Jujutsu Kaisen

Title:Jujutsu Kaisen
呪術廻戦
Overall:Watch
Keywords: , , , , , , ,
Notables: Animation - MAPPA
ENOKI Junya
NAKAMURA Yuuichi
SETO Asami
SUWABE Junichi
UCHIDA Yuma
Yuji Itadori joined the Occult Phenomenon Research Club at his school largely because the club needed a third member to avoid being disbanded. He thought little of a supposedly cursed object he acquired, a withered, severed human finger. But Satoru Gojou of Jujustsu Tech is shocked and appalled by the cavalier treatment this quite deadly artifact gets. When it's true power is revealed, Yuji has little choice but to embrace it in order to save the lives of his fellow club members. Fortunately, his strong will prevents him from being completely possessed by the curse, and Satoru helps find a new line of work for this previously lackadaisical boy.

24 episodes
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Watch 8 8 8 6 5 5 Ggultra2764 [series:4204#1552]
Based on the popular supernatural adventure shounen manga series written by Gege Akutami, Jujutsu Kaisen features users of cursed energy called Jujutsu Sorcerers who are tasked of exorcising Curses, spiritual beings manifested from the negative emotions of living beings. High school student Yuji Itadori finds himself unwillingly pulled into this supernatural world when his school’s Occult Research Club comes into possession of one of the fingers of a powerful Curse named Ryomen Sukuna that attracts other Curses when unsealed. Yuji becomes a host to Sukuna after eating the finger, but is still able to retain control of his body in spite of the Curse’s power. This leads him to become a student of the Tokyo Prefectural Jujutsu High School under the tutelage of powerful Jujutsu Sorcerer, Satoru Gojo, where Yuji learns to manifest his use of cursed energy and aid in gathering all of Sukuna’s remaining fingers before being exorcised.

Jujutsu Kaisen’s story and characters are largely pretty standard as far as shounen titles go. A number of the plot threads within the series such as a school for folks with special abilities to be trained, fighting against spiritual-like evil beings, a pact-like relationship with the male lead and the suppressed evil within him, and a tournament arc are par the course for titles aimed at the demographic. Same deal goes for many of the characters introduced who each have their character types they largely stick with throughout Jujutsu Kaisen such as nice guy Yuji, the overly serious Megumi, brash and short-fused Nobara, and the overpowered yet playful Gojo. The anime does attempt to provide back story on many of its characters to flesh them out. But in many instances, it has a bad habit of doing this during the middle of heated battles and while introducing many more characters during Jujutsu Kaisen’s mentioned tournament arc, which makes many of these back stories lack any impact since the series is trying to introduce as many characters as possible within such a limited number of episodes. The comedy attempted by the series is also typical shounen in that it gets rather over-the-top and obnoxious coming from the more irksome elements of the quirks of the characters, sometimes having the bad habit of popping up during the title’s more serious scenes.

This said though, Jujutsu Kaisen did have some highlights for me. Many of the anime’s action scenes were quite engaging to see animated, being a visual spectacle with the various abilities demonstrated by the characters from grounded melee combat to more large-scale abilities such as those demonstrated by Gojo. The series does also have its effective moments with conveying the more darker elements of its storytelling such as the violent aftermaths depicted of Curse attacks and the grotesque designs of some Curses seen. Some of the villains in the series also come off convincingly threatening due to their abilities, manipulations, or very nature; notable instances include Sukuna, Mahito, and Geto. Sadly though, the current plot within the series involving Jogo and the Disaster Curses aligned with him is left unresolved due to its manga source material still ongoing as of this review.

In short, Jujutsu Kaisen is mostly pretty typical fare as far as shounen adventure titles go in terms of characters, comedy, and storytelling formulas. It does have its engaging elements such as its action scenes and some effective elements coming from the darker aspects of its storytelling with mood, Curse designs, and the actions of some of its major villains. But I feel this series would be more a treat for fans of the typical storytelling mold of shounen titles, as I didn’t feel there was enough to the series that made a big impression on me beyond its action scenes and parts of its darker story elements.

Last updated Thursday, June 24 2021. Created Thursday, June 24 2021.
Unevaluated Stretch [series:4204#628]
(17 episodes watched):

I normally don't go for occult anime, but while episode one of this show seemed freaky and unattractive at first, with time it takes on an amusing tone. The characters are introduced well and get some development. Then things turn ominous. But I found this show to be fun, perhaps because the basic problem that emerges is well explained whereas in many occult anime all we get is a jumbled mess that is only trying to scare us. From now on Yuji will have to fight against the curse within him in order to control it and use its energy for good rather than evil. I'm a bit uncomfortable to learn that this series will run for no less than 24 episodes, however; I wonder if it can stay fresh and interesting (and humorous) throughout. But so far, so good. Yuji passes his entrance test to the Jujutsu academy and meets similar students. It looks like a wide variety of comrades will appear before the series ends, including a panda bear(?). The fights against truly ugly cursed beings are original and imaginative. As the threat posed by different types of them is explained to Yuji in episode four, it becomes clear that this is all a matter of physical force (a baseball bat is good enough to deal with the level 1 type), and not a matter of exorcism or anything like that. These beings are just unusually strong but can be beaten if you become even stronger. That strikes me as sort of unambitious, but the show is fun nevertheless. Yuji is forced to resort to the being that curses him in order to beat a particularly dangerous ('special') opponent, but that creates problems in itself. In episode five we meet several other Jujutsu sorcerers who we've been seeing in the OP sequence since the beginning. Perfectly normal people with unremarkable personalities need not apply for this job, apparently. I thought the situation we were in at the beginning of episode six was intriguing (Yuji seems to be dead), and was eager to see where events could possibly go, but ultimately I wasn't all that thrilled; he just undergoes some unremarkable training in the use of 'cursed energy' and 'cursed techniques'. The thought occurred to me that the one thing almost all occult anime have in common is that when you get right down to it, the evil beings are defeated in pretty much the same manner as perfectly ordinary humans would be, that is, by punching them or slashing them with swords.

Colorful characters are generally a good idea, but the characters in JK seem almost too colorful; people like the guy who only mumbles the names of different kinds of fish; or the intelligent panda bear (no kidding). Just being weird is not the same thing as being colorful; these people have yet to display their skill at fighting demons, so for now they just seem bizarre. What I'd really like to see is the reaction of Yuji's close comrades when they learn that he's in much better shape than they had been told. And the demons are lacking something, too. Maybe the problem is that they are often just as freaky as the good guys. Perhaps I needed some sort of semi-plausible explanation of why demons exist and what they're up to, but I haven't really gotten it. Whatever the case may be, I was not enjoying succeeding episodes of JK as much as I did episode one. But episode nine was encouraging: we meet a new demon-fighter (the guy with funny glasses) who has an odd streak to him but one that isn't outright bizarre and he clearly knows what he's doing. We also meet a bullied boy who becomes a sort of apprentice to the main villain; the cruelty he is subjected to made me squirm at times. Judging from the OP sequence he will change sides and be a friend of Yuji before too long, but I'm still intrigued and want to see how that will take place. After episode nine Jujutsu seemed to be headed uphill again. The main villain (the guy with stitches all over his face) has some sort of theory about whether soul or heart is more important, but it was more confusing than frightening. The bad guys engineer a confrontation between Yuji and the boy. I was kind of disappointed by this turn of events; maybe stories are more fun when the characters don't know everything and must operate like we ordinary humans do, with only a partial understanding of what's going on. It's definitely more realistic and leads to more complex and sophisticated plots. Even more disappointing was the way it slowly dawned on me that Yuji and what's-his-name boy aren't going to wind up as comrades, no, the boy is gone for good. The idea of somebody who had previously been working with the bad guys (but could hardly be blamed given what he had undergone) changing sides had seemed genuinely intriguing and had made me sit up and take notice. But what we get instead is a clash with another Jujutsu academy whose leader doesn't trust Yuji and has ordered his students to actually kill him. The result is a bunch of non-lethal fights that seemed kind of tiresome to me, especially as they drag on for three or more episodes. This is looking more and more like a fight-of-the-week show. Way back at episode one I had also hoped that Yuji's companions in the occult club would continue to play a part in the series, but they too were quickly gone. And again, the whole notion that the battle between good and evil is ultimately nothing but a matter of martial arts is kind of weak. So, Jujutsu Kaisen isn't turning out to be nearly as original as it had first seemed. This is looking like one of those shows which doesn't just run for one or two seasons but continues indefinitely, with lots of action but relatively little plot, and I have never liked shows of that sort. As a result I am thinking that maybe I should quit watching.

Last updated Monday, March 01 2021. Created Monday, October 05 2020.

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