3 months ago, we covered Blue-Eyes White Dragon to commemorate ten years of providing Yu-Gi-Oh card reviews. Now, for the 2500 review ever, we have Burakku Mujishan Garu, whom we have not touched since October 2003 (and even then the only person who actually reviewed her went by the name of DuelMonster).

Behold: Mana the Black Magician Girl. By herself, she is just an underexperienced, weak Tribute Monster, but with the postmortem power of her professor, Mana will unlock her power by growing up to a potential of 5600 ATK for a Level 6 monster. Not bad.

That is, of course, assuming both players have three each of Dark Magician and Magician of Black Chaos in their Graves.

Outside of a planned casual game, the chances that two people that will actually use Dark Magician Decks in a professional, high-stakes game is...well, it just ain't happening. This means Mana will rely on mostly your own Grave to give herself a power boost. And really, Magician of Black Chaos, a Level 8 Ritual with no effect...has even less playability (well...actually 2800 ATK isn't bad at all, so maybe if you have some Ritual support cards, it just might be able to be pulled off). So, in a realistic scenario, Mana can only ever go up to 2900 ATK (assuming you used up all three of your Dark Magicians for the Tributes and Fusion Materials and whatnot they were intended for).

That poses the question: Why not just use Trance, the Magical Swordsman, another Level 6 Spellcaster? He has 2600 ATK to start off with, and can even benefit from any possible Normal Monster support you have for Dark Magician. Pfffft, forget the Dark Magician Girl, Trance even outpowers the Dark Magician himself!

Well first you ask yourself, “Why ARE you using a Level 7 2500 ATK Normal Monster over a Level 6 2600 one anyway (aside from the coolness factor)? The answer, of course, is due to the name. Dark Magician has specific support that allows him to be easily summoned and to have access to various strong support cards.

So the next question is, how do you justify using the GIRL over Trance, when the Girl “might” get over 2000 ATK? There’s one card that specifically requires the Dark Magician Girl: Sage’s Stone. If Dark Magician Girl is on the field, you summon Dark Magician right out of your deck. Yeah, that’s pretty much it. However, I play with a Yugi Deck on Dueling Network, and even though it’s a very weak deck in general, the fast one-two punch of Sage’s Stone still wins me many fast games regardless (but yeah, if your Deck isn’t strictly Dark Magician-based with all his tricks and three copies of DM himself, you have no reason to bother including DMG).

Being Level 6 is significant. This allows you to summon Sorcerer of Dark Magic, who really is easier to summon than he seems. Also (usually with the assistance of Gagaga Magician), this allows you to bring out one of the strong Rank 6 Xyz Monsters. The most prominent one is Magi Magi Magician Gal, which can only have Spellcaster Xyz Materials. Although her ATK pales in comparison to the other Rank 6 Xyzs, her effect allows you to turn any card in your hand into a Change of Heart or Monster Reborn (very powerful indeed).

There are two more things I must mention:

1. Because she has 2000 Original ATK, she can be searched using Magician’s Circle. Basically, if any Spellcaster monster declares an attack, that Trap lets you summon Mana right out of the deck with absolutely no cost. This is a key aspect of Mana, because she is often the strongest monster you can summon with Magician’s Circle.

2. Magician’s Tome is an Equip Spell that only Mana or her teacher can use. It’s not worth using.

She's like...Pikachu. She's not very powerful at all, but she has hidden potentials that could be deadly if exploited correctly. And if you are brave enough to at least try to use her, you deserve to win.

Trad: 1.4/5 (I mean, if you plan on using some silly combo with Painful Choice, Sage's Stone, and Dedication Through Light and Darkness, plus I've seen Magician's Circle used in Trad before)

Adv: 2.3/5 (based off her own strengths, the strength of the Dark Magician Deck as a whole, and how well the Dark Magician Deck can function without her...but I promise you, more on that later this week...)

Awesomeness Factor: It is ineffable, beyond words and ratings, how significant Mana is for YGO. I'm sure Pojo himself would agree with me, if she is not the most important card, she's definitely in the Top Ten. She is one of the most iconic characters of the entire franchise, perhaps the most iconic character behind Yugi Muto himself. Her blue-and-pink magician's cap, her wand, her blonde hair, those anime eyes...she just really has cemented herself as the soild happy-go-lucky anime-symbol of Yu-Gi-Oh. Aside from being Dark Magician's student, she was developed in the image of the "magic girl" anime genre (you know, like Cardcaptor Sakura, Sailor Moon, sorta like that). There are four official DMG artworks. Personally I feel the art from Duelist Pack: Yugi (legs tucked in, hand on hat) is her most serious-looking depiction and is the one that captures her essence the best. Her Series 2 Collector's Tin card in 2005 (wand raised, surrounded by hearts) is her coolest and most dynamic pose. Also, the one we are all most familiar with, the Secret Rare from Magician's Force (close-up of her face) has got to be her most beautiful. The "Kaz" one (flying on her wand like a broomstick) was drawn by the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh himself and has not yet been made into English; that one IMO is her goofiest-looking one. Finally, as far as I know, Dueling Network has a special "Arkana" red version that's so creepy-looking, it's not funny... You know...it's funny. She's really cool as a cartoon character, but if you ever met a person like her in real life, she'd come off as a very strange sort of person! 

Philosophy Corner: "Yeah it would have been nicer if they didn't edit her chest, not trying to sound perverted, but her cleavage was what helped make her so popular in Japan." -DuelMonster

Double Philosophy: Japanese people aren't naturally supposed to have blonde hair and green eyes...but I guess it's supposed to make her look sexier? Send out your thoughts!

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