Anime / Bakuten Shoot Beyblade

3... 2... 1... GO SHOOT/LET IT RIP!!

Bakuten Shoot Beyblade (爆転シュートベイブレード)^note "Bakuten" is a neologism, combining 爆 for "explosion" and 転 for "(rotational) movement". "Spinsplosion" works as a translation. aired from 2001 to 2003 with a season each year in Japan. American audiences got their share of Beyblade from 2002 to 2005. The first season was produced by Madhouse and the last two were done by Nihon Animedia, with some outsourcing to Synergy. The story was adapted from the manga by Takao Aoki, which itself was a reboot of the events told about in Jisedai Beigoma Battle Beyblade. Also included in the anime lineup is the Non-Serial Movie Beyblade: The Movie - Fierce Battle, which can be considered an Alternate Continuity to the third season.

The first season narrates how the protagonists, the BBA Team, rise to the top. It starts out on neighborhood level, with a local gang of beyblading bullies terrorizing Akebono, moves to the Japanese Tournament where the protagonists become a team, then enters a series of tournaments, and finishes with the BBA being the world's last chance against a hostile takeover by Borg and Hiwatari Enterprises. Along the way, each member of the team faces a personal demon and grows both as a person and as a teammate.

Season 2 (2002 in Japan, V-Force elsewhere) shifts gears, moving largely away from the tournament narrative to provide a story of the BBA Team having to defend their four sacred bit-beasts — Dragoon, Draciel, Dranzer, and Driger — from two organizations trying to steal them: the Saint Shields and Zagāto Industries, which are at odds with each other too. The BBA Team's numbers increase with the addition of Hiromi, who provides support to the team alongside Kyōju.

Beyblade: The Movie - Fierce Battle follows on Season 2, but cannot lead into Season 3 on account that Daichi has his introduction in both of them. The movie sees the BBA Team travel to Kyushu for a tournament and to spend a few days on vacation. However, on a nearby island a group of four children accidentally set the Four Holy Beasts of Darkness free and it's up to the BBA to save the world from the creatures' wrath.

Season 3 (G-Revolution) returns to the tournament-heavy format, but with one major twist: the BBA Team is no longer together. Max, Rei, and Kai all go to their alternative teams for their own shot at becoming the world champion. This leaves Takao to join forces with season-newcomer Daichi and his bit-beast Gaia Dragoon. The former teammates face off against each other in various rounds, but ultimately become allies again for another effort to stop the world from being taken over.

The differences between the anime and the manga are significant and plentiful. Firstly, the flow of time is different. Where in the manga everything happens within one year, each season of the anime represents a year, making for three years total. To this end, the length and amount of battles got vastly upped: the manga features a one-battle-only mode while the anime uses a best-out-of-three setup. Furthermore, in the manga, many of the team-type bladers are bodies at best whereas the anime fleshes out as many characters as it can. One important thing to note is that the manga and anime were in part produced concurrently and Aoki did do work for the anime too. This means that on occasion it's the manga which is the adaptation rather than the other way around.

Much like other localized kid-oriented anime of the time, the English version of Beyblade was given a number of changes including Western names for characters, the character Dizzi's very existence, music adjustments, and removal of certain parts of the show that wouldn't fly on U.S. TV. The anime was licensed by Nelvana.

---

Bakuten Shoot Beyblade contains adaptation examples of:

• Adaptation Expansion:
  • Played Straight. Many characters in the manga suffer from underdevelopment, ranging from only existing for one panel to never getting a name or a battle to participate in. The anime went on to give every single team its own set of bit-beasts and each member at least one on-screen battle.
  • V-Force is the very definition of this trope. It takes a fairly short part of the manga involving the Saint Shields, Team Psychic, and Zeo Zagāto and adds characterization, two trial teams, several bit-beasts, and a minor subplot for Kai. Meanwhile, where the manga features Volkov as Zagāto's subordinate, the anime utilizes new characters Gideon, Doctor B, Doctor K, and Dan. The latter two would go on to temporarily manage a new team, the Parts Hunters, when they go rogue.
  • Inverted. Daichi's long-running arc before meeting Takao is not included in the anime. As a result, he comes across as a pesky ball of arrogance rather than someone who worked hard to achieve what he did.
• Adaptational Heroism: Team Psychic starts out real-evil in the manga instead of becoming possessed-evil as it does in the anime.
• Adaptational Job Change:
  • Takao is the BBA Team's captain in the original version, as it was he that won the Japanese Tournament. In the dub, Kai is the team captain.
  • Jeff McKenzie goes from vice director of the PPB Research Center to director, thereby becoming Judy's peer instead of her direct subordinate.
• Adaptational Villainy: No doubt the manga version of Sōichirō Hiwatari deserves to get clobbered in the face for what he inflicts on his family as if they're his property, but he does genuinely care for Kai and, you know, he's not out to conquer the world like he is in the anime. Barthez is not a villain in the manga either, notwithstanding that it's fair to ask about his standing in the Barthez Soldats falling under the Heavy Metal System's influence. In the anime, he's an abusive, controlling creep who's in league with Volkov.
• Adaptation Explanation Extrication:
  • In the manga, Kai's goal early on is to destroy as many beys as possible and the sport in general because he blames it for his father abandoning him. Hence why calling his gang "Shell Killers" makes sense. In the anime, his early goal is changed to wanting to find bit-beasts. "Shell Killers" still works for intimidation purposes, but the intended meaning has fallen out from under it.
  • Ever wondered why the other Shitennō call Hiruta a traitor for taking them out of the game, even though he was thrown out of the gang earlier and they were the very people who destroyed his bey? This is because in the manga, they were thrown out too after losing to Takao and it was Kai who destroyed Hiruta's bey. They understandably call him a traitor in the manga, but with their plot simplified, it makes little sense they do so in the anime.
  • From the same arc, if you only watch the anime, Kai taking off his gloves for his battle against Takao is weird. He takes them off, they drop to the ground the way gloves can be expected to do, and you'd think there's some sort of significance to it but nothing that can be discerned. In the manga, the Shell Killers, still loyal to Kai, hold the gloves for him and comment how heavy they are. Ultimately, this scene would be redone correctly in the anime's third season when Kai reveals his scarf to be weighted.
  • The manga isn't shy to drop characters quietly, but in the case of Ivan no longer being with Borg, the manga actually provides an answer where the anime does not. He lost his team qualification match against Kai.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: There's a big one that we'll call the Volkov-Zagāto tree. In the manga, Borg is a small army of bladers headed by Volkov. Borg is defeated by the combined might of the BBA, the Bái Hǔ Zú, and the All Starz. Its members go in hiding, except the four elite bladers, who break with Borg and become Neoborg. Volkov returns to the true mastermind behind Borg: Doctor Zagāto, head of the Zagāto Ichimi, whose true goal is to acquire the most powerful bit-beasts in existence. To this end, he hired the Saint Shields, aware they meant to betray him, but would be useful regardless. Knowing that the Saint Shields work for Zagāto, Yuriy confronts them, but is defeated by Ozuma. Meanwhile, Zagāto brings together a new elite quartet: Team Cyber. Both the Saint Shields and Team Cyber were defeated, after which Zagāto and Volkov invest their final resources in ZO. When ZO is also defeated, Zagāto turns a new leaf and Volkov is just never heard from again. In the first season of the anime, Borg is an organization that aims to take over the world by means of stealing bitbeasts. Borg is headed by Volkov, who takes orders from and whose organization is financed by Sōichirō Hiwatari (who in the manga wants nothing to do with beyblading). Borg is defeated during the Russian Tournament, its elite bladers break with Borg and become Neoborg, while the other bladers are implied to walk out too. Neither Volkov's nor Hiwatari's fates are given. Then comes the Zagāto arc in the second season and it has no ties whatsoever with Borg. Rather, Volkov's main henchman is Gideon, who, until his death, oversees Psychic, more or less the anime name for the Zagāto Ichimi. Rather than evil, the elite team of Psychic are mind-controlled into their roles. The Saint Shields never work for any branch of Zagāto's organization. Zagāto's goal remains to acquire the most powerful bit-beasts in existence and he eventually bets on Zeo to get them. When Zeo is defeated, Zagāto turns a new leaf. Then in the third season, Volkov returns by himself and, after his henchman Barthez fails with the Barthez Soldat, sets up BEGA to gain control of beyblading. His elite team are the Justice 5, whom are confronted by Yuriy, Boris, and Sergei, but the three are readily beaten. When the Justice 5 learn what Volkov is truly like, they cut ties with BEGA. Volkov is left with nothing as BEGA ceases to exist.
• Adapted Out:
  • Any character that is introduced in the side section, that is to say, Daichi's storyline, is not included in the anime. Daichi himself is the obvious exception. His father's heroic death scene was part of the movie, but he's not so much as mentioned in the third season. Hikaru, Kennosuke, and Tenmaru get a slide in the Japan-exclusive ending of G-Revolution. The fake Daichi has a counterpart in J. That's about it.
  • Notable absences from the main storyline are Mister B and Ken Daiba, both core members of the BBA in the manga. In Mister B's case, what appears to have happened is that both he and his partner Hitoshi were omitted from the first season. By the time of the third season's development, Mister B had already been phased out of the manga, but Hitoshi had been upgraded to Takao's coach. So, Hitoshi was included finally during the third season, but not Mister B. Ken Daiba, meanwhile, is the last character introduced in the manga and all he really does is bring in the heavy metal system. All in all, it's his arc that ends the manga and it's the BEGA arc that ends the anime.
  • Zigzagged with Kai's parents. With Sōichirō's Adaptational Villainy upgrade for the first season, it seems Kai's parents aren't alive anymore. They'd hopefully have objected to Kai being raised as a weapon for his grandfather's plans of world domination if they were still breathing. But there is a line in the Japanese version of S2E5 where his father is mentioned as still being in Kai's life, just that their relationship is horribly strained. In the manga, Kai's mother barely qualifies as a character, but she takes care of him, while Kai's father more or less walked out on them for the sake of beyblading.
• Barely-Changed Dub Name:
  • The English dub usually opted for names that have the same first letter as the Japanese names (such as changing "Takao" to "Tyson"). Rei Kon however just became Raymond "Ray" Kon.
  • The Italian dub changed Max's surname from "Mizuhara" to "Mizihara".
• Canon Foreigner: In terms of beyblade teams, the anime adds Team Who, the Team Psychic mooks, the Parts Hunters, the Children of the Four Holy Beasts of Darkness, and the Justice 5. Then there's various individuals, whether good or bad, like Akira, Hiromi, Alan, Gideon, and Doctor K. The dub jumps even further and adds three more characters in the form of The Voice. Primarily Dizzi, Kyōju's talking bit-beast that resides inside his computer. The two bey-battle commentators Brad Best and AJ Topper are also exclusive to the dub.
• Dub-Induced Plot Hole:
  • In the original version, the Majestic 4 do not have a name. They're simply the Euro Team. The dub gave them the name Majestics. However, the story as it is has the members form a team for the first time, which specifically occurs in S1E38. A.J. Topper and Brad Best introduce them as the Majestics, which Ralf is surprised by and Johnny indifferent to, while Olivier and Giancarlo talk about how beyblading is not a team sport. Which leaves the question just who came up with "Majestics"? There's some implication Johnny created the name, but that would be at odds with him being the one insistently opposed to what's going on in the first place.
  • The big one is Hiromi's inability to see bit-beasts at the start of the second season. In the Japanese canon, the ability to see bit-beasts is rare. In the dub, at least during the first season, everyone can see them. Then in comes Hiromi with a few episodes worth of "I want to see bit-beasts too!". The dub went with it, opting to forgo addressing the established dub canon. Which caused another problem in regards to the dub-exclusive Dizzi. She's a bit-beast, yet during all Hiromi's asking, Dizzi's identity is somehow ignored. This is exceptionally blatant in S2E11 when Hiromi asks Dizzi if she could tell her what a bit-beast is (and is ignored because there are more pressing matters at hand).
• Dub Name Change: So many...
  • Almost every character gets a name change. In most cases, the change turns a non-American name into an American name, even when there's no pretense that the character is American. In other cases, a non-American name is changed into another non-American name that's more recognizable to an American audience.
  • Kai's trading card makes mention of the Shell Sharks, a weird in-between of "Shell Killers" and "Blade Sharks" that suggests the team's name was changed to avoid the "killer" part.
  • A confusing part of the Japanese version of the anime is that a bit-beast and a bey may or may not have the same name. Most are referred to by the same name, but there are bladers who address their bit-beasts differently, namely by their "species" name. These include the BBA's bit-beasts (Seiryū, Suzaku, Byakko, Genbu, Kōryū), Giancarlo's bit-beast (Amphisbaena), the Team Psychic's test bit-beasts (Digital Dragon, Digital Bird), and at least two of the Team Zagāto's bit-beasts (Spider, Kamaitachi). On top of that, a bit-beast with a separate name can be addressed by the bey's name, but the reverse is not possible. The anime technically inherited this from the manga, but it was less in-your-face there because there were less bit-beasts. The dub team apparently had issues with it too and renamed the affected bit-beasts to have the same name as the bey.
  • The second season. It received the additional title "2002" in Japan because it aired in 2002. But it didn't air in 2002 elsewhere. The English dub changed "2002" to "V-Force" and most translations followed suit. For the third season, Japan got the hint and gave it the more versatile addition title "G-Revolution".
• Localized Name in a Non-Localized Setting: Aside from the above Japanese-to-English dub changes, there's actually one example present in the Japanese version of Season 1. In the manga, the Chinese team is called "Bái Hǔ Zú", "Bái Hǔ" being "(the) White Tiger" and "Zú" being "clan". In the anime, the team is renamed "Byakko Zoku", which is exactly the same name but in Japanese. The clan's home country isn't changed. In Season 3, they go by "Bái Hǔ Zú" once more.
• Named by the Adaptation: Two cases.
  • The manga gives less characters a name than the anime, and the original version of the anime gives less characters a name than the dub. For instance, Nobuo is nameless in the manga, and Bianca and Rosetta are nameless in the original version of the anime.
  • In the early part of the franchise, teams technically don't have names. They are referred to either by nation or by organization. The anime was produced with the same setup, but for the localization proper and separate team names were created. This in turn influenced the Japanese franchise to also introduce team names.
• No Hugging, No Kissing:
  • Poorly done in the dub in regards to Rei's and Mao's relationship. All scenes and dialogue regarding their romance are removed or replaced to assure the audience that they are BFFs. The icing is that the dub doesn't change Rei's and Rai's relation, so Rei ends up restoring bestie status with Rai too.
  • There was only so much the dub could remove from Giancarlo's interaction with Bianca and Rosetta to try and make it look platonic, and ultimately it threw in the towel and went with romantic. Next episode though, the dub has the gall to let Olivier refer to the girls as Giancarlo's "friends".
• No Smoking: During the briefing between Douglas and Judy in S1E26, Douglas starts smoking once the topic turns to the BBA in the original version. In the dub, all shots of him with a cigarette are removed. As a result, the briefing in the dub is about half the length of the original version.
• Related in the Adaptation: Several characters are related in the dub when they weren't in the original. The Bái Hǔ Zú Elder becomes Rai's and Mao's grandfather in the dub. Blood and Howling become brothers. King and Queen also become siblings, but in their case it's possible they were meant as siblings in the original too.
  • Unrelated in the Adaptation: Genta and Ganta are no longer specified as being brothers in the dub. Just like in the manga, Takao and Daichi aren't cousins anymore (and by extension Yoshie and Rinko aren't sisters).
• Retool: Hangs around in the Broad Strokes area for the shift from Season 1 to Season 2. Whereas the manga is continuous, the second and third season were done by a different company than the first. Some of the things Season 2 did against Season 1 expectations are:
  • In the original version of S2E7, Hiromi believes Kai to be a spy for an organization that wants to take over the world. She's wrong then, but it is what Kai was raised to be before going in a healthier direction. You'd expect Kyōju to tell her not to bring it up, but no. The dub fixes this flub by omitting the specifics of her accusation and adding a line for Kyōju where he acknowledges that Kai went evil in Russia once.
  • In S2E28, the BBA Team returns to New York on Judy's invitation and get a tour through the PPB facility. Everything references the American tournament arc of the first season except that not a peep is spent on the All Starz. Not even an offhand remark that they're off training somewhere else or visiting their families! The original version is worse in this matter than the dub because at least the dub states that the facility they visit is different from the one where the All Starz trained in the first season, while the original version implies it's the same building.
  • In S2E30, Rei is on the verge of being beaten by Foxy's Doppelgänger Spin. Rei is familiar with Kiki pulling that same stunt and didn't drop a sweat when Paula went with it. He's literally the one BBA'er who should be as good as immune to an attack like that.
  • Even worse is S2E35, in which the opponent has a kamaitachi-type bit-beast. None of the BBA Team can figure out how the beyblade and/or bit-beast can attack without hitting Kai's beyblade at first, and it's Rei of all people who utters the line that it can't be the wind doing the damage. Yes, that Rei, the one who nearly got murdered in S1E49 by Boris's Falborg's knife-like wind-based attacks.
  • The final part of the second season features a World Tournament again. It's in name only, though, as there's nothing "world" about it. It's exclusively the teams that appeared prior in Season 2, most of which members are Japanese or Chinese. The grand exception is the Central American duo, which are such awful stereotypes you just know they were only thrown in to give some pretense of "world". Nobody takes them seriously and they are defeated promptly.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Yūya's fate after using the cyber bit-beast in the original is ambiguous, which among others makes it a possibility he perished. The dub removes this possibility by stating he "was never the same again".
• You Don't Look Like You: The Brazilian Team in the anime is little like the Brazilian team in the manga. The points of resemblance are clear enough, but the anime diversified the group by a lot.

Bakuten Shoot Beyblade also contains examples of:

• 2D Visuals, 3D Effects: Starting with the second season, the beyblades were animated in CGI, while the rest of the show remained drawn.
• Abandoned Warehouse: The hideouts of the Shell Killers in Season 1 and the Saint Shields in Season 2. The manga specifies that the Shell Killers' hideout belongs to Kai's family's company, but this is not stated in the anime.
• Acronym and Abbreviation Overload: There's a number of acronyms that are easy enough to remember what they refer to, but the full name or term is mentioned maybe once or twice. So to sum it up:
  • Organizations: GBC - Great Beyblade Cup; BBA - Beyblade Battle Associaton; PPB - Project Power of Beyblade; BEGA - Beyblade Entertainment Global Association; ABK - Akebo Blader Kids; F-Sangre - Fernandez Sangre
  • Mister B, Doctor B, Doctor K, and J are only known by their initials. Who knows what they mean.
• AcCENT upon the Wrong SylLABle: While the dub got most of the names that stayed the same right, they flubbed on two names: Driger and Draciel. Not exactly the least of names. "Driger" was originally said as "Drai-ger", but was changed to "Drih-ger". "Draciel" was originally pronounced as "Dra-shell", but was changed to "Dra-seal".
• Alphabetical Theme Naming: A major name system in Season 1, but absent in Seasons 2 and 3.
  • Dragoon, Dranzer, Draciel, and Dr[a]iger.
  • Galuon, Galzy, Galman, and Galux.
  • Canarias, Piranias, and Samas.
  • Trygle, Trypio, Tryhorn, and Trygator.
  • Either Dracuos, Wolfos, Bandeos, and Frankeos (original) or Draculor, Lycanlor, Sarcophalon, and Shamblor (dub).
  • Griffolyon, Salamalyon, and Amphylyon and Unicolyon.
  • Wolborg, Seaborg, Falborg, and Wyborg.
• Adults Are Useless: Combines with Invisible Parents and There Are No Adults on a case by case basis. There are only some 20-30 adults in the entire franchise, of which a significant portion true villains (as opposed to all the Defeat Means Friendship child villains). The rest are family, who are generally useless, or people involved with beyblade, who are generally useful. Of the main cast, Rei never gets so much as a mention he even has parents, and the rest have parents that don't actually seem to be too concerned about them. A notable instance is S2E11, which sees the BBBA Team saved from an island fully controlled by Team Psychic. The only "parent" to pick them up? Takao's grandfather.
• Alternative Foreign Theme Song:
  • The English dub and international dubs based on it have a different opening theme song. "LET'S BEYBLADE!".
  • The Italian dub used the original Japanese version as the basis for translation and thus retains the original BGM. However, it still uses an original theme song.
• Ambiguous Gender: Bit-beasts waver between being outright genderless and just never having their gender specified. The exceptions in the anime are Dragoon and Driger, who are male, and Wolborg and Galux, who are female. The dub generally claims that all bit-beasts are male, with the obvious exception of Dizzi.
• Analogy Backfire: For the better, in the original version. In the first season Ralf views beybattles as spiritual successors to the life-or-death duels his ancestors engaged in. As such, he only ever battles an opponent once, because after that they're "dead". Despite that Ralf already defeated Takao once, he ends up agreeing to join forces with his fellow European champions in an exhibition match against the BBA because an exhibition match "doesn't count". The Majestic 4 gets massively defeated during said match, which not only knocks some humility into them but also forces them to reflect on their attitudes to other bladers and to their own bit-beasts. Then steps in Team WHO, who've also underwent a change of heart after seeing the BBA care about their bit-beasts, but still demand retribution from the Majestic 4. Ralf assents, which prompts Team WHO to stand down and Blood to reply that Ralf's old self already has died and that that's enough, thereby redefining the "death" that comes from losing a beybattle as a "rebirth".
• Animal Battle Aura: This is how the bit-beasts are often portrayed during especially dramatic battle sequences. The beybladers themselves are also commonly portrayed with their respective bit-beasts as their battle aura.
• Anime Chinese Girl: Mao and Ming-Ming are prime examples of the trope. Mariam arguably fits too, but is more of a Dragon Lady.
• Ambiguous Ending: Played straight in the show, but averted due to All There in the Manual. Just like the manga ends without saying who, between Takao, Kai, Daichi, and Yuriy, wins, the anime doesn't reveal who emerges victorious from the beybattle between Takao and Brooklyn. The official Japanese website, however, states that Takao won.
• Artificial Human: Zeo turns out to be an android created by Doctor Zagāto to replace the original Zeo, who had died.
• Art-Shifted Sequel: The animation style changed radically after the first season, becoming more streamlined and "cuter", to the point that all the main characters looked younger in V-Force despite being one year older. The Art Shift from V-Force to G-Revolution was more subtle, and the characters looked their age once again.
• Back for the Finale: Done at the end of the first season, when literally every blader Takao and the BBA ever met cheers Takao on during his match against Yuriy. Done again at the end of the Japanese version of G-Revolution in the form of a "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue. It consists of a slideshow what everyone is up to these days.
• Battle of the Bands: Sort of. There are two teams of which the members form a band: the Central American champions in V-Force and the Ming Ming Band in G-Revolution. Both employ their instruments during battle. Of course, their opponents aren't bands, but they do have to follow along with the rhythm if they want to win.
• Battle Tops: The premise of the show. It's worth mentioning that the "bey" in "beyblade" comes from the "bei" in "beigoma", a Japanese spinning top.
• Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: As explained by Volkov in S1E42, Rasputin used alchemy to create Black Dranzer.
• The Benchwarmer: The first season's tournament has a format of 3 vs 3, while the important teams have four members, so someone is going to end up with the short end of the stick. Kai often willingly sits out due to lack of interest in most opponents, or being busy with something related to the larger plot. G-Revolution having a 2 vs 2 tournament ensured that the Bladebreakers broke up so they wouldn't all end up getting benched and overshadowed by Takao.
• Big Bad: Vladimir Volkov and Sōichirō Hiwatari for Season 1, Gideon and Zagāto for Season 2, and Vladimir Volkov again in Season 3.
• Big Eater: Takao, Daichi, Gaoh, and Romero stand out in particular. Of course, they're drawn with a Balloon Belly when they're full.
• Bilingual Bonus: Try Trilingual Treat with Japanese, English, and Russian thrown into the mix. Rei's growth as a blader becomes more apparent if you realize that his last name "Kon" means "metal" and that while he lost against Eddy Smith, he later stood his ground when he faced Boris Kuznetsov, with "kuznetsov" meaning "the blacksmith's".
• Boarding School: The Imperial Academy (帝王学園) early in V-Force, which Kai and Yūya attend.
• Book Ends: Both the very first and the very last episode of the anime end with Kai and Takao about to face off.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Team Psychic. The two test bladers for the digital bit-beasts are hinted to be permanently damaged from their influence, while the elite team survives only by luck.
• Breather Episode:
  • There's three in the first season. S1E18 has the BBA Team return to their homes after winning the Chinese Tournament and before heading out to the American one. S1E21 sees the BBA Team train in the wilderness with a beginning blader, Antonio, to get over the intimidation pulled on them by the All Starz. S1E29 is a Recap Episode narrated by Kyōju following the BBA's victory during the American Tournament. It ends with the team boarding the ship for Russia.
  • The second season doesn't have breather episodes proper, because all happy times episodes end with a plot-related mood swing. But still, S2E17, which mainly is about the BBA Team fixing the strain in their intra-team relations, and S2E28, which mainly sees the BBA having fun in New York City, come close.
  • The third season, S3E30, takes place after the tournament finals between Takao and Kai, has Daichi leaving Takao's house after being annoyed his partner has all the glory, and gets into shenanigans, where he eventually ends up living with Max after an argument about mustard that leads to a battle. Meanwhile, Dickenson and the BBA's buyout and Ming-Ming's cameo are foreshadowed and is the central antagonist for the next episode.
• The Bus Came Back: All three core teams the BBA faced during their journey from Japan to Russia show up for various reasons during the Russian Tournament. Even Team WHO drops in to see the BBA win.
• Can't Catch Up: The premise of bit-beasts damages if not outright destroys any sense of fairness. To put it simple, anyone without a bit-beast, which are rare (and in many cases inherited), has no chance against someone who does, regardless of skill.
  • Team WHO seems to have been added to the anime specifically to address the matter in-universe. The imbalance doesn't get solved, but bit-beast ownership is emphasized as a matter of responsibility.
  • Becomes utterly ridiculous in V-Force when the BBA calls the cyber bit-beasts illegal modifications. Exactly how are they more illegal than "natural" bit-beasts, which most people can't even see and thus don't know about?
  • There's an implication that of all bit-beasts, the ones wielded by the BBA Team are the strongest. Which slaughters any Willing Suspension of Disbelief regarding whether they'll win or lose.
  • The inherent imbalance is why every Beyblade generation after the first simply gave everyone bit-beasts, even if they're no longer portrayed the same as they were in the original series.
• Cast Full of Pretty Boys: The majority of named characters are young, male, and fit.
• Cat Up a Tree: In one of the flashbacks of S1E16, said cat is Mao, at the age of maybe 5. It's meant to show the peaceful childhood she and Rei enjoyed and also how Rei always was there for her when she needed him.
• Chekhov's Gun: S1E32 has two examples. The horror movie the BBA watches while on the train help them figure out the weaknesses to Blood's and Howling's vampire and werewolf bit-beasts. As well, Rei happens to find a silver coin that someone left behind on the train, which he uses to augment Driger with silver to take down the werewolf bit-beast.
• Child Soldiers: Quite a lot of bladers fall under this definition if the fact they're ordered or manipulated by adults to use their immense power for one cause or another is taken to its logical conclusion. Enough so that it's easier to list the ones that don't fit the definition. The trope-high hitters are Kai, Borg, the Barthez Soldats, and the Justice 5. If Demonic Possession is taken into account, the Children of the Four Holy Beasts of Darkness can be listed too.
• Chromosome Casting: The large majority of the cast is male. The original series barely had 4 named female characters (Five, if you count Dizzy from the dub). While the sequel series added more female characters, they still were a small minority compared to the male cast.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome:
  • In Season 1 and 2 of the dub, Kyōju has a bit-beast, Dizzi, who is trapped inside his computer. She disappears in Season 3 without explanation.
  • Ivan and Steve are removed from their respective teams in favor of Kai and Max in G-Revolution. For Ivan, no explanation is given in either the original version of the series or the dub, though he's shown back with his team in the Japan-exclusive slideshow ending. (The manga explains Kai beat him for a spot on the team.) For Steve, the Japan-exclusive slideshow ending shows he's been in the hospital all this time. The trope is thus in full effect for the dub, but toned down in the original.
• Clothing Damage: In the second and third rounds, Falborg's attacks tear up sections of Rei's clothes.
• Combined Energy Attack: Takao manages one against Brooklyn with the help of all the bladers he befriended.
• Conspicuous Gloves: Fingerless gloves a recurring fashion choice among bladers and some people associated with beyblade, like Blader DJ. Some wear them all the time but others, like Max and Kyōju, wear them when blading. Sometimes, the gloves aren't fingerless (or partially fingerless: Max's gloves in season 2-3 still cover his ring and pinky fingers) or Handwraps of Awesome is in effect. The look is more prominent in the last two seasons than in the first one. In fact, in season 2 and 3 a lot of character put gloves on only when blading, as if they were required gear.
• Crushing Handshake: Daitenji and Douglas get into one in S1E26, fake-laughing at first, then outright with clenched teeth.
• Curb-Stomp Battle:
  • Emily not only knocked Draciel out of the match, she blasted him out of the stadium so hard, Max couldn't even react to catch his blade!
  • Eddy puts Rei through this during the finals of the American Tournament. He then ends up on the receiving end of one against Yuriy in the pre-Russian Tournament show-offs.
• Cursed with Awesome: Team WHO. They say they were turned into monsters after losing to the European champions, but there doesn't appear to be any consequences to that in the dub. The sold their souls in the original, true, but what that entails is not dwelled upon. On the plus, they can teleport, have bit-beasts, and clearly took some levels in Badass.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Nearly every beyblader or team that is defeated by the BBA is incorporated into their group of friends. The ones that aren't are one-episode obstacles anyway.
• Demoted to Extra: The bit-beasts in G-Revolution. Despite being a major element to the bey-battles in the previous two seasons, they're barely mentioned or featured in third seasons' fight scenes.
• Died in Your Arms Tonight: Played with in regards to Yūya. He cannot have died in Kai's arms because Kai envisions him later in hospital clothes, which only makes sense if he'd actually been brought to a hospital for a longer stay. However, it is the last time Yūya actually appears in the show and in the original version is the last time he's confirmed to have been conscious.
• Disney Death:
  • There is a somewhat odd example near the end of season 1. Rei's bit-beast Driger apparently sacrifices itself in order to save Rei's life. According to Kai, while Driger was able to protect Rei from taking further damage from Falborg's wind attacks, the attack was too much for Driger, which caused it to disappear after the fight. Near the end of the season finale, it is shown that Driger has returned to Rei.
  • Similarly, in G-Revolution, Dranzer's bit-chip shatters and you hear it cry and yet come the epilogue, here it is again. Then again, Dranzer is a phoenix, an animal depicted to be reborn from it's own ashes...
• Diving Save: Overlaps with Tuck and Cover. In S2E10, Hiromi and Kyōju are in the path of a rock slide and too caught off-guard to move out of the way in time. So, Kai jumps in, pushes them to the wall, and stands over them to protect them from whatever may still fall at that angle.
• Drink-Based Characterization: In S1E29, Kyōju needs some time alone to make sense of his life since the day he met Takao. To this end, he goes to a bar where he orders milk on the rocks, much to the disbelief of the other patrons. Him ordering milk is both a gag because it contrasts with the trenchcoat-and-hat badass way he enters the bar, but it also is a gag because the whole atmosphere doesn't fit Kyōju to begin with. He's a nerd, somewhat prone to stress, and shy and polite. Of course he'd order milk!
• Dull Eyes of Unhappiness: After being defeated by Brooklyn, Kai is seen aimlessly walking around and slouched on the ground of an alley with these. The look is completed by the tired lines underneath his eyes.
• '80s Hair: There's some crazy hair among the characters, but Johnny, Zeo, and Hikaru qualify best.
• Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: Kai vs Sergei demonstrated this nicely in season 1. Not only did Kai lose, but he lost two consecutive rounds.
• Elemental Powers: Water (Draciel), Wind (Dragoon), Fire (Dranzer), Earth (Gaia Dragoon) and Metal (Driger). Dragoon's named element in the show is Wood, but apparently Wind comes under the heading sometimes.
• Evil Twin:
  • Black Dranzer in season 1. It was said to have been created by Rasputin himself!
  • The cyber bit-beasts in V-Force certainly count.
  • Also in the movie, all the shadow bit-beasts.
• Excited Title! Two-Part Episode Name!: The two part type title was used a lot during the first season. The second season dropped it, lacking a notable structure in its titles. Then the third season returned the exclamation marks with the latter type of title.
• Fair-Play Villain: In G-Revolution, Kai forces Boris and Sergei to simultaneously battle him, to ensure a fair fight against an exhausted Takao straight after. Needless to say, Kai singlehandedly defeats them both.
• Fastball Special: In S2E47, Takao's and King's solution to get rid of Dr. K's interference with their match is to have Dragoon throw Ariel at her.
• Females Are More Innocent: Of any given team that has a female member, she's near-guaranteed to be the most innocent of the team. Emily is the only one of hers who didn't bully Max about Judy and who tried to get Judy to admit to some love for her son. Mariam was the first of hers who objected to bit-beasts being hurt and who opened up to the BBA. Salima was the only one able to resist the cyber bit-beasts and refused to abandon her team even if they might hurt her in their state. Similarly, Mathilda was pivotal in getting her team out of Barthez's influence. The only archetype that forms any competition to the Token Girl is the Gentle Giant, which Mao and Gaoh showcase. They're equal in their kindness to outsiders, but Mao gets so much more focus that it's easy to forget Gaoh even exists.
• Final Boss, New Dimension: In the final two episodes of the first season of Beyblade, Yuriy creates a winterish void-like subdimension for him and Takao to do battle. Those left outside just see an enormous, spiked block of ice.
• Flat Character: With as many characters as the franchise holds, of course one falls through depth-wise here and there. But the second season, movie included, in particular has a problem not investing in its cast. It brings back Daitenji and Judy, but makes them doormats compared to their Season 1 selves. It fills up the episode count with several one-shot evil bladers with near no defining traits and certainly no audience investment. Despite that Gordo holds the position of a character that should have a story, he's really only there so Zeo has the partner required for a tag team tournament. Then there are the children that get possessed by the Four Holy Beasts of Darkness... at the end of the movie there's more to say about their caretaker than about them and the bit-beasts combined!
• Foreshadowing:
  • Giancarlo's ability to manage two girlfriends on the surface is just a show of his playboy-ism, but it's also a first glimpse towards him handling a two-headed bit-beast and utilizing a strategy that involves "doubling" his bey.
  • In S1E38, Ralf draws the Ace Of Spades. Knowing that he views a beybattle the same as a true battle with the defeating party "dying in spirit", things weren't looking good for him.
  • One involving the Japanese Beetle Brothers: In S3E9, J's hat features a stylized Japanese rhinoceros beetle. Rock Bison and therefore Rick follows as the stag beetle.
• Forgotten Birthday: In the dub of S1E7, Takao is so excited about his match with Kai that he forgets about his own thirteenth birthday. Luckily, Ryūnosuke hasn't and whips him up a party. This is a departure from the original, in which the party being thrown is a pre-battle encouragement attempt. Plus, Takao is ten.
• The Four Gods: The protagonists' bit-beasts are Genbu (Draciel), Suzaku (Dranzer), Byakko (Driger), and Seiryū (Dragoon). Daichi's Gaia Dragoon is the fifth god from Chinese mythology, also known as Kōryū.
• Free-Range Children: That part of the cast that is a child? It qualifies. Yes, all of it. As far as some have less free range than others, that gets portrayed as unhealthy at best and abusive at worst.
• French Cuisine Is Haughty: In Season 1, there's a bit of praise for many countries' food, but France easily gets the most gastronomic acknowledgement and praise.
• From Dress to Dressing: Mariam bandages Max's arm with her headband in S2E36 after the latter gets injured saving her from what would've been a nasty fall.
• Functional Magic: Device Magic primarily on account of the beyblades, but Theurgy and Inherent Gift are also present. Spirits and the like exist in the form of Bit-beasts and whatever gave the Dark Bladers their bit-beasts. Many if not most bit-beasts are inherited and while they can come under another's control, they do have a preference to stick with one bloodline or meritline.
• Game-Breaking Injury: Subverted. Always. Whatever damage the characters take is always cured in time for the next bey-battle or can be ignored by sheer force of will. There was that one time in S1E14 when Rei twisted his ankle, but it didn't matter because Kai fought his battle.
• Good Is Dumb: Just about any person who fought the BBA Team and reformed is an example. The two most glaring ones are the Saint Shields, who were legitimate threats in their first appearances, and Yuriy, who fought Takao for the World Championship at the end of the first season. Then he returned in Season 3, and was demoted to Kai's second banana.
• HA HA HA—No: In S2E32, Zeo drags Takao to the Aoki River and only there tells him he needs him for a beybattle. Takao laughs, then abruptly tells him no and leaves.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: Brooklyn, the final boss of Season 3, never practices because he has an abnormal level of natural talent. This is presented as a Bad Thing ...except you rarely see anyone else practising either. Most of the time, when someone needs to get stronger, they either get new equipment or a convenient bit-beast upgrade. But whenever they do get new equipment, they have to train. That was how Hiromi ended up joining the team!
• Heel–Face Revolving Door: Kai changes teams on a regular basis — up to three times per season!
• Heel–Face Turn: Just about every blader that the BBA Team fights ends up this way.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • Rei for both times when he lost Driger.
  • Rei doesn't take losing his match against Eddy well.
  • Ozma has one in S2E39 during his battle with Takao. At this point, the Saint Shields failed to capture Dranzer and Draciel and lost the earlier captured Driger. Ozma recalls his harsh training for the sake of his clan's sacred mission — a mission that has been carried by generations preceding him. Aware how much is at stake, he goes mad to the point he endangers his own team and refuses to listen to their concern for him and Flash Leopard.
  • Kai after losing to Brooklyn and thereby failing to join BEGA.
• Hero Stole My Bike: Takao pulls this twice in V-Force. In S2E4, Takao is forced to race across the city on threat that Kyōju and Hiromi will be killed. To make one of the deadlines, he takes Keiko's bike (and her dinner ingredients still in the basket). He gets into a traffic accident that may or may not have wrecked the bike. In S2E28, he takes a bike to go after the people who stole the tablet from the PPB. It's not said whom it belongs to, but is implied to be a police agent's, possibly Scott's. Takao doesn't end up damaging this one.
• Humiliation Conga: Happens to Volkov at the end of Season 3, where he is trampled by children that used to be BEGA's manipulatable fans, pissed on by a dog, and shit on by a bird. The dog and the bird were cut from the dub, although Volkov still has bird poo on his face.
• I Am Not Left-Handed:
  • The leader of the All Starz has one of these moments; notable in that he was an antagonist at the time.
  • Kai in G-Revolution wears a weighted cape and discarding it for dramatic effect during his battle with Takao.
• Ignoring by Singing: Takao tries this, among other things, to not have to hear another word of Bartolomé's story in S1E24
• I Kiss Your Hand: Giancarlo kisses Bianca's hand in S1E35 of the Japanese version. This scene was cut from the dub.
• "I Know You Are in There Somewhere" Fight: Kai on Lake Baikal. Also Zeo vs. Takao, Salima vs Rei.
• Immune to Slapstick: Of the main cast, Kai (being The Stoic Anti-Hero of the team) rarely took part in comedic moments, usually acting as a bemused audience or leaving to do his own thing. Rei, though more jovial, only had a handful of cartoony moments per series as well.
• Island of Mystery: There's two.
  • From episode 9 to 11 of V-Force, the BBA is abducted by Psychic and held captive on an island under their control. They are forced to keep moving due to the threat of the bombs attached to their arms being set off, which is how Psychic forces the bladers to each do battle against a Psychic blader. However, the BBA defeats them all, forcing the agents present to flee the island and allowing Daitenji to rescue them.
  • In the movie, the mysterious island is the one serving as the prison of the four holy beasts of darkness. Professor Tengai and his pupils visit it, unaware of the danger, and the four pupils become possessed by the bit-beasts. When the four are defeated, they are sealed back inside the island ruins. The island then ends up sinking, ensuring the bit-beasts will never be set free again.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Kai prefers to keep to himself, but he's only just joined the BBA when he's already showing signs of a protective streak, especially towards Max. As well, in S1E21, he's willing to train Antonio in part because his determination reminds him of Takao's.
• Killed Off for Real: Strangely, it's the second season with the cutesy art style that does this.
  • Dr B. in the second season gets accidentally killed in a fit of insanity. The death itself is offscreen but the implication is clear.
  • As much as nothing is said about it, no way that there weren't many deaths at the hands of the Shadow Bladers in the movie. For instance, one scene has a positively packed mass of civilians marching through the main street to evacuate when they are hit in full by a tsunami. Another scene has the entire city on fire.
• Lensman Arms Race: Due to the Merchandise-Driven nature of Beyblade, every once in a while the geniuses of the story come up with the new evolution in beyblading. The systems of the first generation are the Spin Gear System (4-Layer & 5-Layer), the Magnacore System, the Engine Gear System, and the Hard Metal System. The Spin Gear System was present from the start and got its importance sidelined in favor of bit-beasts. The Magnacore System was introduced in V-Force. In S2E6, Doctor B develops the Magtram to give Team Psychic an edge. They hadn't counted on Kyōju recording Snakey's battle against Takao and analyzing the tech used by the former. Kyōju then joined forces with Judy and the PPB for the development of the Magnacore. The Engine Gear System and the Hard Metal System were introduced in G-Revolution.
• Light Girl, Dark Boy: With the sole exception of Ming-Ming, every girl in the anime is either light-skinned, becomes light-skinned, or has a lighter skin tone than a related male character. Mao started off with the same skin tone as her teammates, but became paler than them, including her brother, in G-Revolution. Paula is the only member of Spintensity noted to have native ties, yet she's also the only one with light skin. This stands out even more when one considers her unnamed manga counterpart has the same dark skin as her teammates. The difference between Mariam's and Yusuf's skintones is small, but still lighter on Mariam's side. Between King and Queen, Queen is the one with light skin while King has dark skin. Moses's younger sister is also nowhere near his level of melanin.
• Limited Wardrobe: The cast generally sticks with one outfit per season, which you can consider either played straight or averted. Alternative outfits do incidentally show up for specific occasions, like nightwear, training outfits, and in the case of Team Psychic uniforms vs casual clothes. Ming-Ming, Hiromi, and Hitoshi stand out for wearing a few different outfits throughout G-Revolution.
• Long-Haired Pretty Boy: Rei, Zeo, King, Gordo, and Garland have this going on the strongest. Several others could count too, but these four leave the least room for discussion.
• Love Makes You Evil: Doctor Zagāto engineered practically everything the BBA Team had to go through during V-Force, but it turns out they did it all just so that he could use the four sacred bit-beasts to make his android son human.
• Loophole Abuse:
  • There is a rule that you can't attack another player, but obviously there has to be some proof you're doing that. Boris was able to seriously injure Rei by attacking him with air control, which the other high-ranking teams could deduce he was doing, but not witness or prove.
  • As was Garland.
• Lying on a Hillside: It's a recurring event in Bakuten Shoot Beyblade for the protagonists to head to the Aoki riverside whenever they are in Akebono and need a moment of peace.
• Magical Security Cam: Happens in S2E2, when Max sends footage of his first battle with Mariam. It recycles animation from the battle itself. Even weirder is that there even was a camera, because they were bey-battling in a semi-unused garage.
• Male Gaze: There is none in the first season, but it creeps in the second season and gets quite bad in the third season. The worst of the second season is the Girliness Upgrade of Judy and the Stripperiffic second outfit of Doctor K, but at least these are still adult women. In the third season, even the ten-something year olds aren't safe. Among others, Mathilda and Ming-Ming have a squeeze-boobs-up-between-arms part in their more elaborate attack sequences, there's the "Egyptian" dresses Hiromi and Julia wear for a single shot in S3E18, and odd bits here and there like a focus shot of Hiromi's torso while she's running in S3E51. Needless to say, where they could the dub team removed these parts. Also of note is Tao, who in the manga is platonically eccentric, but is turned into a Dirty Old Man in the anime.
• Meditating Under a Waterfall: The Bái Hǔ Zú do this while staying at their own village, starting with Rei in S3E4.
• Merchandise-Driven: Read more about the toys here.
• Monstrous Humanoid: Yes-No-Yes-Yes for bit-beasts in respectively Jisedai Beigoma Battle Beyblade-manga-anime-manga. The GBC title essentially reused sprites from earlier games produced by Hudson Soft, some of which humanoid, that arguably don't count, but it also featured Saizō, Hitoshi's ninja bit-beast, that was one of Takara's designs. For the manga, the Rokumendo bit-beasts were omitted and Hitoshi's bit-beast was replaced by metal versions of the BBA Team's bit-beasts. Then the anime created Team WHO, of whom bit-beasts Dracuos and Frankeos returned the concept of humanoid bit-beasts. The manga would eventually join in with Bloody Moon, introduced in Rising.
• Mood Whiplash: When the light from the final Tiger Claw attack clears, and realize Rei has won the battle, his friends are excited... until they notice that Rei is unconscious.
• Multinational Team: Due to the tournament system, most teams are uninational, but there are some exceptions. Overlaps with Non-Indicative Name, because teams tend to be put together by region, but this does not mean all members of a given team are from said region.
  • The BBA Team themselves, the Japanese team, consist of Takao (Japanese), Kai (Japanese but partially raised in Russia), Max (biracial with a Japanese father and an American mother), and Rei (Chinese). SixthRangers Kyōju, Hiromi, and Daichi are Japanese (as far as information is provided).
  • On a lower scale, Akira is said to be from "the neighboring town", but is exclusively seen interacting with the crowd from Akebono. In the GBA games, he's part of the Akebo Blader Kids.
  • Borg, the Russian team, becomes this when the Japanese Kai joins.
  • The European Majestic 4 have Ralf (German), Johnny (United Kingdom), Olivier (French), and Giancarlo (Italian). Since Rising, they battle on behalf of the United Kingdom.
  • Another European team, Team WHO, have Blood (Romania), Howling (Transylvania), Cairona (Egypt), and Gye (Austria). Egypt is located in Africa, not Europe.
  • In Aoki's notes, Team Psychic's members are said to have been scouted from all over the world. Kane is Japanese-Australian and Gōki is full Japanese. Salima and Jim were not designed with a particular background in mind, though Salima's name was taken from an African travel guide while her nationality in the anime is Canadian, and Jim's name suggests him to be either American or European.
  • The Barthez Soldats are a European team. Michael is named after an F1-racer, which is also how the Majestic 4 got their names. Therefore, Michael would be German. Aaron is Jamaican, but it can go either way whether his deal is like Rei's or Max's. Mathilda is from the United Kingdom since Rising, and Claude's name suggests he's from a (partially) French-speaking country. The French name suggests they might battle specifically on behalf of France.
  • The BEGA Team features Garland, Ming-Ming, Mystel, Moses, and Brooklyn. Garland's appearance suggests South Asian roots, Ming-Ming seems to be Chinese, Mystel is Indonesian according to Aoki's notes, and Moses would have to be from somewhere in Africa. Brooklyn has no decisive hints to him.
• Mundane Made Awesome: Gee, how do we make a show about spinning tops interesting? By giving them a mind of their own, it would seem.
• My Little Panzer: There are some things beyblades can do in the anime that would never allow them to be approved for child, or even general public, use. Even disregarding the bit-beasts, some of the components used in them can cause some serious damage, with one person even firing their beyblade at another like a gun. Obviously, this is all really toned down in Real Life... But that said, it's generally a good idea to make sure the components for them are on tight, and it's not a particularly wise idea to stand close to the arena...
• Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: Right after the question how bit-beasts are supposed to be acceptable by the official rules of beyblade comes the question how automated launchers are when the game outcome depends so badly on a good launch. Customized launchers that give an advantage but still depend on the skill and strength of the user, like Paula's fishing rod launcher or Emily's tennis launcher, could still be part of a fair match, but guns like Borg or Psychic use? Not so much, and just like with bit-beast ownership, the fiction works to avoid the subject. In fairness, the aforementioned teams are depicted as evil, but the launchers themselves are legal and they keep them even after their Heel–Face Turn.
• "No More Holding Back" Speech: This from Kai's second battle against Brooklyn in the dub:
  Kai. That's my name. And I'm a Beyblader. And you might think you are but you're not. You learned from the best but you forgot a very important lesson. Beyblading isn't just about overpowering your opponent with fancy moves. That's only part of the game. There's more to it than that. Much more. That's why I have something you don't.I have learned from every battle I fought. Every friend, enemy and spectator always had something to offer me. And I'm a student to this game. And I always will be. With the hardships of training, competitions, the wins and the losses, they all taught me something. And I've taken that knowledge and used it to my advantage. That's why I can say, that I'm a true beyblader. That's what keeps me going. And that's my strength. I don't think you ever will(understand). Because you're not a true beyblader. You have the power and the skill but something is missing from inside you. You don't have the beyblading spirit! That's why I have to win this battle! Because beyblading means more to me than you could ever understand! IT'S NOT JUST A GAME TO ME! NOW FINISH HIM OFF, DRANZER!"
• Non-Serial Movie: Beyblade: The Movie - Fierce Battle.
• Olympus Mons: Far more subtle in the anime than the manga, but still there is the idea that the BBA's bit-beasts are the strongest of all. The original four, anyway; Gaia Dragoon's status is somewhat ambiguous. This is particularly clear from Zagāto's insistence he has to have those bit-beasts even when he's full of praise for the bit-beasts he already has. By extension, their dark counterparts in the movie also qualify.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Kai has this attitude towards Takao. Not only does he join several rival teams over the course of the series, he also makes sure to always be the one who takes on Takao and that Takao is in the best possible shape for their duel.
• One-Steve Limit: For completeness's sake, the averted list includes manga examples, game examples, and covers both the original and the dub.
  • The Bái Hǔ Zú live by averting this trope. Their main bladers are Rei and Rai, while of the remaining four, three have very similar names: Mao, Gaoh, and Tao.
  • There's Genta Takeshita and Ganta Takeshita, but this is on purpose as they are brothers.
  • There's Makoto (Hiruta), the Blade Shark, Makoto (Amō), Kaoru's sister, and Makoto (Kinomiya), Takao's son.
  • There's Ayaka, the Shadow Blader, and Ayaka (Hiruta), Makoto's sister.
  • There's Hitoshi (Kinomiya), Takao's brother, and Hiroshi, the Shadow Blader.
  • In the Japanese version, the owner of Falborg is Boris (Kuznetsov), but in the dub he is Bryan (Kuznetsov). Meanwhile, in the Japanse version, his coach is Vladimir (Volkov), but in the dub he is Boris (Balkov)
  • Michael (Summers), the leader of the All Starz, and Michael, the leader of the Barthez Soldats, have the same first name only when their original names are written in Latin script. That is, the names are pronounced differently, respectively "Mai-khel" (English) and "Mi-gha-el" (German), which is reflected by the hiragana: "マイケル" and "ミハエル". In the dub, their respective names are Michael and Miguel, which then creates an aversion with Miguel ("ミゲル") of Season 1's Mexican team.
  • In the dub, Mao, of the Bái Hǔ Zú, is renamed Mariah, which looks a lot like Mariam, the Saint Seal.
  • The dub renames Satoru, the Shadow Blader, Steven, which then is exactly the same as Steven, the All Star.
  • In the original version, there's both Dennis and Denny from Team Zagāto. In the dub, Shingo, the Shadow Blader, is renamed Daniel and thus joins the lineup, as does Dan, Doctor K's right-hand man who is unnamed in the original.
• Totem Pole Trench:
  • In S2E18, Kyōju, Hiromi, Rei, and Takao infiltrate Psychic's training center. While looking around in an empty lab, an employee approaches and going Hidden in Plain Sight seems the kids' best chance. They grab two labcoats, Hiromi gets on Takao's shoulders and Kyōju's on Rei's, and then they never turn around when the employee addresses them so he can't see their suspiciously youthful faces. By all means, it shouldn't have worked, but it did.
  • In S3E39, Daichi gets on Takao's shoulders and they don a trenchcoat, surgical mask, sunglasses, and a hat in an attempt to seem intimidating enough to force the stores to sell them bey parts even though the duo doesn't have a BEGA license. It actually was working until they lost their balance and Daichi fell out of the trenchcoat.
• Parental Abandonment: When it comes to the main characters, Takao's mother is dead, and his father is away most of the time because of his job. Kai is in a similar situation, but has it worse than Takao. Max's parents are separated most of the time and he has to choose with whom he lives. In Daichi's case, his father is dead, but he does have the fortune of still having his mother. Rei's parents never appear and are never mentioned, so his case is left unknown. Kyōju and Hiromi have regular home-lifes.
• Pastel-Chalked Freeze Frame: Done throughout the three seasons as closing shots of dramatic episodes.
• Playing Card Motifs: In S1E38, the Majestic 4 draw cards to decide who'll play and in what order. Each of them draws a card from another suit: Giancarlo gets the 7 of Diamonds, Olivier the 9 of Clubs, Johnny the Queen of Hearts, and Ralf the Ace of Spades. The draw means that Giancarlo won't play and the rest will face the BBA in the same order. For Ralf to draw the Ace Of Spades also foreshadows the outcome of his battle in light of his own philosophy that once a blader defeats another, the latter is dead to the former.
• Purple Is the New Black: Very obviously so between Volkov, Gideon, and Barthez.
• Real Men Cook: Rei and Olivier are commended for their cooking skills. They're also the only non-adults shown to be capable of cooking and, incidentally, part of (at that time) all-male teams.
• Recap Episode: S1E29, where Kyōju recaps everything that has happened from the moment he meets Takao until the end of the American tournament.
• Replacement Goldfish: One direct case, another implied.
  • Zeo is a direct case, as he is actually a robot made in the likeness of the real Zeo, who died in an accident. Zagāto wishes to make him real with the power of the BBA Team's bit-beasts. After much struggle, his father allows him to be himself in the end.
  • Emily is an implied case. Narratively, she is placed as this to Max regarding Judy's affection. Not only is she Judy's constant companion during her time with the PPB, but she's also the only one of the All Starz who is about Max's age and uniquely has a matching color scheme (yellow, green, orange) to him. Throughout the American tournament arc, Judy gives Emily the affection she withholds from Max and Max outright wonders if that is because Emily easily beat him in a sample match. Relatedly, Emily is the only member of the All Starz who doesn't bully Max about his mother being on their side and who attempts to get Judy to admit to some affection for her son.
• Rollercoaster Mine: There's one on the Psychic Island in S2E9. It's not that over the top, but the ground isn't even and prevents a smooth ride. Other hazards, like rubble covering the tracks and rusty breaks, are due to age. On the other hand, it's a mystery what it was used for, since its shown ends are beneath a fortified building and another is cut short at a clearing. There's a bridge in the next episode that has tracks built in, so that's probably another part of the mystery rollercoaster mine.
• Scary Black Man: Keeping Ambiguously Brown in mind, there's a correlation between the traits male, dark(est)-skinned, and The Brute or The Big Guy, at least in V-Force and G-Revolution. Season 1 isn't innocent, but it did the most to compensate such instances with either non-scary black men or scary non-black men.
• Science Is Bad: Zigzagged. Science is portrayed as good as long as it assists and is subservient to the protagonists' "natural ability". That is, the PPB's science is presented negatively to the BBA's hard work and good spirits go at beyblading. It is presented positively when Takao needs the backup to have a chance against Yuriy. For that matter, easily the highest science is the creation of bit-beasts, which is solely something the villains dabble in (though the All Starz do too in the dub).
• Serious Business: This series is up there with Yu-Gi-Oh! in terms of inanity. Apparently, if you want to take over the world, you have to do it with spinning tops. As seen in G-Revolution, beyblade is recognized as an official sport. Lampshaded by Brooklyn to Kai, who on several occasions made remarks about how serious Kai was about the game. Also lampshaded in the German Beyblade opening, were a line in the lyrics essentially is "The whole world revolves around Beyblade". This aspect of the series is actually justified. At one point you do see Kai's beyblade chop down about 6 trees in one go and in another situation, he demolishes four brick pillars so you can probably imagine what it'd do to a human. Several of the blades even contain powerful bit-beasts and are covered in very sharp metal spikes, so they're much more dangerous than simple kids tops.
• Ship Tease: The entirety of S1E16 was this for Rei and Mao, even more blatantly in the original than in the dub.
• Shoe Phone: As the series goes on, it introduces more and more ludicrous ways to launch a Beyblade. Hell, halfway through the first season, we see the All Starz using various sport applications to launch. Including a baseball (which splits apart) and one on a tennis racket. That last one actually makes sense given the dubious physics used, all of which were thrown out the window for the second half of ''G-Revolution'' in favour of pure awesome.
• Shorter Means Smarter: In effect for Kyōju of the BBA (at least prior to Daichi joining), Emily of the PPB All Starz, both of whom are The Short Guy with Glasses, Jim of Team Psychic, and counting The Sneaky Guy, Kiki of the Bái Hǔ Zú and Yusuf of the Saint Shields.
• Shouldn't We Be in School Right Now?: Some 90% of the cast are teens and preteens, yet there are only two times, three if we stretch it, their current education is addressed. After not going to school for the whole of Season 1, Season 2 starts with Takao and Kyōju in school, and Hiromi is introduced to the main cast on account of being their classmate. Kai is later revealed to be off to Boarding School, which introduces his classmate Yūya for a plotline later on. It all lasts for 12 episodes, and then no one goes to school anymore. Another mention occurs in the first season regarding Giancarlo, who is introduced while sneaking away from his private lessons about to start. Similarly, Zeo in the second season is shown to get violin lessons from his valet, which opens the possibility he gets private lessons in other subjects too. Then there are various characters for whom it's not hard to theorize how their education works, but that's only theorizing and still leaves plenty of character that just... don't seem to get an education at all. Since then, Rising has addressed these issues too, but just as ambiguously. In the fifth chapter, Daichi has been made to study harder by his mother because his grades have been slipping. Needless to say, he's never been shown to go to school before, but here he gets a private tutor in the form of Hitoshi. Kyōju speaks of preparing for his high school entrance exams in the second special chapter, which is a new kind of concern of his.
• Shout-Out:
  • Tuckerization: In the original version of S1E1, Hiruta tells Takao and the others to meet him at the Aoki River, a reference to the mangaka Takao Aoki.
  • Bruce of S1E8 and S1E9 is a Bruce Lee Clone.
  • In the original version of S1E32, the horror movie the BBA watches is The Devil's Bloody Miserables, a heavy rewrite of Les Misérables. Max considers it in bad taste.
  • Hitoshi Kinomiya is a big shout out the "Char archetype" popularized by Gundam.
  • In S3E9, the back of J's shirt reads "Synergy". Synergy is an animation studio that assisted Nihon Animedia in the creation of V-Force and G-Revolution. Chances are this reference was put in by Symergy themself.
  • Stock Shout-Out: In original Japanese version of S3E21, Daichi loses a boxing match against a kangaroo, leading to a Pastel-Chalked Freeze Frame of him slumped over on a stool with a smile. To complete the homage, even the credits begin to play, leading to Kyōju and Hiromi to interrupt them because it's too early.
  • In S3E41, there's a shot of a BEGA tournament board to decide who'll join the ranks of BEGA's top bladers. Aside from actual characters, included are various (and sometimes misspelled) references. Blader #39 is listed as Aoki. Blader #99 is Synergy, an animation studio that assisted Nihon Animedia in the creation of V-Force and G-Revolution. Bad (#22), Gally (#07), Foxy (#??), Fiegel (#69), Jack (#25), Denis (#92), Denny (#44), and Net (#81) are names that belong to trial members of Team Psychic and Team Zagāto. Akira (#??) and Hiruta (#77) are names that belong to two characters from the early episodes of Season 1. Mamoru (#??) and Hikaru (#88) are two characters from Daichi's portion of the manga that weren't included in the anime.
  • In an interview, director Yoshihiro Nagamori explained that he'd purposefully added elements of Sailor Moon to Ming-Ming. The rest of the Ming-Ming Band may or may not be included in that statement.
• Showdown at High Noon: Max and Mariam have one of these in an abandoned amusement park in S2E37.
• Sinister Silhouettes: In the original version of S1E7, seven silhouettes of potential opponents the newly formed BBA Team could get a chance to battle against are shown against a world map. These are not recognizable as anyone actually faced, but the shot itself is adapted from V1C4 of the manga, which features ten silhouettes of which four identifiable as Rai, Michael, Yuriy, and Johnny.
• Slasher Smile: Kai in G-Revolution, with the Hellish Pupils and the Power Glows and the definite, definite not-smiling-really. Also Brooklyn, accompanied by the Glowing Eyes of Doom and followed by a Suicidal Cosmic Temper Tantrum.
• Slipknot Ponytail: During the third round of Rei's match against Boris, Falborg's attacks sever Rei's headband and tear apart the white cloth keeping the rest of his long hair together.
• The Smurfette Principle: Hiromi is the only female on the main team. She is more of a manager and doesn't actually blade herself.
• Snap Back:
  • Any and all Character Development Takao went through in the 1st season was completely disregarded in seasons 2 and 3, which had him acting like even more of a hot-blooded brat than when Season 1 started, and even back then he was much more mature.
  • The Bái Hǔ Zú and Borg from Season 1 to Season 3. Oh, and the Majestic 4. Kai between V-Force and G-Revolution, to the point where it's insanely hard to rationalise. Rei; goes from usually awesome, polite, and pretty sane really, to muscle-bound meanie obsessed with winning.
• Spanner in the Works: The Savage Slammers from the first season are the kind of people even a Cloud Cuckoolander would be confused by. They operate on nothing but the whims of their emotions and don't seem to be familiar with the concept of stress. In other words, the All Starz aren't able to profile them, and that unnerves them. Emily admits to the BBA that her team's glad it's the BBA that has to deal with these weirdos.
• Survivor Guilt: Kai blames himself for Yūya's fate after using Digital Bird, because if he had given the boy the attention he craved from his idol, he'd never joined Team Psychic. It isn't until he gets to battle a mind-controlled Gōki, who handles the completed Cyber Dranzer and mercilessly taunts Kai over Yūya's suffering, that Kai can escape his guilt cage and avenge Yūya.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Having a beybattle on a frozen lake might be dramatic, but it's also incredibly risky. The blades cause the ice to crack, putting Kai in serious danger.
• The Talk: Occurs in the dub of S1E1 when Takao hopes his grandfather is not going to give him the 'birds and bees' speech, to which Ryūnosuke replies that's scheduled for next week.
• Those Were Only Their Scouts: Pulled a lot. A-LOT! In Season 1, there's Bruce for the Bái Hǔ Zú, Andy & Tony for the PPB All Starz, and Alexander for Borg. In summary, almost every core team has a scout in the first season. In Season 2, half the bladers the BBA Team has to fight are scouts. That is to say, there's twelve scouts, split in two groups that precede Team Psychic and Team Zagāto, while the amount of non-scouts in Season 2 is fourteen. The third season has the Ming-Ming Band and the BEGA Training Squad for the Justice 5. The Barthez Soldat have this function in relation to the Justice 5 too, but only because they themselves chose not to be the true danger.
• Thousand-Yard Stare: Kai after losing to Brooklyn. Complete with flappy cloak. Also Brooklyn after losing to Kai.
• Throwing Down the Gauntlet: In the original version of S1E37, Johnny challenges Kai to a match and when the latter refuses, Johnny throws his glove at him to get him to accept. Which, somewhat surprisingly, works. The shots of the glove being thrown are missing in the dub, so the trope doesn't apply there.
• Tragic Dream: Zagāto's and Zeo's shared dream of the latter becoming flesh and blood instead of nuts and bolts. Even if they had succeeded in capturing all four sacred bit-beasts there was no guarantee they'd actually be able to make the boy human. The both of them do eventually learn to accept things as they are.
  Tyson (dub): He set his goals a little too high, but when he realized he could never Become a Real Boy, he found out that, that wasn't the most important thing in life. You see if you're not happy with who you are, being something else won't make a difference.
• Trauma-Induced Amnesia: As explained in S1E42, Kai lost his memory after trying to use Black Dranzer, and on his own no less. But he was too young, around 7 or so, to control the bey and beast. The resulting experience caused either emotional trauma or physical trauma and it wasn't until he returned to Borg's abbey at the age of 10 that he got that part of his childhood back.
• Turn Coat: Kai wears the crown that comes with this trope. Over three seasons, he switches sides a grand total of six times. He's allied with the Shell Killers, the BBA Team, Borg, the BBA Team again, then Borg again, then BEGA, then the BBA Team once more. Possible Chronic Backstabbing Disorder.
• Twisted Ankle: Rei sprains his ankle when saving Takao from a falling rock on the way to the stadium in S1E14. Takao carries him the rest of the way.
• Warrior Therapist: It seems like this series is ripe with both kinds of this trope. Apparently, no matter how many battles you've won in the past, all it takes to get you doubting yourself is a well-timed comment.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The background of Zagāto's and Daitenji's lost friendship is that 30 years ago they got their hands on a tablet containing bit-beasts. Then Zagāto stole it and disappeared. The two cross paths again when Zagāto has another such tablet stolen. For the rest of the season, bit-beasts are extracted from this second tablet, but the fate of the first tablet after its theft is never touched upon.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • In S1E16, Mao is not appreciative of Rei letting their history cloud his judgment during their battle in the Asian Tournament Finals, despite it working in her favor. She makes sure to call him out for fighting "like such a coward" and forces him to take the match seriously.
  • In S2E20, Takao gets this from Hiromi for yelling at Kyōju all because he was trying to help and he gets this from Max too after he yelled at Hiromi. He also gets this from Rei and Kai to an extent, when they accuse Takao of cheating.
  • In S3E13, Takao gets this from Hiromi, Kyōju, and his own brother Hitoshi when he blames his loss on Daichi.
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: The bit-beasts waver between being treated as living, sapient beings and as tools. It's not a matter of the good side's view or the bad side's view either, although it is sometimes played like that. Season 1 was generally considerate, spending the last two arcs on the need to respect bit-beasts, but even then Black Dranzer got the shortest end of the stick imaginable. Season 2 was not so kind. The cyber bit-beasts got the Just a Machine treatment, the shadow bit-beasts got an And I Must Scream fate, and the bit-beasts taken from the sealed rock were as easily ripped apart by insufficient extraction methods as discarded with literally no one batting an eye at it or taking measures to fix the damage. All things said, a bit-beast's people-value is only consistent along the lines of who owns them. Hence the story cares about the BBA Team's bit-beasts because it cares about the BBA as bladers, but Team Zagāto's bit-beast's get no cruelty protection.
• "With Our Swords" Scene: Takao gets to be the wielder at the end of Season 3.
• Years Too Early: In the original version of S3E5, Takao tells Kyōju he's a 100 years to early to be his rival, which Kyōju agrees with even though Takao's words hurt him. When at the end of the A-Block Kyōju helped Takao win against a tricky adversary that deceived them both, Kyōju shyly asks if the 100 years have shortened to 50. Takao apologizes for what he said and declares Kyōju his rival, no ifs or buts.

---