After months of waiting, the longawaited liveaction version of Yu Yu Hakusho finally debuted on Netflix this Thursday (14). The first season of the production is based on the story of Yoshihiro Togashi There are only five episodes, but how much of the anime has been adapted via streaming?
[Atenção: spoilers do anime e da série a seguir. Não leia se não quiser saber o que acontece]
Like the manga and anime, the story revolves around Yusuke Urameshi, a young rebel who dies after saving a child's life. After the accident, Yusuke tries to understand what happened and is surprised by Botan, the leader of the spiritual world, who explains that there is no place for him in heaven or hell as no one with the young man's kindness has calculated.
After passing numerous tests, Yusuke is given the opportunity to return to life by becoming a “spiritual detective” who eventually becomes embroiled in mysteries between the human and demon worlds.
The gateway to the Yu Yu Hakusho universe, the Spirit Detective Saga is where Yusuke's adventure begins. In this story arc, the protagonist is introduced to the underworld, where he focuses on his quest to return to life and transform into a spiritual detective. In this saga we also follow Yusuke's first training with Master Genkai, the search for the Dark Treasures, the encounter with the Four Beasts and of course Yukina's rescue. Through this rescue, the quartet formed by Yusuke, Kwabara, Kurama and Hiei are actually put to the test and face one of their greatest challenges: the Dark Tournament.
After Yukina's rescue, the protagonist is forced by the Toguro brothers to take part in the Dark Tournament and forms the Urameshi team with Kuwabara, Kurama, Hiei and finally Genkai. The competition is one of the most memorable moments in the story and shows how Yusuke and his friends fight tirelessly for survival because, according to Hiei, “only the strongest win.”
The tournament is nothing more than a cruel competition held by greedy humans who profit from the massacre of youkai who arrive on Earth. In it, people who also threaten the powers of demons are forced to participate in the competition, and the only way to survive is to win the tournament.
With a total of five episodes, the series adapts the entire first story arc and ends exactly at the end of the Spiritual Detective saga, corresponding to the first 25 episodes of the 1992 anime. A number of changes are made as the story progresses some make the plot seem more dynamic and resolve outstanding questions for those who have not seen the anime or read the manga, but others could affect the course of the story if the series is renewed .
In the liveaction, the ending takes place immediately after the fight between Yusuke and the youngest Toguro, who is defeated by the protagonist and his friends and chooses the path of “torture” by being sent to the spiritual world. Unlike the anime, the series ends with a conversation between Yusuke and Keiko, who thanks him for his help and not immediately after Yukina's rescue.
If the series is renewed by Netflix, it would be important for Dark Tournament to be adapted into a season or two, especially to deepen any stories and context presented in one of its longer storylines.
Another important point is that the death of the Toguro brothers creates a huge unknown when thinking about the tournament. The event, which lasts exactly 40 episodes of the anime, is without its biggest villains and also without a defined perspective as to which evil would be big enough to survive an entire season.