My thoughts on JJBA Part 5

[Kyo]

As per CC's challenge. I was originally just going to make a fairly brief post in the "rate the last anime you watched" thread when I finished, but I figure I could take advantage of this thread to put out some more detailed thoughts and leverage a little more discussion.

I've seen up to episode 34 so far and will probably finish the rest tonight or tomorrow, after which point I can update this thread. Since I'm working at the moment I can write out some thoughts here in-between running code and stuff for now.

The anime started off somewhat promising in establishing its playing field: the Italian setting, Giorno's personality being something of a mix of Dio's and Jonathon's (as demonstrated by the Polpo assassination), and building intrigue behind the nature of the gang "Passione" and its elusive boss. However, I feel like the rest of the story doesn't capitalize on its setting too well. I don't agree with the assessment that Part 5 feels like a gangster movie or whatever (though certainly it is more brutal than the previous parts). It just feels like a battle anime.

The establishment of its zany crew that we (mostly) follow for the rest of the story was also done well: briefly showing us Mista's superstitious side and love for life's material pleasures, Fugo's anger issues (although Narancia's aggressive retaliation could just make it seem like these guys are violent gangsters in general), Narancia's naivete and idiocy, Abbachio's distrusting nature. The story, which basically amounts to overthrowing a gang boss, seems interesting.

Over time though I feel like the anime doesn't deliver on a lot of this promise. Giorno, put simply, is pretty boring. (I wonder if this is just an even-odd thing. Jonathon and Jotaro were also pretty boring compared to Joseph and Josuke. But then people jerk off Part 7 so much that I must assume 6 and 7 buck this trend.) There's this conceit that his nature is what changes the other gang members occasionally -- we have scenes in which Bucciarati and Mista talk about how Giorno just unwittingly guides them somehow and fills them with courage, but this is pretty much the only thing there is to him, and in reality it just boils down to "Giorno is the often the only one who knows what to do when the others are lost." Giorno had a pretty interesting backstory, but it has (so far) never been capitalized on outside of his introduction (a problem that some of the other characters share).

Bucciarati feels more like the true protagonist of the series, and his motivations and backstory and interesting enough compared to Gio "I have a dream" Gio. This zombie shit that's going on with him right now is weird though and it's still not clear where that's supposed to be going, so judgement pending on that.

The rest of the gang is kind of a mixed bag. Fugo has one fight and then fucks off halfway into the story and hasn't returned yet. His backstory is irrelevant so I don't have much else to say about him. Abbachio does literally fuck all before his death, which was presented well, but didn't have the writing to back the emotion behind it otherwise. His death ties well into his backstory, but the issue is that his backstory does not matter to his character in the slightest, except for when we first hear about it and then when he dies. His conflict with Giorno goes nowhere. Narancia has more to him than Abbachio and Fugo, and his background ties into his present personality traits a lot better than those two, but it feels like his personality only shines when the plot requires it to. That is to say, for example, his uber-dependence on Bucciarati and his group only presents itself when the plot is about to force them apart. The empathy he feels for Trish is only brought up when he decides to go with the gang to help protect her, and is completely forgotten after that point. And so on.

Mista gets the most screentime of the gang, and his personality combined with his (let's be straight with this) idiotic demeanor is funny to watch. Despite Araki's creativity with Stands in this part, I feel like Mista is the only character of the gang to have a particularly versatile Stand (outside of Giorno and Bucciarati), which is why he gets shoved into more fights than they do. His simplistic backstory also makes it easier for me to buy into his character, since you don't need to do much with it for it to work. (Although, the ease with which he seems to redirects bullets in his backstory, which I'm certain is a subconscious use of Sex Pistols, is not reincorporated in the present as often as I feel it should).

I will talk about Diavolo more when I finish the Part. Like with the previous two parts, I'm sure a bulk of what there is to talk about with the villain will come towards the end.

I mentioned fights before so let's talk about those. The biggest point of praise I've seen for Part 5 is that it has the best fights. And, really, I do see why people say that. Part of my issue with Part 5 is how much of it is just fighting -- the development of the plot is largely just fight after fight after fight, at the expense of interesting plot developments or character interactions, but if treated as just a battle anime, that doesn't have to be so bad.

Araki feels very creative here in coming up with Stand powers. A lot of it feels like he's just constantly throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks, but it does make for some pretty interesting ideas. Part 5 has also made the best use of its environments when it comes to constructing fights so far. The Kraftwerk fight on the truck, the Grateful Dead fight on the train, the entire White Album fight (the spike on the pole was some bullshit though), Green Day/Oasis, etc, are all examples of this. I also enjoy that the protagonists are often fighting a very uphill battle, as some of the enemy Stands they run into are bonkers strong/versatile and are also utilize the particular environment they're in very well, forcing our cast to come up with creative ways to counterattack with their own strategies. In terms of just pure entertainment factor, I might even tentatively agree that this is the best Part for just straight fights, without considering the rest of the series in context at least.

That isn't to say the fights don't have major issues though. Firstly, the insane plot armor. I was just praising the construction of the fights earlier, but there is no denying that the plot armor plays a huge part in that. I think Araki just wanted to make this Part really brutal, but there are so many times where the main characters -- and even the villains -- should've just fucking died with what was happening to them.

Secondly, although I praised the idea of fighting an uphill battle (a major issue with Part 3 is that Jotaro can easily punch any obstacles in his way), some of the most overpowered shit gets thrown at our protagonists in Araki's cycle of having each character constantly one-up the other throughout a battle, and there comes several moments where it's just nonsensical at all for our protagonists to win. For instance, by the time Ghiaccio pulls Gently Weeps out of his arsenal, there's just no way Mista and Giorno should've won the way they did -- which is a shame because that fight was probably the most entertaining one in this Part otherwise. And although I praised Green Day for utilizing its setting well, that power is just fucking ridiculous. Notorious B.I.G. is also just ridiculous on several levels that I don't even want to get into right now (although, again, this was another fight that utilized its setting well...though if it had attacked in literally any other setting, everyone would've fucking died. Well, actually, it's technically killable, but Araki can just say some shit like "a tiny part of it managed to escape [and get into the jet engine]." [That's a good example of when the constant escalation of stakes in a fight just gets tiring, and is a good example of how fights in this Part can just drag for so fucking long.] Like, I don't even see what Diavolo could do against that shit without a surefire method to drag it into the ocean).

Thirdly, a lot of the Stand powers aren't very well-defined. I think this is also problem with Parts 3 and 4, but it feels more blatant in 5. I think part of this comes from what I mentioned earlier -- Araki throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks. I don't think that's anything new for Araki -- sometimes his ideas just aren't fully developed yet, like Star Platinum's range in episode 1 -- but it seems to hurt at a lot in this part especially. The most blatant example is Gold Experience. He creates life that can reflect back attacks or whatever, which is quickly retconned. His punches create an out-of-body experience or whatever by overflowing a person with life energy, which is retconned (you can assume that it's just not illustrated in subsequent fights, but why wouldn't it be? There are numerous instances in which this effect would be relevant and helpful). Then stuff that he creates life from have the desire to return to their owner, for some reason, even if it's an article of clothing like Narancia's shoe. Then he's somehow able to sense people's life force by just checking the area, so why didn't he do that before? Let's not even get into the random BS he pulled to survive Purple Haze's virus. The only "evolution" in his ability that was somewhat organic is when he learned he could "give life" to "heal" wounds in the Baby Face fight.

Although Giorno is by far the most egregious example, there are plenty of other minor ones. Sale can suspend a bullet inside of his skull before it penetrates further, but apparently this doesn't count as suspending a bullet inside one's body (which Mista eventually learns that he can "also" do). Man in the Mirror can push someone halfway out of the mirror world if need be, but doesn't choose to do so in his fight until he drags Abbacchio halfway in first, but it is not clear whether that's a prerequisite (I don't see why it would be). It is not made clear why Baby Face couldn't just deconstruct Giorno before the fight even began, as he did so easily to Bucciarati and Trish -- there is no limitation or anything to this ability that is made clear to us. Spice Girl just isn't too well-explained in general, though I could've missed something with that one. King Crimson isn't supposed to be able to affect things during his erased time, and yet Diavolo is able to grab Trish during it. Also, it makes no sense that Bucciarati attacks his own double or whatever when King Crimson activated his ability. There are more examples but I don't remember them all.

Part of the reason the Stands don't feel as well-defined is also because Araki just seems to make up a lot of their additional abilities as he goes along. Some you could reasonably predict or at least see where they're coming from, others can be more nonsensical.

Fourthly, like I said before, some of the fights, despite having some pretty good aspects, can really drag which caused me to just want it to end after a certain point regardless of what was happening anymore. Part of it is just the opponent constantly coming back with more and more shit they can do.

Fifthly, there are numerous contrived scenarios that force the cast into unfavorable 1v1s or 2v1s. It wouldn't have been too hard to just make this aspect more believable. Parts 3 and 4 suffer from the same issue at times, though not to such a degree. By the same token, you often wonder why more of the La Squadra or Diavolo's underlings don't go for the gang at once, though it's at least somewhat dismissible in that their goal is to get Trish, not kill the entire gang (and some of them are rightfully confident in their ability to either defeat or at least subdue the entire gang anyway, e.g. Prosciutto and Cioccolata), so it's not as bad as other anime or manga might be in this regard.

WITH ALL THAT SAID, however, I think it's a testament to Araki's creativity that I still found many of the fights to be pretty entertaining, despite how dragged out some of them are and how dependent they are on bullshit to progress.

I was going to move on from here to talk about the development of the plot, but I've said too much for now. I will save it for later.

 

[Pocket-Gog~]

Iz bad.

 

[Kyo]

Feeling too lazy to properly finish this up, but since I just finished the anime I figure I'll give it a meager attempt.

The plot structure is what I neglected to talk about before. For the most part, it is kind of disastrous. While more entertaining than Part 3's Saturday morning cartoon shenanigans, objectives come and go on a whim. This is most evident when the concept of Requiems is randomly dragged into the story by Jean Pierre Ex Machina, after it had been so paramount to try and find leads on the boss's identity. Of course, the boss's true identity did not really matter in the slightest and it was simply the only hope our protagonists had of figuring out a way to defeat him, so we have to introduce a method into the story artificially somehow.

This is not even talking about random plot devices that crop up without reason, such as Trish's ability to "sense" the boss nearby just because they're related. No other blood relation has been able to do such a thing before. The Bucciarati zombie plot point was not very well-explained even at the end -- he wasn't fated to die just yet, so here we are. I do kind of see the point behind this decision, but I still feel it would've been cleaner if he'd been simply left miraculously alive.

85% of the plot is just fights, though, so it definitely feels like the plot doesn't have much of a focus a lot of the time. But when the ending and the random last arc goes for an attempt at some kind of thematic profundity regarding fate, which only ties into the preceding events tenuously at best, I'm led to believe the story was meant to be more than just an excuse to string Stand fights together.

Diavolo's motives are very muddied. The Doppio/Diavolo dynamic was interesting, but it was not taken advantage of much before Doppio was unceremoniously written out of the story. Diavolo on his own is a pretty bland antagonist and there is little about him that stands out all -- he is worthy, he is the king of kings. Sure thing man.

That being said, it would've been interesting for the cast to figure out a way to outplay him, but GER is a literal "no u" Stand and Diavolo loses just because he does. Polnareff did explain before that the arrow will grant whatever power the user needs in order to succeed, but that doesn't make it feel like any less of a copout. Araki has always made shit up as he goes along, this is no secret, but the entire arrow sequence from Chariot Requiem up until the end felt like that x10, even in comparison to the earlier episodes of the Part.

Despite ALL of my misgivings with this arc, I was still prepared to rate it like a 6/10 because of how much I liked a lot of the fights before the ending arc(s), despite their tendency to bullshit their way to progression in a long-winded fashion. But the last few episodes really soured the entire experience and the conclusion was not at all satisfying. So this is more of a 5~5.5/10 at best. The writing quality alone is closer to a 4/10 at most.

 

[Papasmurf]

Feeling too lazy to properly finish this up, but since I just finished the anime I figure I'll give it a meager attempt.

The plot structure is what I neglected to talk about before. For the most part, it is kind of disastrous. While more entertaining than Part 3's Saturday morning cartoon shenanigans, objectives come and go on a whim. This is most evident when the concept of Requiems is randomly dragged into the story by Jean Pierre Ex Machina, after it had been so paramount to try and find leads on the boss's identity. Of course, the boss's true identity did not really matter in the slightest and it was simply the only hope our protagonists had of figuring out a way to defeat him, so we have to introduce a method into the story artificially somehow.

This is not even talking about random plot devices that crop up without reason, such as Trish's ability to "sense" the boss nearby just because they're related.

This is actually untrue. DIO and Joseph could sense each other (albeit vaguely) because of DIO's Jonathan Joestar blood.

 

[Kyo]

Were they not using Hermit Purple or something? If not I'll retract the statement but it's still a cliche plot device that I don't feel is particularly justified at all, especially with just how heavily this Part uses it as a crutch.

 

[Pocket-Gog~]

Part 6 is 10x better.

 

[Kyo]

So I've heard from CC and k3nsh3h before. Why does Japan and like half of NA hate Part 6 though?
NA used to hate Part 5 too but changed their minds like a year or two ago I guess.

 

[Pocket-Gog~]

So I've heard from CC and k3nsh3h before. Why does Japan and like half of NA hate Part 6 though?
NA used to hate Part 5 too but changed their minds like a year or two ago I guess.

I don't know? Araki considered it to be the peak of his creativity.

Maybe it's the prison setting being too gloomy?

 

[Kyo]

Sounds fun. I'll read it and Part 7 eventually, I've had enough JoJo for the moment.

 

[Papasmurf]

Were they not using Hermit Purple or something? If not I'll retract the statement but it's still a cliche plot device that I don't feel is particularly justified at all, especially with just how heavily this Part uses it as a crutch.

Joseph wasn't using Hermit Purple, he could just sense Dio was nearby while he was driving that truck. Dio could likewise sense that a Joestar was nearby due to occupying a Joestar body.

 

[Captain Cadaver]

Over time though I feel like the anime doesn't deliver on a lot of this promise. Giorno, put simply, is pretty boring. (I wonder if this is just an even-odd thing. Jonathon and Jotaro were also pretty boring compared to Joseph and Josuke. But then people jerk off Part 7 so much that I must assume 6 and 7 buck this trend.) There's this conceit that his nature is what changes the other gang members occasionally -- we have scenes in which Bucciarati and Mista talk about how Giorno just unwittingly guides them somehow and fills them with courage, but this is pretty much the only thing there is to him, and in reality it just boils down to "Giorno is the often the only one who knows what to do when the others are lost." Giorno had a pretty interesting backstory, but it has (so far) never been capitalized on outside of his introduction (a problem that some of the other characters share).

After reconsidering a lot of things about Part 5, I'd contest this notion. Giorno's interesting duality of essentially being part Jonathan-part Dio is something that continues to make his character decisions intriguing even later on in the part (most notably the Green Day fight), as well as his inexperience compared to the other members showing during the mid-point and leading to some character development within the Babyface fight. It's also important to note how a Stand is a manifestation of someone's spirit, with Giorno's more creative uses of Gold Experience and his attitude later on of freely switching between his Jonathan and Dio characteristics rather than covering one with the other as he did early on displaying him coming to an understanding of himself through his experiences in a subtle way.
Also, whilst the saviour aspects of his character are a bit on the nose, they are fitting when considering the setting and the religious symbolism littered throughout it.

This zombie shit that's going on with him right now is weird though and it's still not clear where that's supposed to be going, so judgement pending on that.

Now that you've finished the part, what would be your thoughts on this element of Bucciarati? I'd say it's one of, if not the, most interesting way Araki has explored death in the series.

Abbachio does literally fuck all before his death, which was presented well, but didn't have the writing to back the emotion behind it otherwise.

Other than a whole lot of essential support roles with his Stand.

His death ties well into his backstory, but the issue is that his backstory does not matter to his character in the slightest, except for when we first hear about it and then when he dies.

We learn about his backstory pretty early into the part. I'd also say it's the most relevant aspect of his character going back to the spiritual aspect of Stands. Moody Blues is a Stand that replays events, which would highlight how much he's haunted by the mistakes involving his partner, something made even more apparent during his death scene.

The empathy he feels for Trish is only brought up when he decides to go with the gang to help protect her, and is completely forgotten after that point.

It was only then that he realised it due to her wound and the knowledge she'd been betrayed by all she held dear, which is fitting as Narancia's backstory is one focused on him being betrayed by the world around him. It's less so that it's forgotten after that and more that it doesn't get much opportunity to be displayed beyond this scene. In fact, this character moment is pretty important when considering Narancia's actions in the Clash fight with his resolve and ability to protect those around him acting as a moment of development due to the scene at the boat.

Part of my issue with Part 5 is how much of it is just fighting -- the development of the plot is largely just fight after fight after fight, at the expense of interesting plot developments or character interactions, but if treated as just a battle anime, that doesn't have to be so bad.

I'd say this isn't quite true. Yes, the plot is primarily dictated by battles, but there were still many plot twists, standard JoJo mystery, character interactions and so on thrown in both in between and during these fights. I'd say the only reason it seems more battle-focused than something such as Part 3 would be due to more attention being required to the group's method of travelling there in a journey that spanned across many countries, making scenes focused on that more relevant. The nature of Passione's mission and their enemies also left very little downtime, so adding more moments akin to something such as DiU's slice of life scenes would take away from the tension.

[qote] like Star Platinum's range in episode 1[/quote]That's actually consistent with the rules we learn about Stands. Short-Range Stands can still travel over a greater distance than usual, but their powers are heavily weakened by doing so.

He creates life that can reflect back attacks or whatever, which is quickly retconned. His punches create an out-of-body experience or whatever by overflowing a person with life energy, which is retconned

Neither of these are actually retconned. For the damage reversal, none of the later Stand fights had someone attack a creation of Giorno's other than the anime changing Diavolo avoiding the scorpion to attacking the it (which is indeed a flaw of the anime). For the enhanced senses, pretty much all of Giorno's fights from Black Sabbath and onward are ones in which neither ability would be useful against the enemy and him directly punching them was limited to the beatdown at the end. Black Sabbath, Babyface and Notorious B.I.G. were all remote, independent Stands, Ghiaccio still wouldn't be beaten by it without getting in the position to penetrate his armour (and after getting to where his neck could be impaled, it was pretty unnecessary) and whether or not it was used against Cioccolata was irrelevant when it'd occur within the iconic Muda that defeated him. It can also be argued GER is an evolution of this ability.

Man in the Mirror can push someone halfway out of the mirror world if need be, but doesn't choose to do so in his fight until he drags Abbacchio halfway in first, but it is not clear whether that's a prerequisite

Man in the Mirror isn't a physically strong Stand, so half-measures wouldn't be something Illuso would desire to do unless necessary as that wouldn't fully take away someone's use of their Stand.

Spice Girl just isn't too well-explained in general, though I could've missed something with that one.

It increases the elasticity of an object it touches, as well as causes a violent reaction if changing it back to normal too quickly. Not much more to it than that.

King Crimson isn't supposed to be able to affect things during his erased time, and yet Diavolo is able to grab Trish during it.

King Crimson isn't bound by fate during erased time and can bring himself into a favourable position. He can still interact with objects around him, though affects don't occur until the time erasure ends, being a delayed version of Za Warudo in that regard. It's also arguable due to their blood ties, Trish would be exempt from the general rules to some extent when considering Diavolo's blood could move in erased time against Polnareff.

Also, it makes no sense that Bucciarati attacks his own double or whatever when King Crimson activated his ability.

That was just Diavolo showing him the affects of Epitaph.

and some of them are rightfully confident in their ability to either defeat or at least subdue the entire gang anyway, e.g. Prosciutto and Cioccolata), so it's not as bad as other anime or manga might be in this regard.

To be fair, La Squadra and Diavolo's team had info on all but Giorno, who was often the wildcard in overcoming the more difficult members.

I'll respond to the 2nd part later as this has already become quite verbose, though I'll provide two videos that do good breakdowns on explaining some of the elements on Part 5 you had issue with. There are still obvious flaws like the plot armour, though I can say that I have looked at a few elements of the part in a new light after viewing them.

Spoiler

[youtube]jXPziHbmOEs[/youtube]
[youtube]7f3l94vuuzI[/youtube]

So I've heard from CC and k3nsh3h before. Why does Japan and like half of NA hate Part 6 though?

It most likely comes down to the difference in its structure compared to the others, as well as the prison making its setting more limited for the first half and the ending making a lot of fans salty. It overall comes down to a lot of fans not getting what they'd expect rather than a fault in the writing.

 

[Kyo]

Thanks for the write-up CC. Ever since I finished the part I have been reading a few analyses as well as just some points from other people who had changed their minds on Part 5 (mostly on Diavolo and the general themes of fate and whatever), not all of which has changed my opinion by any means but does bring to light some things I didn't consider. My opinion of Diavolo as a villain has improved somewhat, although I still think that the themes were not integrated into the work very well even if they make sense to me. I've been told Steel Ball Run is better in that regard.

After reconsidering a lot of things about Part 5, I'd contest this notion. Giorno's interesting duality of essentially being part Jonathan-part Dio is something that continues to make his character decisions intriguing even later on in the part (most notably the Green Day fight), as well as his inexperience compared to the other members showing during the mid-point and leading to some character development within the Babyface fight. It's also important to note how a Stand is a manifestation of someone's spirit, with Giorno's more creative uses of Gold Experience and his attitude later on of freely switching between his Jonathan and Dio characteristics rather than covering one with the other as he did early on displaying him coming to an understanding of himself through his experiences in a subtle way.
Also, whilst the saviour aspects of his character are a bit on the nose, they are fitting when considering the setting and the religious symbolism littered throughout it.

I didn't really see it that way. Most of his decisions just seemed like something any idealistic hero (i.e. Jonathon) would want to do, e.g. when he insists that he save Fugo and succeed in retrieving the key when faced against Illuso. The Green Day fight represents a shift in which he reveals that he was never going to let Cioccolata live, but I never got the impression that this is an aspect of the character that received much focus (nor was he a character that received much focus in his own right in general). I appreciate the nuance of the Stands reflecting the character's spirit, but that is a supplementary detail and not the meat of their characterization.

Now that you've finished the part, what would be your thoughts on this element of Bucciarati? I'd say it's one of, if not the, most interesting way Araki has explored death in the series.

I did say above that I did not find it to be as well-explained as I'd hoped. As far as its utilization throughout the plot, I thought it was a good way to increase the sense of urgency because we don't know exactly what has happened to him -- we can guess that he has effectively died, but for some reason is still present in the world right now, so when will his time truly be up? This is exacerbated by his body deteriorating etc, which was first hinted at (iirc) when he randomly couldn't hear what Giorno was yelling at him in the car right behind him. So it conveyed that feeling effectively.

Other than a whole lot of essential support roles with his Stand.

He plays his role in the group, but I just mean that I didn't think he had a lot going for him as a character.

We learn about his backstory pretty early into the part. I'd also say it's the most relevant aspect of his character going back to the spiritual aspect of Stands. Moody Blues is a Stand that replays events, which would highlight how much he's haunted by the mistakes involving his partner, something made even more apparent during his death scene.

I mentioned that his backstory is first shown early on. But Abbacchio's (and many other's) characterization largely starts and stops with their background. As a character, Abbacchio is rarely focused on except when his backstory is first revealed, and then when his death brings everything full circle for him. Generally this style of characterization is compensated for by focusing on interactions with the other characters in the present (or at least this is one way to do it), but I do not recall anything standing out in particular -- with the exception of his beef with Giorno, which seemed tangential.

It was only then that he realised it due to her wound and the knowledge she'd been betrayed by all she held dear, which is fitting as Narancia's backstory is one focused on him being betrayed by the world around him. It's less so that it's forgotten after that and more that it doesn't get much opportunity to be displayed beyond this scene. In fact, this character moment is pretty important when considering Narancia's actions in the Clash fight with his resolve and ability to protect those around him acting as a moment of development due to the scene at the boat.

Fair enough with the Clash fight. But the fact that the two barely interact after the fact was probably my main beef (except maybe the one scene where Trish is angry at how Bucciarati seems to act coldly to Narancia). In general I felt like this Part was lacking in as many interesting interactions between the characters compared to Part 4 or 3.

'd say this isn't quite true. Yes, the plot is primarily dictated by battles, but there were still many plot twists, standard JoJo mystery, character interactions and so on thrown in both in between and during these fights. I'd say the only reason it seems more battle-focused than something such as Part 3 would be due to more attention being required to the group's method of travelling there in a journey that spanned across many countries, making scenes focused on that more relevant. The nature of Passione's mission and their enemies also left very little downtime, so adding more moments akin to something such as DiU's slice of life scenes would take away from the tension.

Perhaps I did not give the plot enough credit, but I can tell you that when I was watching it felt more to me like the plot existed as a way to string together these long-winded fight scenes. During the first half(ish) of the story, the plot largely just consists of the boss dropping a new objective for our characters to pursue next while on the run. After that point, it's "find a clue about the boss's identity" (which is when the mystery aspect is at its most prominent point I suppose, as we're slowly drip-fed more and more info about the boss) and then suddenly "Polnareff here, you have to go to Rome now."

That's actually consistent with the rules we learn about Stands. Short-Range Stands can still travel over a greater distance than usual, but their powers are heavily weakened by doing so.

Is it a consistent rule? I'm trying to think and I'm pretty confident that long-ranged Stands are outright bound by their range (e.g. Echoes) and had assumed that this must have been the case for short-ranged Stands as well.

Neither of these are actually retconned. For the damage reversal, none of the later Stand fights had someone attack a creation of Giorno's other than the anime changing Diavolo avoiding the scorpion to attacking the it (which is indeed a flaw of the anime). For the enhanced senses, pretty much all of Giorno's fights from Black Sabbath and onward are ones in which neither ability would be useful against the enemy and him directly punching them was limited to the beatdown at the end. Black Sabbath, Babyface and Notorious B.I.G. were all remote, independent Stands, Ghiaccio still wouldn't be beaten by it without getting in the position to penetrate his armour (and after getting to where his neck could be impaled, it was pretty unnecessary) and whether or not it was used against Cioccolata was irrelevant when it'd occur within the iconic Muda that defeated him. It can also be argued GER is an evolution of this ability.

I can sort of accept the enhanced senses thing just never really being shown visually even if it still exists. But this is still a huge advantage in any fight against a close-ranged Stand user. Imagine if for example he fought Secco instead of Cioccolata. Secco's speed/power advantage would be a lot more manageable if Giorno managed to hit him with this ability.

I would definitely contest the damage reversal thing though. For one thing, even if no one directly attacked a creation of Giorno's, I don't see why he would never bait anyone into doing so (this wouldn't even be hard to do, he could use his creations as a shield or armor essentially). Araki generally reincorporates interesting concepts like that when he remembers to, and this is too powerful an ability that should've seen a lot of use to simply be dismissed with "but no one happened to attack one of the things." But either way, I can think of at least a few instances that I thought should've counted as attacks: Mista tearing at the grass Giorno grew (so can he control who gets damage reflected back at them? Even more OP), Ghiaccio killing his vines, Cioccolata I'm pretty sure mold-attacks his vines, and probably a few others I'm forgetting. The most significant example, though, is the body parts he creates for himself and his teammates to "heal" them with. I'm not interested in going back through the anime or manga to make sure whether or not every single opponent just happened to miss those particular body parts, but: a) if they did, that's bullshit; b) if the rules are just different for body parts instead of full-on organisms or something, then that's convenient and I'd be more inclined to just believe that the ability was dropped.

Another ability of his that was randomly shown and then dropped was when he rapidly aged that one tree. But at least that one only happened once and maybe it just doesn't work on humans for some unexplained reason (it would also infringe on one of Grateful Dead's abilities).

Man in the Mirror isn't a physically strong Stand, so half-measures wouldn't be something Illuso would desire to do unless necessary as that wouldn't fully take away someone's use of their Stand.

Makes sense.

King Crimson isn't bound by fate during erased time and can bring himself into a favourable position. He can still interact with objects around him, though affects don't occur until the time erasure ends, being a delayed version of Za Warudo in that regard. It's also arguable due to their blood ties, Trish would be exempt from the general rules to some extent when considering Diavolo's blood could move in erased time against Polnareff.

When I say "affect things" I mean like attack for example, which I'm pretty sure is true (as it appears to make him intangible, and iirc he has never landed an attack during the actual time erasure except for this one instance, else he'd be way stronger). He even rips off Trish's hand (or rather, rips Trish off from her hand) so I'm pretty sure this is breaking the rules. The blood ties thing is an acceptable theory but not one that I'm personally fond of.

That was just Diavolo showing him the affects of Epitaph.

Didn't he even touch himself though?

Spoiler

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[youtube]7f3l94vuuzI[/youtube]

Will watch these later, thanks.

 

[Captain Cadaver]

Is it a consistent rule? I'm trying to think and I'm pretty confident that long-ranged Stands are outright bound by their range (e.g. Echoes) and had assumed that this must have been the case for short-ranged Stands as well.

Echoes isn't really a Stand built for physical interaction though, plus the strength of one's Stand tends to determine how limited they are by certain rules (eg. Strength having enough energy to be seen by regular people) and Star Platinum is renowned for its strength even when Jotaro had yet to fully develop it.

I can sort of accept the enhanced senses thing just never really being shown visually even if it still exists. But this is still a huge advantage in any fight against a close-ranged Stand user. Imagine if for example he fought Secco instead of Cioccolata. Secco's speed/power advantage would be a lot more manageable if Giorno managed to hit him with this ability.

Yeah, of course, but that's if that's what happened, as well as probably why Araki avoided this scenario.

I would definitely contest the damage reversal thing though. For one thing, even if no one directly attacked a creation of Giorno's, I don't see why he would never bait anyone into doing so (this wouldn't even be hard to do, he could use his creations as a shield or armor essentially). Araki generally reincorporates interesting concepts like that when he remembers to, and this is too powerful an ability that should've seen a lot of use to simply be dismissed with "but no one happened to attack one of the things." But either way, I can think of at least a few instances that I thought should've counted as attacks: Mista tearing at the grass Giorno grew (so can he control who gets damage reflected back at them? Even more OP), Ghiaccio killing his vines, Cioccolata I'm pretty sure mold-attacks his vines, and probably a few others I'm forgetting. The most significant example, though, is the body parts he creates for himself and his teammates to "heal" them with. I'm not interested in going back through the anime or manga to make sure whether or not every single opponent just happened to miss those particular body parts, but: a) if they did, that's bullshit; b) if the rules are just different for body parts instead of full-on organisms or something, then that's convenient and I'd be more inclined to just believe that the ability was dropped.

It's pretty arguable if there was something present he could bait his enemies with though, not to mention he'd need to do it in a way they put significant force into their attack for it to be more than a meaningless distraction. We can also infer that this only counts for physical impacts from the cases with Ghiaccio's freezing and Cioccolata's mould (both of which would be difficult to reverse when directly the result of their Stand ability). As I said, Diavolo made an effort not to attack the scorpion Giorno created in the manga, so Araki definitely didn't forget the ability.

Another ability of his that was randomly shown and then dropped was when he rapidly aged that one tree. But at least that one only happened once and maybe it just doesn't work on humans for some unexplained reason (it would also infringe on one of Grateful Dead's abilities).

Giorno describes this as the result of continuously giving it life, something that would be difficult to pull off against an opponent that wasn't stationary and would quickly catch on to his ability if he attempted it.

When I say "affect things" I mean like attack for example, which I'm pretty sure is true (as it appears to make him intangible, and iirc he has never landed an attack during the actual time erasure except for this one instance, else he'd be way stronger). He even rips off Trish's hand (or rather, rips Trish off from her hand) so I'm pretty sure this is breaking the rules. The blood ties thing is an acceptable theory but not one that I'm personally fond of.

Could be Trish's injury was the result of Diavolo snatching her away and escaping in such a dangerous manner, considering it seems a bit pointless to just sever her hand before he kills her. There's also the whole thing about King Crimson being bound by fate that may have made Trish's injury and capture predestined due to Bucciarati's fate being set in stone (pun intended) due to the events of the Sleeping Slaves/Rolling Stone Arc, which is a bit of a copout but something that is fairly consistent with how fate operates in the series.

Didn't he even touch himself though?

Yeah, before the image of his future actions faded away. More importantly, doing this later on would serve no purpose when Diavolo wouldn't benefit from it (especially with both Passione and Polnareff being fairly informed on his ability) and his use of it here was purely to troll Bucciarati.