Dark Signers (arc)

Dark Signers is the second storyline of the Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's anime.

The arc consists of the battle between the Signers and Dark Signers.

Satellite
The brothers Roman and Rex Goodwin both resided in Satellite and worked with Mr. and Mrs. Fudo in M.I.D.S. Roman, who was also a Signer, got affected by the old Enerdy project. With his body choosing the darkness in favour of the light, he removes his birthmark arm and gives it to Rex, before causing Zero Reverse, transforming himself into a Dark Signer.

To prevent the Dark Signers from claiming too many innocent lives, Goodwin started Sector Security and cut the city off from the Satellite to prevent damage from befalling mankind.

The Enforcers
A few years before the current events, the group called The Enforcers was formed by Kalin Kessler, which included Yusei, Jack and Crow. The groups goal was to unite Satellite, which was divided into areas, each controlled by a Duel Gang. However, Kalin became more thrilled by fighting and later went against Sector Security, eventually injuring an officer and getting arrested. Thinking Yusei had betrayed him, and because of the harsh treatment he received in prison, he was convinced into becoming a Dark Signer.

Misty Tredwell
Misty had a brother, who went missing in Daimon Area. His body was later found and everyone agreed it was caused by the Black Rose. However, almost no investigation was carried out, probably because of Sayer knowing Goodwin's secret. Some time later, Misty crashed her car and was saved by Earthbound Immortal Ccarayhua, who transformed her into a Dark Signer.

Greiger's village
Greiger was taking care of orphaned children in his village, including his siblings, Annie and Max. However, because of the Dark Signers doing, they all disappeared. Still, Greiger believed this was Goodwin who did this in order to get control over Crimson Dragon. Because of this, he wanted to get revenge on him during Fortune Cup, but was stopped by Yusei.

Return to Satellite
After the Fortune Cup final, Yusei is crowned the new King and Jack Atlas is rushed to hospital after suffering injuries in his Turbo Duel with Yusei.

The Dark Signers interpret the Crimson Dragon's appearance during the Fortune Cup final as the signal to begin their 5,000 year old battle with the Signers. Using their brainwashing powers they manipulate people using spiders. The brainwashed victims then preach to the people of Satellite that the Crimson Dragon is evil and ask them to side with them in order to save Satellite. Two of their brainwashed victims Grady and Trudge get forced into a duel with the Signers Yusei Fudo and Jack Atlas.

Yusei faces Dick and recognizes the mark on his arm as the spider shape he saw tearing up Satellite. He engages in a Shadow Duel with Dick in hope of answers. The reporter Carly Carmine manages to collect footage of this Duel. Yusei and Carly are both short changed as Dick loses all memory of being brainwashed after he loses, and Carly has her camera confiscated by Sector Security.

Jack's lineage of being a Satellite-born is made public knowledge during the Road of the King preview. He is confronted by Trudge shortly afterwards at the hospital. Carly, who snuck in under the disguise of a nurse, assists Jack in the Duel, since Jack's arm is injured and he is unable to duel. Jack collapses after the Duel and has Carly sneak him out of the hospital to escape the reporters.

Yusei meets Rex Goodwin, who tells him the history of the Signers and Dark Signers' battle. Yusei sees how Goodwin has deliberately isolated Satellite to act as the battlefield, leaving the residents of New Domino City safe. Yusei refuses to stay in the city and wants to save Satellite, so Goodwin has him airdropped back to Satellite.

Once back in Satellite, Yusei meets his old friend Crow. Together they meet up with Blitz, Tank, Nervin, Rally and Blister at Yusei's hideout. The reunion is cut short as Sector Security pursues Crow. The gang arrange a rendezvous point near the Daedalus Bridge. Yusei and Crow Tag Duel against the Securities, while the others venture to the meeting point.

After the duel, they all meet in Crow's hideout where he explains the legend about Daedalus Bridge. During the night, Yusei goes with Crow to B.A.D. area, where he confronts a long thought dead Kalin Kessler and has a Shadow Turbo Duel with him, which Jack, Mina, Carly, Crow, Blitz, Tank, Nervin and Rally watch. When Kalin summons his Earthbound Immortal, Yusei's Duel Runner breaks down and crashes, canceling the duel and severely injuring Yusei. Afterward, he is taken by Crow to Martha's home to be operated on, while his Satellite friends retrieve his Duel Runner, losing all of their cards and their clothes in the process.

New Domino City
The next day, Leo asks Luna if his machine Synchro Monster, "Power Tool Dragon", is the fifth Dragon. She says it might be, making him believe that he is the Fifth Signer. However, once Yanagi and Tanner asks her about it, she says she only said that to make her brother happy since a machine type monster couldn't have been in the battle. Leo then decides that they need to convice Akiza to join them, so they head to the Arcadia Movement headquarters. There, they talk to Sayer, who agrees to help them fight against the Dark Signers. However, after Sayer, and members of Arcadia Movement leave the room, sleeping gas seeps into the room, rendering Yanagi, Tanner and the twins unconcious. Yanagi and Tanner are locked in a room, while Leo is forced to duel Sayer to see if he has psychic/signer powers. He loses, depite summoning "Power Tool Dragon", and fall unconcious.

While Leo is unconscious, Luna pleas to Ancient Fairy Dragon for help. Ancient Fairy Dragon reveals that someone called Regulus, who is her servant, will reveal himself to Luna, so they can set her free.

In the meantime, Carly and Jack return from Satellite. As Jack doesn't want anyone to know about the conflict, he destroys the memory card from Carly's camera and tells her it would be too dangerous to get involved with the Dark Signers. Not wanting to lose contact with Jack, Carly goes to Arcadia Movement to gather information. However, she is spotted by Sayer, who duels her. Sayer's attacks force carly against a window. Just before he commands his final attack, he tells her that Goodwin was born from Satellite. Then he declares an attack with "Psychic Commander", which pushes her through the window and she falls to her death.

However, because of her desire to live, the Hummingbird lines appear and an earthquake occurs and Carly transforms into a Dark Signer. She then returns to the building in order to get revenge against Sayer. At this same time, Misty realizes that Carly has awaken as a Dark Signer and decides to seek out Akiza and duel her. At that time, two Geoglyphs - the ones of Hummingbird and Lizard appear in the city. They are seen by Jack, Goodwin, Lazar and the now recovered Yusei who's still in Satellite.

Thanks to the earthquake that happened when Nazca Lines appeared, Tanner and Yanagi get free and are able to regroup with the twins.

During the Duels, both Dark Signers Misty and Carly Carmine summon their Earthbound Immortals, Ccarayhua and Aslla Piscu. Sayer loses against Carly and Earthbound Immortal Aslla Piscu, and as the headquarters collapses, he falls to his apparent death; Akiza's Duel is canceled due to her shock from witnessing Sayer's death and the fact that the building is falling apart. Outside Greiger, who is the only person spared from being sacrificed to Summon the Earthbound Immortals, is invited by Demak to join the Dark Signers.

As the Arcadia Movement building continues to fall apart, Yanagi, Tanner, Leo and Luna escape meeting Jack along the way, who rides his duel runner into the ruins. He manages to find and rescue Akiza and sees Carly's glasses. Up top, Carly reverts back to her normal self and meets Misty, who explains to her what just happened. Afterward, Demak appears in a helicopter to take his fellow Dark Signers back to their lair.

As Akiza is lying unconsciously in hospital, Jack tells her parents that Yusei might be the only one that could save her. Upon hearing that, Akiza's father goes to the Satellite to take Yusei to Neo Domino City. Upon meeting him, he tells Yusei about Akiza's past. When they return, Akiza is happy to see Yusei. However, upon seeing her parents, she gets angry and challenges Yusei to Duel. In the end, she finally makes peace with them and joins the team.

Signer and Dark Signer battle
After the Duel, the group is invited to Goodwin's mansion. Originally, he doesn't want Leo to come inside with him and the Signers, until Luna says she is not going in without her brother. Then, Goodwin reveals that the Fifth Signer was awakened a long time ago, as well as the fact that Dark Signers are already dead and cannot be saved. He also says that he doesn't know what happened to the people who were sacrificed to the Earthbound Immortals. He then asks them, if they are ready to fight.

Upon hearing that, Yusei becomes upset and does not wish to fight since his former friend, Kalin, cannot be saved. However, thanks to a punch and stern talking to from Jack, he decides it's best to fight against Kalin after all. At the same time, Goodwin sends Lazar to the Satellite. He is mistaken by Crow to be a Dark Signer. After everything is explained, they duel. Lazar at first attacks him successfully and gets confident, however Crow manages to turn the duel around. As the two of them hold out to win, the duel gets interrupted by the Dark Signers' dark mist ritual which makes Lazar run away from the duel leaving Crow behind.

Crow tries to escape with his Duel Runner from the dark mist that's enveloping Satellite. However it's of no use as the mist gets him along with many other Satellite residents. Because of this ritual, all of Satellite becomes enclosed, prompting the Signers in response to, along with Leo and Mina, board a helicopter bound for Satellite, flown by Trudge himself.

Once there, Martha and Blister, along with other children, greet them. However, the reunion is cut short as Yusei finds out that Rally and the others along with Crow have disappeared. That night, Yusei battles in a fierce Shadow Duel against Roman while trying to protect 3 children from Martha's home that had followed him to their dueling site from being sacrificed to the Earthbound Immortal. When the leader of the Dark Signers activates a trap that will allow him to special summon his Spider God straight from the deck, both Akiza and Yusei fear that it will absorb the kids' souls as sacrifices. Half way in to the duel, Roman talks about the Zero Reverse and Yusei's parents, and that Rex Goodwin is his brother. The Earthbound Immortal Uru is Special Summoned. As the souls of the two children near the duel are about to be absorbed by the Earthbound Immortal, Jack appears saving the children just in time. Uru then launches an attack which Yusei deflects, only to end up with the attack hitting the building where Martha, Trudge, and the third kid are watching the proceedings from the roof. The building starts falling over and Martha saves the third child from falling off only to end up falling over the side herself, getting sacrificed to the Earthbound Immortal. This act pushes Yusei to the brink of despair. Yusei makes a dramatic comeback, summoning "Stardust Dragon", only to have Roman reveal that this whole time, he was not the one dueling. This whole time Yusei was dueling Rally in disguise, unconscious and unaware of what was going on. Once Roman removes his mind control over Rally, he, knowing someone has to die, decides to sacrifice himself to save Yusei by synchro summoning one-shot booster and using its effect to destroy Uru inflicting 3000 damage to himself.















After the duel concludes, the rest of the Dark Signers show themselves to their rivals, the Signers, as their final battles are about to begin. While chasing after them, Jack discovers one of the Dark Signers is Carly. Later on after each one of the Signers is set on defeating their respective opponent, they split up in order to get to each one of the Old Momentum safety switches. As each are particularly located outside of where the system itself resides, they are each are marked with a corresponding Geoglyph. Those being the Giant, Lizard, Hummingbird and finally the Monkey.

As Luna and Leo are taken by Trudge to where Demak is waiting, Luna suddenly vanishes in a flash of light, traveling to the Spirit World in order to free Ancient Fairy Dragon. With Luna missing, Leo decides to duel Demak in her place, trying to fulfill his promise of protecting her. Leo barely manages to hold his own against Demak, though since he is not a signer, the prospect of winning is slim. While Leo is dueling, Luna searches for Regulus, dodging the Monkey King Zeman's minions. She finally finds Regulus with help from a spellcaster spirit named Torunka. After some concurring events Luna reveals to the White Lion, her identity as one of the Signers, along with the promise she made to the Dragon's spirit long ago.

Together they get to Zeman's castle, trying to trick him into releasing Ancient Fairy Dragon. Hovewer, Zeman finds out they were trying to trick him and orders his army to attack them. Zeman, who is also battling Leo in the real world as a dark synchro monster at the same time, gets killed simultaneously in both worlds by Regulus and Leo. Demak in the real world then summons his Earthbound Immortal Cusillu, sacrificing the souls of captured duel monster spirits to do so. He attacks Leo directly, who withstands the attack but gets stuck under a rock. In the spirit world, Torunka sends Luna back to the real world, where she duels Demak in her brother's place using his deck. Demak summons Ancient Fairy Dragon and sacrifices it to activate Cusillu's effect. Luna uses the opportunity to rescue Ancient Fairy Dragon and defeats Demak with her brother's help, freeing all the sacrificed creature spirits. Ancient Fairy and Regulus join Luna's deck, and the Old Momentum Monkey safety switch is shut down.

Crow somehow managed to have survived the black fog by hiding in a refrigerator, but realizes all the children he was caring for has disappeared because of it. Taking his anger out on the Dark Signers, he runs into Greiger, who had just become a Dark Signer in order to exact his revenge against Goodwin and Yusei, and immediately challenges him to a Manual Turbo Duel. Discovering the new Geoglyph, Yusei chases up to the two and tries to talk them out of it. Crow begs him to just watch his duel, and Yusei allows them to continue. After his key card is defeated, Greiger retaliates by summoning out his Earthbound Immortal Chacu Challhua. Much to every ones surprise they all realize that the souls sacrificed for its summoning were the people who had disappeared from Greiger's village supoosedly during a summoning of the Crimson Dragon. Greiger, realizing it was the Dark Signers' fault after all, tries to stop the duel himself, but then is possessed by an unknown and evil entity who takes over his body. The entity tries to crush Crow with the Nazca God but gets defeated. Eventually the souls are freed with Chacu Challhua's destruction, however Greiger, being defeated, withers into dust but not before making peace with both Crow and Yusei.

With his detours settled, Yusei finally reaches the Giant's safety switch, to face Kalin(Kiryu in Japan). Their duel is intense as Yusei tries to save him while Kalin justs wants revenge. As more of the Enforcers' past is revealed including Kalin's final moments before becoming a Dark Signer, he Summons Ccapac Apu and tries to destroy Yusei with it. However, though Yusei manages to fend off attacks from the Earthbound Immortal's assault, the attacks leave the ground trashed. Kalin has dificulties manuevering and goes off the road. Yusei tries to save him by synchro summoning Savior Star Dragon and take down Ccapac Apu. Kiryu makes peace with him then withers into dust. The Giant's safety switch is then shut down by Yusei.

After the battle, Roman speaks to Yusei through a once again mind controlled Trudge. Roman claims that he's the next one Yusei should face against. Yusei along with Crow, Luna, Leo and Trudge, travels to the Old Momentum. They meet with Roman inside. The Dark Signer blows the Old Momentum system, releasing the negative energy inside. As it fills the room, the two of them stand on a bridge inside the base and finally begin their rematch. During the duel, Roman not only tells the accounts of the events that lead him to become a Dark Signer, but also that he was the the Fifth Signer, possessing the Head of the Crimson Dragon, until he tore off his own arm. He also fianlly reveals that he was responsible for the Zero Reverse incident, he being the one who overloaded the system to kill himself, becoming a dark signer and releasing the Earthbound Immortals to begin again the 5,000 year old ancient battle between the Nazca Gods and the Crimson Dragon. Though in desperate straits, Yusei in the end defeats Roman with Stardust Dragon. Roman, before fading away, detonates his robotic left arm, destroying the bridge they were dueling on and causing Yusei to fall in the energy below. Yuseing enters a dreadful world filled with the spirits of those who died during the zero reverse. Yusei meets his father who warns him of the rise of the King of the underworld. Yusei's father then sends him back to the world of the living.

Mean while Jack, who has finally reached the Hummingbird tower, looks surprised as Carly appears, riding her own Dark Duel Runner. They engage in a Shadow Turbo Duel. As the duel proceeds Carly attacks mercilessly while Jack at first is opposed to fighting her. After degrading most of his lifepoints, Carly activates a trap card, putting Jack into an illusion of losing the duel and gets saved by Carly, turning him into a Dark Signer and King of the hellish world that is the remains of Earth. Jack remembers Carly's old glasses and snaps out of the illusion in time to cancel the effect of Carly's trap card. As the duel continues, Jack is able to turn Carly back to her former self. However, once again as with Greiger, a dark and evil entity takes over her and so the duel is forced to go on. As she summons her Earthbound Immortal Aslla piscu, Jack manages to turn the situation by summoning Savior Demon Dragon. He attempts to save Carly by killing her Earthbound immortal with inflicting damage and end the duel in a tie but Carly instead destroys Aslla Piscu inflicting damage upon herself through Jack´s Savior Demon Dragon's effect. Thus upon losing the duel, Carly vanishes while being in Jack´s arms.

Finally Misty, who is guarding the last controller Tower, awaits for Akiza while mourning for her dead brother, Toby. Eventually Akiza and Mina arrive where the Lizard Tower is situated, in an old and abandoned carnival. As the two of them split up and look for Misty, Sayer reappears, posing as a security agent from Goodwin. He tricks Mina and throws her into a pit. Yusei, Luna, Leo and Trudge soon arrive and split up to look for Mina and Akiza. Akiza is guided by Misty into a House of Mirror where they finally commenced their rematch. As it begins, Misty recounts the events that lead up to Toby’s death that undoubtedly involves Akiza, through the use of her Sad Story Spells and Bad End Trap. Meanwhile Sayer corners Yusei and attacks him with a materialized Psychic sword. He traps Yusei in the same pit as Mina, sealing it shut while flooding it with water. He goes where the duel is taking place, while Akiza who is now tormented by the truth, loses the will to continue the duel. Sayer appears to save her from landing into a shard of shattered glass, instead deviously awakens her powers as the Black Rose once again. Misty summons her powerful Bad End - Queen Dragon, and Akiza responds by unleashing her Black Rose Dragon, shattering every mirror in the vicinity and is finally able to confront her opponent face to face.

Misty continues her duel against Akiza with Bad End Queen Dragon and manages to gain the upper hand by summoning her Earthbound Immortal Ccarayhua. While she does that, Yusei tricks Sayer in to revealing the truth behind her brother's death. Upon hearing this she commands her monster to devour him and avenges her brother's death. Before she could surrender the evil entity of the Underworld takes control and tries to finish Akiza off with a direct attack, but Akiza pulls through by blocking the attack and summoning Black Rose Dragon again to destroy everything on the field. Misty tries to counter by inflicting damage through a card effect, but Akiza counters the damage and deals it back to her, ending the duel with Misty feeling at peace. Misty vanishes, leaving behind the musical locket of Misty and Toby.

Because Akiza failed to seal the final control switch before sundown, the Condor geoglyph appears on the sky. Then the Crimson Dragon appears once again and guides the Signers to Rex Goodwin. He reveals to them that he has acquired the powers of both Signer and Dark Signer. He intends to use the power of the Crimson Dragon along with that of the Wicked Gods in order to become the Ultimate God. As the Condor mark on his back shows itself, he declares that a Shadow Turbo Duel will be held within the Condor geoglyph as a ritual to welcome the King of the Underworld.

Yusei, Jack, and Crow accept the duel in order to stop the resurrection of the Underworld Ruler. As the duel rages fiercely upon them and Goodwin, both Jack and Crow are unable to continue due to Goodwin´s, Earthbound Immortal deathly effect, however still in the end Yusei is able to win with their help.

And after the King of the Underworld is also finally destroyed, in exception to Goodwin and his brother Roman, all of the other Dark Signers were returned to life. However without recollection of their transformation into one or any other events after.

Changes to episode format
A number of edits to the structure of episodes were changed for this storyline.

The Japanese opening theme is changed from Kizuna to Last Train - The New Morning and the ending theme is changed from START to CROSS GAME.

Use of CGI during the episodes became more prominent, increasing from shots of Duel Runners to several shots of monsters being summoned and battling (particularly with the Five Dragons and Earthbound Immortals).

The newer episodes begin with a snippet of Lua and Luca introducing the Featured Card, on a stage, with 4 other cards alongside it. (Not included in the dub)