Yugioh perma-deaths ranked by how much I think they should stay dead
Spoilers
1. Yami
Please never bring him back. Him moving on and finally "dying" is the capstone on his entire arc, and I feel like you can't undo that without severely harming the emotional impact of the ceremonial duel. I consider it the height of disrespect that Kaiba even attempted it. There's some very tasty acceptance of grief going on there, as well as the fact that Yami was always dead, he just needed a little bit of time to catch up. That's a marvelous ghost story. Leave him in the grave. Let him rest.
2. Ai
I suppose he straight up isn't dead, according to duel links and also the last five seconds of the Vrains finale. I'm not opposed to him coming back eventually. I do think, similar to Yami, that bringing him back could weaken the impact of his final sacrifice, however unlike Yami, he never wanted to go, so I could see a world where him coming back and reuniting with Yusaku emotionally hits. I also feel like there's a lot of questions that would have to be tackled. For instance, unless he was literally backing himself up until the moment he died, wouldn't a rebooted Ai not know the outcome or contents of his final moments? If there's a gap in his memory banks, how big is it, and is he still the same person with it missing? This whole thing was kickstarted out of a belief that Ai could not live without Yusaku sacrificing his life for him, so how does he feel about being put right back in that inevitable cycle? And, I also feel that bringing him back immediately would steamroll the process of Yusaku's grief, which is one of the major thematic support pillars of Vrains. Give me Yusaku immediately post Ai's death. Give me messy and unregulated Yusaku, working himself to the bone chasing a ghost. Give me Yusaku healing. Give me Yusaku learning to move on. Then, and only then, give him Ai back, if you must. I'm not opposed to him being resurrected, but I do find the uncertainty the ending of Vrains presents to be a more fun space to play in, personally.
3. Bruno
You know, not a whole lot of people are out there making Bruno Lives AUs. Which is crazy, because unlike Yami and Ai, he went into his death having not really accepted it. He is also, I would argue, both literally and narratively, way easier to resurrect than Yami. The Bruno we meet and get to know has already had it happen to him once before.
Of course, there's all the same existential questions that come with bringing back Ai: if you bring a robot back to life, how much of their personhood is tied to their code and how much of it is tied to their lived experiences, what even makes a person a person, is it even "coming back wrong" if they were already an imitation of consciousness to begin with? All sorts of fun robot emotions to dive into and play with there. Bruno's death is also a lot less The Point of his show's whole finale so undoing it wouldn't damage as much of the emotional structure. I don't have a whole lot of feelings one way or the other on if he should stay dead, mostly because I feel like I haven't seen many people try to bring him back, but overall. Yeah. I could see him getting brought back.
4. Yuto, Yugo, Yuri, Celina, Rin, and Lulu
Literally why did they do that to them.
