#Shueiesha

[popcultureoverdosed]

Jojolands Chapter 1 Review- The Mechanism

If someone had told me a few months ago that part 9 would be GTA with stands, I'm not sure if I would laugh or just dance with joy. Probably both. Jojolands  is already off to a strong start with probably the best first chapter out of any part. Readers quickly get introduced to Jodio and their sibling Dragona getting accosted by police that then delves into sexual assault. Jodio doesn't tolerate this at all and he breaks out his stand to wreck some havoc. November Rain is the name of the stand and it appears that he can manipulate water to create crushing raindrops. That's a cool ability but seems way too cut and dry for a protagonist stand. It's probably just an application of its true ability. 

Jodio is without a doubt the most amoral Joestar thus far. He has no issue with severely beating cops(potentially killing them), stealing cars, and selling drugs to teens. All of this establishes him as a weird alternate universe counterpart to Giorno. Jodio's ruthlessness will take some getting used to so I'm hoping he eventually gets character development that makes him more noble. He's a cool guy but very punchable at the same time. Kinda like how Johnny was at the beginning of part 7. He also seems to be very hedonistic since he wants to get rich simply for the sake of it. He's a true gangster at heart. I also want to talk about Dragona who's easily the biggest highlight of the chapter. Despite their feminine appearance, Jodio calls them his brother. Jodio monologues how Dragona has always been into women's fashion and even got injections to expand their breaststroke. This implies Dragona could possibly be trans or nonbinary. The original Japanese version doesn't even use gendered pronouns to address them but all three translations( you know a manga is hyper when three different people translate it) uses male pronouns. I feel that using gender neutral pronouns for now is the wisest decision. I'm curious to see where Dragona's gender identity will lead but then again, Araki is infamous for never elaborating on important plot points. Here's to hoping he doesn't screw them over.

Near the middle to end of the chapter we are introduced to the primary objective: stealing a 24 carat blue diamond from a Japanese tourist. To assist in this mission they are joined by Paco, a kleptomaniac with some seriously sticky fingers and an unnamed character in a wetsuit who buys drugs from Jodio. Yeah, this part has a lot going on for it. It fills me with excitement just imagining how this heist will play out. The narration implies things will go horribly wrong and piques my interest even more. It's important to not that all the stands seen thus far are non-humanoid and only Jodio was one suited for combat. This makes me believe there'll be an even lesser focus on battles than in Jojolion and will focus more on tactical espionage. It's a fun change of pace but I'm seriously missing  the powerhouse stand battles we used to get. Overall, Jojolands is destined to be a captivating new installment of JoJo.