Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series

Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series (often abbreviated to Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged or simply YGOTAS) is a popular fan parody of the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime created by LittleKuriboh.

Overview
As the name suggests, Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series is a dramatically shortened down version of the original series, cutting each episode down from its original twenty minutes. This includes episodes in two or more parts. All characters in the series are voiced by LittleKuriboh, even the female ones, adding to the comical effect of the parody. A notable exception of this are the characters of Rebecca Hawkins in the regular series and Gary Stu in the Other Abridged Movie, which are voiced by LittleKuriboh's friend, Abigail, mostly referred to by her screen-name Safty.

The series is focused on making fun of the eccentricities of the series, most prominently the fact that Duel Monsters is a children's card game, yet is played by teens and adults with unfaltering seriousness and unreal consequences. This leads to frequent commentaries about the role of the game in the series and the plot of such. It also lampoons the changes made to the series in the English dub, and greatly exaggerates the characters' personalities from that version, to comic effect. There are also jokes that break the "fourth wall".

The series is also known for playing different songs to suit the mood of certain situations. Beginning with the fifth episode, the series would open with a snippet of "Kawaita Sakebi" (the theme song from the first series anime). There have been a few exceptions, however:
 * Episode 10, which plays the "Cruel Angel's Thesis", the opening theme from Evangelion.
 * Episode 13, where it played the chorus of "YMCA".
 * Episode 17, where there wasn't even the opening; there was only a bunch of random clips (to symbolize the channel changing) before cutting to "The Card Game Channel".
 * Episode 18, where it played the end of "Wollt ihr das Bett in Flammen sehen" By German NDH band Rammstein.
 * Episode 30, where it played a parody of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air theme, titled "The Phresh Pharaoh of Bel-Air".
 * Episode 34, where the regular sequence is sung a capella.
 * Episode 37, where it played a part of Ave Satani, with altered lyrics.
 * Episode 40, where it plays the normal theme with Joey "Nyeh-ing" to it.
 * Episode 45, where it plays the normal theme with a background voice saying "In 3D!" with text saying "3D!!!" on screen.
 * Episode 46, where it plays Dragonforce's Through the Fire and Flames.

All episodes would end with a scene from the anime juxtaposed with audio from another source. For example, the end of episode 2 featured Téa and Yami Marik as Lois Lane and Lex Luthor in a scene from the Superman Returns trailer.

Recently as of Episode 40, LittleKuriboh has been using tracks from the English dub along with other music he usually finds for episodes. They give the series a bit more of that "Yu-Gi-Oh!-feel" to them.

Season 3 is set to begin in April

Warning: Plot Endings and/or Spoilers Below

Series humor
The humor of the series has constantly varied and expanded from its original premise. Rather than just making fun at the original series, other elements have been added throughout time to the parody.

Music

 * Main article: Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series music

Most episodes have background music conveniently placed to fit the perfect moments.

Impostors
In light of the popularity of "The Abridged Series", several fake accounts have cropped up, most actually insulting LittleKuriboh and his work. The rise of fake LittleKuriboh videos is later parodied in episode 18, when Yami summons LittleKuriboh impostors, which prevents Pegasus from finding the real LittleKuriboh, and thus prevents him from watching the Abridged series (as well as making Yami the winner of the duel). Ironically, LittleKuriboh has also mocked Naruto the Abridged Series when Yami Yugi said to Pegasus "Don’t worry, Pegasus. There’s always "Naruto: The Abridged Series". But as everyone knows, that's just not quite as good!", and in episode 24, when Ishizu says, "I predict that all the jokes you just heard will soon be appearing in somebody else's Abridged Series. You know the one." In Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Movie, in Yugi's prediction, Anubis says "Seires degdirba eht Oturan hctaw!" which is "Watch Naruto: The Abridged Series!" backwards.

Impact
Many people have also started to make their own "Abridged Series" of the same kind as LittleKuriboh. Most notably Naruto and Dragonball Z. However, LittleKuriboh doesn't seem to mind the Naruto version or the DBZ one, as he guest starred in the first and eighth episodes of the Naruto one and the fourth, fifth, and tenth episodes of the DBZ one, parodying his own Yami character. He does, however, make fun of it regularly. He has even stretched the teasing further by making his own parody of Naruto abridged, conveniently called "Naruto The Abridged Comedy Fandub Spoof Series Show" where he made fun of the popular quote "Shut the h*** up, you fuzzbag". In Episode 29, there was an actual parody of it (titled "Episode 42: Emo Sasuke Fights a Log) to which its creators lent their voices. In Episode 40, takahata101 from Dragon Ball Z Abridged guest starred as the ghost of Nappa. Additionally, in the same episode, Yami asks Bakura whether he'll have the Naruto Abridged fanbase to come kick his butt, to which the regular Yugi (who is a spectator in the duel at the time) asks, "They had a fanbase?" LittleKuriboh also recorded a video of himself dressed up as Naruto (with the whiskers scrawled on his cheeks with a marker) explaining "Why Naruto The Abridged Series is better than Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series" in jest, a parody of a Chad Warden video. Melvin (Yami Marik) also claims he was the one who was behind the cancellation of the TeamFourStar's Dragon Ball Z Abridged from YouTube and it is revealed by Yami Bakura in Episode 45 that Melvin indeed works for 4Kids.

Copyright infringement charges on YouTube
On the week of March 8, 2007, the first episode of Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series was removed from YouTube by site administration, citing copyright infringement as the reason for the removal. LittleKuriboh has reportedly heard nothing from the administration regarding this removal or if the the other episodes are in danger of being removed as well. In response to this, LittleKuriboh posted Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series Episode 1 (Live Performance), which was a video of him performing the voice over part of episode 1 on the street, without using footage from the anime. Soon after this, episode 2 was also removed for the same reason.

On March 12, 2007, LittleKuriboh posted a live video announcing several new sites that his videos would be available on. In the video, LittleKuriboh is in a Kaiba cosplay outfit and impersonates Kaiba (Which was later removed by Youtube). The three new sites presented were http://www.jentsproductions.com/littlekuriboh/, http://www.dailymotion.com/littlekuriboh/, and http://www.littlekuriboh.head-desk.org/. However, http://www.littlekuriboh.head-desk.org/ is no longer available due to bandwidth issues.

On June 19, just one day after release, all parts of The Abridged Movie were removed from YouTube (Part 1,2,3 were removed by YouTube while part 4 is removed by LK) along with episode 20, 21 and 22. However, DailyMotion.com has started removing videos as well. At the moment, part 2 of the Abridged Movie is currently removed. However, LittleKuriboh has stated in his LiveJournal account that he will have to re-upload the movie because he must edit a certain portion of the movie that could be 'potentially harmful.' The edit was done to remove a line from the credits which mentions Upper Deck Entertainment.

However, while YouTube has claimed copyright infringement is displayed on the videos, there has never been a claim by 4Kids themselves to have the videos removed. Further proof of this is seen that when the video is taken down, there is no 'this video has been taken down due to a copyright claim from 4Kids Ent.' tag. This has further supported the theory adopted by LittleKuriboh's fans that other users themselves are flagging the videos. Due to the enormous number of videos on YouTube, administrators appear to not have the time to review the material in question and promptly delete it without a second thought. Several users have left messages on LittleKuriboh's message board saying they were the ones who flagged the videos. LittleKuriboh's fans respond in kind by blocking the users and flagging their videos to have their accounts closed. In response to the flagging, LittleKuriboh had Kaiba, while sitting at the computer, say "I'm busy flagging YouTube videos to compensate for the fact that I have an extremely small penis."

On June 22, 2007, LittleKuriboh began offering direct downloads of every episode in WMV format, plus Episode 1 of Cr@psule Monsters, the Christmas Special, and the Abridged Movie, through a website with the domain http://www.yugiohtheabridgedseries.com/ so as to avoid the risk of removal by YouTube and DailyMotion. The full site formally launched on July 16th, 2007. As of July 20, 2007 the site has added a bittorrent tracker. Season 1, Cr@psule Monsters, the Christmas Special, and the Abridged Movie are currently available in two torrents: One containing the videos in WMV format, and the other in MP4 format. Recently, the official website has began hosting their videos on the site REVVER, which, though including ads at the end of every video, helps Little Kuriboh pay for the sites server load, which is excessive due to the episodes extreme popularity. On October 5, 2007, LittleKuriboh's site was accidentally crashed by the admins in an attempt to add a friends list function.

On July 10, 2007, LittleKuriboh's account was suspended on YouTube, likely due to repeated flagging by other users. However, the account was re-opened again three days later on July 13, as well as LittleKuriboh being awarded status in the Most Subscribed and Most Viewed league tables, which some fans believe he should have been in previously. More organizations such as A-4KE created by narutoiscoo appeared on YouTube after LittleKuriboh's "second coming" for the sole purpose for protecting his account from flaggers, spammers etc. YouTube has not yet made any statement to LittleKuriboh or his viewers regarding the removal or restoration of the account. During this time LittleKuriboh's account fell victim to flagging, spamming, advertising from other users looking for popularity, on his account, and Pornbots who advertised porn sites on his account. On August 13, 2007, LittleKuriboh's YouTube account was suspended yet again. The last video he posted was a video of LittleKuriboh himself proposing to his girlfriend. The video was disguised as "Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series Episode 2X". Disguising videos by the thumbnail is indeed a violation of Youtube's terms of service, and may have played a part in the second suspension. This created another uproar from his fans demanding for LittleKuriboh's account to be returned once again with no response from YouTube's administrators. Many fans of LittleKuriboh continue to upload his videos onto YouTube.

CardGamesFTW
LittleKuriboh has created yet another account on YouTube, the same account that was featured at the end of Marik's Evil Council of Doom #1, CardGamesFTW, and has uploaded all Episodes of Season 1 & 2 of The Abridged Series, the 2nd Christmas special, and the Movie, as well as other comedic material.

On April 13, 2009, LittleKuriboh uploaded a redux version of Episode 1 with better quality video and audio. This episode was formatted like later episodes with the Season 1 intro, with the logo and end quote at the end. A bonus ending was also added with a little variation of the "Screw the rules" joke. On April 29, 2009, LK uploaded older episodes of the series. All episodes of Seasons 1 & 2 have been uploaded. In places such as Germany, Episode 25 has been flagged and is currently unable to be viewed there.

On December 16, 2009, LittleKuriboh's channel won an award in Mashable's 3rd Annual Open Web Awards for the Funniest YouTube Channel. On January 8th 2010, LittleKuriboh was chosen to attend an interview with Kanashimi at 91.8 the Fan. He accepted. On January 30th, 2010, LittleKuriboh's channel became the #1 most subscribed channel in Japan. To celebrate, he created a Magibon-esque video, referencing the former #1 channel.

Bonus videos
Besides the normal videos LittleKuriboh also made bonus videos. These include: