arguably becomes nonbinary like them. Even before literally fusing with Yubel, he gains “aurea apprehensio (golden awareness) of this marvelous reality: we are gods, because we all are man and woman at one and the same time.” This applies to other gender non-conforming characters of GX, even if they don’t gain the same awareness symbolized by fusion. By the time Judai irrecoverably embraces Yubel, GX has (for the most part) embraced its gender non-conforming characters as part of its world.

Judai remains true to himself throughout GX in the face of people who wish he would apply himself in school more, play to win instead of have fun, or form a heterosexual partnership; all which would align more with masculine gender roles. Yubel initially plans to transform Judai into the masculine figure of the Supreme King so they can rule together, but Judai incorporates Yubel into himself as well–instead taking on traits of both men and women. The Supreme King represents masculinity in his stoicism, imposing presence, seclusion, and condescension; which Judai takes on when harnessing his ability to control spirits. The nonbinary and androgynous Yubel comparatively represents femininity in their devotion, sentimentality, duplicity, and “hysteria.” Yubel as a specifically transfeminine and nonbinary symbol of femininity makes Judai’s simultaneous bigender existence more multifaceted than simply combining one man and one woman.

Judai/Yubel, their post-fusion self with a new character design in season 4, complicates other dichotomies of gender and sexuality as well. By combining their souls into one and sharing a body, Judai/Yubel directs their love toward themself as well as another person, making their attraction directed at others but also no one. This active choice in partner/lack thereof differs from Judai’s earlier characterization of apathy born out of unawareness. Even when broken down into individuals, their attraction to one another blurs the line between “heterosexual” and “homosexual” due to their nonbinary gender (though straight and gay identity can encompass attraction to nonbinary people). By not abandoning Yubel, Judai fulfills the promise he made in his past life to love Yubel eternally–but he doesn’t exclusively love them like the Supreme King intended. Judai does not sever his relationship with Johan, as they reunite to defeat Darkness (Nightshroud) and resist his manipulation with the strength of their bond, nor his other companions. Yubel’s anger at Judai for loving Johan instead of them went so far as to trap Johan’s soul inside a card and resolve to destroy various dimensions if Judai wouldn’t love them back, but season 4 no longer characterizes them as threatened by Johan’s presence. Judai doesn’t solely love Yubel and doesn’t have a clear cut relationship with Johan either, blurring the lines between monogamous and non-monogamous.

GX ends with Judai at many borders: between childhood and adulthood, school and the public, human and monster, masculine and feminine, etc. He embraces adulthood, but remains a social nonconformist by opting out of competitive dueling as well as traditional manhood. He doesn’t start a career nor “settle down” with a wife, instead wandering the globe in search of his next adventure with his queer partner (plus his spirit buddy Winged Kuriboh, his cat Pharaoh, and the spirit of Daitokuji, making up a collective family of choice). While other characters with gender variance fall back on some gender norms, such as Asuka (Alexis) wearing a dress at graduation or Manjome (Chazz) intending to rejoin his family’s business, Judai’s connection to Yubel sets him apart. With that said, the other characters are worth looking at in their own right:

• 101: Duel Academy and Crowler
• 102: Blair Flannigan
• 210A: Alexis Rhodes
• 210B: Atticus Rhodes
• 310000: Chazz Princeton
• Study Abroad: Jesse Anderson
• Capstone: Jaden Yuki and Yubel

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