Marik Ishtar

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Marik Ishtar
Yu-Gi-Oh! character
First appearance Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelist Volume 10, Duel 92
Original Japanese manga Volume 17, Duel 151
Voiced by Older: Tetsuya Iwanaga (Japanese)
Jonathan Todd Ross (English)
Younger: Akiko Kimura (Japanese)
Profile
Age 16
Date of birth December 23
Known relatives Elder sister: Ishizu Ishtar
Adopted brother: Rishid Ishtar (Odion in the English anime)
Father: name unknown (deceased)
Mother: name unknown (deceased)

Marik Ishtar (マリク・イシュタール Mariku Ishutāru?) in the original Japanese anime and manga, is a character in the manga Yu-Gi-Oh! and the second Yu-Gi-Oh! anime series (known in Asia as Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters). The heir to a clan of tombkeepers, Marik's hatred of the nameless Pharaoh compels him to disregard his duties and turn to a life of evil, eventually developing a split personality. He serves as the third antagonist Yugi faces in the manga, and is the antagonist in seasons two and three of the anime.

Contents

[edit] Marik

Marik Ishtar is a later antagonist of Yu-Gi-Oh! and one of the foremost adversaries of the series. His family has guarded the tomb of the pharaoh for generations. Marik holds the Millennium Rod and with his Ghouls organization (called the Rare Hunters in the English anime), he wishes to obtain the three God Cards, and with them, unlock their power for himself so he can gain the title of "Pharaoh" and set his family free.

He also has a hidden agenda - to get revenge on the ancient Pharaoh's soul for killing his father, as he was made to believe. In the English anime, he is considerably more fiendish. He wants the God Cards and the Millennium Puzzle to gain the power of the Pharaoh and rule the world. He believes that Shadi killed his father and is not particularly concerned as he never had any real affection for his father. The character's sister is Ishizu Ishtar .

Marik's mad quest to defeat Yami Yugi has made every single one of Yugi's friends and himself to suffer. For example, he's possessed the minds of Téa Gardner and Joey Wheeler in order to break Yugi to the core. He's even more ruthless and cruel when his plots failed to accomplish anything. Marik later appears at the Battle City Finals, diguised as Namu who befriends Téa and Joey. Unknown to Marik himself, his hatred and rage have been fueling his dark side, Dark Marik, for all the time. Later, after Marik lost his duel against his dark side, he sought refuge in the mind of Téa and warned his older sister, Ishizu, to hide Rishid (Odion in the English anime), away from the hands of Dark Marik.

[edit] Dark Marik

Dark Marik (Yami Marik)
Dark Marik (Yami Marik)

The sadistic alter ego of Marik Ishtar, he is an entity that was created when his host was only ten years old. After having the secrets of the Pharaoh forcefully carved onto his back, Marik struggled to cope with the agony and hatred he felt against his father. It also manifested itself into his other self, Dark Marik who could only emerge if Marik himself were full of rage.

He made his first appearance when he murdered his own father (in the manga he specifically skinned his father's back with the millennium rod and threw it on Odion) before being sealed away in Marik's body by Odion, waiting for his chance to break free. But when Odion is knocked out in his battle with Joey Wheeler on the Battle Ship during the Battle City semi-finals, Marik is so furious and in despair that Dark Marik finally escapes, embarking on a rampage of destruction, horror and madness.

He then traps the soul of Mai Valentine and has several brain insects slowly devour her body after he manages to easily defeat her in a shadow game (in the English version, he banished her soul to the shadow realm). After this, Joey is determined to duel Marik and save Mai even if he dies in the process.

Dark Bakura (Yami Bakura) teams with Marik's soul to stop Dark Marik, but fails as well and loses the Millennium Ring. Joey becomes severely injured to the point where he can no longer duel. As time goes on, Dark Marik becomes the dominant host of Marik's body, with the real Marik's soul slowly fading out of existence. Dark Yugi (Yami Yugi) is the only one who could stop Marik. When Dark Yugi and Dark Marik duel, Odion wakes up and he makes Marik realize he had to accept his responsibility for being a tombkeeper.

With this confidence, Marik overpowers his evil self and forfeits, destroying Dark Marik. Marik gives Yugi the Millennium Rod and Ring as well as the Sun Dragon Ra a.k.a. The Winged Dragon of Ra. Marik then reveals the tombkeeper's initiation. The carving of the Pharaoh's (Dark Yugi a.k.a. Yami a.k.a. Atem) memory onto the back of a tomb guardian involves using either a hot dagger (as in the manga), a normal dagger (in the Japanese version of the second series anime), or a tattoo (in the English second series anime) on his back (see below right image). Fulfilling his duty as tombkeeper, Marik goes with Ishizu and Odion and returns to Egypt to start a new life.

Officially revealed in the English-language manga, Dark Marik is an alter-ego of Marik. When he received the tombkeeper's initiation and was tattooed, Marik created a second personality to deal with the pain and agony of the ritual. This can be used to explain Dark Marik's obsession with pain: he was a vent through which Marik's pain was shunted he is a textbook example of sadistic personality disorder. Overall, Dark Marik and Marik are most likely suffering form dissociative identity disorder, more commonly known as suffering from multiple personalities.

[edit] Naming

Marik Ishtar's back with carvings (tattoos in the English Anime).
Marik Ishtar's back with carvings (tattoos in the English Anime).

In the character profile leaflets of a Japanese volume his name is romanized as Maric with his alter ego's name romanized as Yami Maric.[1]

Marik Ishtar is known as "Malik Ishtar" in Indonesia [2].

Marik's family name is derived from the Mesopotamian deity Ishtar.

[edit] Deck

Marik's deck theme is Immortality. While slowly torturing his opponents and watching them squirm, he plays and replays The Winged Dragon of Ra in the ways he finds most evoking of pain. To this end he relies primarily on reviving it via Monster Reborn and continually transferring the card to his hand via Left Arm Offering and Zombie's Jewel, among other cards.

Besides this, his deck is largely composed of Fiend-type monsters, and his cards rely on draining an opponent of strength: Helpoemer discards cards, Viser Des lowers the ATK of an opponent's monster, etc. A great deal of his cards rely on "burn" damage: Life Point damage through special effects rather than battle. In particular to the theme of pain, several of his cards are modeled after torture devices, such as Nightmare Wheel being based on the breaking wheel.

[edit] Note

In Yu-Gi-Oh! Characters Guide Book: The Gospel of Truth, Marik's sign is indicated as Sagittarius. When employing the sidereal zodiac, this is correct. But when employing the tropical zodiac, Marik's sign becomes Capricorn. Since the signs of all other Yu-Gi-Oh! characters in the book are either incorrect when using the sidereal zodiac or match with the birthdays in both tropical and sidereal zodiacs, the tropical zodiac sign is used here.

[edit] References

Preceded by
Maximillion Pegasus		 Yu-Gi-Oh! Main Villain Succeeded by
Noah Kaiba
Preceded by
Noah Kaiba		 Yu-Gi-Oh! Main Villain Succeeded by
Dartz
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