Ye olde JoJo update
May. 24th, 2006 08:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
petroniaSomewhere in volume 68 (that is, about five volumes into part 6). Also halfway through volume 4 of SBR. Just bought volume 8 yesterday, along with GB 35 - the modus operandi here is ordering serials as the tankoubon come out, "filling up" the package with BL yomikiri collections and the occasional novel. Right now the only non-BL series I'm following are GetBackers, Steel Ball Run and Petshop of Horrors (...there's a certain humour value to that sentence if you stare at it for a while).
Stuff that can't be bought for love or money: apparently there is sort-of canonical information on what happens to Fugo, it's in the second Jump novel. Which Amazon refuses to ship outside Japan for some godforsaken reason. It's probably not good but this is not about literary quality, it's about knowing what happens. :P
Also at some point they actually published the Oingo & Boingo comic book, along with - this is the stroke of genius - an afterword by Kishibe Rohan.
By the way,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-syndicated.gif)
worldserpent, I have here on my screen a Shioul ML message dated February 2002 in which you observed, "I've seen what CLAMP did to Jojo, but it really is true that shounen manga is getting prettier and prettier [...]" Which goes to show that the fandom brain is only capable of holding so much before it gets tossed out with the bathwater. I knew we were talking about the series in '02 but I can't dig up any messages in which you detail what you saw, nor how Rietta was induced to read "Under Execution Under Jailbreak" and assign it a review mark of 10/10 (!).
My excuse is that I wasn't paying attention to anything but the Mirage of Blaze anime. XD (Eh, there's a stand called Dark Mirage, at first I read the kanji as Mirage of Blaze and nearly had a heart attack.)
Ahh, Stone Free, the long-hoped-for synthesis of two great historical currents of Joestar philosophy:
1) punch inna face
2) stupid rope tricks
ある意味最強。XD (No, really - surprisingly enough I immediately thought of a way to godmode it.)
One of the side effects of being told that a story is set in Miami, 2011 is that I automatically assume anyone with dark hair is Hispanic - Hermes, Guess, Mila Schon (I had to use Google. Basically for part 6 you enter the katakana and look for the first hit that relates to fashion design). ~_~ Not that it matters a whit but JoJo is a situating story despite the absurdities and my brain likes to situate. Father Pucci is black I guess. That is, in JoJo if someone looks black they generally are black and not crinkly-haired suntanned Japanese or something, so... maybe his father's Italian?
Man, after sixty volumes I felt justified in assuming there wouldn't be any dodgy Catholics. Clearly it was too good to be true.
Then there's F.F.: possibly the cutest (in the sense of bubbly, sunao) JoJo girl to date, despite the fact that she's actually the black slime alien out of the X-Files.
Jolyne appears not to realise and would no doubt be furious to learn that she takes completely after her no-good deadbeat father. XD;; We discussed how Jotaro is probably "pulling a Caesar's dad" by leaving his family out of what he considers his own burden of responsibility, and thus out of his life altogether, but he doesn't seem cognizant of the sheer amount of resentment this sort of attitude is apt to generate. (Let alone that it never works; at least Jolyne was able to keep him from dying.) I'm guessing he never missed his father as a child, and Holly never acted like she felt neglected, and Joseph had a mile-long juvenile rap sheet and turned out no worse for sowing his wild oats, so he assumed Jolyne would have an equally freakish temperament. :P However even if she did I imagine Jotaro's sheer Jotaro-ness would test her limits. This is a man who, when his daughter trips on the stairs, does not reach out to steady her but instead grabs the important gadget she's holding out of her hand as she falls past. And helpfully sets the timer on it before handing it back. And then is clearly baffled when she goes GAAAAHHH at him.
SBR: starting volume 4, the one with the cover I don't want to have to explain to anyone (yes, I know Johnny is tragically disabled and he's only hugging Gyro's thigh in a heroic attempt to keep himself upright, but we have groin-level action going on there). Currently battling the wossface family with ye ultimate cowboy Mountain Tim, who fills the stupid rope trick quota for this arc. By the way, I cannot believe Gyro and Johnny make fun of Mountain Tim's hat as if it were noticeably of the special. That is to say, it is noticeably of the special as one of the classier and more wearable items of headgear in this arc, and we are talking about a zebra-striped Stetson with an antelope skull decoration.
Gyro's teamed up with Johnny in order to get through the Arizona desert; I feel like someone should warn him that joining forces with a Joestar is not a winning Zeppeli strategy in the broadest sense. OTOH Gyro is the main character, and thus his very existence seems designed to avenge on poor Johnny the karmic debt incurred by his lineage toward that of the Zeppeli and - why not? - denizens of the Italian peninsula in general. Evidently Araki thought it would be funny to have a JoJo who 1) couldn't run and 2) had to do all the chasing. I can't recollect any other Zeppeli requiring ardent pursuit on horseback, let alone for 2-3 volumes. Come to think of it when do JoJos ever have to bother chasing anyone down? For the next demonstration of the centripetal whirlpool force emanated by BALLS OF STEEL, show slide of 1 x Kujo Jotaro.
Luckily(???) there is still Dio. Snail on the thorn, etc. And a goal in life is what Johnny needs. :P
Despite the continued WTF attacks the series is beginning to wear grooves (has since part 5, really). One knows when SBR will end: one arc is around 16-17 volumes, and sure enough in volume 8 they're about halfway across the continent. The main villain will probably have a fucked-up time-based attack. There's a certain amount of - not to say exact repetition, but a thematic or familial resemblance between stands (other than the Joestar ones obv.). You could classify them:
Metals and magnetism
Mirrors and alternate realities
Psychology and gaming (I always hate these - the commonality is that they work on the opponent's sense of fair play, i.e. you lose as soon as you believe you lost or have cheated)
And so forth. I could go on but I've got to get out of here sometime. XD
EDIT -- sat in a café to read Gyro's backstory; four volumes is about as long as Araki can be expected to hold out. :P Unexpectedly this constitutes a detour into... Ruritanian romance. Is there anything this series hasn't done yet? Space pirates? If JoJo is Araki's Comédie Humaine as he keeps saying it is I motion it's not a complete picture until there are space pirates.
Stuff that can't be bought for love or money: apparently there is sort-of canonical information on what happens to Fugo, it's in the second Jump novel. Which Amazon refuses to ship outside Japan for some godforsaken reason. It's probably not good but this is not about literary quality, it's about knowing what happens. :P
Also at some point they actually published the Oingo & Boingo comic book, along with - this is the stroke of genius - an afterword by Kishibe Rohan.
By the way,
worldserpent, I have here on my screen a Shioul ML message dated February 2002 in which you observed, "I've seen what CLAMP did to Jojo, but it really is true that shounen manga is getting prettier and prettier [...]" Which goes to show that the fandom brain is only capable of holding so much before it gets tossed out with the bathwater. I knew we were talking about the series in '02 but I can't dig up any messages in which you detail what you saw, nor how Rietta was induced to read "Under Execution Under Jailbreak" and assign it a review mark of 10/10 (!).My excuse is that I wasn't paying attention to anything but the Mirage of Blaze anime. XD (Eh, there's a stand called Dark Mirage, at first I read the kanji as Mirage of Blaze and nearly had a heart attack.)
Ahh, Stone Free, the long-hoped-for synthesis of two great historical currents of Joestar philosophy:
1) punch inna face
2) stupid rope tricks
ある意味最強。XD (No, really - surprisingly enough I immediately thought of a way to godmode it.)
One of the side effects of being told that a story is set in Miami, 2011 is that I automatically assume anyone with dark hair is Hispanic - Hermes, Guess, Mila Schon (I had to use Google. Basically for part 6 you enter the katakana and look for the first hit that relates to fashion design). ~_~ Not that it matters a whit but JoJo is a situating story despite the absurdities and my brain likes to situate. Father Pucci is black I guess. That is, in JoJo if someone looks black they generally are black and not crinkly-haired suntanned Japanese or something, so... maybe his father's Italian?
Man, after sixty volumes I felt justified in assuming there wouldn't be any dodgy Catholics. Clearly it was too good to be true.
Then there's F.F.: possibly the cutest (in the sense of bubbly, sunao) JoJo girl to date, despite the fact that she's actually the black slime alien out of the X-Files.
Jolyne appears not to realise and would no doubt be furious to learn that she takes completely after her no-good deadbeat father. XD;; We discussed how Jotaro is probably "pulling a Caesar's dad" by leaving his family out of what he considers his own burden of responsibility, and thus out of his life altogether, but he doesn't seem cognizant of the sheer amount of resentment this sort of attitude is apt to generate. (Let alone that it never works; at least Jolyne was able to keep him from dying.) I'm guessing he never missed his father as a child, and Holly never acted like she felt neglected, and Joseph had a mile-long juvenile rap sheet and turned out no worse for sowing his wild oats, so he assumed Jolyne would have an equally freakish temperament. :P However even if she did I imagine Jotaro's sheer Jotaro-ness would test her limits. This is a man who, when his daughter trips on the stairs, does not reach out to steady her but instead grabs the important gadget she's holding out of her hand as she falls past. And helpfully sets the timer on it before handing it back. And then is clearly baffled when she goes GAAAAHHH at him.
SBR: starting volume 4, the one with the cover I don't want to have to explain to anyone (yes, I know Johnny is tragically disabled and he's only hugging Gyro's thigh in a heroic attempt to keep himself upright, but we have groin-level action going on there). Currently battling the wossface family with ye ultimate cowboy Mountain Tim, who fills the stupid rope trick quota for this arc. By the way, I cannot believe Gyro and Johnny make fun of Mountain Tim's hat as if it were noticeably of the special. That is to say, it is noticeably of the special as one of the classier and more wearable items of headgear in this arc, and we are talking about a zebra-striped Stetson with an antelope skull decoration.
Gyro's teamed up with Johnny in order to get through the Arizona desert; I feel like someone should warn him that joining forces with a Joestar is not a winning Zeppeli strategy in the broadest sense. OTOH Gyro is the main character, and thus his very existence seems designed to avenge on poor Johnny the karmic debt incurred by his lineage toward that of the Zeppeli and - why not? - denizens of the Italian peninsula in general. Evidently Araki thought it would be funny to have a JoJo who 1) couldn't run and 2) had to do all the chasing. I can't recollect any other Zeppeli requiring ardent pursuit on horseback, let alone for 2-3 volumes. Come to think of it when do JoJos ever have to bother chasing anyone down? For the next demonstration of the centripetal whirlpool force emanated by BALLS OF STEEL, show slide of 1 x Kujo Jotaro.
Luckily(???) there is still Dio. Snail on the thorn, etc. And a goal in life is what Johnny needs. :P
Despite the continued WTF attacks the series is beginning to wear grooves (has since part 5, really). One knows when SBR will end: one arc is around 16-17 volumes, and sure enough in volume 8 they're about halfway across the continent. The main villain will probably have a fucked-up time-based attack. There's a certain amount of - not to say exact repetition, but a thematic or familial resemblance between stands (other than the Joestar ones obv.). You could classify them:
Metals and magnetism
- Bast (magnetizes bodies on contact)
- Metallica (freely manipulates atoms of metallic elements - anything from invisibility barriers to murder by anemia)
- whatever it was the Bunboons had (freely manipulates atoms of magnetic metals, i.e. can draw the hemoglobin right out of your veins but can't move a lead bullet - also needs to be activated by contact)
Mirrors and alternate realities
- The Hanged Man (physically jumps from one reflective surface to another)
- Death (pulls sleeping opponents into a dream world entirely controlled by the user, leaving stands behind)
- Man in the Mirror (pulls opponents through a reflective surface into a 'mirrorverse' where they cannot affect the real world, leaving stands behind)
Psychology and gaming (I always hate these - the commonality is that they work on the opponent's sense of fair play, i.e. you lose as soon as you believe you lost or have cheated)
- Osiris (gambling with souls)
- Atum (video game gambling with souls)
- The Lock (perceived guilt, even if irrational)
- Marilyn Manson (betting and debt collection - material not metaphysical)
And so forth. I could go on but I've got to get out of here sometime. XD
EDIT -- sat in a café to read Gyro's backstory; four volumes is about as long as Araki can be expected to hold out. :P Unexpectedly this constitutes a detour into... Ruritanian romance. Is there anything this series hasn't done yet? Space pirates? If JoJo is Araki's Comédie Humaine as he keeps saying it is I motion it's not a complete picture until there are space pirates.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 12:08 am (UTC)Could have fooled me XD.
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Date: 2006-05-25 02:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 12:31 am (UTC)*stares* huh? you m ean GB is NOT a BL series? :)
also, you do too follow more! Bleach, yes? yes yes?
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:48 am (UTC)Hahaha! -_-
Schtuff I buy at physical bookstores in French not included in a discussion of my Amazon Japan ordering habits obv., so that would add Bleach, XXXHolic and Nana. :P
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Date: 2006-05-25 12:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:27 am (UTC)well, you can divide part 3 into two parts: the first 2/3 where they fight eventual teammates and then a slew of tarot-themed enemies. The last 1/3 is set in Egypt and by then Araki has run out of tarot cards so he does what is apparently the egyptian version with 9 egyptian gods.
The first set of OVAs covered just the egypt bit... however, due to lack of time they cut all those fights down to... like... 4 fights total (it's just the N'dour, D'arby, Vanilla Ice, and Dio fights). Also pretty much all the wackiness and weirdness and nonsense was chopped due to time constraints. The fights are fun to watch animated though.
The second set of OVAs (which came out recently) covers the first 2/3, only since there were similar time problems (well, think how many tarot cards there are!), they skipped the vast majority of those fights and kept... er... I think it went vs Magician's Red, vs Silver Chariot, vs Strength, vs Hanged Man & Emperor, vs Enya/Justice, and... er... don't recall, that may be it? (I may be missing one or two but they skipped most of the ones I liked best, included several of the fights where nobody actually did a lot of fighting).
Basically the OVAs cover the basics of part three, from beginning to end (actually the beginning/end fights are my favorite parts to watch), but for the most part you're missing out on all the parts that were silly/ridiculous/etc and stuff. They're definitely worth watching though!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 01:01 am (UTC)However even if she did I imagine Jotaro's sheer Jotaro-ness would test her limits.
I love Jotaro's profile page from part 3; I read it (after I'd already finished part 3 because I don't think it had been scanlated and I saw it in the official translations) and felt totally enlightened and full of love for the retard. ♥♥♥♥♥♥ It's still valid, surely?
I imagine the whole deadbeat-ness is partly a Japanese thing, too? I mean, salarymen, and all. When I was researching Japanese food more than one of my sources felt the need to mention how fathers were often absent and mothers were the main source of adult authority in the home (until the children went off to school and then they had to EXPRESS THEIR LOVE WITH OBENTO). I'm sure Jotaro was all up on the financial support angle, at least.
I doubt Holly ever was neglected? But I think Jotaro should have guessed with Josuke, even if it turned out well eventually.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 03:28 am (UTC)It's more that the concept of family is the emotional core of the series, for good or for bad. I mean, in and of itself it's the epic tale of a family spanning generations (to make it sound like an Oprah book of the week). If a character is fighting to protect something, chances are it's a parent or child. If a character is psychologically messed up, chances are bad parenting had something to do with it. There's actually a character where I am in the series who says something along the lines of, "A man must carry a map in his heart as he wanders the wilderness; his family is where his happiness lies. Protecting the family means protecting the country as well, out of respect for the memory of your forebears and the future of your descendants. To do otherwise is to dishonour the family." It's not presented as a perfect philosophy but the fact that it's stated at all is meaningful. The interesting thing is that there's a definite emphasis on the alienating effect all the never-home-because-out-in-wilderness-protecting-family has on the family itself, which is something that's almost never shown in manga at all (the salariman thing as you say - it's not remarked upon). At the same time it's not precisely portrayed as the "wrong" choice either, just the opportunity cost. No judgment is passed either way.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-26 03:08 am (UTC)P.S. It is indeed a
goodsad day when shounen is more BL than BL manga. *koffsNarutokoffs*no subject
Date: 2006-05-26 02:42 pm (UTC)It's in one of the officially translated volumes, so like the first three books of part 3? Don't know if that helps you when you're in Australia. :D;
Basically, the part that brought me joy was where it's all "Jotaro thinks he's pretty transparent, and so doesn't feel the need to explain himself to others. This can lead to a great deal of misunderstanding...." XDDDDDDDD
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Date: 2006-05-27 03:12 am (UTC)... That make so much sense -_-;; Jotaro is just one of those dorks *sniggers*
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Date: 2006-05-27 07:02 am (UTC)Doesn't it just? ("... ♥" really sums up my reaction. orz)
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Date: 2006-05-27 12:57 am (UTC)(Just realized now I misread your point about Holly being neglected; for some reason I thought you meant by Joseph, not Kujo—ok, I don't even know his name. ^^;;;)
I imagine that it still plays a part in why Jolyne's reaction is different than Jotaro and Josuke's, though. (Ooh, more infuriating things Jotaro does! When Jolyne tries to leave the visiting room as they're first caught in the dream sequence, she gets shot at. Jotaro flicks the bullet away during time stop, but doesn't do anything to try to cushion her impact as she flies into the table! <headdesk> (Though maybe it was because if he had done that, she'd still be near the door?))
Getting back to your point on theme, do you really think Jotaro divorced Jolyne's mom in order to keep them safe? o.o I thought it was more just due to how it wasn't working between them due to his being away all the freakin' time. (Then again if that's read in the context of his being away to protect them in the first place, I'm not sure which point has more weight....)
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 01:38 am (UTC)Has the main villain showed up yet?
Wait, Araki compared himself to Balzac?
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Date: 2006-05-25 02:44 am (UTC)(At the time, looking back, Remiel was hardcore sl0ring to the entire ML and no one took him up on it. Missed opportunities etc. XD But my instinct is that I wouldn't have grokked it back then.)
Villain: not where I am. But there are *drumroll* assassins, so I hope it doesn't turn out to be the Italian archduke himself or something. =_=
Not so much Balzac per se, but he keeps saying the theme of the manga is "humanity" as a whole. XD
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:47 am (UTC)Ah, I see. Okay, maybe I did see it in the Clamp in wonderland video? That could be it. Maybe you should post your impressions of Jojo to the ML... XD
Yeah, Araki seems a lot more positive than Balzac. Although, you could say that a lot of loooong epic stories have that as their main theme.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 03:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 02:31 am (UTC)oh, and for space pirates... maybe someday Araki will return to the adventures of Cars in outer space? XD
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Date: 2006-05-25 02:51 am (UTC)I think he should just go on with the AU gig, only next round will be Joseph Joestar, pirate ship captain - IN SPACE. And Cars etc. will be an ancient race of powerful aliens.
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Date: 2006-05-25 02:52 am (UTC)39? YOU CAN'T AU JOTARO! ....what would he BE? ...he'd be so HOT! ....I.....I give up. orzno subject
Date: 2006-05-25 03:50 am (UTC)Regency gentleman and officerGolden Age detective80s rock starCousteau-like adventurer at seaActually I feel the possibilities are endless. >D
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 03:33 am (UTC)Dude, AU Space Pirate Captain Joseph Joestar would be the hottest thing I've ever seen ever.
You know, I don't want SBR to end because I like it, but I really am so curious about what's next. XD We should write to Araki and recommend AU Space Captain Joe Joestar and his friend, er, Francisco Zeppeli or something XD Maybe he'd think it's a fun idea! XD
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Date: 2006-05-25 03:44 am (UTC)Yeah, I'm also really curious (since Araki claims he has the general idea of parts 8-9 worked out already XD). If he continues with the AU I think it's more likely to be set in 1938 again. But I actually do want him to do space opera as it's practically the only pulp genre JoJo hasn't covered!
Failing that, someone should fic itno subject
Date: 2006-05-25 04:00 am (UTC)(Don't ask why this is so excessively detailed... you've seen our IRC conversations.)
Do you think Araki READS his fanmail? >D
no subject
Date: 2006-05-25 05:26 pm (UTC)