Yu-Gi-Oh! GX is way better than Yu-Gi-Oh! 5DS and Zexal

Ladies and gentlemen, what truly defines 'better' when talking about cartoons (or Anime if you want to be specific)? The word 'better' has a large variety of definition, but the one we'll be focusing most on in this debate is the following:“[adj] more desirable, satisfactory, or effective. „ we're looking for concrete evidence that Yu-Gi-Oh GX is NOT more satisfactory than either of the two series that came after. But what defines satisfactory? “[adj] fulfilling expectations or needs; acceptable, though not outstanding or perfect. “And desirable?“[adj] wished for as being an attractive, useful, or necessary course of action. “ so, we aren't looking at a well defined terminology here, we are looking at something that is changeable, something that varies from person to person. If I come along and state that GX is not better than 5D in my opinion that means that this debate would fall in my favour, just as it would fall in my opponents favour if someone would come along to state the opposite. So, we must find which series has the most following and is thus satisfactory to the biggest audience, hence being 'the best' of those we're talking about. The best series must be the one that most people enjoy, the one that is best received. Why one would perceive it as better than the others is irrelevant as long as the person enjoys it. Let's start simply by looking at official ratings. Finding relevant ratings for all three series took a little bit of time but after some extensive research the following four websites provided me with the most reliable results, both on the 4Kids cartoon and the original Japanese anime: imdb.com1-3tv.com4-6sakuhindb.com7-9anime-planet.com10-12 We can see that the following results:GX: | 6.2/10 | 8.5/10 | 2.442/5 | 0.12/No idea, assuming 1|Zexal: | 6.9/10 | 7.2/10 | 2.081/5 | 0.07/No idea, assuming 1|5D's: | 6.9/10 | 8.6/10 | 2.861/5 | 0.93/No idea, assuming 1| we can agree on the fact that Zexal is the underdog of the three and won't really qualify as the contender for the title “Best Yu-Gi-Oh spin-off.” So to make things much simpler and shorter I'm going to drop that one entirely from the debate until further notice. Looks like the common opinion is that 5D is better. It has higher ratings and is more often praised than its precessor.If we attempt to normalize these ratings and get a final value out of them we'll see that GX has the average rating of 0,5196 while 5D's manages to score the impressive 0,76. Even if we ignore Sakuhindb's strange rating scale we still manage to get 0,65 against 0,70. This indicates that the general public thinks that GX, albeit good, was not the better series. In fact, out of all the places I searched I couldn't find any rating scales that dictated that GX was better, it was almost always that 5D's was at the top of the scale followed closely by Gx and Zexal being at the bottom of the barrel. But what made 5D that much better? Scanning trough some of the reviews that accompany the ratings I cited along with a watching a show or two and seeing what others thought of it I think that we can single in on an answer. :What GX had going for it was that it was relate able to younger audiences. The lead character is a young energetic character that is optimistic and leads a bright life. He's cool (in his own eyes), confident, incredibly amusing and always seems to have life going for him, even when it isn't. It's easy for kids to connect to that, and to be completely honest the show wasn't bad, it was actually quite entertaining. But it also quickly got stale, it didn't really add to the franchise and left fans everywhere with a run off the mill series with characters that didn't really evolve. A few fans complained that the characters where undeveloped, seemed a bit motiveless from time to time. The base plot line of Yu-gi-oh! was the Pharaoh's never-ending chase for his memories, his constant drive to get home, the tournaments and the diverse villains that he had to face in different worlds. That was a time when every single show could possibly lead to a new and exciting side-storyline just to keep you entertained. When there where life lessons to be learned it was a bit more than just friendship, it was often a much deeper, darker undertone that where sometimes crude, but needed. GX focused too heavily on friendship, the storyline remained at times too linear and the series is often bound by it's never changing scene. No matter where the characters travel and go, they always end up again on the duel academy campus, always limiting the plot to that base location in some way. 5D on the other hand brought a great deal of depth in the series. It no longer focused on witty dialogue and love-able characters that we cheer for. It suddenly became much, much darker and laid out a detailed plot line that everyone could enjoy. Suddenly it sparked an interest in the older audience that felt somewhat left out in the GX era, who where intrigued by the plethora of detailed, mysterious characters that each had a story behind them; The sudden increase in romantic sub-plots and the ever changing scenes as our heroes fight entertaining villains. The motorcycle duels got mixed reviews but often it got met with positive feedback as duels now where choreographed, had a much faster pace and introduced something new into the series, albeit they where still keen on breaking any official TCG rulings. Not only does 5D bring us Synchro monsters that give us new angles to duelling and thus improve the franchise as an entity but it also brings us a bit closer to home, to the original duel monsters that we grew up with. In certain ways. Yusei shares much with Atem. Both are dark and mysterious. Both resort to violence at times which lead to deaths in the Manga and both overcome themselves and use their bonds with the other characters to handle the issues that they must face. We can also move away from the show content and see that 5D has amazing visuals that drag viewers in simply by glittering and providing an enchanting world that we can enjoy to watch, no matter what dark secrets are in it.And that's what we all want from a good show. We want it to be able to maintain our attention, we want it to shine for us, to amaze us and keep us interested in it's own mysteries. We don't want the shiny glow of a perfect children cartoon, we want to explore the darker regions of the human mind, we want to be shocked. And it is my honest opinion that GX, albeit a fantastic instalment to the franchise, did not do enough to maintain it's older audience that didn't need 25 minutes to tell them that friendship is important. They wanted an immersive world that develops and changes with each episode, they wanted the better show. 1)http://www.imdb.com...2)http://www.imdb.com...3)http://www.imdb.com...4)http://www.tv.com...5)http://www.tv.com...6)http://www.tv.com...7)http://sakuhindb.com...8)http://sakuhindb.com...9)http://sakuhindb.com...10)http://www.anime-planet.com...11)http://www.anime-planet.com...12)http://www.anime-planet.com...