Joe Kirifuda

Joe Kirifuda is the third central protagonist of the Duel Masters Anime and Duel Masters Manga series, succeeding Katta Kirifuda, the central protagonist from the previous Victory and Versus saga.

Details
He is the main protagonist in the final episodes of the Versus Revolution Final season of the anime and a new generation duelist first introduced in the season, followed by his childhood friend Kira.

He's Katta Kirifuda and Lulu Takigawa's son, Shobu Kirifuda and Lucifer's nephew, Shori Kirifuda and Mai Kirifuda's grandson. Like his father and parental uncle, he learns dueling at a young age.

Like his father and parental uncle, he have abilities linking to the creature world. While his uncle Shobu was capable of making contact with the spirits and his father Katta being able to give the spirits physical forms from their cards and speech through his "Victory Mode", Joe was able to make the card designs he drew into actual cards with the help of Decky. Due to growing up in the creature world in the first 3 years of his life, Joe was capable of interacting with creature spirits, especially the Jokers he created.

Appearance
Joe is a 10 year old boy with brown hair which is yellow in the front, styled with a "D" and '"M" above his forehead. This is similar to the "V" for Victory Mode found on his father's head during a duel.

He wears a neckerchief given by Kira, blue wristbands and hangs his deck box (a living entity with a J on it called Decky) around his neck.

At the age of 3, Joe is a small toddler. He wears a toddler poncho in a model of Hamukatsu.



When he was 8 years old, the edges of his hair was not as sharp and the "D", "M" above his forehead wasn't as visually obvious. He wears a red neckerchief, red wristbands and buckles a red deck belt on his waist.

Personality
Like his father Katta and parental uncle Shobu, he is quite energetic. Unlike his father, he dislikes curry bread (Because his father ate it too much and he got bored about it) and prefers ramen. He also can get a bit cocky like his father when it come to duels. Like Katta when he first picks up dueling, he was an amateur duelist in the beginning, losing many times to Kira. He was not quite good at building decks, as he placed cards from all 5 civilizations in his first deck, making it unbalanced. Despite that, he was capable of using spells and shield triggers to good use, though he have to read the card mechanics, making him a bit slow in a duel. Later on when dueling his father's friends and rivals, his skills have improved and his deck becomes more balanced. He loves drawing and western cowboys. He was shown to be a skilled artist, being the one responsible for drawing his own trump cards from one of the blank cards; Jolly the Johnny Joe, which later became an actual card. He was constantly seen with drawing materials and a sketchbook. Some individuals like Kira were impressed by his artistic skills. When he learns a new concept of dueling, he comes up and draws a card and abilities to match the concept learned. The cards he comes up with have some crazy abilities, much to his opponents' dismay or shock. He sometimes draws cards based by his friends and allies, much to their chagrin. His room was filled with drawings of creature designs, in which Joe later on uses Decky to convert them into cards. He still have liking of dragons, as his father always tells Joe stories of the legendary dragons.

He looks up towards his father, who was one of the strongest duelists of the era he was in. His parental uncle Shobu also took a great liking of him. Due to his family members being the strongest duelists in different generations they were in, Joe aims to become stronger than them in the Duel Masters World.

When he was a toddler, he was quite shy, though he was able to introduce himself to his family and his parents' friends. He is not afraid of creature spirits as he grew up coexisting with them, even riding onto Dragon Ryu as Ryusei with Katsudon. Ironically, he did not believe that they are real despite being born and raised in the creature world until Katsudon's arrival when he was 8, which was not a surprise as Joe was too young at that time to remember.

When he was 10 years old, his personality remains almost the same as when he was 8 years old, and He also uses Decky to create Jokers which can become into real creature spirits that aid him in his daily life, such as Chotto Q being his transport mechanism. Joe carries a canteen of hot water in case he needed the creature spirit.

Duel Masters Versus Revolution Final
Joe Kirifuda was born during the time his parents Katta Kirifuda and Lulu Takigawa were in a 7 year long journey in the creature world. He befriends his father's creature partner Katsudon and some of his allies since he was born, constantly playing with them before he went to the human world along with his parents and Dragon Ryu. At the age of 3, shortly after his parents' wedding, he was presented in front of Katta and Lulu's friends and family. Upon Katta revealing that Joe is his son, everyone was in a state of shock and surprise about the couple already having a kid. He was later being admired by his family and sits on his mother's lap in the group photo.



Being part of the Kirifuda Family, a prestigious family of duelists, he learns how to duel at a young age. He eventually grew up in the human world for the next 5 years. When he was 7 years old, he first met Kira, who was amazed by Joe's sketch of a cowboy. When he was 8, he tries to take one of his father's cards from his deck when he was sleeping but got caught by him as a result. He lost to Kira in a duel and decided to practice with his father. Before the day of the duel, he uses one of the blank cards and draw out Jolly the Johnny Joe, along with a name and skill. Katta then takes a look on Joe's deck, pointing out that the deck was unbalanced, though he promised Joe that he will teach him some important basics of the duel.

However, on that day, his father was not present. As he wanted to find some clues of his father's whereabouts, he took one of his mother's notebook in order to find out more about Katta's friends. He then visits Yohdel, Benchan, Bucyake and Hokaben in order to learn about his father's status and has a duel with Benchan. He uses Jolly the Johnny Joe, much to Benchan's dismay as it was the card Joe created but he have to go easy due to Joe being an elementary school kid. Joe win with Johnny's automatic win condition due to removing all of Benchan's creatures with the series of shield triggers in Benchan's turn, making Johnny the only creature in the battle zone once it was summoned.

He eventually meets one of his father's allies; Leo Hyakujuu and Nanmo Nai, who he decided to tag along with them in their spy missions. Upon learning of Leo and Nai's cooperation, he comes up with a support card Yattareman for Johnny. Again, he used Yatterman's effect to make all of his removal spells cost 1 and headed for the extra win.

Then he meets Kojiro which was working in a film studio and Kojiro did use a combination of Hellborof, Supreme Dragon Edge, Deathgoros, Supreme Devil Corrupt King, Death the Lost, Demon Revolution and Kill the Borof, Rebellion of K to put Joe to the brink but he then used his Bainaradoor card to remove all of Kojiro's creatures and headed for the win.

He then went to his uncle Lucifer's house and shoulder rides Lucifer. After then he challenges Lucifer to a duel, which Lucifer read all of his moves and the cards in his hand and in spite of Joe's drawn card, he still won with the help of Philosopher's Emblem.

He and his mother Lulu watches Basara's motor grand prix race. Finding Basara cool, he secretly entered one of the rest stops where Basara's crew were resting. As Basara's crew consisting of Hakase, Rambo, Ijiwaru Kiyomori and Rokuro recognize Joe's surname and queries if he is Katta's son, Joe answered positively, much to their surprise and shock. Joe continues to stalk Basara all the way to a high cliff, in which Basara saves Joe in time. Basara reveals to Joe how Katta have changed his perception about the world and noted that Joe was like Katta when he was determined. After the duel, Joe received his father's note from Basara, in which stated that he have to beat Kira first. Joe managed to arrive at Kira's apartment in time before Kira could leave a farewell note to Joe. As Kira have to move overseas, Joe challenges Kira to their 100th challenge, right at the place they first met. Even though Joe was stuck by Kira's labyrinth duel, he manged to unstuck himself and gain his first victory against Kira. In the airport, he and Kira exchange their scarfs before they see each other off.

Somehow his father also sees Kira off, though Joe decides to challenge him to a duel. Knowing that his father was much more capable than him, Joe drew cards based by his father's allies and comes up with crazy abilities based by their duel style. In Joe's first duel against Katta, he uses most of the cards that he comes up with, combined with their crazy abilities, much to some of Katta's friends chagrin and amazement. Katta commented that Joe had become strong due to all of the duels that Joe had went through. Joe almost commanded a direct attack until Katta uses Iron Fist of Revolution as a close shave. Joe eventually lost by his father's very first trump card, Startdash Buster, Divine Hero Mech's direct attack.

In the end, Joe accepted his father's statement of the creature spirits when Katsudon arrive. Joe then passed his father all of the cards he have drawn before his and Katsudon's departure to the creature world

Duel Masters (2017)
2 years after the events of Versus Revolution Final, Joe was 10 years old. He and his mother moved to a new town after his father's departure to the creature world.

When he entered a Duel Masters club, he was bullied by the rich boy kid Shacho and his friends. However as soon as he went home, he saw a comet swarm and tried to photograph it, but in the middle a living deck box known as Decky hit his face. Joe bought it back home and it claimed that it can create cards, which had Joe stick in a drawing of Jolly the Johnny in its mouth, forced it to dance and stuck a key up its rear and it became a real card. He was amazed that the creature based by his drawing becomes alive until Johnny started shooting in his room. Decky then coverts Johnny into a card before more damage could be done. He then proceeds to make a deck by turning all of his drawings into cards as well.

In his second time entering the dueling club he challenges Shaccho into a duel and at first Joe swarmed the field with Jokers but Shaccho bounced all of his creatures with Sharkuga, King of the Sea and broke all of his shields. However Joe still managed to win by topdecking Jolly the Johnny and won via the extra win condition. The following day, Joe realized that he was almost late for school, and his mother left breakfast and a note saying that she has to go to work early. He have an idea and drew Chotto Q, with Decky converting the drawing into a card. Decky then uses hot water to make the card materialize and Joe rides it to school, in which it picks up speed until it reaches a staggering 300km/h, though he overshot but made it in time. However, this had caught the attention of Team Usagi consisting of Pyonko-Hime, General Rabbit and Kabamaro, forcing Joe to play dumb in order not to get found out. After school Joe went to the bar his mother and maternal great-grandfather owns in the shopping district. He continues to assemble his deck until he was called to help by his mother. Team Usagi also visits the bar and noticed the same card he used to get to school. Joe continues to be ignorant on Team Usagi's attempts to find out more about his cards, though it was unintentionally foiled by either his mother or great grandfather.

He was then spotted by the Team just to get his cards, with Rabbit reluctantly going into a duel with Joe due to pressure from Pyonko and Kabamaro. While General Rabbit summoned Georges Bataille by spamming Mafi Gangs and removed his jokers with Dark Sun and Gurudo 54, Dragon Armored, Joe used Bainaradoor against his Georges Bataille which made his graveyard have 4 cards left and defeated him with Jolly the Johnny's extra win effect. A few days later he heard that his friend Kira was arriving from the airport and he used Chotto Q to meet him. He then encountered Kira dueling a swarm of duelists and winning every single one of them and hangs out with him, stopping by in his mother's bar and showing around the shopping district. After a while, he challenges him to a duel. In the duel Kira locked him easily by sending out Shouten, Stellar Guidance and Wonder Turtle, Great Labyrinth Turtle and became extremely hostile, and despite Joe sending out Jolly the Johnny, Kira won anyway and crushed him, causing him to cry, and when he asked Kira for more answers he left without an answer, much to his dismay.

Joe returns home and decided to convert the drawing of the dragon he had kept a long time ago into a card. He mentions to Decky that when he was young, his father always tell tales about the legendary dragons and their significance in the creature world. Decky mentions to Joe that it was impossible as dragons no longer exist in his world (which matches the Duel Masters timeline).

At one time, Joe was depressed that he did not have a chance to eat ramen. He eventually drew a creature The Ramen as an alternative method to have some ramen. However, the creature itself was not into the idea of having its ramen being eaten by Joe. Joe was forced to hide The Ramen when Team Rabbit arrives and secretly uses Decky to convert it into a card, but accidentally reveals the card. This results in Pyonko-Hime to challenge him to a duel.

In the duel Joe managed to send out The Ramen but was shocked to see that it was Vanilla. Pyonko-Hime then broke all of Joe's shields using Spike 7K, Ganzan Tank only to meet a last shield Bainaradoor and joe won by breaking a shield with The Ramen, then using Jolly the Johnny to extra win.

Joe eventually encounters a walking pumpkin and his classmate Urara Kamomo was following it. Joe drew Ura NICE to find out where she went. However, the creature spirit wants Joe to pay for its services to the point that Joe uses The Ramen to threaten it. Through Ura NICE's predictions, Joe arrives to a strange pumpkin field, finding Kamomo's smartphone and Kamomo being kidnapped by a rogue Shizenseijin which the spirit has taken a human form. To save her, Decky teleport the group to a tower Duel Stage, which have the similar properties as the one projected by Katta's creature partner Katsudon's Duel Field.

However, Joe experience the duel in the hard way. Like his father and parental uncle's experience, Joe sustained damage when a shield break occurs. To make matters worse, the rogue creature managed to spam the battle zone with massive amounts of Mafariich Tanks and broke all of Joe's shields, but the last one was the Ura NICE he created which caused a reversal, allowing Joe to defeat the rogue creature.

After then Joe stops Johnny from finishing the creature and instead allowed Decky to turn it into a card and send it back to the creature world. Even though the duo managed to stop one creature spirit, Joe and Decky worries that there might be more.

Manga
Joe has created creature cards that became reality known as Jokers and used them to defeat the rich boy kid Shacho. One day he has encountered the Jolly the Johnny Master Card and caught it using a rope. However after eating a bowl of ramen he encountered Team Usagi consisting of Pyonko-Hime, General Rabbit and Kabamaro which used a pair of pincers to get the card and fled.

This had him creating Bainaradoor and caused him to drop in the top of the Tokyo Skytree, in the middle of a pond in a park where Kira was eating an ice cream cone, into antartica and finally into the moon before entering Pyonko-Hime's base in a hot air balloon where he landed on top of the princess and stole the master card, enraging General Rabbit and General Rabbit challenges him to a duel.

In the duel Rabbit destroys Joe's Jokers with Mukade, Asura and he destroys it with Chotto Q, but Rabbit then regenrates Mukade and kills his Pali Nights. However when the Mukade broke Joe's last shield it was a Bainaradoor and on the next turn Joe sent out Jolly the Johnny and beat him using the extra win condition. However he has mistakenly enraged Kira since he mistakenly swiped his ice cream cone into the ground when he left the park where Kira is encountered.

Duel Masters Versus Revolution Final
Statistics

Aside of these statistics, he dueled Kira from Episode 45 to Episode 49 at the beginning of each episode, but all of those matches resulted in a loss. He had a total of 100 duels with Kira in the course of the story, meaning that he lost 99 duels against him at this period of time.

In his first deck, all of the cards used are from all 5 civilizations. Despite being unbalanced, the usage of multiple shield triggers and spells in the deck helps to make up for the flaw. He prefer to use alternate wins through Jolly the Johnny Joe's ability, therefore he uses and comes up with cards to remove all of his opponent's creatures from their side of the field.

In the later stages, his deck is more balanced, consisting of Fire, Nature and Light Civilization cards. All of the listed civilizations are primarily used by his parents and relatives.

Duel Masters (2017)
Statistics

He uses a Jokers civilization deck with a few Fire Civilization cards.

Trivia

 * He is the artist for his namesake card, Jolly the Johnny Joe. (However, the real artist seems to be Shigenobu Matsumoto)
 * Joe, Katta and Shobu have similar character concepts; all 3 uses Fire as their main civilization (though Joe switches to Jokers with a few Fire cards) and aim to surpass each other and their own family members in the Duel Masters World. Also, the character concept of Katta and Joe is a "Father and Son" bond, similar to Shori and Shobu. All 3 of them shares the same voice actress Yumiko Kobayashi in childhood and teenage years. The protagonists have a deep connection to the creature world, though Joe was born and spent the first 3 years of his life in the creature world together with his parents.
 * Joe is the third central protagonist to be part of the Kirifuda Family, succeeding his uncle Shobu and his father Katta.
 * His first name Joe is a common English name, making him the first central protagonist in the main series to not have a Japanese first name.
 * As Joe was 3 years old in his first appearance, this means that his parents were 18 when he was born. This was made in consideration that his parents are quite young.
 * Joe was the first main character in the anime and manga to design and illustrate his own cards.