The Spring 2016 Anime Preview Guide

Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable

Ten years after the saga of Stardust Crusaders, a new Jojo has risen to take on the Joestar name. Josuke Higashikata is a high school freshman with love and peace written all over his heart-shaped suit, but his gentle demeanor hides a hair-trigger temper: it can only be triggered by insulting his hair! Thanks to the Joestar genes he inherited, Josuke's psychic powers are as wacky and contradictory as his personality. His Stand, Crazy Diamond, has the same destructive power as Star Platinum, but he instantly repairs whatever his mighty fists have broken! Jotaro Kujo isn't sure what to make of his grandfather's illegitimate son at first, but he didn't come to this little town of Morioh to make friends with the crazy guy. He came with a warning! There's something sinister brewing in the otherwise peaceful neighborhood, so Josuke must use his Stand to uncover the truth before he can claim his father's inheritance. As the eve of a new millennium approaches, can Josuke prove that Diamond is Unbreakable?! Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable is based on a manga and can be found streaming on Crunchyroll, Fridays at 12:30 PM EST.

Lynzee Loveridge
Rating for JoJo Fans: 5/5
Rating for Newcomers: 4/5

David Production returns for the next installment of over-the-top theatrics, ridiculous fighting scenes, and the high-contrast color palette that makes JoJo's Bizarre Adventure so addictive. The episode opens with a jarring first person camera sequence that shows someone making breakfast. They crack two eggs over a strip of bacon as a local Morioh radio station plays tinnily in the background. They pour a glass of orange juice and take a seat, only for the camera to pull back and reveal a severed arm. Something dangerous is afoot in what otherwise appears to be a picturesque town.

We're then quickly reacquainted with Stardust Crusaders protagonist Jotaro as he attempts to track down a high-school freshman named Josuke. This segment will be more difficult for newcomers to wrap their head around, but I don't think there's any information presented here that serves as a wall for viewers who want to jump in at Part 4. Josuke is revealed to be the illegitimate son of Joesph, Jotaro's grandfather, and he stands to inherit some of his estate. He also has the same Stand powers as the other members of the Joestar family. Jotaro does a quick Stand info dump to reacquaint anyone watching with the concept, and then we're back on track for outrageousness, like punk fights over a turtle and punching holes in people's chests.

Josuke's effectiveness as a lead protagonist shows potential. Jotaro's most interesting aspect was laying waste to his enemies. Otherwise, he rarely spoke or outwardly emoted except in extreme circumstances. Josuke takes the kick-ass abilities that make Jotaro appealing but also interacts with the people around him. I never found Jotaro particularly appealing as a lead (sacrilege, I know), since his personality seems better suited to a supporting, guiding role.

This season also sees the return of questionable, overprotective name-changing. For those unfamiliar, the world of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure takes a ton of inspiration from classic rock groups, going so far as to name actual characters, Stands, and finishing moves after real-life musicians, bands, songs, and albums. This leads to a lot of changing up, which is why characters like Muhammad Abdul become Muhammad Avdol, Devo becomes Soul Sacrifice, etc. Usually, these are characters that only last a couple of episodes but I was sorely disappointed to see Josuke's stand changed from “Crazy Diamond” (a reference to the title of a Pink Floyd song) to “Shining Diamond.” That's going to be a lot of episodes with subtitle mismatching.

If viewers had an interest in the world of JoJo, Part 4 could be a great part to get the ball rolling before revisiting the previous three seasons. Some aspects might not be as fun without previous knowledge to draw from, but you shouldn't find yourself lost.

Nick Creamer

Rating: 4

JoJo is back! With Jotaro's quest to defeat Dio completed, Diamond is Unbreakable turns to the daily life of his “uncle” Josuke, Joseph's illegitimate son over in Japan. With a strangely retro setting and a new aesthetic coat of paint, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is looking as compelling as ever in its third season.

Actually, “as ever” is probably a bit inaccurate. At least going by aesthetic alone, Diamond is Unbreakable looks far superior to Stardust Crusaders. While Stardust Crusaders’ giant muscle man character designs had a certain campy appeal, the more lithe and rounded designs of Diamond is Unbreakable already seem more expressive, and better suited to JoJo's pose-happy strengths. On top of that, the color work here seems far superior to Stardust Crusaders, and harkens back to the technicolor visual inventiveness of the show's first season. One of the first season's greatest strengths was its visual flair, and the strange pastels of Diamond is Unbreakable nicely echo that. It's both a unique visual style and a welcome compliment to a story that seems more about suburban unease than globetrotting theatrics.

Of course, there was also a less lauded reason the first season of JoJo was known for its stylish freeze-frame aesthetic - the show was making up for a serious lack of actual animation. That issue returns here in Diamond is Unbreakable, with this first episode featuring none of the occasional animation highlights Stardust Crusaders brought to the series. To have the first episode of what will presumably be a four season show lack any well-animated highlights is a bit of a worrying sign, but with its fundamental art design this strong, it's likely Diamond is Unbreakable will be able to get away with that lack.

But visual comparisons aside, story-wise, this first episode is classic JoJo from start to finish. We get introduced to new Jojo Josuke at roughly the same time the show is torturing its first animal (it wouldn't be JoJo without a few dead dogs here and there), and by the end of the episode, we've already run through half a dozen pointlessly dramatic confrontations between Josuke and the world at large, mostly over people insulting Josuke's hair. It's silly and stupid and a whole lot of fun, a camp package embellished with great, absurd lines like “the last crime he committed was so vile it'd even make a rat in the bathroom puke.”

Diamond is Unbreakable seems like it'll be more of a dynamic, slow-boiling story than Stardust Crusaders, which is also a welcome shift - it'd be nice to see the JoJo formula applied to a story more complex than a march through monster-of-the-week Stand users. And the setting here is more distinctive than those we've seen in the past, with Josuke's neighborhood offering a creepily idyllic backdrop to a story that will certainly involve more than a few grisly murders. But we're over sixty episodes into JoJo now, so at this point, you should probably know what to expect. Diamond is Unbreakable opens what looks to be another strong chapter in what has become a reliably entertaining show.

Rating: 4.5

The folks at David Production really know how to make every new Jojo's adventure feel special! The introduction of Stands to the JJBA-verse may have changed everything going forward, but that doesn't mean every new arc should just ape Stardust Crusaders's style. Other long-running adaptations might have gone into autopilot with the new season, but that's too blasé for Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. Right away, Part Four sets itself apart with a bold and gaudy pop art palette, absurdly '90s turntables in the soundtrack, and fractal-ized shot transitions that make you feel like you're watching some action scenes through the glimmering facet of a diamond. From the very first wiggity-wiggity-wack moments of the episode, the direction and art design are firing on all cylinders to make this feel like a brand new Jojo's that's just going to party like it's 1999.

And that's a good thing because the new story gets off to a relatively gentle start this time. While Josuke is immediately unique and hilarious as a protagonist, most of the episode is just devoted to cementing his schtick. He's the nicest guy ever until you insult his hair! He'll break your face at the slightest provocation, but at least he'll put it back together! Jotaro pulls rank as the straight man once again, but we also have a little sidekick on the sidelines, Koichi Hirose, who hasn't done much but gawk at the two titanically tall Jojos so far, but will probably fill the deuteragonist role once Jotaro steps away. It's all setup for the most part, but the execution is everything, and JJBA superfan Naokatsu Tsuda once again manages to make every moment thrilling from the director's chair.

As a casual Jojo's fan myself, Stardust Crusaders was the alpha and omega of my experience with the franchise before this rebooted series started coming out, so while I was ecstatic with anticipation when that first episode of Part Three came out, this first episode of Part Four is all new ground for me. For many Jojo's nuts, however, Part Four is one of the most beloved arcs in the manga (and the author's favorite!), so I'm eager to discover what makes it so memorable. David Production is still doing right by Jojo's, and this premiere has been well worth the wait.

Rating: 4, but don't take my word for it

Alright, confession time: I never finished Stardust Crusaders. I never watched past the first three or four episodes, actually – I went back to watch the first two parts, Phantom Blood and Battle Tendency, at the insistence of every Jojo's fan I knew, and then stalled out after Battle Tendency (which was great, but I took a break from the show afterward and never found time to go back). So I went into this primarily to determine whether or not you can start watching Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable without really knowing much of what happened in Stardust Crusaders.

Turns out the answer is largely “no”, at least in my experience. Diamond is Unbreakable is wildly entertaining in the same way all the other David Production Jojo's Bizarre Adventure adaptations are, but there are big information dumps that straight-up won't make a lot of sense unless you've been following the Joestar family line this entire time and can keep up with it all. This episode opens with the main character from the last round, Jotaro Kujo, running across the new main character, Josuke Higashikata, and why any of that is significant will be just confusing enough to make you feel like you really can't watch this one blind.

I loved what I saw, though – Josuke made me laugh a whole lot, and it feels like they managed to turn up the absurd machismo somehow (which I didn't think possible with this show). The color design on this thing is brilliant – David Production always goes out of its way to make these adaptations look great, and this one is no exception (I especially loved Josuke's crimson color palette, which you see near the end). I'll just have to speed through Stardust Crusaders as quickly as I can to get back here – it's all a little too much fun to be left behind.