JoJo part 6 summaries (cont.)

[petronia]

part 1
part 2

Currently I'm at the beginning of volume 76 though I've read ahead a little as well. One decidedly gets the sense that the series is winding down... Also it's reaffirmed that Giorno lucked out in the genetic sweepstakes. XD;;

The stand Survivor (one of four Pucci sent into the solitary confinement unit against Jolyne): Pucci asks Dio what the "weakest" stand is that he encountered on his travels. Dio files the question as Not Applicable - kings have stands befitting kings, cooks have stands befitting cooks [1], and relative strength depends entirely on the manner and context in which the stand is used - but when pressed he tells the story of an alpine hiking expedition whose members beat each other to death after lodging with a local for the night. It turns out the host was an unwitting stand user whose power was a barely measurable electric current - the strength of a neural impulse - that shorts out all physiological checks on aggression. One of the guests said something that made him inwardly angry; the ground was wet from rain; the "anger" transferred itself through the water to the others and caused them to fight until no one was left standing.

But, says Pucci (or rather the reader), then it wasn't really a weak stand at all. It was weak, says Dio, because he could neither control it nor use it to his advantage. His power didn't distinguish between friend or foe. His parents divorced after a fight came within an inch of attempted murder, and all his life it brought him nothing but problems. Unalloyed violence is not strength.

(Well, I thought it was an interesting parable for the inner fanboy. XD One of the lessons of part 6 seems to be that everyone needs a minion accomplice "friend" loyal friend on their side, even Dio-sama, because some scams take two to run.

As far as I can figure out, Dio then "gave" the stand to Pucci, meaning I suppose that he took Pucci to the user in question and had him retrieve it with Whitesnake.)

Since the guards had the hose running the entire time, the area gets flooded and everyone is affected by Survivor, including Jolyne - although she's not affected affected in the sense of going into a berserker killing rage like the guards and other prisoners, I suspect because Joestars have all had to learn how to roll with their aggressive impulses (good thing for the world too XD). Jolyne has to take on the remaining guard *cough* Viviano Westwood, who has the ability to attract asteroids (i.e. if he falls down and you're standing over him, you get hit by a fast-travelling, flaming rock), then the wizened former cult leader and kung-fu master Kenzo, who attacks with REALLY BAD FENG SHUI. [2] I found Dragon's Dream sort of cute, actually, in that it would snipe at Kenzo and even give Jolyne free advice, and who ever heard of an enemy stand like that. XD You can almost see how it would consider itself a neutral party, after all feng shui is just a constant of sorts.

I like this fight because Jolyne demonstrates her multilingual fluency in rude hand gestures. XD Great-grandpa would be so proud.

Meanwhile FF and Annasui sneak over to the solitary confinement unit without too much trouble, in time to help Jolyne out with Kenzo. (It took me a little while to figure Diver Down's abilities: basically it enters things and exerts force "from the inside out". So it can punch a wall and the force of the blow will bash someone in the face on the other side and several feet to the left. Or it can slide into someone's body and artistically rearrange their internal organs. FF and Annasui yell at each other a lot, but Annasui argues with anyone and everyone that Jolyne likes, he's a spaz to be honest. XD) They spot Dio's bone being poked at by a random surviving prisoner, but when they corner him he... grows flowers and turns into a tree.

At this point it starts getting weird.

Before Jolyne & co. can turn around, the thirty or so assorted corpses lying around have all turned into wizened tree trunk-like growths, and the bone disappeared - to be replaced by a green pod-object hanging from the nearest tree. Maybe it's an optical illusion but that thing looks awfully like a little green baby with a Joestar mark on the back of its neck, observes Jolyne. OHNOYOUDIDN'T, exclaims the reader. Jolyne decides to take the pod and run, since she doesn't want Whitesnake getting its hands on the thing, but this is made difficult by the fact that she starts growing flowers whenever she gets near it. Staying out of the sun helps, though. XD

BRAINSTORMING SESSION IN THE HOUSE OF ARAKI, #109,335 IN A SERIES

Araki: *drawing* What's the opposite of coffee?
Assistant #1: Um, tea?
Araki: Tea it is. What's the opposite of vampirism?
Assistant #1:
Assistant #2: ...Photosynthesis?
Araki: ............................YES
Assistants:

They also discover the current (wimpy and unwitting) user of Survivor, and Annasui rather cruelly rigs him out as a trap to wound the last remaining enemy stand user D&G, who's been hanging around in the background the entire time. It doesn't make much difference, though, as D&G's stand Yo-Yo Ma is a wussy automatic type. XD

Yo-Yo Ma joins the party outside the solitary confinement unit, and nearly the first thing it does is eat the pod. XD; Then it fawns over Jolyne and provides the party with a motorboat. Of course they all know it's an enemy stand, but it's so slobbery and pathetically friendly and easily abusable that they take it with them (it has the pod in its belly and all), leaving FF behind to keep watch. FF is the first to be attacked, when the others have their backs turned, and realises the stand is so wussy it's programmed to attack only in one-on-one situations when no one else is looking.

Disabling Yo-Yo Ma took much longer than warranted, not only because they couldn't figure out how it was attacking (its body fluids melt holes in people - can be carried by mosquitos among other things, EW DIE EW) but because Annasui kept thinking Jolyne was hitting on him when she tried to warn him about it. XD;;; In the end it was permanently defeated when FF took out D&G, which took some doing because the rescue crew had arrived in the interim, along with Father Pucci himself. FF discovers Pucci is Whitesnake's user, has a pitched battle with the latter and manages to escape with Weather Report's help, abandoning her body in the process.

Back on the boat, Yo-Yo Ma goes poof and... Annasui and Jolyne discover the pod hatched. XD;; Annasui tries to prevent the result from slipping overboard and gets a nasty baby-hand-shaped burn mark for his pains. It crawls/swims ashore, they chase after, only to find that it has a stand that halves their size with every step they take in its direction. Annasui tots up and realises this means they cannot mathematically ever reach the thing, let alone pick it up. Of course Jolyne has to verify the hypothesis, and they end up fighting the stand and trapping it in a glass bottle. Not for long, but the point is moot as the green baby spots Jolyne's star mark and promptly decides it likes her. XD XD XD

(However it does not like Annasui. Rather, the world for the green baby is divided between "interesting" and "non-interesting", and Annasui is not particularly interesting - edible at best. XD Just as well because Annasui thinks it needs to die for coming between him and Jolyne.

Annasui: Jolyne, let me take this moment to say I love you, from the moment I WHAT IS IT DOING.
Jolyne: Looks to me like it's eating your hair.
Annasui: WHY HAVE WE NOT KILLED IT YET, IT IS OBVIOUSLY AN ENEMY.)

Okay gotta go, will continue when appropriate. XD


[1] Which just made me wonder if he'd bumped into Tonio Trussardi in the highlands of Tibet.

[2] The stands in this arc are definitely weirder. Take "must not make a Kingdom Hearts joke" Ungaro, that must've gone over well with the editorial department.

Shounen Jump: I DON'T CARE IF DISNEY WORLD IS LOGICALLY RIGHT THERE, YOU MAY NOT TURN MICKEY MOUSE INTO A STAND
Araki: but
Shounen Jump: STICK TO EXPIRED COPYRIGHTS, BUCKAROO

Comments

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

Ahahaha, I love these summaries. Even though I do not actually have copious free time, and I am far less jyozu at Japanese than you, I shall see if I can get ahead of you in the reading. >D

Yeah, Giorno *did* luck out, didn't he? Apparently sometimes the Brando and Joestar genes don't mix v. well.

Anasui's ability is hard to understand, yeah. At first I thought it was just phasing through things, but I think it is said in the explanation parts that he can cause it to store force and change the internal structure of an object his stand touches. Which is somewhat confusing, but actually a fairly good outgrowth of his disassembly mania. (What was he studying, do you think? engineering? He sure doesn't in character design fit your image of a guy who like to fiddle with things and take them apart; but everyone in Jojo is much more smrt than they would be in a regular shounen manga)

[supplanter.livejournal.com]

Well, you gotta consider that this green baby missed out on having actual baby-making machinary in its creation, though I suspect that even had it been born of woman, it might not grow up to be filled with seigi. XD

So wait, how do you think green baby was born?  What stand was involved?  Dio's stand?  Za Warudo?  Is this supposed to be an outgrowth of its Hermit Purple vine properties?  Is it properly a new critter entirely or is it like a graft, so it's really Dio-as-a-green-baby rather than green-baby-as-Dio-progeny?  &c.

Dio confuses me—he's so incredibly fabulous that of course I adore him, but I'm generally convinced his awesome really was added to over time rather than being there all along.  In part three when he's all "With my superior wisdom I will RULE OVER ALL" I was all "um, excuse me but you're like 120 years old, and 100 of those you spent stuck in a coffin underwater.  So you never got your lawyer degree, circa 1890, and you've spent the last century or so thinking at yourself underwater after grafting your head to someone else's body, but otherwise you're like 20 and—you know, I think that goes a long way to explaining your psychosis, and good job with the white and pink" (this was when I assumed his heart-bedecked get-up was white with pink hearts; I was inconsolably disappointed to realize otherwise).

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Gawd, looking at these other ones you realise Giorno's like Dolly the sheep, who knows how many failed clones it took. =_=

I kind of figured Annasui was engineering, yeah, it would also explain why he's good at math. XD

Have been following discussion of Giorno's psychology though I find myself with little to add... I think I'd rather write Giorno in fic than any other way. XD

[petronia.livejournal.com]

It is The World, yeah. Or an evolved form thereof. Green baby is how Dio's getting to Heaven. XD;;; I hadn't thought at all of the Joestar "minor technique" vine property but you're right, that would make sense as to why it's a plant.

(Well, that and there's a metric fuckton of Osirian imagery that's not even explained, just dropped there for the alert reader to gawk at. XD The code words that Pucci spouts... I should just continue with the summary.)

Dio is a good deal cooler retroactively in part 6, yeah. XD However if I'd ficced him after parts 1-3 I'd probably have written him much like this regardless. Not sure what this says for me, other than that I share Araki's thing for Italian Renaissance art that is. XD

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

I guess we could see that Dio had a lot of free time down in Egypt. XD Or jet-setting around the world, apparently.

Yeah, it is a good discussion, though. :D (Ha, so you plan to write more? ^_~)

[supplanter.livejournal.com]

How he's getting to Heaven... god, no one's mentioned him in forever, but I wonder if Dio considers Jonathan's part in his existence anymore?  They can go together this way!  Ah, but attaining Heaven appears to be a mental rather than physical event, so nvm.  (And he doesn't care about having the best body in the world, right. <gone to look for scene of Dio stabbing himself in the head and cackling like the loon he is>)

I suppose we might find out in the next set of summaries, but I wonder if Pucci is jealous that greenbaby!Dio-thing considers Jolyne his mommy, even if she's really his sort-of retroactive great-great-great-granddaughter?  Or is—you know, it really is impossible to picture-read this series. >.>

[supplanter.livejournal.com]

You know, I wasn't actually expecting there to be answers to my barrage of questions. XDDD

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Actually what's interesting, if you look at the privilege cards, Dio ate all the other mothers. XD;;; Maybe he let Giorno's mom go because she did so well ahahahahaha. orz

I have at least one more part 5 fic I have to write, the rest are pleasant but not strictly necessary.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Also: WHY IS GIORNO NOT IN FLORIDA? UNLESS... HE ALREADY IS.

DUNDUNDUNDUN

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I didn't read them that carefully. But how could they be born after he ate the mothers? Or they were born in his castle? Or he came back and ate them after they had given birth?

[The fact that the birth of Gio was not a fluke makes me think of another vampiric being in a book I read, who desired to see new being created off of his genetic matrix; of course, this character also committed incest as well, which thankfully Dio didn't do...)

I know! I read that part too. XD (Araki must be getting frustrated with all of the continuity, eh?)

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

BTW, what are your thoughts on whether the World is actually Jonathan's Stand?

(Haha, don't know if Dio would want to compare himself to Osiris, considering what ended up missing. XD Totally missed that Egypto-mythic aspect, though. )

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Maybe the details were to be found in Dio's other notebook (the little black one >_>).

I imagine people wrote in complaining to him about it and he threw up his hands. XD This I have to say, Perfect Dio Evolution seems to have upgraded everyone's radar. If Joseph and Jotaro could've been like "he's ten miles away moving north... no, northwest" they would've avoided not a little rigmarole.

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

If Jojo were a fandom the size of Harry Potter, all of this would make me really, really scared about the type of fic.

I am not at all surprised that Jojo would have readers who would do that. XD

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I would think it's Jonathan-and-Dio's stand. I mean, a stand's final form seems to depend as much on circumstance and personality, and as shown in part 6 the thing itself resides in the head. XD The World is obviously the paterfamilias of all Joestar stands but I think if it were just Jonathan who got shot with the arrow The World wouldn't be The World. If that makes sense.

"The spiral stairs, the scarab, the identifying mark, the morning glory, the secret emperor..." Of course then he goes off about Giotto and fig tarts so it's not quite how-to-spell-DIO-ROCKS-in-hieroglyphics. XD (Giotto and fig tarts?)

[worldserpent.livejournal.com]

Ah, that was what I hypothesized as well, that it was a fusion. On the other hand, stands do change due to damage to the body, as in Silver Chariot. So maybe the world has the body of Jonathan's Stand with the head of Dio's? It is all rather confusing.

Oh! It IS the scarab. My dictionary said beetle, so I was rather disappointed. But there also is Christian imagery, like "angel" and "via dolorosa"

[naanima.livejournal.com]

Giorno's like Dolly the sheep

OMFGBBQ!!!!!! can't breathe, laughing too hard.

It is fascinating just what Dio considers to be weak in a Stand. I love getting a look into his brain because in part 1-3 Dio was very 2d in personality, though you ALWAYS wanted him to have more depth, because as much as I adored His Sadistic Megalomaniac Rock Star Vampric Self, I nonetheless wished for a bit more on top of the hearts.

[naanima.livejournal.com]

But isn't Dio (in part 1) all about becoming one with Jonathan? Barring the homoerotic subtext of the scene on the ship with Jonathan cradling Dio's head (by the gods, I don't think I have ever typed a sentence more wrong.) It would suggest that Dio does consider Jonathat's existence to be of importance. So, wouldn't that mean Dio does consider Jonathan's existence? Also, the star on his neck that allows him to feel the Joestars must make it incredibly difficult for him not to consider Jonathan.

Mind you, it could be Dio getting irritate by the Joestars rather than considering Jonathan's existence. -_-;;

[petronia.livejournal.com]

You know, I don't really want to consider Dio considering Jonathan, since for all intents and purposes he has Jonathan (or quite a lot of him) and can misuse him as he likes. :0

The duality is always present, though. Joestar and Brando are two sides of the same coin and not a particularly thick one at that.

(The stuff I don't want to consider keeps piling up. =_=;; Like Giorno meeting Pucci. I know he's not going to show up but logically he should and AAAHHHHHHH)

[supplanter.livejournal.com]

Wait, so Giorno was seriously a breeding experiment? :OOOOO  Dude, majorly disappointed he does not show up in part 6, 'cause wah Araki-sensei, why so uncaring? T^T

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Not really. XD Or well, the choices at hand are 1) Dio gave women babies because he had secret plans for his progeny or 2) Dio gave women babies because he was a pimp. Lady or the tiger, I mean, you decide.

(The real question is, did Araki plan any of this out more than five minutes in advance? The answer is no.)

It's just the rule of the game is all. :P Frankly throwing Giorno into the mix could only make the current situation more apocalyptic not less, unless you posit that Father Pucci would be momentarily stunned by the pwetty gold Brando sparklies allowing Jolyne to sneak up behind him and bean him over the head with a brickbat.

[youkofujima.livejournal.com]

My explanation: Dio will NOT let Pucci hump/oogle/use the son that is a perfect specimen. Cuz Giorno is technically the perfect mix of the Brando-Joestar genes...he really lucked out O_o; I'm looking at the others and going "oh, god."

[supplanter.livejournal.com]

Hm... given the narrator's assertion in part 5 that "to Dio Brando, women are nothing but food because he's literally in love with his own body", I'm guessing the first, but you know that was a whole arc back, so who knows if it still holds? orz

Viviano Westwood, who has the ability to attract asteroids (i.e. if he falls down and you're standing over him, you get hit by a fast-travelling, flaming rock)

btw, do you know the name of this stand?  ... it's not Meteora, is it?

Also btw, were you planning on any more for ariadne, or was that all she wrote? :3

[supplanter.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but petronia's translation of the exchange between Dio and Pucci here (http://petronia.livejournal.com/464263.html#cutid1) indicates that Dio considers Heaven to be a state of mind, so it's not like he can take Jonathan along for the ride, since he's only there in body and not spirit. orz  Though I dunno if he'd really share his thoughts about Jonathan with even Pucci.  So does Pucci even know Dio was a body thief/vampire?