Thoughts on Reading JoJolion

As I reread JoJolion this time, I kept wondering how to describe the feeling it left me with. It tells a tense, suspenseful story about criminal gangs, murder, and conspiracy. But when I think back on it, three other words come to mind: suggestive, sugary, hazy. These words describe both the visuals and the content. They mix together and are hard to separate.

I read the color version of the manga. As far as I know, it wasn’t colored by Hirohiko Araki himself, but it isn’t fan-made either. The colors in JoJolion are mostly bright and warm; dark colors are rare. I remember the color of the grass at the Wall Eyes, the light brown of the earth, Josuke’s white sailor suit; I remember Morioh’s clean, pale streets, the sky, Yoshikage Kira’s home at the beginning, and the sea. When I recall those images, the colors come back with them, as though they have not yet faded from view.

And, of course, most important of all, there is Yasuho. Her vivid pink hair and lips, the pink roses on her skirt, and her sky-blue shirt. These colors always stay together in my memory. I also noticed that, among the two main characters and the members of the Higashikata family, everyone except the eldest daughter, Hato, wears colorful clothes. And there is the Locacaca fruit. Even the fruit is a soft pink.

This suggestiveness and sugary sweetness also follow the characters into the places where they live. Much of the story takes place in the Higashikata home, a luxurious modern mansion. There are sofas, floor-to-ceiling windows, beds, and the soft clothes of Daiya Higashikata (Daiya). As I read, I begin to notice these things too. The story is still tense, but my gaze lingers in the rooms, on the furniture, the fabrics, and the things that suggest a soft touch. So the JoJolion I remember has color, and it also has a texture I can touch.

Compared with all the earlier parts, JoJolion introduces very, very many erotic elements. As I write this, though, I feel that “erotic” may not be quite right. I should say suggestive and sexual elements.

I think of the girl’s hesitation when she sees the naked boy at the beginning, the physical contact that follows, the embrace in the hospital, Josuke getting an erection without meaning to; later, the naked woman in Yoshikage Kira’s apartment, Daiya Higashikata trying to get intimate with Josuke, and so on. These images come back one after another. Some are embarrassing; some give a sense of closeness. Love between men and women, intimacy between men and women, and the portrayal of women’s bodies reach their peak in JoJolion.

Of course, it is also one of only two works in the series to depict love between a man and a woman, in this case Yasuho and Josuke. The sixth part of JoJo, Stone Ocean, has a little of this too, but it is hard to call it a comfortable kind of love. It seems more like a one-sided declaration by a character. When I think back to Yasuho and Josuke, though, I think of spending time together, of touching, and of that comfortable feeling when two people are together. This feeling, too, becomes part of the suggestiveness and sugary sweetness I have been talking about.

Thinking further, I find that the haziness remains in the characters and the plot too.

As a series that has continued for more than forty years, JoJo has kept evolving in the way it expresses its themes. By Steel Ball Run (SBR), the blurring of the line between good and evil, black and white, begins to become apparent. When I think of this, the first person who comes to mind is the villain Funny Valentine (Funny Valentine). From SBR onward, JoJo also no longer has the “golden spirit” shared by all the earlier protagonists.

By JoJolion, those stark, strong oppositions in spirit and theme are gone too. Although the villains are still a group of evil people, I feel that the struggle of spirit or ideals has receded a great deal. Often, the opposition becomes a conflict of interests and positions. The characters still compete, still give chase, still have to defeat each other. It is just that, when I read this far, the emphasis I feel has shifted.

Thinking back on the earlier parts, the aim is either to stop the evil DIO from ruling the world, to defeat the serial killer Yoshikage Kira, or to bring down Diavolo, who commits every kind of evil. All these goals stand out clearly in my memory. In JoJolion, though, good and evil, and motives, grow blurred.

Or perhaps good and evil are not blurred. The protagonists are clearly still good people, and the Rock Humans really are bad people. It is just that good and evil are no longer discussed at such length. As I read, I still know which side I am on, but I rarely feel that strong opposition of spirit or ideals anymore. Interests and positions gradually take up more space, and the things that once could be stated clearly become harder to describe.

Finally, I think of Josuke again. He is someone with almost no origins and no family, which further strengthens that sense of blurriness. It is as though there is empty space behind him. And when I think back to him, to the white sailor suit, Yasuho’s pink hair, that modern mansion and the soft things inside it, that empty space is still there, making all of it hazier.