Now that we are entering the third stage of this Steel Ball Run we have left the dry desert behind us and are instead in the much more lush Rocky Mountains. But that doesn’t mean things are going to be easier for Johnny and Gyro. With winding paths and many differences in elevation, this place should bring a whole host of new challenges to our main characters. And the biggest problem they have is the fact that Gyro isn’t exactly close to the lead. Dio and Sandman are both ahead of Gyro and Johnny. But it looks like things are about to get much more dangerous. Dio has been thrown from his horse, or at least is making it seem like he has. It’s not surprising that someone called Dio is going to be a bad guy, and Johnny makes this clear to Gyro. Still, Gyro is a good guy so he decides to help out the stranded Dio. Refusing the help, Dio does show signs of something being seriously amiss. He is passed out between the bones of a dinosaur with some sort of scales appearing on his hand. This will either be a stand or a part of the body of Christ. Yes, don’t tell me you forgot about the point of this race. It’s to find the body of Jesus Christ for the president of the United States.
It’s a trap
Leaving Dio to his own devices, the duo continues their way through the Rocky Mountain region towards the mountains themselves. They’re about to finish for the day when they’re caught up to by Dio. Something seems to be seriously wrong with Dio. His skin is still cracking with something seemingly trying to escape out of it and not to mention he’s making bad jokes and doing weird acrobatics on his horse. He’s clearly lost his mind. Not quite the intimidating Dio I expected. At the very least he doesn’t seem to be openly hostile to the duo, but that can just be a ploy. Now I know nothing about the manga for JoJo part 7 so every theory I have is purely conjunctive, but wouldn’t it be incredibly funny if Dio wasn’t actually a bad guy and he was just a total weirdo. Still, old habits die hard and Johnny can’t trust Dio. So despite being able to camp out inside a village, the two decide to make sure to keep an eye on their belongings and their horses while staying here.
This is the most Dio behavior possible.
While Johnny is making coffee, Dio is eating rocks and barging in on Johnny while behaving strangely animalistic. While talking, Dio still seems to be somewhat normal although he defends his habit of eating rocks as if it’s normal. He also has strangely raptor-like arms right now, but there’s no good reason for Johnny to decline him some coffee. Something does seem to be weirdly off with him. Not just that, his face seems to be turning very raptor-like. And to top it off, we see Dio turn into a raptor after seemingly eating a wild bear. What the hell is going on in part 7?
My, what big teeth you have.
Man, Dio’s design here is so freaking cool. A multicolored dinosaur with large scars on his chest and symbols around his legs that form the word Dio. It at the very least doesn’t seem like Dio is in full control over what is happening as his animalistic senses seem to be taking over from his normal wits. If this is a stand ability, Dio will have some training to do. While they’re trying to fight off Dio, Gyro notices something about the tattoo on Johnny’s arm and the nearby mountains. He seems to see the exact location of the next part of the corpse. With the lack of movement from Gyro and Johnny, it looks like Dio is going back to his dinner, which is the remainder of the bear corpse.
This very much reminds me of watching Page One in One Piece.
After using some steel ball tricks to get rid of Dio, the duo wants to start talking about the corpse again before being interrupted by a second dinosaur. This time it’s the corpse of a bear that is turned into a living creature below them with the same stone scales that Dio showed at first. I wonder if this means that Dio is the owner of this power or that he was already dead or dying when the others found him and was brought back alive through some external power. As is tradition with JoJo, after watching a full episode I have more questions than answers, but it’s still very entertaining for sure.
While we’re still dealing with the aftermath of the Shi family’s destruction, we now also have to deal with two new problems that have been laid out in front of us over the span of the past five episodes. The locust / grasshopper plague that’s ravaging the lands and only promising to get worse as well as the white snake woman who is able to fascinate the capital’s nobility while also seemingly handing out very addictive and damaging drugs to the most vulnerable population. We’re dealing with a combination of systematic destruction as well as natural disaster.
Oh, Maomao is far from finished with her work in the rear palace.
Yet life at the palace goes on as normal. Luomen has taken over Maomao’s spot with master Guen (the quack doctor) and has been a massive boon for the doctor. At least that’s what he thought as it looks like Maomao’s being summoned back to the palace. And it looks like a possible replacement for her duties down here is already in the works as Sazen is showing himself to be much more knowledgeable on medicine and herbs than Maomao expected. Despite falling, the Shi family continues to impress. If she can employ Sazen as her replacement while going to the palace, she has much more leeway. Sazen on the other hand seems to need some convincing. He doesn’t think too highly of himself, but he doesn’t quite realize that despite his humble upbringing, he can still be someone who makes a name for themselves. Your parents wealth is no indication of intelligence, only of means.
me talking to my students.
I do love that Maomao’s first instinct upon seeing the quack doctor is that he’s gotten himself fired. It turns out I was wrong in my prediction that Maomao is going to have to work at the palace, but I was right that she would be leaving. Herself, the quack doctor and Jinshi seem to be heading out together. At the very least the kids get a good laugh at Maomao sharing a name with the cat. Surely the fact that they’re bringing the cat along isn’t a sign that the cat will end up playing a valuable role in whatever business they’ll have at the village. Something, something, Chekov’s gun.
The only possible explanation here.
Here we once again see that my predictions based on the opening are often very wrong. Jinshi’s wound on his face festering seems to be less so a real thing but instead just a way to disguise his face. A running theme in this show that I really like is that whenever Maomao catches on to something on the political movings in the palace she quickly dismisses it because she really doesn’t want to bother worrying about it. Here she notices that Jinshi is being prepared for the possible role of emperor. But she also rightfully recognizes that there are still many boys in front of Jinshi when it comes to the royal line.
He’s such a sad boy
We end up traveling several days south-west to the quack doctor’s hometown where they grow rice and barley. We immediately realize something is amiss, as one of the farmers looks like he’s been through hell and back despite the crops seemingly doing well. Someone that isn’t doing well is Jinshi, who almost collapses his entire disguise when he hears even the slightest possibility that Maomao might be hitched to someone else at some point. And before we dive into whatever is plaguing the village, we look at it from more of a personal level.
Sometimes you’ve got to show people their place by taking their fish.
Let me start naming Guen by name as calling him the quack throughout this arc will be quite mean. It looks like his relationship with his nephews isn’t exactly great, despite Guen taking over for his sister and going to the rear palace in his stead. And of course, he has greatly exaggerated his worth to his family. Don’t we all? They want him to make a request of the emperor and he immediately admits that this is beyond his limit. He doesn’t realize that the emperor’s little brother (actually his son) is sitting right there, and he has a lot more pull than anyone else in the room would have.
Look, it’s Maomao and Maomao
And here we get to meet one of the worst kinds of people that are out there, both in fantasy stories and in the real world. You’ve guessed it, landlords. After the passing of the previous holder of these lands, the established deals that allowed the family working here to buy the land over the span of twenty years seemed to be more and more abused to the point that payment is being hasted, presumably in an attempt to make the deal null and void and run off with both the land and the money spent on it so far.
A good conflict has both a societal side as well as an interpersonal side and it looks like we’ve hit upon the second one. My early – probably wrong – prediction is that the young girl is the landlord’s daughter.
It seems that there’s quite a bit at play in this village that goes beyond the simple greed of a landowner trying to make up for a lower profit margin. That’s always what it comes down to, right? Not a loss, but a lower profit. We can’t have that, less profit than the previous year might as well be the end of the world for the rich. But having Maomao, Jinshi and Basen present at the meeting should make it a lot more interesting. We’ll have to see what they get done in the next episode and I hope to see you all there again. Thanks for reading!
It’s been a very busy few weeks for me. I had an important uni deadline last Friday and I had to catch up on a bunch of work stuff that I neglected because of that afterwards. So I had to think really hard to try and remember what happened in last week’s episode. But it was revealed to us that the President of the United States is sending assassins after Gyro and Johnny to reclaim what I believe to be the body of Jesus Christ, which his father went on a pilgrimage to bury in the United States. Also, Johnny got himself a limited edition Labubu. I think it’s speaking either Italian or nonsense to him. Let’s move on.
hey lil mama lemme whisper in yo ear.
Considering this episode is called “Tusk part 2” I wouldn’t be surprised if Tusk is the name of this Labubu and not the name of whatever stand is currently harrowing Johnny. Remember that he was being fished through the feathers and beetles in his surroundings? It looks like the Labubu is either directing Johnny’s stand ability to do things or simply helping him. Also I swear it said “Johnny” so I think it’s friendly towards his new host. Things are definitely getting more and more interesting.
His legs most definitely moved here. Second time in a few days now. Maybe this guy isn’t even handicapped, he’s just doing it for the easy parking spot.
Johnny is starting to put things together too. He’s figuring things out very quickly and without the context that we as viewers have. The Steel Ball Run is being used to gather the mummified parts of a corpse and these parts give the person who is holding on to them some sort of power. It does feel bad knowing that this latest villain is likely not long for this world, considering he’s clearly mentally unwell. With the help of Gyro’s steel ball, Johnny is starting to figure out a direction to go into. Despite this guy’s personality, I find the power design to be very cool. Johnny is basically playing Meccha Chameleon in real life (the game where you paint yourself to blend in with your surroundings). It’s confusing the hell out of our poor villain.
Maybe don’t refer to characters who are younger than me as “old man” from now on? It’s hurtful.
Let’s not forget that as nice as Johnny and Gyro’s relationship has been, Johnny is in this for his own reasons. With the help of spin, this corpse or stand abilities he is hoping to repair his broken legs. Despite our villain’s shortcomings, he can be pretty clever at times too, sending Slow Dancer to go search for his boss and flush him out. Johnny uses this pinch to resonate with his newfound abilities and indeed name his new power tusk, as it’s gone beyond just the use of nails.
Look at me. I am the sandman now.
But we aren’t out of the woods yet. Using the unconscious body of Gyro as bait, our terrorist lures Johnny in and the two are sent hurdling towards him with the hook through them. I do wonder what his end goal is, considering he has now fully shown himself and is probably about to be turned into roadkill. Johnny tells Gyro that he will not give up the corpse that has entered his arm and it is now up to Gyro to deliver the finishing blow before the two of them can have a proper conversation about what the hell is going on. I bet the language on his arm is Italian and Gyro can read it, but we’ll probably get to that after Gyro sends his steel ball through this annoying guy’s face.
Now I feel kind of bad for him.
And yeah, I think I saw this coming to an extent, but this guy is really out here trying to prove himself to other people. It looks like he’s been down most of his life and finally wants to show off that he is smarter than people think. Unfortunately – and not through any fault of his – he isn’t smarter than people think but instead he’s doing other people’s dirty work for them without even realizing he’s being used.
This shot feels very “part 5”
Oh, it’s not Italian, it’s Latin, that makes sense. The writing means “move your legs”. Very apt for a saint to give Johnny the power to move his legs as one of their miracles. So the theory here is quite simple but makes for a great background for this story. If you have the body of a saint – someone who performs two miracles after their death – you will have a thousand years of glory and prosperity. And the only two states that have managed to do this so far are Venice and the Vatican. Surely the president of the United States is angling to become a third. And Gyro is already catching on to the fact that this might not just be your everyday saint. It might in fact be the body of Jesus Christ which feels all but confirmed.
lol
Despite being a great team, this now does mean that Johnny and Gyro have different goals. The upside of this is that if things go well, their goals don’t have to be in conflict with each other. Gyro wants to win and Johnny wants to find the corpse parts. Both can reach their goals, but they have to be quick to make up their mind because Sandman and Dio are right there. The four dash towards the finish line and through a little bit of unintended sabotage on Johnny’s end, Gyro loses his focus and ends up being fourth, with the victory going to Dio and second place going to Johnny. This is sure to cause some conflict between the two, but Gyro’s face here was very funny.
Lore accurate US President
Damn, this fictional president is probably much more clever than the actual presidents we’ve had in the US lately. We learn a little bit more here, as it is revealed that the president has already found one of the parts of the corpse. With this, we are headed towards the third leg of this journey. Gyro and Johnny are working together to win the race, find the body parts and save the child that caused Gyro to go on this journey in the first place. It looks like both Mr. Steel and Lucy are far from on board with the president’s shenanigans and if I can make one more bold prediction, I want to say that the man with them in the train – the third character in the president’s cabin that hasn’t spoken yet – is somehow related to Gyro. They have similar facial hair and we all know facial hair is genetic, right? Either way, I thought this was a fantastic episode and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Thanks for reading!
It took me a lot longer to write this review than I had originally planned. I also took the time since then to read the manga – up to volume 11 – to get a sense for what was coming after. There will be no spoilers for the manga though, only the knowledge that after the anime ends, the story only gets better. With that out of the way, let’s dive into the world of Daemons of the Shadow Realm.
A little fun fact about Gabby. Her color scheme wasn’t actually designed by Arakawa herself but it was just such a broad assumption that she’d be blond with a red coat that the author just went with it.
Yuru is a normal boy living in a mountain village. Well, normal might be a lie. He lives with his grandmother and his twin sister and goes out into the mountains to hunt. When he was younger, his parents abandoned him and his sister. This sister has also been stuck in a cell since she was very young, as she had a very important duty to perform for the village. You see, Yuru and his sister Asa are the twins of day and night. When twins are born in Higashi Village and one is born during night and one after daybreak, they are said to be able to inherit the power of seal and break. Seal and break are powerful daemons who allow their wielders to interfere with other Daemon contracts in pretty major ways. They basically make the person who wields them incredibly powerful. But to gain these powers, the twins will each have to die at least once.
You’re going to get that feeling a lot, I’m afraid.
The story takes off on a day when Higashi village’s barrier is torn down and they are suddenly and brutally attacked by a group of strange people wielding even stranger weapons and powers. You see, while Higashi village maintained an old standard of living within their barrier, the rest of the world advanced to modern times and those modern times have now come to wreak havoc. The main culprits here are a young blond girl named Gabby who wields a giant set of dentures and a young woman who is Yuru’s sister? But Yuru’s sister is in the cell? What is going on? During the chaos, Gabby kills a lot of villagers with no regard for their lives and Asa violently attacks Asa – yeah, it’s confusing – before proclaiming that she is the real Asa.
I love this show of Yuru posing against the sun behind him. He is the night after all, and we see Asa in darkness, the two of them being each other’s other half.
While all of this is happening, Tadera Ryu – a porter for the village – takes Yuru to safety, even giving him a medallion that lets him wake up two powerful Daemons that have guarded the village for centuries. Left and Right. These guardian Daemons are supposed to be a countermeasure against the powers of break and seal, but now they are in the hands of one of the twins. After Asa and Gabby reconvene with the other people they were with, Dera takes Yuru off the mountains and into the modern world. And all of this is just the first episode.
Hana explaining things this way is easily the best running gag in the entire manga/anime.
The story more or less follows a complicated web of different factions wanting different things from the twins. Yuru needs to navigate this web as well as his new life in the world below. Hiromu Arakawa – yes, that Hiromu Arakawa who wrote Fullmetal Alchemist – is at her best when she’s writing believable characters with interesting moral dilemmas to face. Yuru is calm, collected and very reasonable, but he’s also a teenager. He gets upset, gets overeager and in a world where he does not understand the stakes of what he’s doing, this can lead to dangerous situations. Still, he behaves logically and is a joy to watch. Asa has a life of trauma under her wing that she and the people around her try their best to navigate as well.
Good job!
When it comes to the anime itself, the execution is perfectly adequate. It doesn’t have the animated polish of One Piece’s Egghead, but the animation just does its job perfectly well. With character designs that feel grounded yet interesting, we get to see once again why no one does it like Arakawa. I genuinely think she is one of the most – if not the most – talented character writers in manga. There are better characters in manga than the twins (both from this show and from FMA) but I can’t think of many authors who are as consistent in writing characters. Asuma, Gonzo, Asa, Yuru, Dera, Hana, Yamaha, Danji, Left, Right, Gabby and Jin all feel like they are real people with real backgrounds, experiences and worldviews. And the same can be said for many of the more minor characters.
The other twin, Asa.
Lastly, to finish things up let’s quickly talk about the opening themes. Both of them are solid as well, with the first one being by a favorite of mine, Vaundy. The second one is done by an artist I’m less familiar with – Masanori Otoda – but is just as good if not better. What I like about the second opening is that there are some pretty big pieces of foreshadowing that I wouldn’t have caught up on unless I knew what was going to happen, so props to the people directing those. If you want an anime that – despite not telling the full story quite yet – feels like the complete package, then you absolutely must give this one a watch. I liked it enough that I thought it warranted its own review, that’s why it took a little bit longer than the rest. Thanks for reading!
Yesterday I reached 400.000 words for the year which I think is pretty impressive. I was aiming for 500.000 at the start of the year but due to life being busy lately, I think I’ll aim a little lower. I’ve been taking it slow lately to make sure I don’t overwork myself and a lot of the writing I have been doing is aimed at stuff that’s not coming out anytime soon. I’m still in the process of figuring out exactly how to tackle the Hesitant Hero from here on out, but more on that soon. For now, let’s watch our favorite catlike apothecary stumble through palace politics.
Nerdge.
I’m reminded each week of how good the music used for this show is. Both the opening by Yorushika and the ending by Eve have been playing on repeat during my commute. One thing that just caught my attention is that the book that the opening focuses on is not the one about insects – which Maomao had been searching for – but instead one about plants. I wonder if that will end up becoming relevant later on in the season. It looks like this opening has a ton of symbolism and little bits of foreshadowing, so I doubt it was put there without a purpose. Perhaps the wound on Jinshi’s cheek needs to be healed – as we see it scarred over – with a plant that they can’t find easily. We also see several characters in a garden later on. But first, the episode is titled after the white snake which means we’ll likely get to see more of the albino woman we saw last episode.
I am lowkey obsessed with eyes with strange colors. A big part of my early stories also included characters with special eyes. I want to bring that back at some point, but someone with white hair and red eyes just activates all the right neurons for me.
Maomao gets a visit from Lahan, who is her cousin and the adopted son of Lakan. Lakan’s subordinate is called Rikuson and he is sent instead of Lakan who is busy falling in love all over again. Either way, it’s time to go visit a show. And the only way to visit a show is by wearing a mask, because it would be weird if people recognized you. Now obviously with a mask like that on in real life it would still be relatively easy to recognize people – especially ones that you know – but I barely recognize people without a mask on if I meet them outside of the places I expect to meet them, so I’d probably be totally lost in a place like this. Then again, I wouldn’t go, so there’s that.
Yet you still listen to your dad and let the snake go.
There’s something to be said about the allure of something or someone being different from what you’re used to. This is going on a tangent, but I remember when a boy joined our class whose family came from Afghanistan. I grew up in a relatively small town, so it was somewhat rare to have people of color around us, although we did have a few kids in school with roots in other cultures. Still, I remember this being a very big deal because this guy was so different from us in how he looked. Obviously it wasn’t a bad thing and although I wasn’t close friends with the guy, he was just one of the kids in the class. These people here have never seen a woman with white hair and red eyes before, and are enthralled by her beauty. It does help that she’s putting on a show.
Is this your card?
Of course Maomao gets chosen to partake in the show up front and when she remarks that the ink she’s given to write with is thick and grainy you know that this is going to be part of the trick. I am a little bit disappointed that this woman is essentially doing a Penn & Teller here. There is a lot of showmanship and there are a lot of sounds that distract you from the other things that are going on. Either way, the woman knows exactly what Maomao wrote on the note. Not only that, she also knows exactly which of the spots she put the note in. Of course Jinshi assumes Maomao would figure out how it was done but Maomao hasn’t been able to quite figure it out yet. There also seems to be some trickery of the senses going on while on stage, as Maomao gets hot and a headache while on stage. I wonder if there’s some sort of drug being dispersed throughout the air. Perhaps everyone’s just getting stoned while in there.
Snack.
Maomao has it all figured out, but I, dear reader, have not. I know it’s trickery, of course, but I am lousy when it comes to figuring out magic tricks. A lot of it has to do with alchemical reactions. This stuff has layers. What makes the entire thing dangerous at the end is that she takes in mercury. It looks like she left some people seriously ill but none of this seems to have been done to any clear and particular effect. With the white lady once again disappearing from the public eye, we’re left to wonder what was truly going on.
It’s been almost a week since I last wrote something that isn’t for work or an essay for uni. I handed in a big essay this morning after more or less finishing it yesterday. I’m pretty nervous about it because I’ve had a lot of failures in the past few years, but I’m very close to graduating which would turn my contract into a permanent one. I’ve talked about this before, I won’t bore you with it any longer, but today I want to get back into the habit of writing every day. And it’s JoJo day so that shouldn’t be too difficult.
Symbolism
Jesus jumpscare. We learn that Joseph drew a map of America before it was discovered. It was also the lost map that was the only thing that survived the fire and it looks like the stars might match the different legs of this journey. Is all of this in the bible too? I never knew. And somehow all of this led to Johnny’s hand being scooped out of his skin. Or not? Rule of thumb when you can’t explain something in this story is that it’s probably the work of an enemy stand user.
me when I try to get that irritating little pimple from the inside of my nostril.
After the opening finishes we get to learn a little bit about how badly things have been going for some of the racers. Over 500 of them have dropped out – many of them at the same location – and there are already 68 casualties. It is very concerning that a ton of these people are currently racing through the devil’s palm and many of them will probably pick up a stand ability while traveling through it. “The devil’s palm chooses people.” And it looks like a lot of people are about to be chosen. And despite all of their encounters, Gyro and Johnny are still ahead. And Mr Steel possibly knows something about Gyro and his situation, since he thinks Gyro is picking something up on the road. Does he know about Zombie Horse?
It’s kind of insane how in 2004, Araki wrote an American president that looks like a short, fat weirdo with obviously fake hair. He’s a prophet.
We meet two new characters that look like Ibaram from One Piece. They are probably from Italy – I was wrong, it’s the president of the United States – and they were the ones that sent Oye after Gyro. These people are after a corpse that is supposedly here in the desert. How does this link back to Jesus and Joseph from the start of this episode? Whose corpse is it, why are these men looking for it and why do they believe that Gyro might have it? It looks like we’re digging into the core of the story now and I’m curious to see who these people are and what their deal is. My very early guess is that the hand that just went into Johnny’s skin is the first part of this corpse. Why it did that, no idea.
Japan invented react content.
I do like these quieter moments where the duo are just having fun with each other. It makes sense that if you’re traveling the entire continent on horseback there will also be times where you’re just talking about silly shit instead of having active life or death situations going on. Don’t you agree, Gyro? Gyro? Where did you go? Johnny must be a gamer, because gamers don’t look up and even though we just saw a bunch of birds fly over, he isn’t looking up at all. Even the birds could explain what is going on, why did both Gyro and his horse disappear without the gear, while the gear disappears afterwards. Whatever it is that took Gyro and his horse, it’s not currently visible and seems to be attacking Johnny with a different power. One power makes things disappear, another power can cut into things.
nope, nope, nope, absolutely the fuck not.
Whenever I cycle to work, there’s this little tunnel that goes along the water underneath a bridge. Sometimes there will be people there that are fishing and one of my fears is that one day they will swing back their rod to cast out a line and hit me with the hook on their fishing rod. It’s not a very realistic fear, but I feel like that would be a terrifying experience. So I can only imagine the terrifying feelings that having a steel hook piercing through your face would bring you. Absolutely awful to even think about. It looks like these feathers have the ability to send out hooks that grab onto people and then take them into another dimension. Something seems to be around here, invisible, guiding the feathers. They stop at a certain distance after all. Using his own stand powers, Johnny does manage to get to relative safety despite his disability.
This reminds me of a game I played as a kid where you would use magnets to fish inside a big square, let me see if I can find it online.
This stand is definitely related to the president we met earlier as it has a clear goal. They want something that Gyro and Johnny might have and Johnny puts the pieces together. Oye and Stroheim were also after this mummified arm. We now meet the stand user that did all this and it’s probably the weirdest person we’ve seen in this series so far. Even though this guy has access to the things he stole from Johnny and Gyro, it seems he was also able to take out Gyro in the process. His ability looks like it works like a weird form of fishing. The weirdo fishes into a bowl of water and catches whatever is on the other side of the ability, be it through feathers or insects. So my fear of people fishing might be more accurate than I thought.
I couldn’t find a picture of the exact game I had – it’s probably ancient at this point – but this is similar enough to show you what it reminded me of.
And ladies and gentlemen, if you thought this show was weird before, it’s about to become even weirder. Some weird labubu just came crawling out of Johnny’s arm and started talking to him. Is this his stand ability or the stand ability of the corpse that seems to be fusing with him? Next thing you’re going to tell me is that this labubu is actually the new body of Jesus Christ. That’s what was hidden here, right? The body of Christ? I can’t think of another logical explanation, if it was Joseph that went on a pilgrimage and buried something. We’ll have to wait a while to figure out if I was right, but as always I think this was a very interesting episode. Thanks for reading!
No cold open for this one but we’re jumping straight into the opening. After waiting far too long, I finally got the song for this on my Spotify playlist. Glad they finally released it, Yorushika is one of my most listened to artists. Other contenders for that spot are Bump of Chicken, Greenday and Counting Crows, but all of them pale in total listens when compared to Fall Out Boy. I digress, let’s talk about episode 4!
Ah-Duo says to not mind her, but she’s totally just going to sit there and listen in. Suiren and Maomao talk about the books and Suiren says one is missing. When she says this, we see a shot of the two of them with the focus actually being on Ah-Duo’s hand in the background. I wonder if that is alluding to something or if it’s simply there to remind us that she is listening closely. We learn that the apothecary at the Shi family home used the resurrection potion to get out of there. Unfortunately for Maomao, the side effects of the potion hit him as hard – if not harder – as they hit Chou-u. Again we see Ah-Duo’s hand in focus. These shots feel intentional, so she is probably going to at the very least add something to this conversation.
I’m trying to pay more attention to the way shots are framed, especially in anime that seem to be doing a good job at this stuff, in hopes I can get a bit more information out of them. Here it is clear that Ah-Duo will have something to do with what is being discussed.
And of course, Ah- Duo is immediately catching on. Shisui might have left something important behind and it takes a reminder of the most impressive of the women in the rear palace to figure out what is going on. Maomao does a little happy dance when she finds out where the book was and then promptly gets Jinshi to retrieve it for her. It is interesting to think that in a world without the internet – or many copies of books in libraries everywhere – having access to a series of books can make a huge difference. You can be clever or knowledgeable to an extent, but having the research and clear drawings of someone who actually knows their stuff is a big deal. Maomao and Jinshi finally have to accept that a large locust plague is on its way.
I lowkey really like these drawings, they’re super well done.
We learn here that the betrayal of the Shi family hasn’t shown its full damages yet, as they’ve taken out the forest that was supposed to be protected by the previous empress. With no trees there, not only do they have no wood to sell in exchange for food but there is also no place for the birds to thrive, leaving their natural enemies few and far between. Maomao has a bunch of ideas to deal with it, but none of them are particularly good. It’s just like her to feed grasshoppers to a royal like Jinshi. He doesn’t let her win and instead lets her feed him one of the grasshoppers and some porridge. I guess anything is game if it’s fed to him by Maomao.
Maomao reminding her why she is named after a cat, showing some very catlike qualities.
With how involved all of the women at the Verdigris house are with relationships, romance and sex, it only makes sense that they’re all very perceptive when it comes to these things. Everyone’s caught on to Maomao’s fondness of Jinshi, Maomao herself is of course no exception to this. It is kind of sad to think that these women are considered too old when they look like they’re probably still younger than me. Maomao agrees. The rumors they’re talking about when it comes to a strange girl spotted around that the people are into is likely the girl that has been going around feeding drugs to the people.
Alright, but maybe we should just hear her out, she seems lovely.
This sorceress seems to be doing some pretty big manipulation among the upper ranks in the city. She’s gathering a crowd by claiming she can bring immortality. Surely this won’t become an issue in the long run. We saw her briefly at the very start of the episode, but we see more of her at the very end. In a crowded room full of officials and incense, a young woman with red eyes and bright white hair drinks something that looks metallic. Something fishy is definitely happening. A shorter recap this week, but I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless. Thanks for reading.
I spent way too long this morning figuring out if I had somehow missed an episode or where I was going wrong only to realize after several minutes that I had simply gave last week’s episode the wrong name. I named it episode 4, but it was in fact episode 5. I have of course changed it since then but it is a sign that even though I’ve been sleeping a ton the past few days, I might still need more sleep. Luckily the time change is this weekend and we get an extra hour between Saturday and Sunday. I’m not a big fan of the time change in general, but most of my dislike is aimed at the change in spring where we lose an hour. Anyway, you’re here for more JoJo.
The enemy stand user could be anyone in this desert.
Last week we dealt with a creepy assassin named Oye who tried to kill Gyro and take the large bounty on his head. Despite having a very dangerous stand ability, he didn’t quite make the cut. Now our duo are on the road to find this zombie horse that a letter to Gyro was talking about. I’m curious if this will end up being a horse with a stand or something else. Spoiler, it was something else. Apparently it’s just some thread that is turned into a mural and when you stitch it into your wound it should help with the healing. A gift from the king. I’m not quite certain if they’re alluding to this king also being related to Gyro as family or not, but we learn at least as much that his father was a doctor. Gyro also doesn’t believe either the string or the steel balls have anything to do with stands.
I get that the spin is probably some hamon-related power that the Zeppeli family are masters over, but I reckon this zombie horse is the stand of someone back in Gyro’s home.
I get my answers quickly – as usual – and we see that a young Gyro opens the door for a visitor, who summons Gyro’s father to the castle. This takes place in the kingdom of Naples, and although there is no link between part 5 and part 7 from what I know, it is curious they’re going back to Italy. And here we learn a little bit about the power of spin. Gyro is a Zeppeli after all and if you remember in part 1, it was Zeppeli who taught us about Hamon. These people have been special in each part of Jojo they appeared in. So Gyro’s father teaches Gyro how to use the power of spin so he’s ready by the age of 13. It does seem incredibly cruel to have a 13 year old join his father for the day as the king’s executioner. And of course this is all done for effect, but at least prepare the boy for it beforehand.
When violence isn’t solving all of your problems, you’re not using it enough.
Let’s actually take a step back and look at the real world for a second. We’ve probably all heard about the botched execution taking place in the United States recently. A woman who murdered someone quite brutally has been awaiting her execution for decades only for the person administering the injection to not quite get the vein right. What they bring up in this anime is the fact that an executioner needs to be very familiar with how the human body works, which makes sense. But in the modern world, doctors swear an oath to never harm someone on purpose. This does tend to leave the type of people who do end up administering lethal doses to prisoners to be the less scrupulous people. If this is you, I’m sorry, but I don’t have a high opinion of you. When Araki talks about this being a reality and someone having to do it, I can understand the concept in an older society, but it’s 2026 here, most modern countries have long since outlawed capital punishment and for good reason. Not only is it apparently very expensive because it takes a lot of prep and expensive drugs, but it’s also botched more often than you would think. And finally, sometimes they get the wrong person. That last one is the big reason why I’m fully opposed to the death penalty. I don’t want to go into too long of a tangent about the prison system in general, but I’m of the opinion that most sentencing should be focused on rehabilitation. I’m not naive enough to believe that there aren’t people who cannot rehabilitate, and I also do not believe I’m smart enough to know what we should be doing with those people, but I don’t think killing them – when the chance is there that we got the wrong person – is the way to go. But enough of that, let’s go back to our fictional ball-wielding gentlemen.
Excuse me…. but what the fuck?
It looks like I’m not the only one who has second thoughts about this whole thing. A young urchin named Marco is sentenced to death for treason, which is probably just a way to get rid of a nuisance. Gyro is a kind soul. The spin is not meant for hurt but for peace. He will not put an innocent boy to death just because the king tells him so. We see the difference between someone who chooses to follow orders and someone who chooses to think for themselves. I can empathize with Gyro’s father’s way of thinking. You have a job to do and doing it well causes the least suffering. But you can’t change the system that way.
You’re not wrong, but what value is a life where your heart is permanently closed off?
I knew this was going to make me like Gyro, but I’m glad I wasn’t wrong. We get his motivation here. I thought when this backstory started that he would just save the kid and run, but instead he is running to save the kid. If he can get the king to give out a royal pardon after he wins the Steel Ball Run, then the boy can be saved. He will still have to go back to Naples afterwards to become an executioner, but we’ll see how that pans out as the story continues. For now we have to deal with legally distinct Stroheim from JoJo part 2. Fortunately this doesn’t take long and we go back to finding out more about Gyro. He doesn’t tell Johnny a lot about himself, but at least he shares a little bit about himself here.
The nazi is back! Kind of crazy that in part 2 we had a character that was a literal nazi from the nazi party that actually seemed like a fun dude. Sometimes fiction is…… strange. Fuck nazis.
Before we leave and go to the next episode we get a pretty creepy visual of what is undoubtedly someone’s stand ability in which Johnny’s hand gets opened up like a zipper (shoutout to Buciaratti from part 5) and his meat and muscles fall out. That’s some pretty creepy stuff to end an episode on.
Last week’s episode genuinely feels like a month ago to me. Not because of anything to do with the show, but it’s been so incredibly busy these past two weeks that I’ve felt exhausted for days on end. Now that I have some sleep under my belt and a full week of fall break ahead of me it’s time to sit down, relax and enjoy some strange desert adventures. This is probably my brain activating way too late, but was Robinson a reference to the Simon & Garfunkel song? It has to be a song or band because Araki, but I didn’t make the link until I heard Johnny call him “Mrs Robinson”. Anyway, the point here is that he might have also been after the bounty on Gyro’s head and I hope we learn some more about what that is all about so that we can get this tension out in the open and dealt with. I will say – seeing the opening again – it is slowly growing on me. I doubt I’ll like it nearly as much as some of the classics, but it’s not a bad song by any means. I wonder if we’ll get any alternative versions of it.
Is this going to be a nurse Joy/officer Jenny situation where there are a billion of them that all look the exact same?
It looks like the gambit to go through the desert paid off as Johnny, Gyro, Mountain Tim and this weirdo named Oye are currently a day ahead of the main pack, at a town built to serve as the halfway point for this leg of the race. The episode is called “a terrorist from a faraway country” and I’m curious if that refers to this new guy or if it refers to Gyro. I think my question gets answered pretty quickly. Oye finds a note in Gyro’s belongings talking about a zombie horse that the king has prepared for him. Meanwhile Oye is here to kill Gyro. They’re presumably from the same country which I believe we learned in an earlier episode is Italy? Either way, Mountain Tim gets blown to bits – or escapes – by Oye’s stand ability while Gyro and Johnny are doing some shopping. And I’m sorry, but are you telling me that Johnny has been lugging that wheelchair around all this time? That or the Steel Ball Run office is kind enough to provide one for him, which would be incredibly based of them.
Me when one of my students changes the subject on me so they don’t have to engage with the work they’re supposed to do. Still, I fall for it every single time even when I see it.
Speaking of being based, Tim literally tore his body apart with his stand ability to survive the blast of the explosion, but it looks like it did some serious damage to the cowboy. This fight looks to be set up wonderfully by Araki. We get Mountain Tim to figure out how the ability works by getting hit by it, then we get Gyro disabled by the power because he now knows not to open his hand, but that also means he can’t do anything which probably means that this will be another chance for Johnny to grow and perhaps discover more about his newfound abilities. Oye’s voice sounds really familiar though, let me look it up. Ah, it’s Noriyaki Sugiyama (Sasuke from Naruto and Ishida from Bleach). Wait, Ishida and Sasuke have the same voice actor? These people are talented, I never realized this. I hear Ishida in his voice here a lot more than Sasuke. Either way, he’s a terrorist who killed up to 5 innocents back in Gyro’s home country.
You wouldn’t explode a guy in a wheelchair, would you?
This bombing ability is weird as hell. It looks like Oye leaves his skin behind on other people to make it explode. When it mixes with sweat it gets slippery and the pins start to come loose and while under the effect of this ability you also start to sweat more. The stand name is “Tic Tac Boom” by the way, or at least in English it is. It’s probably different from the Japanese name because they don’t want to infringe on any copyright laws here in the west. In Japan everything is blatantly named after artists and songs which I think should be allowed, it’s not harming the income or popularity of those songs and people and everyone with even the slightest bit of awareness can separate these characters from the artists they’re named after, but historically they didn’t want to take that risk over here. But enough yapping, we need to chase after Oye who is trying to get the zombie horse after blowing up Gyro’s leg.
Cool guys don’t look at explosions.
I will say, for someone who has only had this stand ability for about four days he knows how to deal with it quite well. Using the water to distribute the pins is a smart move and it probably would have worked on any lesser jockey than these two. They speed through the explosions in a very cool segment. It’s good to see that Johnny is starting to learn how to use his ability and can apply it to things around him. He uses it to take out the wasps that are attacking them but somewhere in the confusion Gyro gets hit. It looks like this guy can even attach the pins to cigarette smoke. Although I doubt this is just a normal cigarette with how much smoke is coming out. It’s looking pretty dire for the boys. But of course they had a plan. Johnny uses his nails to spin some spiderwebs around and in the moment of distraction, Gyro manages to hit Oye with both of his steel balls. Terrorist down and out. I just hope Mountain Tim is already, he seemed like a cool dude.
Although I do not put any big spoilers for the latest seasons of these shows in here, I will be putting in some pretty big spoilers for season 4 of Re:Zero, so if you haven’t seen it yet, skip that part of the review please.
Go listen to the ending of Polar Opposites by season 2. It’s one of the catchiest songs I’ve heard in a long time and it’s made me an instant fan of Mega Shinnosuke.
A little look behind the curtains for you all, but when I know I’m going to have a busy day at work, I try to schedule a piece of writing that’s a little bit easier to get through and requires less of my brain to still be functioning. Quick Reviews are a great outlet these days because I think they’re fun and interesting enough for people wanting to quickly see what the season was about while not being particularly deep, so writing them feels like a breeze. A win-win situation for everyone. I’m writing this one after I spent the entire day doing a training for mentorship in school. I might become a mentor at some point in the future so I figured I might as well take the training for it ahead of time. It’s free after all. Anyway, you’re not here for that, you’re here to see my lukewarm opinions on some anime sequels. So without further ado, let’s get into it.
Ascendance of a bookworm
I feel like this is what he ends up saying throughout this series the most. It’s got to be hard dealing with an adult in a child’s body who often just behaves like a child anyway. Not like he’s any easier to deal with himself.
And let’s start off strong with the now fourth season of this lovely isekai series about a book lover who died and reincarnated a sickly young girl. Where season 3 of this show felt a little bit slow and unassuming to me, this fourth season really managed to pull me back in with an interesting storyline, some more time spent with interesting characters we met in the last season and even a pretty interesting ending to the season. We continue to follow Myne – now Rosemyne – as she navigates her new life among the nobility. The subtitle for this season is the adopted daughter of the archduke after all. Rosemyne is trying to make a Jureve this season, a sort of elixir that will harden the mana in her body and – after a lengthy slumber – should turn her into a healthy young girl. She needs several hard to get ingredients for this elixir, but nothing is impossible if you have the head priest and several royal knights on your side. Still, getting all of the ingredients for this elixir does take some time and things even take a turn towards the end, causing the situation to become much hairier than it should have been. Still, throughout it all Rosemyne continues to love books, develop new technologies and stuns everyone in her surroundings with her vast amount of knowledge and ideas. If the third season made you wonder if this show was still worth your time – like it did for me – know that this fourth season has picked up the pace and is probably fun enough. A small bump in the road was the use of AI in the making of the first opening of this season which rubbed fans – myself included – the wrong way, but they have since then changed it. Up to you if that’s enough for you to turn away from the series or if you don’t mind. I’m fine either way.
Saga of Tanya the Evil
I think she’s mad.
How much time between seasons is too long? Attack on Titan tried to figure out just exactly how much time they could get away with and it resulted in the show feeling a little bit more confusing and chaotic than it could have been. I’m sure they had good reasons to take it slow – catching up to the manga being one of them – but the damage was still there. For me, the Saga of Tanya the Evil felt similar. In this second season of the bizarre show about an alternate world war 2 after nine years without it felt rather jarring to me at times. I remember liking the first season – in big part because of how strange it was compared to other series on the market – but I didn’t remember much beyond the basic plot. A ruthless person on earth is pushed under a moving train – Gantz style – and reincarnates into the body of a young girl. There he starts a feud with god – being X – about what it means to exist and if God truly is real. All of this takes place in the aforementioned alternative reality world war 2 where the empire is still going strong, but not without costs. In season 2 the fighting continues and we spend more time on the frontlines while others are getting involved. Fictional allies, fictional Great Britain and Fictional Italy all have a part in this war and things get dicey for the Empire at times. With Tanya wanting to find her way out of this predicament, she seems to have no luck so far and we end the season in a very similar position as we started it. I don’t know, I’m not convinced I’ll watch a third season of this if it arrives, but if the setting excites you, I have no real complaints about the execution. It looks and sounds fine and there’s lots of army battles. Just not my cup of tea.
Grand Blue Dreaming
Preach.
This is a show about diving. I think. Anyone familiar with this anime or manga will know that this is technically true but also a meme. Grand Blue Dreaming is about a college club called Peekaboo that goes diving. Iori has been living with his uncle and cousins above their diving store for a while now, and has fully embraced life in college away from home. Their club does more drinking than diving, although they are truly passionate about diving too. In this season, we finally get a bit more romantic development between the characters but also a growing feeling of responsibility as they all get a little bit older and their seniors are even trying to get jobs because their time in school is almost over. The atmosphere changes although there is still room to return to the silly toilet humor we’ve come to appreciate throughout the earlier seasons. In this third season we see a return to Iori’s home where we meet some strange foreigners, some hijinx with Iori and Kohei’s classmates, a stint into becoming influencers and we top it off with a trip for just Iori and Chise which doesn’t quite go the way they expected. Throughout it all, the series is loud and proud of its humor and there’s even jokes in there about the censoring having grown by a certain percentage to keep up with the rules and regulations. There’s honestly not too much to say about this show. If you like dumb comedy shows this one will be great for you and even if you’re not big on comedy in anime – which I really am not – you will still have a good chance of enjoying this one. The jokes definitely land at times and the show can be surprisingly tender when it wants to be. At the very least do yourself a favor and watch the first season, just to get a taste of how silly this show is.
Re:Zero
You’re basically just a squatter.
When it comes to Isekai anime, Re:Zero has always been an interesting one to me. At some points in the story it feels rather generic in its plot and worldbuilding and sometimes I get the feeling that the story is a little bit all over the place. But then the core mechanic of how this world works and how Subaru’s suffering eventually makes him grow as a character is really interesting. Not only did he suddenly find himself in another world, but he also keeps returning to an earlier point in his life within this new world every time he dies. This is obviously quite traumatic and with Subaru not being the bravest person to begin with, this is tough for him to deal with. In this fourth season, we leave the city of Priestella behind us and start making our way towards the tower where the sage is located. We still haven’t found a way to get Rem back, and the same is true for Julius. Both of them have been forgotten, but at least the latter is still conscious. I personally thought that the first half of this season was rather weak and had some jarring tone shifts. Subaru’s behavior was off throughout and it wasn’t really explained why this happened. One thing – and this is where the spoilers come in – that really got me curious from this part of the story is what happened to Emilia at the top of the tower. I still remember how she introduced herself as Satella in the very first loop, which then made her very shocked when Subaru called her that in the next loop. This is a question that set up the mystery at the start – which I think was a great hook – and seems to be built upon here. The dragon Volcanica refers to her as Satella as well but gets angry when she mentions the witch of Envy. Maybe there is more truth to the fact that Emilia and Subaru were in the tower somewhere in the far past. But then again, Shaula only recognized Subaru and she would have recognized Emilia too if she had been there before or if Satella had been there before. After all, the few visions we get of Satella tell us that the two look very much like each other. I’m definitely back to being hooked on this series again and can’t wait to learn more. Hopefully we get a fifth season somewhat soon.
You and I are polar opposites
I love all of these silly little goofs. But most of all I want each of these fictional characters to be happy.
When I talked about this show after the first season finished airing, I already made it very clear that I loved this show. The characters are great and the pace is very solid, making for an enjoyable experience. Although I think some of the early episodes of season 1 as well as the opening theme and its beautiful animation added some depth to this show, I think the second season kept going strong. Where much of the first season was focused on Tani and Suzuki, we spend a larger part of this second season on the relationships between Taira and Azuma as well as Yamada and Nisshi. This gives us three relationships with very different dynamics that each play out very differently. It reminds me a little bit of Horimiya with that, because in that show we ended up focusing on a lot of different characters as well and it really made the show a lot better. A relationship can be very complex and we see some of that in the different ways these kids develop their feelings. There were some moments where I was a little bit worried about where the plot was heading, but by the end of the season, I felt completely satisfied with everything I’ve watched. I have a soft spot for the Taira and Azuma relationship because it comes from a place of hurt for both of them, but evolves into something very healthy. I bought the manga after the end of season 1 but specifically waited for the anime to finish before diving into it, so I still have that to look forward to.
This poor guy can’t catch a break.
And with the exceptions of Bleach and Yomi no Tsugai, I have now more or less said everything I wanted to say about this past summer season of anime. Those two anime will get their own dedicated post in the near future because I have lots to say about Yomi no Tsugai and I don’t want to talk about the Bleach season yet with 2 episodes still not having aired yet – as of writing this. And then it’s time to start looking ahead again to the future. I better start thinking of things to write about. I’ll go do that, so thanks for reading.
