Ryou Bakura

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Ryou Bakura
Image:Ryou-bakura.jpg
Ryou Bakura holding his favorite card, "Change of Heart." (From the Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters anime)
Appears in manga:
Yu-Gi-Oh! (Original manga)
anime:
Yu-Gi-Oh! (Toei)
Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Yu-Gi-Oh!, second series anime)
Debut Yu-Gi-Oh! (original and English manga) Volume 6, Duel ??
Birthday September 2
Deck Occult
Sign Virgo
Age 16-17 at debut - 18-19 at the end
Height 176 cm (about 5'9")
Weight 52kg (about 114.4 lbs.)
Blood Type AB
Favorite food Cream Puffs
Least Favorite food Fresh oysters
Status at debut Domino High School 1st year (10th grade)
Relations Younger sister: Amane Bakura (deceased), Unnamed Father, Unnamed Mother (deceased)
Seiyū 1st series: Tsutomu Kashiwakura
2nd series: You Inoue (Episodes 12-41), Rica Matsumoto (Episodes 50+)
Voice acting Ted Lewis (US)

Ryou Bakura (麦良了 Bakura Ryou) is a transfer student to Domino High School with a shy, quiet personality but a strong interest in games, especially of the role-playing variety.

Bakura is the holder of the Millennium Ring, a Millennium Item that houses a spirit-- in this case, Dark Bakura. The Millennium Ring seems to have a number of powers which both Bakura and his darker half take advantage of: detection of other Millennium Items, and the ability to remove a "soul" from its host and place it into an inanimate object (such as a doll or rock tablet).


Contents

Name

He is one of the few characters whose name is not altered for the dubbed anime or the English translated manga. The first kanji character in his name has the very common pronunciation of "Baku," but the kanji character with a pronunciation of "ra" is very common．In fact, the kanji character used as "ra" in the character's surname can also be pronounced "Ryou," the same as the final kanji character (了) that makes up the character's given name. The kanji character for "ra" (良) can also (and is more commonly) be pronounced as Makoto, a common Japanese name for both boys and girls in Japan.

The kanji character "baku" typically refers to a kind of tapir (a nocturnal hoofed mammal), while the character "ra," more commonly pronounced "ryou," means "good" or "a B grade (in the A, B, C... system)."

The kanji character used for Bakura's given name, "Ryou," means "finish; completion; or understanding." Most likely Takahashi selected this name because it's a relatively common given name. However, the surname "Bakura" is not common at all in Japanese, and is more often used as a foreign approximation of the surname "Bakula," as in Scott Bakula (star of the Star Trek series "Enterprise" and the popular sci-fi comedy series "Quantum Leap"). Common names conjugated with the "Baku" kanji include "Baku" and "Bakurou," but to include the character "ryou" (pronounced as "ra" in this instance) makes this surname very uncommon and unique.


Character design

Bakura's character design was overseen by Kazuki Takahashi.

In the Duelist Kingdom arc, he wears a cream-colored V-neck sweater and a light teal green collared shirt underneath. His usual outfit in subsequent seasons includes an unbuttoned sky blue collared short sleeved shirt over a blue and white horizontally striped t-shirt. His white hair is pointed downwards in various directions and trails just past his shoulders. He wears the Millennium Ring on a thin rope or cord around his neck.

Character Biography

16-year old Ryou Bakura is a transfer student to Yuugi Mutou, Katsuya Jounouchi, Hiroto Honda and Anzu Mazaki's class at Domino High School. In the first animated series by Toei, he is seen around town before transferring to Domino High. Miho Nosaka develops a crush on him, but when he reappears at the high school, he does not remember who she is, which greatly upsets Miho.

Despite his shy, quiet, and wary personality, Bakura still becomes fast friends with Yuugi Mutou and the others. In the original Toei anime, Dark Bakura invites Yuugi and the others over with the pretense of making them game pieces of the tabletop RPG "Monster World," the same game that Dark Bakura had trapped Ryou Bakura's former friends and classmates from prior schools in. However, before Dark Bakura can do so, Ryou Bakura exerts his control over his dark half's hand and is able to turn the tides of the game, thereby saving the lives of Yuugi and the others. In the Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters anime, this arc occurs slightly differently: the Monster World game does not happen prior to Duelist Kingdom but instead during Duelist Kingdom and is adapted so that Yuugi is already aware of his dark half, Dark Yuugi, and that instead of being trapped in game pieces, the risk is that they will be trapped within their favorite Duel Monsters cards.

In the manga, his father is said to be either the owner or the curator of a Domino history museum, though it is not known if this museum is the same as the one that houses the three tablets that Ishizu Ishtar shows to Seto Kaiba and Yuugi Mutou. However, it does hold a number of Egyptian artifacts, including the mummy of the former High Priest Akunadin. In contrast, in the anime, Bakura's father is simply an archaeologist, and the fact that he is constantly on expeditions explains why Bakura lives alone.

Voice/Mannerisms

In the original Japanese versions of Yu-Gi-Oh!, Bakura has a very polite speech pattern using a number of honorifics when referring to other people. This is in direct contrast to other characters, such as Seto Kaiba and Katsuya Jounouchi and to his own dark half, Dark Bakura. In the English dub, Bakura speaks with an English accent, while in the Singaporean dub, he speaks with a Southern American accent.

Deck

Ryou is never actually seen playing Duel Monsters, but his other self, Dark Bakura is. For information on Dark Bakura's deck and playing style, please go to his page. However Ryou tells Yuugi and his friends, that his favorite card is Change of Heart

Related Articles

Astrology, Blood Types, and Yu-Gi-Oh! - Ryou Bakura

External Links

Retrieved from "http://seventh-star.net/wikific/Ryou_Bakura"
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