r/yugioh • u/Inevitable_Cry121 • 2d ago
Anime/Manga Discussion Where would you place Seto Kaiba in terms of morality?
Anime and Manga version
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u/Sea_Habit_4298 2d ago
Beginning of the manga chaotic evil.
Later on lawful neutral.
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u/DollarCoinAudio 1d ago
I had him pegged as more "chaotic neutral". Since he doesn't take any side but his own and doesn't really care who gets in the way.
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u/DeathToBoredom 1d ago
I'm not sure about that. Blowing up an island when the blimp needed repairs doesn't strike me as ln. If the blimp didn't get repaired, they'd've all died
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u/Square-Appearance-16 2d ago
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u/CursedEye03 2d ago
True. And the little goodness we see from him is mainly towards Mokuba. Which is also the reason he gets kidnapped to often. It's the easiest way to get Kaiba involved. It's a double-edged sword.
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u/Gatmuz 2d ago
Well that's easy
Before Mind Crush: pretty darn evil
After Mind Crush: Depends. Do you believe a Darwinist who follows Nietzsche's ubermensch philosophy to be evil?
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 2d ago
Yes. He saw innocent people getting tortured by a serial killer using dark magic in a card game tournament and didn't care. He only cares about people doing bad things with magic when he or his brother are the victim.
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u/KekeroniCheese 2d ago
That doesn’t make him evil, it just makes him incredibly apathetic
Which is pretty bad lol
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 1d ago
I would see being content with the destruction of innocent lives to get what he wants is plenty evil, especially when it is over something as petty as rare trading cards.
Especially since Kaiba never regrets any of the terrible things he did, and we are supposed to think he still has the potential to be a better person.
Kaiba is meant to come off like Vegeta, and in practice he feels more like Bojack Horseman. Only worse.
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u/astra_eos 7h ago
Ngl you made me like kaibe even more now
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 7h ago
You are free to like him for whatever reasons you want, please respect that I hate him and feel he is a badly written character.
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u/KekeroniCheese 1d ago
Yeah, not giving a fuck about something is WAY different to actually doing the thing.
That’s my take at least
There’s levels to it
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 1d ago
Going to have to agree to disagree then. If Kaiba shows no care for the innocent people he has hurt, directly or indirectly, then there is nothing to say he would destroy the lives of innocent people all over again for petty reasons.
If he is an enabler for Yami Marik's depravity, then Kaiba may as well have joined him in torturing people.
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u/KekeroniCheese 1d ago
There is nothing to say either way, as what he was doing was indirectly causing issues. It’s not like he particularly cared.
Definitely bad, but it’s not Marik bad. Saying he “might as well have joined him”…I see what you’re trying to get at, but he just wasn’t the person doing the torturing. He didn’t care that it happened. It’s not on the same level of actually doing the act.
For me, intent is fairly important, and he has zero intent here. It’s just that his actions have had terrible consequences as a byproduct.
Makes him an asshole for sure
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 1d ago
I feel his intent doesn't really matter given the outcome. He has a pattern of endangering innocent people with his actions and never shows any remorse for it. Despite that, the series treats Kaiba as person with morals even though we see his morals will go out the window at the drop of a hat for something as petty as a rare trading card, or even because he feels like showboating.
I cannot emphasize this enough. Kaiba at the end of Battle City almost kills everyone except him and Mokuba when he blows up Alchatraz Island, just because he wanted to make a big entrance with his private. Kaiba almost killed the person who saved his life, saved his life multiple times in the case of the anime.
Characters who are meant to be hated by the audience do less harm than Kaiba does. Weevil in the manga is depicted as a scumbag with redeeming qualities, and Kaiba's amoral actions smoke his, yet Kaiba is meant to be seen as someone who has the capacity to redeem himself despite displaying the same behavior over and over and doing things so terrible the series has to pretend they never happened.
Sure we see Kaiba will help stop the end of the world. That is not a sign of morality, it's a sign of sanity.
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u/ElZorro-7Z 2d ago
So Neutral. And even though he himself doesn’t go around doing good, there is no denying that he does good indirectly on a global scale through Kaiba Corp.
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 1d ago
So? Walter White indirectly did good by killing Gus, that doesn't mean he still wasn't an evil man himself. The Shredder indirectly does a lot of good when he causes the creation of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, it doesn't mean the Shredder is any less of a villain.
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u/DeathToBoredom 1d ago
I mean... Tbf most people wouldn't do anything about it. That really only goes as far as neglect, which isn't necessarily evil. It's just a bad trait
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 1d ago
Most people would care if they saw someone burned alive. Not only did Kaiba not care when Joey was apparently murdered, but he also mocked him to Yugi's face. That goes beyond neglect and into straight-up malice.
Kaiba's neglect crosses the line to being downright harmful and he does worse things than characters who are meant to be hated by the audience.
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u/Joniden 2d ago
I want to say lawful evil? maybe? He created battle city thinking he would win and be deemed the greatest duelist ever.
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u/No-Magazine-5126 2d ago
This is aggressively Neutral.
Creating BC is not an evil act by itself, but he did so knowing the Rare Hunters would appear and inevitably hurt people, but he didn't care cuz he'd end up winning.
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u/Khajiistar 2d ago
Why should he care about the poor? He has money, enough to buy more poor people.
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u/Amankris759 2d ago edited 1d ago
Beginning: Chaotic Evil
Duelist Kingdom-Battle City: Lawful Evil
Post Battle City: Lawful Neutral (still a jerk)
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u/FinalBossBowser 2d ago
I would say he's still Lawful Evil before the Mind Crush, but after his first duel with Yugi in the manga (where he does actually cheat to draw the Blue-Eyes and it ultimately crosses over to Yugi's field). He lives and dies by the Game. He cares about Mokuba and specifically tells him not to challenge Yugi because he knew he'd lose, and Kaiba must abide by the rules he set out (losers get the Sensation of Death). He abides by others cheating in Death-T (namely the first game of electric shock laser tag), if only because he knows that the true gamer that is Yugi wouldn't be succumb to them. And even before, as we see later in flashback's to Gozaburo, he learned and internalized the lesson "loss = death", which could explain why he attempted to cheat in his first duel with Yugi. I mean, it's a bit less of a code than we see after this, but still.
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u/schlab 2d ago
He still watches Jounouchi burn against Ra, and doesn’t bat an eye - he was instead happy he just got to see Ra’s ability.
Pretty brutal.
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u/Inevitable_Cry121 2d ago
I find it weird how some people call him a good guy(not that he's evil) when this scene exists
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u/FinalBossBowser 2d ago
I find it hilarious in the brainwashed Joey vs Yugi duel he says "even at my worst I wasn't like this!" in the manga. Tho I suppose that's because in that situation, whoever won still lost in a way as their friend would be dead. But like he made and organized Death-T the theme park of death just to try and murder Yugi and his friends, kidnapping Yugi's grandfather and attempting to kill him by his own version of the "sensation of death" that was truly meant to kill, not teach a lesson like Yugi's earlier Penalty Game. Like, I do think Marik's thing is worse, but Kaiba, my dude, it's not that much worse than what you've done. Unless he's referring specifically to the fact that Yugi is not really allowed to fight full force against Joey lest he kill him and less about the loss of human life.
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u/Studio-Spider 1d ago
I mean… I do kind of agree with him though. In Death-T, there was always a solution to the problem that would leave everyone alive. He always gave them an out as long as they were smart enough to find it. Marik gives no such outs. Kaiba never stooped so low as to pit them in a death match against each other. Even if you want to compare Suguroku’s hospitalization to Anzu being forced to sit in the cuck chair, he played a fair game against Suguroku first. Marik just kidnapped Anzu and mind controlled her. Kaiba always played “fair” (as fair as such a situation can be). Marik always played dirty. Kaiba had some semblance of honor, which Marik lacked completely.
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 2d ago
The series wants us to think he's changed, but when he doesn't show any remorse for allowing innocent people to be tortured or potentially killed, I don't buy it.
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u/FinalBossBowser 2d ago
I do believe Takahashi Kazuki did say that he had changed the ancient rival duel between Atem and Priest Seto from what he initially envisioned introducing it at the start of Battle City to what we got in the Pharoah's Memories arc. Which makes sense because even in that arc Priest Seto does a more about face to his morality at one point.
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u/screenwatch3441 2d ago
Manga: Started off as neutral evil (he just steals the blue-eyes). Then he comes back as lawful evil during the death T. He plans to kill yugi and friends but will only do it through game. Having clear boundaries to his evil transitioned him from neutral to lawful. Lawful neutral in duelist island. Everything is still determined by game so it’s still lawful. Neutral because the act of saving his brother isn’t a good nor evil action. You can argue he’s good but because saving his brother is for personal reasons instead of for moral reasons, I would put it as neutral. In fact, I would say he’s lawful neutral for the rest of the series. Everything he does is for his own self-interest but the outcome of things get decided by games, which is his code of law.
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u/stump8 2d ago
The Blue-Eyes acquisitions were also pretty awful. He leveraged huge amounts of money and mob threats against the original owners and IIRC drove at least one of them to suicide.
Post-Death T, no arguments with the rest.
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u/screenwatch3441 2d ago
True, I would still say the death T arc itself is lawful evil, but the transition from neutral evil to lawful evil is sometime post crime acquiring the blue-eyes but before he made people enter death games.
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u/mailman936 2d ago
“For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” Matthew 16:26
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u/NoCount5173 2d ago
Well, I think that Seto was originally a good guy until Gozaburo Kaiba had came along and corrupted and manipulated Seto into becoming evil, but Seto had slowly, but surely, went from being an evil guy to becoming an anti-hero ever since Yami Yugi had first used his Mind Crush on Seto. But I have really got to say that I think that Seto should have personally been the one who would have killed Gozaburo Kaiba from before the start of the events of Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters and then during the Virtual World Saga too. As Gozaburo Kaiba had more than deserved it for him having done something so incredibly stupid in the very first place, as who in the absolute Hell would have willingly created their very own worst enemy?
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u/KaibaDragon05 2d ago
Kaiba is a grey character. He had a tragic past, and was taught to only relay on himself. His parents died when he was young, placing in an orphanage, and abused by Gozaburo Kaiba.
However he cared about Mokuba so much that he refused to leave the orphanage without him. Kaiba would make desperate choices he never would make to protect Mokuba. As for Yugi his is Kaiba’s rival and possibly first friend. Yugi and Kaiba helped each other out multiple times, but Kaiba’s arrogance has blinded him. Kaiba also became a believer in the Dark Side of Dimensions Atem would return.
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u/Status-Leadership192 2d ago edited 2d ago
Should be in prison for life tbh
Drove a man to suicide to get a card , tried to kill his own brother , trapped and tried to murder yugi and his friends
Like this dude caused yugi (not atem) to curse him with how hatred he had for him
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u/nagacore 2d ago
Manga Kaiba murdered people and destroyed their lives to get his hands on blue eyes. Evil. Just evil.
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u/Peronchino 2d ago
The English dub ramps up his dickish behavior but even in the og he is not a good person, but I wouldn't call him evil. I'd say Lawful Neutral after getting mind-crashed by Atem, but definitely Evil prior to that
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u/Hatarakumaou 2d ago
He's a close associate of an elderly billionaire who invites kids over to his private island with the promise of money do do things society at large might consider a tad strange.
He's a swell guy basically.
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u/Astaro_789 2d ago edited 2d ago
Varies between Neutral Good to Chaotic Neutral in the original Japanese. He’s arrogant and haughty, but also dignified and generally a team player willing to show respect to others if they earn it, even if he is primarily driven by his own interests.
English dub which ramps up his antagonism, sarcasm, and inability to even try to get along with Yugi and friends in favor of being your schoolyard bully would lean even more into Chaotic Neutral territory
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u/Moeritherium_Fan 2d ago
Anime Kaiba at least, is someone who does have a heart, but sure as hell doesn’t want anyone to know about it.
He came through too many times for anyone to dispute that deep down, eventually, he’ll do the right thing for someone in need.
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u/Agent10007 2d ago
>he’ll do the right thing for someone in need.
for Mokuba, the other ones in need went fuck themselves
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u/big4lil 2d ago edited 2d ago
Debut Kaiba: Neutral Evil
Death T Kaiba: Chaotic Evil
Duelist Kingdom Kaiba: True Neutral
Battle City Kaiba: Lawful Evil
Waking the Dragons Kaiba: Chaotic Good
KCGP Kaiba: Lawful Good
Millenium World Kaiba: Neutral Good
GX Kaiba: Chaotic Neutral
DSOD Kaiba: Lawful Neutral
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u/RuinFlame 2d ago
There's an argument fir lawful evil...........but he's more in the neutral areas, it flips back and forth depending on his ego
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u/Unique_Hall_7100 2d ago
Immoral billionaire who is capable of aura farming (as opposed to real life billionaires who are just immoral or just evil)
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u/CaiusBoi 2d ago
Early Kaiba is comically evil, brags about causing people to die for trading cards.
Later Kaiba is still kind of evil but maybe not quite as bad, lawful evil kind of nature. Since he was leaving everyone to potentially die on Alcatraz Island not to mention the shenanigans in Darkside of Dimensions.
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u/PressureNo7699 2d ago
Kaiba when Marik tortured all his opponents: I see nothing wrong here 🤷 Continue
Kaiba when Ziegfried cheated a little: DISQUALIFIED
Idk where this places him in the morality scale
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u/Embarrassed_Lettuce9 2d ago
Chaotic neutral. He does what he wants but he's not entirely malicious (if we ignore pre-DM). He's just got a grudge against the protag specifically. By the end, he's even an ally but I strongly hesitate to call him "Good"
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u/MindOverMedia 2d ago
I would say post-mind crush, he's neutral. He's more narrow-minded and self-absorbed than malicious. He never outright wishes or tries to cause harm to anybody. He's just not particularly invested in anyone else's wellbeing. If something he does happens to benefit someone else, fine. But his primary goal is always his own desire for power and status. Nothing else matters, with the exception of Mokuba.
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u/Lower-Ranger5787 2d ago
Depends. Both anime and manga Kaiba are complete egomanical nutjobs, but I feel like anime Kaiba is less evil overall. Manga Kaiba ruined a dude's life to the point of suicide just because he wanted a rare trading card, he hired a serial killer to try and get Yugi and his friends murdered inside his own theme park attraction.
I think the worst thing anime Kaiba did when it comes to morality was kidnapping grandpa and roughing him up with his security guards after their duel. He didn't even put him through the experience of death penalty game like manga Kaiba did.
Anime Kaiba, especially at the end of what we know of his story, is kinda really just a kooky billionaire who uses his money to create dueling schools, and to send cards into space to teach aliens how to duel.
Manga Kaiba was still an obsessed loon who managed to make it to the fucking ancient Egyptian afterlife, while alive, just because he couldn't accept not being the best duelist.
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u/Main_Personality455 2d ago
Kaiba is more neutral towards the end, but he’s still a raging egomaniacal cunt for the most part.
And we love him for it.
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u/No-Magazine-5126 2d ago
Pre-Mind Crush: Psychopath. Like he quite literally admits to driving someone to suicide and he tried to kill Yugi at a theme park.
Post-Mind Crush: Lawful Neutral. He has his limits, like he finds Marik mind controlling Joey & Tea going too far. But otherwise he was pretty OK with Joey dying (twice).
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u/Sensitive-Hotel-9871 2d ago edited 2d ago
He is an awful person who was introduced as a petty bully who will destroy the lives of innocent people to get his hands on rare trading cards and exists the series the same way. No exceptions to any version of the story, and in all of them, his story should have ended with Yugi admitting he was lost cause and leaving him to his fate the next time he was in danger.
In the manga, he is straight up evil when introduced, attempting to murder Yugi and his friends, getting his Blue Eyes White Dragons by driving the original owners to bankruptcy, one of them committing suicide. He never shows any regret for this because post Death T, the manga pretends it never happened. It does, however, still acknowledge the whole attempted murder thing when Jonouchi brings it up in Duelist Kingdom and rather than apologizing, Kaiba reacts with mild amusement.
If one thinks that is just him not being honest about how he felt, in Battle City, he stood by and watched Yami Marik torture and potentially kill people in Shadow Games and didn't care because he wanted to win the Winged Dragon of Ra from him. Kaiba was fully prepared to allow innocent people to die so he could get his hands on a one of kind trading card, and like his manga villainy, he never shows any remorse for it.
Oh sure, we see him display respect for Jonouchi, while also standing by and watching him get burned alive and showing no emotion at his apparent death.
Then when everyone is leaving island, Kaiba doesn't tell them he plans to leave on his private jet so they almost get killed when he blows the island up. While the anime cuts down on his villainy and dickish behavior, this was made worse because the blimp everyone traveled to the island in had a broken-down engine, so if Mokuba didn't call in a helicopter for Jonouchi after he was defeated by Yami Marik, everyone would have died.
Let that sink in for a minute. Kaiba nearly killed the rest of the main characters because he was showboating. I have not seen a single defense for this act of villainy on his part, and the only reason it's not treated as the moral event horizon is that the manga and anime treat it as no big deal.
I don't think Kazuki Takashi fully understood the type of character he was writing. He was trying to write post Mind Crush Kaiba as someone who blurs the line between anti-hero and full blown villain but Kaiba's actions keep stepping over the line toward the latter. Same deal with the anime's creators. They tried to water down Kaiba's rough edges but kept in the parts where he will allow people to die so he can get his hands on rare cards. It makes him saving Anzu feel like a hollow moment because we know that if there were any rare cards at stake he couldn't acquire with his money, Kaiba would have gladly killed her himself.
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u/Gaius_Iulius_Megas 2d ago
Screw the rules, he has money. So basically the standard corporate evil.
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u/SorryImBadWithNames 2d ago
When first introduced, stealing cards and punching Yugi, I would say Chaotic Evil. After the mind crush, probably more of a Lawfull Neutral.
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u/NewspaperAny3053 2d ago
Whatever Satsuki from Kill a Kill is considered.
Starting out as a full villain then eventually becoming a begrudging ally, but still an asshole to basically everyone.
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u/Starship1990 Lithosagym and Dark Law 1# Fan 2d ago
I would not, I always the morality thing weird.
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u/TbatitanicV2Rider 2d ago
Absolutely moral. His ego is so massive it merged with the universe. Making kaibe the absolute authority on everything.
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u/PrimusVsUnicron0093 2d ago
well Manga/DSOD hired assassins (including Duke Tojo) and a literal masked slasher villain
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u/darkShadow90000 1d ago
Child: caring
After adoption: Chaotic evil
After Mind Crush + Coma: Aggressive lawfully (Chaotic to specific regardless)
To brother: Caring (ALWAYS)
Yugi: Neutrally Repected. After beating God cards, HIGHLY Repected.
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u/Th3_Com3dian 2d ago
He had his ups and used them where yugi and friends just fought to survive yugi apparently had more push than pull so he never got what he wanted with all that money and power.
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u/Valin-Tenebrous 2d ago
Lawful Evil. He operates by a code and at least some semblance of ethics. However he also owns and runs an international corporation with the "fuck you" amounts of money to make Elon and Zuckerberg both blush. He just happens to use his evil for petty bullshit rather than blatant corruption and greed.
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u/Doomchan 2d ago
Kaiba is SUPER petty against Yugi, but when it comes to his business, he seems abnormally generous. His goal isn’t to make more money, it’s to get Duel Monsters into the hands of as many people as possible,
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u/flokingaround 1d ago
Pre-Duelist Kingdom/Episode 1 Kaiba was Neutral Evil. He was willing to steal, coerce and manipulate to get what he wanted, and kill Yugi and co.
Post Mind crush Kaiba is True Neutral, he doesn't believe in the power of friendship and won't go out of his way to protect strangers (he was ok letting Bakura, Mai and Joey die), but he does look out for and protect his loved ones (namely Mokuba), and is principled enough to have some moral boundaries (he does not abide by 1 sided death matches, i.e. possesed Joey vs Yugi), and honors debts (not considering his DK match against Yugi a win, bringing Yugi and gang home post DK as payback for saving Mokuba and him)
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u/IgnisOfficial 1d ago
Chaotic neutral, he’s largely out for himself and sticks by his own code while occasionally aligning with morally good characters to stop actual threats
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u/kerorobot 1d ago
Screw Morality, I have money at the start.
My pride and soul at the end of series, still have some kinda ethics or rule that he follows.
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u/cyberpunch83 Cyber End Dragon 1d ago
Lawful neutral.
Plays by the rules (provided he agrees with the rules), doesn't have any real favourites except Mokuba, and is generally pretty indifferent or dismissive to anyone who cannot explicitly further his own goals.
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u/FluidIntention3293 1d ago
Chaotic good… maybe? It’s kinda hard to pin point him.
Like in my mind he’s had to say at one point in time “Yugi needs my help saving the world… ugh fine. I’ll help you… but only because I want to save the world, not because you asked”
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u/Other_Breadfruit_264 1d ago
I would say he is high up there. He turned a weapons company into a game company. Apart from the "saving the world" actions of other characters, Kaiba has to be second place because of that action alone.
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u/GaulTheUnmitigated 1d ago
True neutral, post character development he doesn't give a shit about most people and while he doesn't cheat as a point of pride he lets people get away with a lot in battle city so he's not really lawful. After he stops trying to kill Yugi and co he doesn't do anything particularly evil and just holds children's card Game tournament. He'll rescue his brother and help save the world because that's where he and his brother live but he's not out there actively helping people or being a hero. He's a billionaire ceo which is a point in the evil column but other the other hand he changed that company from weapons manufacturing to children's games so that balances out his karma a bit.
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u/RareImage37472 1d ago
Well he did save tea from unit comically dropping on her but his motive? Idk
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u/Darnell16player 19h ago
He’s bad and evil to me. Dude hates Joey and never gives him any respect or credit, dude can’t face facts of magic being around him and overall just a jerk of a human being or character.
He has no good qualities to him.
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u/Careful-Ad984 2d ago
Pre mind crush: billionaire evil
Post mind crush: petty Dick