Episodes eight and nine are a string of battles leading to another confrontation between Dio and Jojo, interspersed with tragedy and coincidence. Jojo becomes Zeppeli’s hope for success to destroy both the Mask and Dio as he falls to his inevitable fate. More allies arrive in the form of Zeppeli’s teacher and several fellow monks to face the zombie army Dio made out of the town of Windknight’s Lot. It’s truly hard to talk much about “Sorrowful Successor” without spoilers so there is at least one coming below.
1. Split Decision
I have very mixed feelings about these episodes. They are part of a series I really love, but even in things you love you have to see their faults. I think where “Sorrowful Successor” and “Bloody Battle! Jojo and Dio” fall short is the noticeable difference in animation quality in the episodes and when compared to the ones that came before, the quality and level of details vary during the episodes themselves. The difference is not really bad but its noticeable, its particularly true of “Bloody Battle, Jojo and Dio,” some of the big fights look rushed, less rendered then others. The animation would stand up really well compared to shows like Fist of the Northstar from the 80’s or even compared to the Jojo OVA series from the late 90’s but it doesn’t stand up compared to itself. Its still well done, but I really wish it fit the rest of the series better. The climax of the story deserved better, even if the writing relies a bit too much on coincidence.
2 Passing the Torch
It’s actually very hard to talk about “Sorrowful Successor” without revealing Will A. Zeppeli’s fate. The flashback in this episode reveals not only his fated death but the where and when of it through his mentor Tonpetty. It is so clear that the moment has come that Zeppeli knows the time is here. He so clearly has come to terms with it and faces the coming moment with calm stoicism. I think the shock to him is the futility of his actions and the brutality in Tarkus’s attack that ends his life. Other then interrupting the fight, Zeppeli accomplished little in his one attack, but in its aftermath, his actions matter. His dying act, transferring his remaining Hamon and spirit to Jojo ,changes the course of this fight that those that follow. Losing Zeppeli showed the obvious depth of attachment that had grown between Will A. Zeppeli, Jojo, and Speedwagon, despite knowing each other only a short time. Between Jojo and Zeppeli there was a real familial father son relationship even if they knew each other for mere weeks. The way the scenes were animated following the battle gives the scenes that were a little rushed more impact in retrospect. Losing this eccentric father figure gives Jojo another reason to want to bring an end to Dio.
3. Love to Hate
Yes we get it, Dio is evil through and through. He is deliberately cruel for the sake of it. In “Sorrowful Successor,” Araki shows just how cruel Dio is. He callously promises a woman to spare her child and take her instead fully knowing and looking forward to her devouring her own child after becoming a zombie. As she can’t regret her actions, this was all just for his own amusement. He does something very similar to Poco’s sister by complimenting her beauty and promising her eternal youth to join him. Her slap may have shocked him, but he’s ready to punish her denial, leaving her to the tender mercies of Doobie (named after the band the Doobie Brothers and visually based on the elephant man). These actions and gruesome, monstrous creatures he made out of the people of Windknight’s Lot remind us of who he is, vampire or not. Looking back, he’s always been that way even before the mask, before being a vampire, and before coming to the Joestar family. It does make him interesting, if one sided. Many writers will often humanize villains when they revisit them, as happened with characters like Magneto, Doctor Doom, and Jamie Lannister. They become someone we can like, understand, and mourn but Dio. He’s more vile and openly hateful and more the villain that we can be free to love to hate.
Continued below4. Yes, and
Hirohiko Araki seems to be playing a game of “yes and” in his approach to his creative process. He makes Dio a “vampire.” A vampire that sucks blood through his fingertips, and can freeze the air around him and things that touch him. He creates zombies though his feeding and can apparently raise the long dead. He is not turned by crosses and not subject to any weakness other then sunlight. Araki implies that Dio can put disparate bodies together into hybrid creatures as cat-headed birds, human headed dogs, and the like litter stash pages depicting him. He gives him the ability to… well actually I won’t mention that because I can’t spoil everything. Araki has Dio survive terrible body horror levels of damage to still remain a threat and recover. To fight the horror he created, he makes his heroes creative and resourceful, use their environment, and eventually outthink their more powerful enemies. Its a pattern established here, one that he follows into future volumes and wildly different battle landscapes.
5. Stacking coincidences
The storytelling of the ‘Phantom Blood’ story arc can often feel rushed or in fast forward. Hirohiko Araki often seems to be in a bit of a hurry to get to the next interesting story beats and plot points. He also never really worries about wild coincidence of the odd “wait, what?” moments in the telling. He replaces Jojo’s lost mentor with Zeppeli’s teacher Tonpetty and his monks Dire and Straits. He explains their presence there and knowledge of Jojo with a letter from Zeppeli. When was the letter mailed and how did they arrive so fast and here? I know it’s a shonen anime and the how’s sometimes really don’t matter, but I’m still curious. I also want to know about the 20 Zeppeli apparently spent adventuring with Dire and Straits and how that affected the family he abandoned. It was also a bit too big a coincidence that Poco’s father escaped becoming a zombie and that his sister was abducted by Dio and was kept long enough for Jojo and crew to save. I know those are the story beats we were promised, but strung so close to the other all the “wait, what” moments do knock me out of the story. I forgive it, I overlook it, but I don’t love it.
