JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
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JoJo's Bizarre Adventure (ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 Jojo no kimyōna bōken, alternately translated as JoJo's Venture) is a Japanese manga written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki. It is famous for its original art style (complete with over-the-top violence), intricate plot, and numerous Western rock music references. Every main character's name in each series can be read as JoJo.
The manga is published in English by VIZ Media.
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Manga
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Part 1: Phantom Blood
The story begins in Victorian England with young Jonathan Joestar living at his father's wealthy estate. Another young man, Dio Brando, is adopted by them having recently lost his father, Dario Brando, who once saved Lord Joestar from an accident. (Actually Dario Brando did not attempt to save him at all, he just happened to be in the place where the nearly-mortal accident took place, and he was also trying to take advantage from the situation by stealing his belongings)
Jonathan tries to befriend him but Dio's plan is to achieve wealth and power by any means necessary. Hoping to drive Jonathan mad, Dio acts like a perfect gentlemen around his adoptive father Lord Joestar but is physically and psychologically abusive to Jonathan whenever possible.
Seven years later Jonathan's father falls ill. Dio is very attentive and brings him his medicine every day. Jonathan is suspcious as he is certain Dio is up to no good. Jonathan discovers an old letter written by Dario Brando on his deathbed requesting Lord Joestar care for Dio. In his letter, Dario describes his symptoms which are identical to Lord Joestar's mystery aliment. Jonathan believes that Dio must have poisoned his own father and is now trying to do the same thing to Lord Joestar. Dio discovers Jonathan with the letter and Jonathan accuses Dio of poisoning Lord Joestar. Dio decides that he must kill Jonathan before he is exposed.
In order for Dio to kill Jonathan, he puts on a cursed mask that transforms its user into a vampire permanently. Fighting ensues and Jonathan is able to burn Dio down with their house. However, Dio survives, and takes off to plot his revenge. Later, Jonathan meets a man called William Zeppelie with a strange power called the ripple (波紋 hamon) which is most effective against vampires. It is basically a respiration technique. After teaching Jonathan how to use the ripple they both set out to seek out and defeat Dio.
Their chase takes them to a village in Europe where most of the villagers have been turned into vampires by Dio. Eventually they fight their way to Dio : Will Zeppelie loses his life in battle, and a fight between Dio's eye beams and Jonathan's ripple ends with a loss for Dio.
Somehow Dio's head was still intact, and while the heroes travel back home by boat they are ambushed by Dio. Dio manages to sink the ship and take Jonathan's body with him to the bottom.
Part 2: Battle Tendency
The second JJBA series takes place in the 1930s, and follows the misadventures of Joseph Joestar, the grandson of Jonathan Joestar, as he fights zombies and vampires with some help from a cybernetically-enchanced Nazi. He lives in New York and seems to have inherited the power of the Ripple.
Part 3: Stardust Crusaders
The most popular series, Series 3's main character is Kujo Jotaro, the grandson of Joseph Joestar. Jotaro is a juvenile delinquent who believes he is possessed by an evil spirit, and first appears in a police holding cell. To prove his possession to Joseph and his friend, Muhammed Abdul, Jotaro takes the gun from a nearby guard and tries to shoot himself in the head. The bullet stops in midair, but Joseph and Abdul see a spectral hand clutching it. Abdul explains that Jotaro has a Stand, a manifestation of psychic power, that he and Joseph also possess. Jotaro's is called Star Platinum (スタープラチナ), Abdul's is Magician's Red, and Joseph has Hermit Purple.
Jotaro's mother Holly falls ill, and the Stand wielders see thorny vines entangling her body. They discover that Dio is still alive and is causing the illness due to his Joestar blood, and they must find him and defeat him to save Holly's life. What follows is a 13-volume travelogue with copious amounts of conflict and over-the-top violence.
Kakyoin Noriaki (Hierophant Green) Jotaro's classmate, is possessed by Dio and forced to try to kill Jotaro before they leave. Tower of Gray downs the plane they take. Jean-Pierre Polnareff (Silver Chariot) joins them to avenge his sister's death. Captain Tenielle (Dark Blue Moon) sinks the boat the heroes took, forcing them to board the ghost ship Strength, which tries to kill them. In Singapore, Devo (Ebony Devil) and Rubber Soul (Yellow Temperance) attack them. In Calcutta, they encounter the cowardly cowboy Hol Horse (The Emperor), his companion Nena (The Empress), and J. Geil, the Man With Two Right Hands (Hanged Man), who killed Sheri Polnareff. The death car Wheel of Fortune tries several times to run them off the road to their deaths. J's mother Enya (Justice) sends townspeople-cum-zombies against them in Cairo. Dan Steely (The Lovers) interferes in Karachi. The heroes get briefly saddled with the secretly sadistic baby Mannish Boy (Death 13) before they leave Arabia, and then they get the bull terrier Iggi (The Fool) in Abu Simbel.
The OAV series starts with Volume 20, with the appearance of N'Doul (Geb, having exhausted the 13 tarot cards, the stands are now named after Egyptian gods), who blinds Kakyoin and puts him out of commission. Oingo and Boingo (Khnum & Thoth) try to defeat the heroes, and then Boingo tries to help Hol Horse. The evil Anubis sword possesses Polnareff. Mariah (Bast) magnetizes Joseph, causing metal objects of various sizes (up to and including cars and escalators) to fly at him. The cowardly Alessi (Sethan) uses his Stand to de-age victims to infancy, and then kills with a submachine gun and axe. Daniel J. D'arby (Osiris) offers to tell them where Dio is if they play a game of chance; Polnareff and Joseph are turned into poker chips upon losing, and Jotaro must beat D'arby in a poker game to get them back. The falcon Pet Shop (Horus) fights Iggi, and Terence Trent D'arby (Atum) challenges the heroes to video games. When they get inside, they are trapped inside Tenor Sax, and must defeat the Stand wielder Kenny G to escape.
Upon reaching Dio, the villain seems to teleport around, and puts Abdul inside a sarcophagus in the blink of an eye. Abdul is killed by an invisible force that reveals itself as Vanilla Ice and Cream, Dio's most loyal henchman who does "every little thing I ask of him," including decapitating himself. Dio uses his blood to resurrect Ice as a vampire, and Ice attacks the heroes, killing Iggi. Dio reveals the nature of his stand, The World (ゼ・ワールド): it can briefly stop time. He chases Jotaro and Joseph, until a climactic battle between The World and Star Platinum, where Dio uses an oil tanker (a steamroller in the manga) as a weapon, and Jotaro must use Star Platinum in ways he never thought he could.
Part 4: Diamond Doesn't Break
But wait! There's more! This series focuses on Josuke Higashikata (Stand: Crazy Diamond), the illegitimate son of Joseph Joestar, with Jotaro Kujo and Joseph Joestar along in a supporting role. Apparently feeling that Stands needed more explanation, Araki retroactively introduces the "Bow & Arrow", an ancient artifact (and yes, it is a bow & arrow) which causes latent Stand ability to develop in people. Unfortunately, the Bow & Arrow falls into the hands of a serial killer, who uses it to turn assorted other crazy people into Stand Users who then run around maniacally butchering others or just causing trouble. (They're not really working together like they were in Series 3.) Most of the Stand Users are teenagers, too, so the effect is sort of like "Stand User High School". Josuke's classmates also become Stand Users, and the powers they go up against get stranger and stranger... "Heaven's Door", which allows you to open up a person's face like a book and change their memories; "Echoes", which attacks with materialized sound effects; "Pearl Jam", which causes your food to apparently dismantle your body from inside... This Series is most notable for (1) Taking place in Japan and (2) Taking place in an imaginary place, without any trips to real locations. (The plot is mystery-oriented, not travel-oriented, as the characters try to locate the true murderer without being exterminated, but mostly they just wander around and encounter weird people.) Also, it really pumps up the rock references; there's even a villain jamming on a guitar, which might cross the line into total ridiculousness. For its sheer inventiveness, and its artwork, it occupies a high rank among many fans, even though it's probable that "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" was supposed to end with Series 3 and was just continued due to its popularity.
Part 5: Golden Wind
Stars Giorno Giovanna, the son of Dio Brando and one of his many wives. He tries to attain the rank of Gangster King (?) for the Italian community he loves. He uses the stand Gold Experience, which adds life to anything it touches. Along with his friends Bucchiarati (Sticky Fingers), Mista (Sex Pistols), Abacchio (Moody Blues), and others, "GioGio" has plenty of help to reach the top!
Part 6: Stone Ocean
The story of Jotaro Kujo's(Part 3) daughter, Jolyne Kujo. She is framed for a murder and ends up in the prison "Stone Ocean." She makes friends to recover her father's memory and stand, the perfect form of Star Platinum, stolen by a mysterious priest and his stand White Snake.
Most notably, she meets the likes of F.F., a Stand that's both plankton and a stand, that took the form of a dead prisoner, fellow transfer Hermes and her stand KiSS, and the murderer Annasui, who likes to take things apart and put the pieces side by side.
Part 7: Steel Ball Run
Was recently officially declared a part of the JoJo story line.
This series stars Gyro (sometimes attributed as J.Lo) Zeppelli, who uses a set of steel balls that spin incredibly fast, and Jonny Joestar, a former hot-shot rider who was crippled by an ambusher, and lost his fame and fortune. They race, along with others, in a mad-dash across America for 5 million dollars. This series is likely caused by the after effects of the stand "Stairway to Heaven" (the name was changed to メイド・イン・ヘブン "Made in Heaven" in the tankōbon release, "Stairway to Heaven" was written without any katakana furigana), which was reputed to create a perfect universe for everyone. This explains the inclusion of characters such as a Higashikata - someone of Josuke's lineage - an Abdul lookalike, and Diego "Dio" Brando.
It seems to largely be a retelling of Series 1, but the inclusion of Stands and the Western turn-of-the-century setting add a new element to the old coming-of-age story.
According to Jojo publisher, Steel Ball Run is a parallel world of Jojo. Hence, Steel Ball Run does not have any story-relation to the Jojo's Bizarre Adventure Universe.
Steel Ball Run is being published by Shueisha in Ultra Jump.
Anime
Two OVA series have been adapted from Series 3. The original six-episode series in 1993 began with Joseph, Jōtarō, Polnareff and Kakyōin in the Egyptian desert on their quest to find Dio (volume 20 in the manga). The series offered very little exposition, assuming the viewer already knew the backstory. A prequel seven-episode series was released in 2001, offering an explaination for those unfamiliar with the story in the previous series. It started with Joseph coming to Japan to explain Jōtarō's strange behavior (volume 12 in the manga).
Video Games
Several video games have been adapted from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. The first was an RPG based on Series 3 released in 1993 for the Super Famicom. Later, two fighting games were also adapted from Series 3 by Capcom, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Heritage for the Future, both in 1999. A third Capcom game was based on Series 5 titled JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Gold Whirlwind (ジョジョの奇妙な冒険: 黄金の旋風) and released for the PlayStation 2 in 2002. This game will be released in Europe as GioGio's Bizarre Adventure.
A note on WRYYYYYY
The eerie cry of "WRYYYYYY!" (ウリイイイイイイ uriiiiii, pronounced ree) is a shriek given off by the vampires throughout JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. While all vampires in the series are prone to doing so, this noise is most commonly associated with Dio Brando.
A resurgence of popular interest in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure occured when "WRYYYYYY" began making the rounds as an internet meme, sparked by a flash movie which features stick figures performing the signature attacks of five different characters. Dio Brando's features his use of The World to freeze time, a barrage of throwing knives, and finishes with a steamroller dropping on his opponent, atop which he leans back and exclaims "WRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!". While amusing to fans of the series, this proved hilariously random to those unfamiliar with JoJo. This internet phenomenon has spread mostly from the 4chan imageboards.
It is of interesting note that a debate has sprung up regarding the proper spelling of "WRYYYYYY", specifically how many Y's it should contain. While many argue that the 20-Y "WRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY" is the only "correct" spelling (assumedly since this is the amount of Y's featured in the flash movie), those who have read JoJo's Bizarre Adventure will note that not only is there no set amount of letters in the manga, but "WRYYYYYY" is actually a less common portrayal of the vampire cry, which is spelled as "URIIII" or "URYYYYY" far more frequently. A six-Y "WRYYYYYY" returns over 10,000 entries on Google, which is far more than any other spelling.
External links
- The JoJo FAQ, with plot and character summaries (http://www.sonic.net/~jason/jojo.html)
- Official JJBA OVA series site (http://www.jojo-ova.com/)
- Jojo posing school (http://homepage2.nifty.com/kajipon/jojo.htm)
- Jojo Flash Movie (http://qwerqwer1234.hp.infoseek.co.jp/mudah/mudah.swf?Target=)fr:JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
it:Le bizzarre avventure di JoJo ja:ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 th:โจโจ้ ล่าข้ามศตวรรษ zh:JoJo奇妙冒险