As we left off from our protagonist in Part 1, Jonathan Joestar’s sacrifice has saved England, Europe, and the whole world from the evil schemes that the antagonist, Dio Brando, would have brought with the power of the stone mask. With the stone mask destroyed for good, this story ends in a happy ending, for now anyway. 50 years later, a discovery has been made in the jungle ruins of Mexico. As the Speedwagon foundation uncovered, not only a bunch of masks but also a stone man stuck in the wall.

Straizo, a fellow Hamon user who accompanied Jonathan on his adventure to defeat Dio, apparently praised Dio for his high power over the mask. As such, he took the mask from the wall and placed it on himself, becoming a vampire Dio once was. Speedwagon shocked was “killed” and left for dead in the ocean. With such power, Straizo wanted to eliminate the one person who can defeat him…. and that is Jonathan’s grandson, Joseph Joestar. Joseph Joestar always lived in rebellion since he was never raised by his former parents. His resistance though, soon turned into revenge when he heard how Straizo wants to eliminate anyone who knows of the stone mask, including his old friend, Erina Joestar. This quickly led to a fighting showdown between Straizo and Joseph going throughout New York City. With every blow, Joseph knew his armed equipment would not kill a vampire, so he used his secret technique, Hamon.

How Joseph received his Hamon was from his descending grandfather, Jonathan Joestar. Although, it was weak for how he had no proper training though it was enough to take down Straizo and reveal how he was not the threat but of what the Germans are testing in Mexico. With this info, Joseph set sail to Mexico, introducing Part 2 to the bizarre adventure. With Speedwagon alive thanks to the German soldier’s medicine, he was forced to tell everything about the masks and who was associated with it. These details might reveal what the man in the wall is capable of. Eventually, Major von Stroheim named these kinds of people, the Pillar Men and for the man in the wall, Santama.

Santama released himself out of the wall thanks to the blood provided by the German soldiers in which he started to analyze his surroundings. He quickly learned how to speak English and know how to use some man-made objects such as guns. As the German soldiers all fell down with one swoop of his attack, one stood out, which was Joseph Joestar. He got rid of his disguise and fought against Santama with his Hamon since the Pillar men are also weak to sunlight. Eventually, Joseph won with some new information about being more Pillar men out there in Italy. In Italy, Joseph Joestar found a new partner who goes by Caesar Anthonio Zeppeli, the grandson of Will Anthonio Zeppeli. These two remarkable allies grouped up into a fight since they don’t enjoy how their grandfathers died by the mask in the first place. With Caesar now in the team, he tells them where the Pillar men are being held, which is in an underground cavern. As they went down, 3 Pillar men revealed themselves and walked out from their wall.

Alright, I’m going to stop here cause the story is longer than I thought it would be, and this is not as bad as the other Parts later in the story. Sorry for the interrupted stop. For any questions, Speedwagon is alive and is with Joseph’s gang, Santama died from the extreme sunlight being reflected by the water, Major Von Stroheim sacrificed himself to defeat Santama by exploding himself, and the reason why Caesar knew where the Pillar men were located was for how the German soldiers were allies with him. If you have more questions about such things, it will be explained later on.

JOJO PART 1)

You thought I was done reviewing about JoJo, but you were wrong! Technically, every part of Jojo is it’s own anime. In total, that makes 5 parts that are adapted from the manga so far. Anyway, let’s start our review about JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Phantom Blood (Part 1 and sorry for some skipped details). Part 1 in summary is a vampire story where a hero must stand up from his horrible childhood and defeat an evil that will take over the world!!! (But we don’t about The World yet.) The first scene starts off with George Joestar I being “saved” by a gentleman named Dario Brando, where the wife died from a carriage crash incident. 12 years later, Jonathan Joestar is shown as the main character of Part 1 along with the antagonist, Dio Brando. 

Unexpectedly, Dario Brando dies from an illness which brought his son, Dio Brando to the Joestars as an adopted son. Jonathan is already not a fan of Dio by how he kicked his dog, Danny, in the face on purpose. 7 years later, George is sick and Jonathan has his doubts that Dio is behind this so he ventures out to town to find evidence about the poisoning. Later, he meets a thug named Speedwagon who attempted to kill him, failed, and joined his party after he saw the characteristics of JoJo. After finding and revealing the evidence to George, Dio quickly puts on a stone mask which he believes will bring him the power that he deserves. Shortly, he became a vampire and JoJo burned his mansion down to leave Dio dead. Though, it turned out that Dio was not actually dead. Desperate about this info, William Zeppeli teaches JoJo the ways of ancient Hamon to defeat Dio.

Through many adventures that include but not limited too JoJo having a montage of learning Hamon techniques, defeating Dio’s overpowered minions such as Jack the Ripper, Bruford and Tarkus, realizing how powerful Dio is for his freezing abilities against Hamon users, and introduced other side characters such as Dire, Straizo, Poco, Poco’s sister (Has no name given, I swear), and Tonpetty, we reach the final battle between JoJo and Dio. With JoJo as the victor, he returned to his normal life with his wife, Erina Pendleton, and ventured off to America where they lived happily ever after. Just kidding, it turned out that Dio was not actually dead. He revealed himself in the boat as a floating head and as he tried to steal JoJo’s body, Jonathan decided to sacrifice himself for the greater good and brought the whole ship down. As pregnant Erina settled on a coffin holding a baby, she continued her life raising the Joestar family bloodline for generations to come. 

JoJo is like no other since it is a cross from series’ such as Castlevania and Fist of the Northstar for their known non-stop action and medieval fantasy (At least for Part 1 anyway). Being a Classic, Dramatic, Revered, and Niche series, JoJo does it with style, which includes the ongoing postures each character goes through in every Part. You can probably pause on any random scene, and you’ll be able to see a pose that you want to copy in real life. 

With only 8 arcs (5 put as a show while the rest of a manga), its popularity has grown immensely in Japan within its 27-year run. Jojo tends to reveal many western and eastern cultural references within episodes, especially music such as Walk like an Egyptian or Freek’N You. With the author’s constant love for western Rock and Roll music, it is hard for JoJo to be publicized in the west since the characters are named after bands. An example of this is The Zeppeli family name which is a reference to the English band, Led Zeppelin.

The show consists of about 10 episode arcs that revolve around a descendant of the Joestar family. This includes Phantom Blood with Jonathan Joestar, Battle Tendency with Joseph Joestar, Stardust Crusaders with Jotaro Kujo, Diamond is Unbreakable with Josuke Higashikata and Golden Wind with Giorno Giovanna. Each arc consists of different periods and various parts of the world, such as Egypt, England, etc. With such little episodes, one may wonder how a viewer can love a character only to be replaced by another shortly after? With the dramatic style of illustrating and writing, Hirohiko Araki makes sure it is translated into a colorful, stylistic, and memorable scenes in the world of JoJo. 

Speaking of characters, the masculinity brought by Araki is beyond what reality may bring. Not everyone enjoyed this at first, including myself. Still, after a few episodes in, you’ll get used to the unique art style and gorgeous animation throughout each arc. Beware though, as the show is relatively violent, so it may take time for newcomers to get used to the hardcore, bloody action at times. That concludes my review of the series of JoJo, so if you enjoyed it, maybe try watching it at some point.