Dissecting Ryuuga - An essay

Dissecting Ryuuga
An Essay

This is an essay based up the basic profile that we have on Ryuuga, although information has been taken from the anime and manga, it will also be based on my own opinions as well – because there is so many things about this character that make him rather… mysterious, so I will place my own opinions about that in here as well.
From what we fans can make out, Ryuuga is a powerful character, when you see him in action you know he is a force to be reckoned with, he’s rather cocky and full of himself although we see that him having complete faith in his own abilities, we never saw him break into a sweat when he battled someone – apart from two occasions – he always seemed to know what was going on and in general he is very much an anti-hero.  
He flat out refused to work alongside Ginga and his friends, he basically rejected Kenta’s invite for him to join the other Legend bladers and Kenta had to prove himself to gain some kind of respect from Ryuuga.
On the whole, Ryuuga seems to be arrogant and rather selfish, he was after power for L Drago, that was it, his bey is the be all and end all; it’s his life from what we can all see, nothing else will fill the void; he takes it to an extreme that none, none of the other blader’s in the show do.

So onto the first section of this essay;

Younger Years
Not much is known about Ryuuga’s younger years, the anime only showed him getting L Drago from Koma Village and in the process being drained by L Drago, causing him to either go into a coma or for Doiji to put him into a sleep until someone powerful came along to help him regain all his energy again.
All of this is done roughly about a year before everything happens in the show.
What we can say though is that Ryuuga was trained and most likely raised by Doiji (or Daidouji, however you prefer to say his name).  The reason for assuming that Doiji raised Ryuuga is how Ryuuga himself acts; he is completely confident in his skills by the time we meet him, not believing that anyone can defeat him or will be a threat to him and his power.
Next we have Ryuuga calling himself the Dragon Emperor, before he got L Drago.  Obviously in the anime we never heard him refer to himself like that until later in the show, when he is taking part in the battles; however we can tell that Doiji called him that give the fact that when Ryuuga went to steal L Drago, he already had the golden dragon arm gauntlet and the golden dragon crown – essentially Doiji would have had extreme confidence in Ryuuga to be able to overcome the power of L Drago and become the bey’s owner (It could also be said, of course, that if L Drago killed Ryuuga, Doiji would just need to collect the crown and arm gauntlet and continue on with his search, it’s a bit of a macabre thought but it would probably be true.)

Doiji would most likely have had to raise Ryuuga from a younger age – this is where I would think he would be similar, but not the same; as Boris from the original Beyblade show.  He would have made sure that Ryuuga was training every day and make every training exercise difficult and completely different from the last, although Ryuuga wouldn’t have been punished – as most Beyblade fans think Boris would have punished those in the abbey – he probably would have been denied something, perhaps food or some caring words from Doiji.  With such extreme training it would have made Ryuuga the blader we all know today.  It would also had made sense as to how he was happy being alone, he never called anyone friend, although I don’t think that was Doiji’s idea, I think that just happened because he was completely focused on his blading skills that he never bothered to talk with other people when he had a chance, he just kept to himself.
As for the whole Dragon Emperor and L Drago, which Ryuuga was obsessed with; considering the whole time he had L Drago Ryuuga wanted power, even when the dragon was released from him in session one, Ryuuga made sure the dragon understood that he was the master, and that he would use his skills to make the dragon far more powerful that it already was.
Doiji most likely dropped little hints and titbits about L Drago, to get Ryuuga to want to become stronger, and to train harder than before.  In time Ryuuga would ‘find’ information about L Drago; as in where L Drago was kept and that would fuel his desire for the forbidden bey.
I say ‘find’, I don’t think Ryuuga would have found the information for such a bey easily, I would believe that Doiji and most likely he got Merci to help him in this as well, had left some easy clues for Ryuuga to find the information – although Ryuuga wouldn’t have been aware of that at the time.

Manners?
In the Japanese show, Ryuuga is very rude to everyone he speaks to, however he didn’t use such words to the female bladers.
A friend came up with a little scene in their head of Doiji sitting with a young Ryuuga at a very refined dining table and asks him:

“How do you behave when you are having dinner with a girl?”
“… I would force her to a beybattle instead?”
“My boy, you make me proud,”
Cue little second of affection then and return to dinner.


Family
It’s clear that Ryuuga and Ryuuto are related; there is some big clues that give it away really.  Although no one in the show appears to have clicked on it.  Granted Ryuuto acts nothing like Ryuuga, surely his appearance alone would be a big clue.  But no, nothing happened there.

In the anime nothing is said about the two being related in any way, shape or form.  It’s the manga, or more to the point the extra manga that tells us who they are to each other.  Although the translation of the manga isn’t around – probably because more people want to read the proper manga and not the extras – the manga shows that not only do Ryuuto and Ryuuga know each other in some way, but Ryuuto is happy to see Ryuuga as well.
In the manga Ryuuga had been raised by the Dark Nebula into becoming a bad ass blader and to wield the L Drago blade, but it seems clear that he hadn’t lost contact with his brother.  This is more fan speculation than actual fact, but there could be a chance that either Ryuuto also joined the Dark Nebula and just wasn’t deemed worthy to stay (or Ryuuto might not have felt worthy to stay considering how powerful his brother is), or that he ran away to do something that he loved.

The mystery between these two stays, chances of anything being made clear to the fans is slim to none now, we can but hope that they will make something clear in the manga about their relationship and if they ever see each other again.



Friends
This is Ryuuga we are talking about here! He doesn’t do friends.  This could easily be related back to Doiji and his training methods, which most likely comes back to the harsh training he underwent.
Chances are high that Doiji probably made him think that having a friend who wasn’t to the same level as you makes you weak, or something similar.  
Perhaps it might be a bit too harsh to place the blame at Doiji’s feet.  Given the fact that he considered Ryuuga an ally and never expected him to attack him in such a manner, he was surprised that the one who he aided turned around and essentially stabbed him in the back.
So maybe it was Ryuuga who got it into his head that friends made you weak, chances are he probably battled people who he had a relationship similar to what Ginga and Kyouya have, rivals yet friends, but Ryuuga found that they kept losing to him, most likely they lost hope and he never wanted to lose hope in someone, so why risk it on a friend?

Upon thinking of this, Yu considered him his best friend, and although Ryuuga didn’t treat him badly as they were both in the Dark Nebula, he wasn’t close with him either; but Yu was a good ally for Ryuuga to have at that time, considering he was the one who found Tsubasa – whether he managed to do it alone or alongside Doiji was unclear in the anime.

Whatever psychological damage happened to Ryuuga during his time with Doiji – which we obviously can only speculate – Ryuuga knew nothing of friendship, until he found Kenta who decided to stubbornly stick alongside him for as long as he could.

This is probably where I should start talking about Kenta, because Kenta was indeed Ryuuga’s first friend, even though Ryuuga never truly admitted it until the end.  However I am going to look at something else; which is his rivalry with one of the main heroes of the show.
Ginga.

While this should go under another section called; Rivals, I am not going to do that, because it was Ginga, after all who said that when blader’s fought each other they became linked together by friendship; obviously the first battles Ginga had with Ryuuga were fueled more by anger and rage;

“Anger! Anger! Show more rage! The angrier you get, the more power L Drago will gain.” Is what Ryuuga told Ginga – which in a sense should have given Ginga a rather big clue to calm down and figure how else to fight him rather than let his rage grow further.

Later on, in Masters, Ryuuga helped out Tsubasa with his own darkness – most likely the negative energy left by the old L Drago – although Tsubasa would ignore the advice and continue on by himself.  However Ryuuga made sure that Tsubasa made it to his team, obviously this would be a two birds and one stone effect for him, considering it was his fault that Tsubasa has the darker part of him whispering into his ear and the other part was to aid Ginga.  I mean ‘repay my debt to you'; by which he helped to aid Ginga by battling him before he had to battle Julian in the next match.
Although it could be seen as him trying to drain Ginga’s energy – as am sure Ginga’s team were thinking that – he was essentially getting Ginga’s head around the whole left rotating bey, if Ginga could put up a fight against him who has a new and vastly improved L Drago, then Julian should be easy to deal with.  
Then you also had to think of him being the third and final member to battle against the Starbreaker Team in America; battling Jack because Jack had issued him a challenge and Ryuuga wanted to see it through when Jack’s bey was complete.  Although it seems like Ryuuga was doing it solely to battle Jack, why would he bother going in to a tournament and battle for Ginga?

Once his battle was finished these words were uttered;

“Ginga, I will not allow you to lose to these fake bladers in the final match, do you understand what I am saying?”

He walked off after saying that, obviously he had faith enough in Ginga to defeat the American team; although he came back again to aid Ginga in destroying the floating fortress (Can I say Visions of Escaflowne?), no one knows how he got on to the ship, considering we all saw him on a cliff top watching the floating fortress move away.  
I won’t go into the theories I have for that however.  Without Ryuuga, Ginga wouldn’t have been able to take down the fortress; even though he wasn’t friends with Ginga it does show that he was willing to help someone when he knew he probably wouldn’t be able to.  Chances are he wanted Ginga to remain his main rival because of their bey’s being different sides of the same coin.

Now when it enters to the final series, we see that Ryuuga travels around, refusing to help Ginga and co against Nemesis and Rago, instead he opted to try and get the bad guy himself, for one reason only; power.
I’ll get to that in a second.
This session didn’t have much interaction with Ginga and Ryuuga, so I will focus on the last few episodes.
Ryuuga had fallen after an intense battle against Rago, he is lying battered and bleeding (although they never showed any blood, cos it’s a kid’s show) and moaning in pain.
When all the Legend Bladers and there little helpers see this, see that the Dragon Emperor couldn’t defeat Nemesis they lose hope; basically it was kinda like this:

Everyone: Oh no! The bad guy defeated the undefeatable badass anti-hero of the show! We are doomed!
Ginga: But… I defeated him before too!
Everyone: Yes, but you’re the hero idiot, you were supposed to beat him, because he was the bad guy.
Ginga: …. We’re doomed.

This is where it becomes interesting, the hero of the show, the one who always had faith in his skills and believed in himself and his friends who support him and cheer him on in every battled he faced; he’s lost faith.
He lost faith seeing his rival on the ground, who had been soundly beaten by a blader who was a lot more powerful than him.


Now I am going to go on to Kenta.  During the series we never really saw much of Kenta, aside from session 1 where he is essentially a whiny kid who tries as hard as he can, but still gets beat – although that happened a lot to Ginga’s friends really.
Kenta was the one who really grew as a character in the final session; he was the one who went after Ryuuga – although he didn’t really do it to be Ryuuga’s friend, he did it to make his friends proud of him – but instead he was rejected and Ryuuga never gave him a second thought.
Of course Kenta has a stubborn streak in him and he continued to follow Ryuuga around; ending up proving himself as Ryuuga went into some dangerous places without any fear and Ryuuga noticed and ended up, in his own special way; taking care of Kenta.  He wasn’t mothering him though and he didn’t really treat Kenta as a friend, but he treated him fairly well and even fed him which says something about Ryuuga as a person really.

Although many people feel that this is when Ryuuga took Kenta under his wing to become his protégée, which I am going to disagree with; not because I don’t think Kenta doesn’t deserve it, considering how hard Kenta battled in the end I would say he does deserve that title; but character-wise? It doesn’t fit into Ryuuga’s character.
Yes Ryuuga helped Kenta, waited for him to wake up even though he was protected under a big tree and Kenta was getting soaked, he did give Kenta food, most likely so Kenta wouldn’t pass out at a later time and he did battle against Kenta.

Because although people would love to see a nice, kind Ryuuga, that isn’t who he is.  Psychologically he probably only helped Kenta because he’d feel the basic guilt at not doing so, more than likely he would do that for anyone who followed him; but Ryuuga wasn’t completely kind to Kenta.
Yes he allowed Kenta to follow him, like he allowed Yu to follow him around back in session one; he trained with Kenta because he could and most likely would have battled with anyone who came across his path.
Now this seems like I am arguing the whole ‘friendship’ vibe that I was gearing up to; but considering that Ryuuga has been denied and in denial about needing friends to help him out, it wouldn’t really fit into his character, not right away at least.
It was when Kenta made a nice big scratch on L Drago’s face bolt that Ryuuga began to respect him and probably knew there was a lot of strength inside the boy than anyone realised; including Kenta’s very own mentor, Ginga.
Kenta obviously stopped Ryuuga becoming twisted as he had been back in session one, where he wanted Nemesis’ power for himself, he also tried to get Ryuuga out of the crumbling cave, showing how much Ryuuga had really rubbed off on him before Ginga pulled him away.

When the final battle came along, who ran into the huge temple first when they noticed Nemesis vs L Drago?
Kenta.

Ginga only moved after Kenta, showing that he was either stunned at the sight (when really as the hero he should have rushed in to help, considering Ryuuga is a Legend Blader) or he didn’t care.  Most likely it would be the former rather than the latter.


Now we are at the final stand, Ginga has lost hope, along with the other bladers around them, all because Ryuuga is beaten and L Drago is damaged.
I can imagine;
‘The Emperor has fallen.’
Being said.

Considering that in the whole history of Beyblade the main hero has kept the faith, it’s been shaky but they remember that they have people believing in them and will continue to fight onwards.
Ginga gave up and instead Kenta was the one, who looking around at every blader there who found the situation hopeless, went ahead and attacked Nemesis, even though he was no Legend Blader, he had no real rank either, he was just a normal blader who trained with Ginga and more recently with Ryuuga.
Yet he was stubborn as he battled Nemesis, going at him again and again not losing faith that he can be stopped.
Everyone watched him battle, no one seemed to have faith in him though; until Ryuuga stood up and made a little speech about Kenta being his friend and ended up giving Kenta his star fragment, which made Kenta's bey evolve and caused more trouble for Nemesis, since it also ment that the other balder’s began to regain hope, because Kenta now held the star fragment of summer and they could take Nemesis out!

The sad part I found in this wasn’t that everyone regained their hope and helped Kenta, it wasn’t even that Ryuuga vanished; it was that it was all Ginga again.
This part would be a personal opinion and so I will leave it out.

However Ryuuga found himself a good ally to keep close to hand, Kenta is loyal, stubborn and will do the best he can do no matter what the situation.  He isn’t a strong blader; most would consider him weak in comparison to the other blader’s like Yu and Tsubasa; yet it was obvious that he proved himself to Ryuuga enough that the Dragon Emperor would train with him and aid him, in his own way, to become stronger.

The sacrifice that Ryuuga made in the scene is a rather striking one, because it showed that he could consider someone as a friend; but it was not only that; Kenta was the one to stand up and not lose all hope when everyone else had done so, partially because their own attacks didn’t work and also because the Dragon Emperor had fallen.

He made a great sacrifice for Kenta by allowing him to take his star fragment, in a sense he was admitting that he couldn’t win or help in this battle and had Kenta step in his place, in doing that he also lost his L Drago bey, although if he also lost his own life in the process is still rather unclear.



L Drago

Ryuuga’s bey, it was one that had killed many of its previous owners, although all of its previous owners need to have a certain quality in them to wield the dragon bey.  Whether that quality is determination, greed, darkness isn’t exactly clear, what is clear is that Ryuuga was the only one to outlast all the previous owners; which would mean that the previous owners – who were apparently royalty or very high up in society – didn’t live over a few months; although I want to say year I am unable to, considering that Ryuuga had ‘just woken up’ when he battled Ginga for what appeared to be the first time.

‘Amuse me as only you can.’
Which was a quote that I found a bit odd, considering it was the first time he battled Ginga, unless they knew each other from the past? Or the English dub made an error of some sort.

As Ryuuga had told Julian and Tsubasa about the long history of L Drago, he stated that it was in the hands of powerful people and the bey took the negative energy from them, which the more it was used the more likely they would die by the bey taking over, as it tried to do with Ryuuga.

Now in Battle Bladers he battled everyone, after all he wanted to face off against Ginga and he knew that he would get all the way to the top.
Although Ryuuga believes – rightly I think most of us can agree – that he’s superior, he battled those weaker bladers to get more points for the final.

To move forward, after his possession of L Drago to when he battled King; he wasn’t even using his full power.  Although King did indeed give him a run for his money considering that Ryuuga had seriously underestimated him, probably thinking King was all talk and no action.  Of course he learns that actually King is a lot tougher than expected; however Ryuuga still didn’t use his complete power and managed to defeat him, only to walk away as if it wasn’t that hard at all.


Nemesis
Although Ryuuga got badly defeated by Nemesis and Rago, it’s important to not think that he lost so easily to this blader.

When you look at the facts:
Seven Legend Bladers as well as three normal bladers all attacked Nemesis together and were all blown away by his power in the first hit.

Compared to:
Ryuuga who fought Nemesis by himself, even kept Rago to focus on the battle more than before, considering L Drago was causing him some trouble; to such an extent that Rago never expected it.
Although it is a slim chance, had Doiji not made that his moment to come and taunt Ryuuga again the battle might have ended differently, although given how powerful Nemesis was it doesn’t seem likely.

He was also beginning to obsess over the power of Nemesis, knowing that it could be used for L Dargo and make him an Ultimate Dragon Emperor.
Although it is hard to think of how Ryuuga would be able to ‘cleanse’ Nemesis considering Nemesis was created from darkness, so the risk would have been there for Ryuuga to turn into a far darker character than he had been before.

This isn’t even the tip of the Ryuuga saga, the man is literally a mystery to all who meet him, some can try to climb into his head and see how he thinks or feels, but it is all just guess work in the end.
This might give a glimpse of why that is though.