Boa noite Brasil (lost "Yu-Gi-Oh segment" from Brazilian television variety show; 2003)

Mockup image of the segment.

Status: Lost

Boa noite Brasil (or Good Evening Brazil) is an Brazilian television variety show hosted by Gilbero Barro from 2003 to 2007. Though, the show became mostly infamous for a segment about the card game, Yu-Gi-Oh being associated satanism, occultism, and the yakuza.

Background

In 2003, Yu-Gi-Oh was growing exponentially in Brazil due to airing of the anime on television. Though, it had a similar battle with religious groups like Pokémon due to the cards and what they depict, mostly claims of references to the devil. As a result of these claims, Gilbert Barro decided to make four programs attacking Yu-Gi-Oh saying that "it was the devil's deck" on June 2nd, 2003.^[1] But on June 5th, 2003, Boa noite Brasil decided to dedicate itself an whole segment to dealing with Yu-Gi-Oh. Gilberto went with great length to demonize Yu-Gi-Oh without knowing what it really was.

Barro started the segment by talking about Yu-Gi-Oh, Magic The Gathering, and other card games having satanic symbols and and influenced children to Satanism. For the prosecution was theologian, Alexandres Farias who antagonized all types of card games and role-playing games were an pure apology to Satanism. Defending the case was event organizer, Luciano Santos, and card game tournament judges, Roger Glasser who explained the origin of Yu-Gi-Oh and that it was a game about agility and intellegence.^[2] Even also explaining that there were no supernatural influence that turned children into zombies, as people wanted to imply at the time. Furthermore, there was a youth court where Gilberto interviewed them that played the card game.

One of the most remembered moments from the segment was Gilberto playing a scene from Dragon Ball Z, claiming that the scene was from Yu-Gi-Oh. Another remembered moment was Gilberto also claiming that there was a Yu-Gi-Oh card that demands the player to attack their father.^[3]

Consequences and Apology

After the airing of the episode, it spread like wildfire in evangelical churches in Brazil. Many parents bought what Gilberto said about Yu-Gi-Oh and threw away, tore apart, or burned the cards. School also started to banned children from bringing Yu-Gi-Oh cards.^[4] The Yu-Gi-Oh anime, which was shown on Nickelodeon and on an open channel, left the open channel's programming in the first quarter of 2004 due to having been reclassified as inappropriate for children under 12 years old.^[5] In 2017, Gilberto made an apology during an broadcast on TV leao, quote:

“I was guilty, but not that much guilty. People didn’t understand the message I wanted to give”, recalls Barros, as close as he can to a justification. "It was all from the heart, a movement to improve the youth and children of Brazil."^[6]

Availability

For years, it was believed that there was only one screenshot of the broadcast, but it was then revealed to be an mockup image on February 8th, 2021, which came from another Boa noites Brasil program about Simpatias in 2004.

On January 11th, 2023, two behind-the-scenes photos were found on Alexandre Farias' Flickr taken the next day after the program was made.

On January 11th, 2024, some images of the program were released on the Lost Media Brasil discord server from Redes Bandeierantes, including one of Gilberto Barros tearing a Yu-Gi-Oh card apart.^[7]

As of 2024, no footage of the segment has been released.

Gallery

Images

Gilberto ripping a card apart
Someone shuffling through a deck
Gilberto showing two Yu-Gi-oh booster packs to the camera
Screenshot 1/2 of Gilberto interviewing kids who played the card game
Screenshot 2/2 of Gilberto interviewing kids who played the card game
Gilberto shows a Magic: The gathering card to the camera
the person in the left part of the picture is a journalist, but, the person on the right used to be the deputy mayor of Belo Horizonte, "Betinho" Duarte, a man who tried to make these card games ILLEGAL in Brazil
Gilberto printed out comments, emails and forum posts from people criticizing his comments about the card game and how exaggerated the broadcast was
Photo of the dressing room.
image of Gilberto Barros and Alexandre Farias behind the scenes