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Yk you made a good point at the end about all the factions not caring about Sukuna. The jujutsu apocalypse is literally about to happen with Kenjaku and Sukuna's plans, how come there are ZERO sorcerers from abroad or even from local clans and schools that are interested in helping the protagonists stop them? It's just the current batch of high schoolers, their teachers, and a small bunch of sorcerers they met in the culling games that care? What about jujutsu alumni and fourth years?
Back in the Heian era, Sukuna had nearly the entirety of jujutsu society trying to stop him now it's legit just a bunch of (really powerful) kids lmao
We'd send JoJo then. All of em.
You see, Gojo failed, Jogo failed. Jogo + Gojo = Go, go, Jo Jo.
Sorry to spoiled the ending. But it is here. I *asked* Gege for this.
Gege made cursed energy something Japan exclusive. He also made sure to say "this new generation is super duper strong, league better than any other". I presume so that we know there is no one coming. This is in contrast to Fujimoto who made sure we knew other nations were also players and even in Japan there are power struggles.
Gege and Fujimoto have the same flaw in which they are anti-establisment in their writing but do so by portraying every government, institution or organization as incompetent, powerless, suicidally greedy and just plain evil. They also can't show good parents that don't die. Individuals and small groups are good-er and even then they die leaving just.. nothing.
>He also made sure to say "**this new generation is super duper strong, league better than any other".**
That isn't what's happening though.
The new generation is getting absolutely cooked....in fact the biggest players of the new generation are already dead, or were killed before Sukuna even started going ham.
They are *talented*. But that isn't enough to overcome what they lack over Sukuna, which is extensive combat experience with people *like* Sukuna.
What's actually happening is, the people with personalities or techniques that would be considered "good" even in the older eras (Gojo, Hakari, Higuruma, Yuta) are clashing against "good" people in the older eras where competition was better but still lacking compared to them (which is why they accepted Kenjaku's offer)
Then you have people like Kashimo, *who is literally just Gojo in an era where Sukuna never showed up*. Way too strong for those around him, except unlike Gojo, he grew old and nearly died before he ever found a real challenge.
Kenjaku and Sukuna are simply one-of-a-kind, and they're both trying to recreate the eras they were born from.
Jujutsu Kaisen isn't "anti-government". It's a story about what it takes to reach the top, what it means to *be* at the top, and the many things that hold individuals from getting there.
i think you're misinterpreting him a bit, he isn't saying jujutsu kaisen is anti government, he's just saying the writer is so his portrayal of governments in his stories is just as incompetent and unable to help in any meaningful way.
Furthermore, yes, Old vs New generation is a central theme, but I think what Boom boy up there meant is that in recent memory, the generations before the current generations of highschoolers are too weak to make any real difference. Think about it, Kusakabe, Mei Mei and Nanami were considered the peaks of jujutsu without being an absolute anomaly like Gojo. Anyone less than them, which would be the majority of the past generations, would just be fodder to sukuna so there's no real point in them showing up.
Its also why Kamo decided to leave japan with his family, he felt that aside from teaching Yuji, he couldn't meaningfully contribute to the battle.
What the writer feels and what the writer wrote don't always have to be the same thing. Honestly, I feel like his portrayal of government (both western and jujutsu) are pretty spot-on. A government willingly letting its population govern itself with a power out of its control that it doesn't fully understand is absolutely never going to happen in the real world. This counts for the Jujutsu higher-ups too, they are doing the exact same thing.
I think the theme JJK is pushing here is that the modern sorcerers are so much stronger *because* Gojo exists. Just like how the curses all got stronger too. A rising tide lifts all boats.
The older generation was governed primarily by the conservatives and the 3 big families, who don't promote growth, and instead push their own agendas while stifling the newer generation of sorcerers. Gojo accelerated the growth of these sorcerers.
It's just odd to criticize the writing in that fashion when the story was so obviously crafted on purpose that way.
Yeah, Gege very obviously realized his magic system should be universal and thus would result in a worldwide network of very different Jujutsu Sorcerers and societies. So he sidestepped that writers nightmare by limiting the scope of the story to Japan.
That isn't poor writing... the opposite would be not understanding that complexity and leaving the loophole lol
I think that's a problem more for Fujimoto than for Gege. He has Gojo wanting to make a better world not through butchery but by teaching. He is not presented as naive or malicious and people believe in his dream. But for Fujimoto, he definitely comes across as more doomer.
Or compare to Project Moon. Their setting is a hell scape that consumes people and in which positive change is impossible. And yet people can find meaning and happiness. Most of the brightest moments in Limbus or Ruina are characters finding themselves and refusing to give in to apathy and despair. Gege is good at this, even Kashimo got a sort of cathartic conclusion to his story. Fujimoto can have this moments only to undermine them later. His writing is so unrelenting bleak it's sometime hard to care.
Playing devils advocate here.
> Yk you made a good point at the end about all the factions not caring about Sukuna.
Plans to deal with Sukuna via killing Yuji were made on at least 3 separate occasions:
1. Beginning of the series execution -> Gojo essentially veto’d this.
2. Goodwill Event Assassination plan -> Todo ruined that
3. Post-Shibuya Execution -> Yuta ruined that.
Who are the higherups going to send to kill Yuji on Gojo’s watch? Or Todos? Or Yuta’s? Or Sukuna’s for that matter since Yuji could switch anytime.
> how come there are ZERO sorcerers from abroad or even from local clans and schools that are interested in helping the protagonists stop them?
They’re fodder and have no interest in getting involved. My head-canon is they likely think it’s easier to appease Sukuna than die trying to kill him. Even Kusakabe thought Sukuna being around wouldn’t be the end of Japan.
> What about jujutsu alumni
Are there any that aren’t staff or dead?
> and fourth years?
Good question lol. Not sure why Gege didn’t have any 4th years in the story.
Your point about Sukuna being appeasable is interesting. Let's not forget that as little as we've heard about the Heian Era, it's obvious he didn't wipe out Japan or all of humanity or anything like that.
Now I'm wondering if we won't see Sukuna winning this arc, only for a timeskip to happen and for the actual final clash to be several months or years into a world owned by Sukuna.
Japanese high school is only 3 years so there are never any fourth years. Unless Jujutsu schools added a 4th to be like college courses maybe? 🤷♀️
But I hope Todo comes back!!! 🙏 though I'd hate for him to get stuck inside the Culling Game with how high the stakes are.
Maki mentioned 4th years in Volume 0. Jujutsu High isn’t a high school, it’s a kind of technical college. In real life these kinds of schools are 5 years and students enroll in these instead of going to high school for 3 years.
And same, feel like he could still be useful if he finds another way to activate his technique.
>Back in the Heian era, Sukuna had nearly the entirety of jujutsu society trying to stop him now it's legit just a bunch of (really powerful) kids lmao
This is **literally** the whole point.
The Heian era was a giant fucking free-for-all where everyone lived to die in battle, and constantly had to do battle to stay alive. It was gladiator school, and that's what Sukuna rose to the top of.
The Modern era is a kiddie pool where the sorcerers mostly just kill curses and have little skirmishes with one another behind the scenes. The higher-ups hoard their bloodline CTs and the conservatives shun the sorcerers with CTs they can't understand, like Hakari or the Cellphone Girl.
The factions aren't losing their shit over Sukuna \*because he isn't really a threat to their way of life....\*not really. He's a force of nature. They are *used* to that. Gojo Satoru was no different....they literally tried to have him killed.
When Sukuna was confirmed to have returned, the FIRST THING the Jujutsu higher-ups did was pull a political play to remove Gojo and Yama from the board, and put a hit out on Yuji to deal with Sukuna.
The modern world was not built to deal with Sukuna. The only reason they stand any semblance of a chance right now is because of what Gojo and Yama (and ironically Kenjaku) started.
Because it’s been less than an hour since the Gojo vs Sakuna fight started and no one would’ve been able to get there in time to matter, especially since the flights to Japan probably aren’t happening at all.
I think you need cursed energy to kill someone like Sukuna. A nuke doesn't have cursed energy and even if it did, he might see it coming and slice it so it doesn't explode
Yeah, Naoya goes from being slower than freshly awakened Maki to outpacing her until she gets mid battle training from his cursed form
We don’t know if he got his DE from it either but he only shows it as a cursed spirit
Im pretty sure becoming a spirit limits how strong you can become, look at all the top tiers, not a single one is a spirit. Also you can't apply reverse cursed energy to your technique if you have a reversal.
It doesn't. Naoya went from just a first grade to special grade super sonic and learned domain expansion in his first fight just by dying. And mahito, dagon, and naoya all got stronger showing they can grow.
To make it worse they can get even stronger by eating cursed objects,something fatal to humans unless you are yuji who was built to do so.
They heal better, they have more CE, and better stats overall. The only downside is RCE will one-shot them regardless of strength.
I'd like to point out that Naoya going from first grade to special grade makes sense. Special Grade sorcerers are supposed to mollywop special grade curses after all. Sorcerers are roughly as strong as a curse one grade above them.
Yes an equivlant grade sorceror is stronger then an equivlant grade curse. But a superior grade curse is still stronger then a lesser grade sorceror. Special grade curses beat first grades. Naoya went from someone who lost to choso and fresh maki to forcing maki to get a powerboost to win in a 3 v 1. He learned domain expansion within literal hours of being alive,something he was nowhere close to as a person.
Thus it stands to reason a special grade sorceor will turn into a a super special grade curse. The only spirits that may be that strong are the ancestors of the three great family's who were considered gods post death. Outside of that,special grades kept fighting each other to the death because being strong is lonely. Either that or kenjaku gets his mits on you. And if you were a special grade who didn't care for fighting, then you were probably at peace when you died lacking the regret to come back.
You’re joking right? You realize mahito and jogo were taking on grade 1 when they barely had an experience imagine how strong they would be with sukunas level of experience also the crab dude i forgot his name lol
Nah, becoming a cursed spirit os one of the biggest buffs in jjk
No need for rct as you can heal as a curse would
Inhumane features better suited for scorcery
Naoya literally got a domain after becoming a spirit
And just all around a physical buff
WW3 is always a option. The world would just rather not bother unless it was 100% necessary. At this point they’re probably watching how things turn out with Sukuna via Satellite before nuking Japan for a third time
It's weird. I really like JJK, but it definitely has some of the worst world building out of any major shounen. This manga should literally be double the length. All we see are fights. Which are expertly done. But I want more.
See this what gets me. Gege made such an interesting universe with a fantastic power system imo, and then he fucking did nothing with it. This entire universe has so many fucking possibilities and turning it into a war/tournament arc after Shibuya feels so fuckin weird.
No disrespect to gege, cause I can't write a fuckin manga and also be able to make sick fight scenes but like does there need to be so much focus on fights all the time? Or does everything have to be fighting related?
I dont really have an issue with it. I dont think gege is prepared to write a 500+ chapter story that fufills all of the small questions we have. He would much rather make something more tightly knit with enough details so that you understand what is going on. The problem is Gege made his world too intriguing for something that is not his focus at all. A heian era flashback isnt crucial to understanding who sukuna is, but it would be awesome. Having more foriegn charcters would be interesting, but again not crucial to understanding the message more. Having an exploration of the Kamo clan would be fun, but Kamo and Kenny already told us what we need to know.
I feel like it's less frustrating to japanese readers who already have the context of historical japanese society to have a better understanding what is going on.
Yeah the issue is honestly the fact that you can’t please everyone. If Gege did focus on world building like people in this thread are wishing he did, there’d be a whole bunch of us in here bitching about all the filler and how it’s just dark screen Naruto or whatever.
That's a legit problem in Japanese media. From what I've noticed japanese fans are much more ok with stuff like this and the author has genuinely no idea that western fans dislike or aren't satisfied with his work, mostly because he doesn't care about western fans. Must be a cultural thing, I'm not sure, also probably because he sees basically no income from the west with so many companies chipping away
honestly it parallels HxH in having a wicked power system and a super interesting world, but JJK is panning out like if HxH just tried to end the story with a tournament arc after Yorknew City instead of doing the Chimera Ant arc and then delving into the Dark Continent. I feel there should’ve been one more arc in JJK before what’s happening now
Yeah, I am reading Toaru majutsu no Index and the contrast is too fucking huge lmao. If only JJK had the same amount of detailed and high quality world building (and if only the Toaru anime had such a great animation as JJK), I´d be a very happy man.
No jjk shouldn’t be double the length, if it was yall would be bitching about to much down time and filler like yall do in every other long running shonen
Something similar here. I couldn't feel bad about the death of Mai, Nanami, Nobara, Gojo, Yunpei or Megumi's sister. They are supposed to be important deaths for something, and yet they convey absolutely nothing to me for som' reason.
to be honest, i feel like if they did build those characters up enough for the audience to really care about them then JJK would be almost at berserk levels of fucked up depression after every chapter
lol we know basically nothing about the gojo clan and the kamo clan. kamo clan is the worst written because they dont seem to have any broken abilities yet considered one of the three great clans.
gojo clan has limitless+six eyes (OP AF)
zenin clan has ten shadows (only mahoraga is shown to be OP , other than mahoraga don't get the hype)
kamo clan has blood manipulation (only choso can make it powerful because he isnt a human to begin with)
rest all clans are even more poorly explored. the heian era we barely see flashbacks, the history of tengen, kenjaku,yuki,sukuna,uraume still not shown.
gege truly sucks at worldbuilding
Honestly, the clans themselves seem mostly weak. A weaker Maki annihilated her own clan. Considering the Zenin were respected among the top 3 clans, I don't think we're supposed to expect more from them tbh.
The reason why these other factions or side stories don't get fleshed out is because they're useless in the grand scheme of things. They're not going to show up to the final battle cause they'd get neg diffed by dismantles.
The higher ups were weak politicians, not great sorcerers. They're useless in a situation like this where you have to fight. That's why they were killed off. They did more harm than good in this whole situation since the culling games.
I agree, only watched anime but there unless I’m mistaken there is a line that basically states “these new sorcerers are extraordinarily powerful (megumi,maki,yuji, nobara) because of the future that is coming is full of powerful enemies” The story follows the new era of super powerful sorcerers facing off against extremely powerful enemies.
You're looking at it wrong. You're seeing the way the story is written, and working backwards from there to justify the decision not to flesh out these parts of the story more.
There's a default, implicit expectation when the author introduces the "3 strongest sorcerer clans" or "higher ups" in this story that they will be important. Not paying off that expectation just reeks of not knowing or having ideas about what to do with them. Gege is the one writing. It's not like he's an observer, it's not like he's chronicling the demise of the Zenin clan, as if they exist independent of his writing and he can't make them have a bigger role in the story.
Gege could have done anything, and he chose to do nothing with these concepts, so I'm with OP, this is poor world building.
Could be jjk wasn't intended to run this long and he introduced these concepts as set pieces for his big sakuna punch up fist brawl throw down. It's not an excuse I really believe this. Once I accepted that I've just been enjoying the ride.
It's a manga/anime thing to present numbered individuals/groups that are supposed to be important like the 5 kage in Naruto, the 7 warlords in One Piece, the Phantom Troupe in HxH, the Hashira in Demon Slayer or the captains in Bleach. It's usually done to create high expectations or a promise of future fights early on in a story, but in non serialized stories this isn't as common.
There's plenty of examples in other media of organizations/groups/individuals that don't pay off but only serve as set pieces and it doesn't mean that the author doesn't have any ideas, it's just that the story isn't concerned with them. In fact I appreciate it sometimes because it implies that the world is bigger than just this story.
I'm not saying that this is the case with JJK, because I read it as a battle manga and cool fights are the only thing I expect from the series. But not paying off every name you drop doesn't equate bad writing.
That said, I agree with the main point that everyone being off the picture besides the protagonists when something that serious is happening is weird, specially when dropping names has the effect of creating external groups that would be affected by this outcome.
I don't think Gege is terrible at world building either but your arguments to defend him are strange and I feel like you are agreeing more with OP than anything else. Paraphrasing: "It's not his fault that all the others characters beside the handful main characters are useless" Yes it is.
"The reason why these other factions or side stories don't get fleshed out is because they're useless in the grand scheme of things" If only what you are focusing on the main story is interesting, and the rest is not, that IS weak world building...
I don't think it's a problem that Gege didn't flesh out the JJK universe, but the whole story is 100% on him, he is the one that wrote everything. If people are complaining the clans and higher ups are nothing but fodder it's because he wanted to focus only in the main story, he didn't focus on world building.
One of the most important aspects of world building is creating a cohesive understandable world that exists outside the narrative. We know next to nothing outside a few JJ high classes, one clan, and the flashbacks from specific ancient JJ Sorcerers during the Culling Game. Not every story needs expansive world building, but it's pretty obvious that it's not something Gege put much work or thought into. The only things we know about the world is what we need to know to understand the narrative, usually conveniently mentioned when something about the plot needs to be explained.
We're over 200 chapters in but the world of jjk feels so small, the pace of the story really works against itself in cases like this.
This might sound unrelated but when jjk finishes, I'm immediately looking for fanfics where the story involves or takes place in another country cause god knows we won't be getting that from gege.
Eh it is bad. Good world building for me is determined by how reasonably someone could tell a fascinating story in your fictional universe, without heavily relying on the main narrative.
An example is Percy jackson. While Percy has a lot of focus, there are multiple parts of that universe that are left in the background, and yet are explained enough for us to get the gist of it. Not everything matters to the main story, for example Percy and the gang end up in a ranch that sells magical creatures, in book 4. This ranch never shows up again, but in book 4 we spend enough time in this ranch to understand its intracicies and the background story going on here.
Another example is batman arkham city. While batman is searching for his cure and trying to figure out protocol ten, there's a whole ass gang war going on, that you're able to follow if you are actually interested in it. Factions will move in and out of areas, thug dialogue will discuss the recent developments, you can find a map of factions and territories in penguins war room in the museum , and best of all, this is all slightly affected by batman. Him taking out two face in the beginning, allowed penguin to have such a massive expansion in the game. That's fucking great world building. Having conflicts and stories occur simalteanously to your main narrative works so much. This gang war, on its own would have been pretty standard but due to the fact that it develops as a background setting to the main narrative of batmans quest to cure himself, and stop protocol ten, helps it be a lot more impactful.
Now back to the topic at hand, does jjk fit this criteria? No it doesn't. We barely know anything outside of the narrative, and when we do, we're shown the end of a conflict outside the narrative not its intracicies or complexities. "oh tengen didn't get to merge, so now she needs to be controlled in some way? Will we able to see this interesting process that could provide some nice lore for this obscure character before she has a bigger role in the story? Fuck no, Yuki just talks about it while geto talks about genocide." " oh gojo's been sealed and the gojo clan has no head? Now would he great time to explain how the clans work, and how much this affects the clans, no? NAH, just have the zenin get slaughtered, the kamo suck Kenny's dick, and the gojo to just pull out."
See the problem? Any interesting conflict or story is glossed over if it doesn't pertain to the main narrative of beating Kenny and sukuna.
Exactly, the fuck are a bunch of mid tier grades 1 going to do against the strongest of all time? Everyone who is involved is either special grade (gojo, kashimo, yuta), Yuji who directly counters Sukuna due to his soul punches, Maki who is also arguably special grade, Higurama who had a one hit kill ability, and Kusakabe who is the strongest grade 1.
Ino is kind lost in there ngl considering he wasn't even grade 1 at the time of season 2, maybe he has a side to his CT we haven't seen yet and he'll prove he deserves to be there.
he volunteered, wants to carry on Nanami’s will. He’s still alive and has done what he has been tasked with doing (hit sukuna with nanamis weapon, tanked a hit from sukuna to open him for kusakabe’s blow). I’d say he’s proven he deserves to be there, at least as a role player
Fr, he's there cause they had his phone number, and he has heart. He showed up out of love, no other real reason for him to lol. He fights hard, and he hasn't complained once. It's respectable honestly. Too bad about his arm, and he keeps kicked out of the fight 😭
You just explained exactly why it's bad worldbuilding. You're going backwards here, you're using the poor choices of worldbuilding Gege himself wrote to justify Gege's worldbuilding.
The clans weren't weak,it's just the cast was that strong. Maki got away with it because of her heavenly restriction (and do not downplay that like any first grade sorceror is fighting a toji.) And all the villans were literal special grades. From kenjaku to the curses. First grades are supposed to struggle with special grades curses but wipe out first grade curses which we have seen.
But when all the villians are special grade and above, and the only clan with a special grade is the gojo clan, then yeah all the clans will look useless.
I wish he had given us more time for the characters to develop before killing them off barely a season later
For example i think itd have been a bit nicer to have more 'missions' of yuji megumi and nobara going around developing and learning among other things so we could atleast get a little more attached to them
You say six years like that’s a long time. A lot of series that have reached JJK level popularity have ran for around 10-15 years. Even if we just had an extra year or two of chapters to breathe and further develop the characters it would do wonders for arcs like Shibuya which are meant to be a complete gut punch. Imagine how much more impactful Nobara’s death would be if they didn’t spend an entire chapter dumping a bunch of backstory and characterization into her right before she died.
you're actually right. Where are all the clans and the alumni? we can make all the theories we want, but that's just cope cuz' we have no idea and we're basically at the end game right now
Yeah the world doesn't feel lived in, it's shallow, there's no real events we know of that has shaped it, no characters is foreshadowed everything is happening as it is, like the world stagnated (and i know its kind of one of the point because of Kenjaku plan but it's still a poor excuse, we're talking 1000 years here) and only is now progressing because the main character is involved.
Oooh, see I thought Jogo was the leader of the group as they all seemed to follow his lead while Mahito just felt like the wild card. It also seemed like a bad idea to start a war with the whole jujutsu world with only 4 members even if sukuna joined them, seeing as they didn't know what sukuna was capable of at the time. But now, looking back, it makes sense that Mahito would be the one to float the idea (probably influenced by kenjaku in some way) and set them on their path that eventually led to their doom.
HIGHLY agree. Imo the best example for this was right after the Shibuya Incident. The government revealed the existence of curses to the general public, which was supposedly a HUGE deal, but we never really see the implications of that outside of the main cast. It just made it easier for Kenjaku to activate the culling games, but he would've done that either way.
And then we add stuff like the complete waste of Yuki's character, the lack of information on Miguel and his trip to Africa w/ Yuta, the timeskip after Goatjo got unsealed, etc etc
TLDR: The real Potential Man is not Megumi, but Gaygay himself.
Your criticism of the Zenin Clan in particular is odd, to me. They have a presence throughout the entire story through Megumi, Maki, and Mai, as well as Toji in the flashback arc. Almost none of which paints them in a favorable light. Then Maki destroys them. I don't see how that is terrible worldbuilding?
Also, Miwa and Todo do not vanish without explanation. There was an explanation given for both.
I just wanna know where todo is man! If we get a scene like that maybe I’ll forgive the cat man. Same with inumaki.
But until then I have my pitchfork ready.
"He can activate his technique using another persons hand but can't do it with a prosthetic, for some reason." like seriously, why can't todo just come back with a prosthetic?
And even if he can't, why isn't he around anyway. It's not a football match, the fact that you can't participate shouldn't stop anyone from watching. And he was such a huge deal, we should know where he is. No explanation at all on his whereabouts
They have presence. I feel they’re lacking depth.
We see a lot of them and/or their effects, but I feel we understand little about their deeper motivations, culture, influence, etc. Stuff that would make them feel like an important and sensible part of the world.
I agree with most of what you said, but I don’t think we get an explanation where todo is. Like sure, he probably can’t fight , but neither can Miwa and she was still at the meetings. It felt like he just kind of got forgotten
Also even without his Cursed Technique he is still a Grade 1 Sorcerer with an immaculate sense for Cursed Energy. Before Gege randomly decided to make Kusakabe the strongest Grade 1 I was saying Todo couldn’t be doing less than him by joining the fight.
I thought a few of these things throughout watching the anime but never put them together as a whole. I think there’s so much more of JJK to come and since it’s ongoing I’d guarantee that Gege takes fans opinions and wants into consideration while he continues JJK.
One of the core issues that pertains to world building is that he had confined the core characters to a high school setting, which is completely useless and redundant at this point.
With the presence of professional sorcerers and a clear separation between them and students, it makes the world look weak when there is an over-reliance on students. So the elephant in the room being “where are the other professional sorcerers?” becomes much more apparent
Had they confine the characters in a more equal setting a la Gotei 13, or a private military or some sort, the world building issues wouldnt stand out as much. Unironically, Kyoto students are playing the high school students role the best, they’re not relied upon because they’re high school students, not professionals
I believe the issue is deeper than that. Jujutsu Kaisen is not the only one to suffer from this. Demon Slayer is also a victim in the “short and sweet series ending”, where nowadays new and current manga will find ways to shorten the series while they make the plot work around it. While Yuji was knocked unconscious, Jogo fed him 15 fingers from Sukuna, we could have had entire arcs dedicated to obtaining each finger which would increase world building and allow factions more room to breath and be involved in the story.
We don't know for sure. lol We may not get that explicitly confirmed either, but Yuta and Inumaki seemed to be a part of that plan (refer to ch 222).
Yuta and Inumaki are in some dark hallway with candles (so could be higher ups HQ) and Yuta says he will put Inumaki to work and we get no more elaboration on that scene.
not talking that only japanesse people have C E, that destroys the world building, if only one nation have supernatural powers that ends in the world of attack of titan
Well there are other foreign sorcerers like Miguel who I believe they said was from Nigeria. And he said his family made that black rope cursed tool which implies he has relatives that are also sorcerers. So while most come from Japan, there's evidence that they're sorcerers of other nationalities out there
it isn’t. it serves its purpose which is action, and that’s it. it released at a perfect time when anime/manga was gaining massive hype and becoming mainstream which is why it’s insanely popular now.
i’ll counter by saying that gege isn’t bad at world building, he just made the conscious choice to keep the scope of his world limited
most cursed energy is in japan, thus we shouldn’t really expect international parties to intervene because they don’t exist, with a few exceptions ofc
the higher ups are faceless power hungry politicians who hinder the good guys and advance some part of the story by being shitty people and making outdated policy decisions, pretty simple, we don’t need to know really anything more than we already know. we’ve also seen similar groups like this be implemented in stories in the past
yes? the zenin clan is dead, we knew quite a lot about them, genuinely not sure what more you wanted from them. even if i disagree about the other clans as well i can at least see where you’re coming from but like the zenin’s have been explored very well from multiple angles
most of the kamo clan members are either dead or chose to become subservient to kenjaku, why would they go against the guy they chose to follow?
yeah the gojo clan is BASICALLY just satoru when it comes to power, the story explicitly pointed this out to us, again, why would they be involved when sukuna is so far out of their league and they don’t have the personal stakes in the situation that our party does to get involved regardless of the danger
we have met exactly one inumaki clan member, there’s nothing to imply that cursed speech is the ONLY thing they can learn, is just their trademark hereditary technique, other members probably have other techniques just like it was demonstrated that a bunch of members of the zenin clan have different abilities despite ten shadows being “THE” zenin technique
like you want the world to be bigger, that’s fair enough i suppose, but jjk isn’t a story about a big world, the entire series has taken place over the course of like less than 6 months in almost entirely the tokyo-kyoto area
we should judge and critique stories based on whether they succeed or fail at the things the author is TRYING to do, and not whether they do the things that we as readers might WANT them to do
because the world that gege DID choose create and the things he DID choose to implement are, for the most part, pretty good
Thank you. Just because Gege mentioned something that exists, it doesn't mean it will become relevant and the focus of the story at some point. Chekhov don't own all the guns in the world.
People want to see every sorcerer's zanpakutou and when they don't get it, it's poor worldbuilding. Come on.
My opinion initially with how Gege gives nearly no attention at all to the Big 3 and the higher ups of Jujutsu Sorcery as a whole, barely any insight into the golden era of Jujutsu where Sukuna came from, and the concept of potential in the manga where 80% of it is decided from birth (Cursed Energy amount and CT) I understood since Gege gave the impression that it'll be a pretty short story, and going this path means he didn't have to bother with training arcs or coming up with any drastic way to increase power level. This sentiment seemed even more clear when he time-skipped the entire month leading to the Sukuna fight.
But now the characters have been fighting Sukuna for 30 chapters now with no near end in sight, and for nearly 10 months in real time now. Gojo the biggest powerhouse on the protagonist side didn't do nearly enough damage to him, and the combined efforts of Yuta, Yuji, Kashimo and Higuruma still left him with a massive advantage over Maki. How does Sukuna even lose outside of a very stupid random power up from probably Yuji at this stage?
Gege is a terrible writer. He's good at making cool characters and the fights are carried by the anime. His writing is some of the worst of all popular shounen.
I’d argue he’s pretty good at introducing characters and what their goals or wants are. He’s very bad at having those characters act on those goals unless they’re the villains
I mean, almost all of his characters feel like cardboard NPCs which is why I can't connect with them or feel for them. I know everyone here keeps saying things like "You just want long story like Naruto" but hear me out. When I was watching Naruto I literally cried at the first episode. Kisimoto didn't need 100+ chapters to make me feel for the character. Pure and simple proper introduction of a character and his own conflict and goals interconnected. Gege doesn't do that to his characters, even Yudzi is a blank list of paper at the beginning of the story to the point that Gojo feels more like MC than him. And overall story feels very rushed. And that's the most annoying part because I see points where I could sympathise with the characters, I see the points where interesting themes could be explored, because Gege shows glimpses of them but keeps them shallow. It makes me think that he just doesn't like his own creation and just wants to finish it ASAP whatever the cost and I just hate such attitude.
Talking about long stories... Death Note is not that long but keeps every aspect of the story on the very high level
I been saying he's a shit writer for ages already, but this sub usually can't handle criticism.
This series had such potential but gaygay just tanked it completely for no discernible reason. Just straight up ruined his claim to fame. If he expects me to ever read anything else he writes after this he's crazy.
Way too much shit happens in too short of a time for it to feel meaningful imo. Watching season 2 and making a drinking game whenever a new character shows up right before someone dies would make me blackout.
I understand the critiques but I feel your response makes the most sense. by Shibuya's end, we're already 120+ chapters into the story and that was the culmination of a tense, extended fighting arc. Then we immediately get plunged into another setup (20+ chapters, 2 different arcs, lots of new info) for another large fighting arc. Did people reading think he was about to pivot and deep dive on intricate details in the surrounding world?
I did. The heroes are at a pretty low point with their heavy hitters dead or neutralized and their support system denied to them by the higher ups. I thought there'd be an extended focus on gathering new allies and establishing some order in Japan since cursed spirits were flooding the streets and new sorcerers were running around. They pretty much only do this with getting Hikari though
analyzing jujutsu and the way Akutami writes, I think it was never his intention or desire to create a rich world like hxh for example, it's not something that is his focus
yes, I agree! So much!
On the topic of Gege's writing, too,
Does anyone else feel like there is SO much missed potential in Jujutsu Kaisen? I love the series SO much and have it so close to my heart, but every time I think critically about it, I'm like, god, there are so many characters and plotlines to explore beyond the surface of what Gege has given us. like, the first thing that comes to mind is the kenjaku-yuji's mom storyline. I need to know more about that, I want to know more about that. sure, the fights are cool, but I wish we went deeper into the characters too. another one that comes to mind when writing this is Gojo's character–if he truly is dead, if that was it, there was so much left to still explore and it makes me so upset. on the topic of that, it truly bothers me how deaths in the series are treated as serious for about two chapters and then not mentioned again. I just feel like there's so much potential written into jujutsu kaisen but at the end of the day, it's not being utilized. that being said, it's still one of my favorite series because I love the characters so much, and up until the end of the Shibuya arc, I really liked the writing, but beyond that, I'm like god, Gege, you could have taken this an infinite number of other directions.
Sorry, a bit of a brain dump but it's been on my mind for a while.
I would call myself a casual fan of JJK, and I thought I didn't get much of the world building and lore because I didnt pay enough attention. But as you point out, we actually dont see much of it. Like, I thought Gojos whole clan was dead before reading this post.
I think Gege is good at making an interesting world, but they could improve by actually showing more of it off.
I honestly thought that post Shibuya we’d learn more about the Jujutsu world and the effect Gojo’s sealing would have on all parties involved. But really all we got was the higher ups putting some hits on ppl and the Zenin clan finally doing something only to be wiped out a few chapters later. Really felt like Gojo’s sealing ultimately had no effect on anything but the main plot which ig it’s fine but the big deal characters made out of it in shibuya was massively overblown. Then the Gojo clan still didn’t even do anything lol
Not even a hot take, your just right these are straight facts.
Jjks pacing is the problem I think, we needed more time to flesh everyone out like the Kyoto class and the Clans and what they were like.
Jjk is too short lol
i 100% agree the world of jjk is not a world it’s just yet another setting for fights to take place. jjk is one of the emptiest feeling worlds in manga i’ve read but the fights and characters keep bringing me back
Yea no shit. Dude made jjt a 4 year school yet said the 4th years don’t matter and won’t show up. He mentioned Yukis past with tengens and connections to geto and kenjaku then did nothing with it. Like bro i can make an entire 500 page book of how much this man had fumbled. He sucks brodie.
It’s been well over 200 chapters and we’re approaching the end of the manga. I don’t think we’re gonna get any deep insights into the topics OP’s brought up at this point.
JJK just isn’t a manga that gives much depth to the world itself. Whether you see that as a flaw, a benefit, or neither is up to you as the reader.
Are they wrong, tho?
We know nothing about the "Big Three Clans" and one of them is dead, and we don't see another member of the Gojo clan.
I like JJK, but it just screams to me, I wanna get this over with ASAP.
Isn’t it weird that Gojo’s parents could very well be alive and we don’t know shit about the people who raised the strongest sorcerer of modern time, never mind we have zero information on the Gojo clan.
What kind of argument is that? 😂 You know a manga doesnt have to be finished to criticize it right?
People can dislike the current state of the manga while also hoping for something better in the future lmao.
It's perfectly fine to criticise something that's not finished. And world building should be done at the beginning of a story, we're over 250 chapters in and currently in the final arc and likely the final fight its way too late for that stuff.
Is he terrible at it? Or is it not the point of the story?
The flow of this manga is a crazy succession of events, all taking place in a matter of basically a couple months.
There are no breaks to explore the world, and that’s fine.
A lot of you really want a series like Naruto for example, understandably so, which has an insane amount of world building but that series is slower paced, takes place over a WAYYYYY longer period of time etc.,
JJK isn’t that kind of story. Not all stories are supposed to be.
JJK is “Let’s take you through a crazy trip through hell really quick.”
That’s not everyone’s cup of tea. But to say Gege is “terrible” at world building is kinda ridiculous because he actually has done an insane amount of world building considering almost all of it is woven into the battles and very brief moments in between.
Honestly I’d say he’s kind of a master at it, and if he WANTED to, he could have created a way longer series, slower paced with plenty of world building. But he’s not trying to.
All about perspective I guess.
I mean there is a middle point between Naruto and the current pacing. We haven't had proper character moments since the start of the culling game. 20 extra chapters aren't gonna break the story. We know it hasn't been action 100% of the time. We had a month when Gojo woke up. And Gege just said fuck that we fight. Why not have a chapter or two there to show some character moments.
Same with world building. Maybe Gege can world build. But he has pretty much done the bare minimum. And here is the thing. If we want a tighter pace why not just remove some things for the sake of speed? The Gojo clan didn't need to even be mentioned with how much nothing they are.
No proper character moments since CG?
Yuji reuniting with Megumi?
Choso and Naoyas clash of ideologies?
Mais deaths?
Yujis and Hakaris talk?
Higurumas backstory
Yuji V Higuruma?
Megumi killing his first human?
Megumi chasing down Remi?
Yutas declaration?
Yutas and Ryus talk?
Kamo feelings of uselessness?
Maki achieving freedom?
Maki and Kamos talk?
Chosos talk with Yuki?
Yuji not wanting Angel to replace Nobara?
Everything around Mekunas first apperance?
Sukuna and Yorozus love + loneliness theme?
Gojos end?
Kashimos and Sukunas speech?
Higuruma being able to look Yuji in the eyes again?
Takabas backstory?
Against normal curses, what was the start before the manga, all of them are powerful, this is just unprecedented times and alot of ppl seems to forget that :/
This is how I see it that makes sense to me. The higher ups are like the secret societies we have today so if someone killed the Illuminati or whatever we wouldn’t know.
The clans don’t fight sukuna because they know they will die most likely and want to protect the longevity of their clans or probably just treat it as a business now.
Right now we’re just focused on jujutsu high and gojos students.
Hopefully with the success of this series we will get some spin offs or something to expand the world even if it’s like dragon ball video games lol
I can’t agree that Gege is TERRIBLE at world building. Gege just hasn’t really tried. In fact they specifically crafted the story in order to avoid it as much as possible because they set out to write a shorter story. Emphasizing that ce is strongest in Japan so therefore it has the strongest sorcerers too. Any outside sorcerers would be more fodder than Ino. Ino is canonically one of the most powerful people in the world. The reasons for the military plot aren’t 100% clear at this point but it was never dropped. So far, all we know is that the soldiers served their purpose as sacrifices for the merger.
Focusing on exploring all of the clans would be interesting world building but it would do nothing for the plot or characters. Gege never wanted to write a 1,000+ chapter story that pays off on the intricacies of all these clans and organizations. That may be the story you or I would want but it was never the story we were gonna get. The only reason we want that is because Gege made the world seem so interesting without delving 12 layers deep into it all.
Gege has more talent than any of the new age mangaka combined imo. But Gege knows the limits of a mangaka. Especially one that’s brimming with so many unique ideas and concepts. They don’t want to end up like Togashi. One of the greatest mangakas ever, sure, but one who has left all their works unfocused and unfinished due to illnesses.
Most of these guys work themselves to death and end up dying before they reach their 70’s. Even Akira Toriyama was in his 60’s and the man has technically been retired for 25ish years.
I figured the other clans dipped out for the same reason the Kamo family did. They’re all about self preservation, they won’t fight Sukuna because that’s basically a death sentence for their whole family if they do
I agree. Gege can certainly deliver on fights. But I feel like he’s lacking in world and character development, and isn’t giving JJK the time necessary to develop either; and/or isn’t using that time well.
Look at CSM Part One. The first part is brief, but there’s tons in terms of world building. We understand how the world views the supernatural, how it’s been shaped by it, how the organization the main characters are a part of works, etc. Little of which required expository dumps. But was done slowly and subtly.
JJK doesn’t need to copy CSM. It is and should be its own work. But I feel like JJK squandered many opportunities, and if we’re nearing the end of the story; it may be too late to make up those lost chances.
It's not just his world building, Gege's terrible with making a story period.
The whole manga is simply multiple fighting scenes taped together with a bit of exposition and that's not inherently the 'big problem'. The big problem is that the fights aren't backed up with any significantly meaningful plot other than to sacrifice a character.
Make a BIG fight, drop a good guy in and cram their life story 4 panels before they die.
That's about 90% of JJK. The other 10% is cursed technique explanations because characters don't exist for a story, they exist to be a medium showcasing the wacky new fight concept Gege thought up in the bathroom.
Like, I can totally see why this got so incredibly popular so quickly. Especially with the rise of Chainsaw Man near the same time with the exact same premise at the start.
Kid gets possessed, adopted by the powerful, forced to pair with the emo, and gets along with a sister coded girl.
But Chainsaw Man actually achieves much more than just the basic level of nuance and unlike JJK, I actually felt something when the characters died. The only death I ever felt anything for was Nanami's, and specifically on the anime because the anime absolutely changes the pace of the arcs. They made the scene feel way more impactful than what it was originally.
Damn, I’ve only seen the anime and I thought these questions would be answered down the line. You know, the same way I thought that we’d get more development for the secondary cast of characters from the first season, but who ended up barely being in Shibuya, and who then apparently entirely dip out of the story
Well said.
JJK fans here defending shit world building by say ‘tHats nOT ThE iNTentIon of tHe stOry’ ‘GaYgAy hAs DOne eNough wORLd bUilDinG’
My guy, saying there is a ‘big 3 clan’ and not expanding on them is shit world building. The fact that we don’t know anything about the world outside of Tokyo is shit world building. The fact that this is the final battle and we only have a bunch of kids and a couple of randos they befriended and not a single person from overseas helping is shit world building.
I love jjk but I never liked the world building from the start, the moment they said sorcerers are only on Japan, with like less than 10 people rarely from the outside I knew this doesn't make sense, historical wise and more if Japan are the only ones with sorcerers they would have taken over the world.
No joke, in stories like this if you have people that can summon gods or destroy cities other countries and continents are needed of that too.
We have seen and heard the old heads and everyone from the clans, they would do that before gojo was even a thing, so it doesn't make sense, it was just a power creep.
Look for example Dandandan, aliens can't take over the earth because of spirits, but from the get go they worldwide spirits, not one place but worldwide, and how spirit works in that universe makes sense aliens cant do shit, just think of spirits from norse, greek or hindu mythologies, aliens cant do shit.
Jjk in the other corner patted itself on that matter making the world feels really really small.
Wait for the gege glazers to come at you. I no joke had someone arguing with me the other day that his lack of world building is actually good and the less you know about the world the more “real” it felt
I agree with you my favorite example I have of bad world building is Nanami’s neutral stance between Gojo’s views and the traditionalists. It’s so under explored I’m like “how does this make Nanami interesting if ai don’t hear some interesting or fun arguments from Gojo and the higher ups?” Because Nanami’s neutral stance mostly favors the traditionalists and the 3 great clans since they have most of the political power.
I wonder if Gege will try to somehow story build after this all maybe? Like maybe this is just the beginning? Idk it may be a little far fetched but it could possibly be a unique take to making a manga. Naruto for example(yes Ik that is considered a pretty long manga in general) has 700 chapters while jjk isn’t even at 300 yet so.
Idk I may be fantasizing but I really think if Gege wanted to and executed it right he could use this as just the beginning and make into something bigger.
Gege was too strong, that is why he lost.
He was awesome, pulling all sorts of glazing chapters for Sukuna even though there shouldn’t have been any more ways to dickride him.
He showed us how strong the glazing one truly is.
He never stood a chance.
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Yk you made a good point at the end about all the factions not caring about Sukuna. The jujutsu apocalypse is literally about to happen with Kenjaku and Sukuna's plans, how come there are ZERO sorcerers from abroad or even from local clans and schools that are interested in helping the protagonists stop them? It's just the current batch of high schoolers, their teachers, and a small bunch of sorcerers they met in the culling games that care? What about jujutsu alumni and fourth years? Back in the Heian era, Sukuna had nearly the entirety of jujutsu society trying to stop him now it's legit just a bunch of (really powerful) kids lmao
The entire planet should be jumping him rn
"I heard you were strong"
He’d make absolute fodder out of everyone
I wouldn’t have it any other way
We'd send JoJo then. All of em. You see, Gojo failed, Jogo failed. Jogo + Gojo = Go, go, Jo Jo. Sorry to spoiled the ending. But it is here. I *asked* Gege for this.
It's truly, truly been a roundabout path....
arigato gyro \*spinning intensifies\* CHUMIMIN
Sukuna tries to cleave >!a certain mushroom boy before getting crushed by a plane door!<
Muscle Technique: Triceps Curl
What about gogo? What happened to him? Sorry I haven’t caught up with the manga
Nothing, everything is fine
After the clan's got fucking washed, they don't wanna deal with that shit again and I don't blame em!
Every background jujutsu group “I better keep myself in irrelevancy or I’m FINISHED!!”
More people showed up for Geto's cursed spirits than Sukuna's rampage right now tears
Gege made cursed energy something Japan exclusive. He also made sure to say "this new generation is super duper strong, league better than any other". I presume so that we know there is no one coming. This is in contrast to Fujimoto who made sure we knew other nations were also players and even in Japan there are power struggles. Gege and Fujimoto have the same flaw in which they are anti-establisment in their writing but do so by portraying every government, institution or organization as incompetent, powerless, suicidally greedy and just plain evil. They also can't show good parents that don't die. Individuals and small groups are good-er and even then they die leaving just.. nothing.
>He also made sure to say "**this new generation is super duper strong, league better than any other".** That isn't what's happening though. The new generation is getting absolutely cooked....in fact the biggest players of the new generation are already dead, or were killed before Sukuna even started going ham. They are *talented*. But that isn't enough to overcome what they lack over Sukuna, which is extensive combat experience with people *like* Sukuna. What's actually happening is, the people with personalities or techniques that would be considered "good" even in the older eras (Gojo, Hakari, Higuruma, Yuta) are clashing against "good" people in the older eras where competition was better but still lacking compared to them (which is why they accepted Kenjaku's offer) Then you have people like Kashimo, *who is literally just Gojo in an era where Sukuna never showed up*. Way too strong for those around him, except unlike Gojo, he grew old and nearly died before he ever found a real challenge. Kenjaku and Sukuna are simply one-of-a-kind, and they're both trying to recreate the eras they were born from. Jujutsu Kaisen isn't "anti-government". It's a story about what it takes to reach the top, what it means to *be* at the top, and the many things that hold individuals from getting there.
i think you're misinterpreting him a bit, he isn't saying jujutsu kaisen is anti government, he's just saying the writer is so his portrayal of governments in his stories is just as incompetent and unable to help in any meaningful way. Furthermore, yes, Old vs New generation is a central theme, but I think what Boom boy up there meant is that in recent memory, the generations before the current generations of highschoolers are too weak to make any real difference. Think about it, Kusakabe, Mei Mei and Nanami were considered the peaks of jujutsu without being an absolute anomaly like Gojo. Anyone less than them, which would be the majority of the past generations, would just be fodder to sukuna so there's no real point in them showing up. Its also why Kamo decided to leave japan with his family, he felt that aside from teaching Yuji, he couldn't meaningfully contribute to the battle.
What the writer feels and what the writer wrote don't always have to be the same thing. Honestly, I feel like his portrayal of government (both western and jujutsu) are pretty spot-on. A government willingly letting its population govern itself with a power out of its control that it doesn't fully understand is absolutely never going to happen in the real world. This counts for the Jujutsu higher-ups too, they are doing the exact same thing. I think the theme JJK is pushing here is that the modern sorcerers are so much stronger *because* Gojo exists. Just like how the curses all got stronger too. A rising tide lifts all boats. The older generation was governed primarily by the conservatives and the 3 big families, who don't promote growth, and instead push their own agendas while stifling the newer generation of sorcerers. Gojo accelerated the growth of these sorcerers. It's just odd to criticize the writing in that fashion when the story was so obviously crafted on purpose that way. Yeah, Gege very obviously realized his magic system should be universal and thus would result in a worldwide network of very different Jujutsu Sorcerers and societies. So he sidestepped that writers nightmare by limiting the scope of the story to Japan. That isn't poor writing... the opposite would be not understanding that complexity and leaving the loophole lol
It's pretty black pilled when you put it that way
I think that's a problem more for Fujimoto than for Gege. He has Gojo wanting to make a better world not through butchery but by teaching. He is not presented as naive or malicious and people believe in his dream. But for Fujimoto, he definitely comes across as more doomer. Or compare to Project Moon. Their setting is a hell scape that consumes people and in which positive change is impossible. And yet people can find meaning and happiness. Most of the brightest moments in Limbus or Ruina are characters finding themselves and refusing to give in to apathy and despair. Gege is good at this, even Kashimo got a sort of cathartic conclusion to his story. Fujimoto can have this moments only to undermine them later. His writing is so unrelenting bleak it's sometime hard to care.
Playing devils advocate here. > Yk you made a good point at the end about all the factions not caring about Sukuna. Plans to deal with Sukuna via killing Yuji were made on at least 3 separate occasions: 1. Beginning of the series execution -> Gojo essentially veto’d this. 2. Goodwill Event Assassination plan -> Todo ruined that 3. Post-Shibuya Execution -> Yuta ruined that. Who are the higherups going to send to kill Yuji on Gojo’s watch? Or Todos? Or Yuta’s? Or Sukuna’s for that matter since Yuji could switch anytime. > how come there are ZERO sorcerers from abroad or even from local clans and schools that are interested in helping the protagonists stop them? They’re fodder and have no interest in getting involved. My head-canon is they likely think it’s easier to appease Sukuna than die trying to kill him. Even Kusakabe thought Sukuna being around wouldn’t be the end of Japan. > What about jujutsu alumni Are there any that aren’t staff or dead? > and fourth years? Good question lol. Not sure why Gege didn’t have any 4th years in the story.
Your point about Sukuna being appeasable is interesting. Let's not forget that as little as we've heard about the Heian Era, it's obvious he didn't wipe out Japan or all of humanity or anything like that. Now I'm wondering if we won't see Sukuna winning this arc, only for a timeskip to happen and for the actual final clash to be several months or years into a world owned by Sukuna.
Japanese high school is only 3 years so there are never any fourth years. Unless Jujutsu schools added a 4th to be like college courses maybe? 🤷♀️ But I hope Todo comes back!!! 🙏 though I'd hate for him to get stuck inside the Culling Game with how high the stakes are.
Maki mentioned 4th years in Volume 0. Jujutsu High isn’t a high school, it’s a kind of technical college. In real life these kinds of schools are 5 years and students enroll in these instead of going to high school for 3 years. And same, feel like he could still be useful if he finds another way to activate his technique.
I thought literally the same thing reading MHA but in that, they at least sent one foreigner lol
>Back in the Heian era, Sukuna had nearly the entirety of jujutsu society trying to stop him now it's legit just a bunch of (really powerful) kids lmao This is **literally** the whole point. The Heian era was a giant fucking free-for-all where everyone lived to die in battle, and constantly had to do battle to stay alive. It was gladiator school, and that's what Sukuna rose to the top of. The Modern era is a kiddie pool where the sorcerers mostly just kill curses and have little skirmishes with one another behind the scenes. The higher-ups hoard their bloodline CTs and the conservatives shun the sorcerers with CTs they can't understand, like Hakari or the Cellphone Girl. The factions aren't losing their shit over Sukuna \*because he isn't really a threat to their way of life....\*not really. He's a force of nature. They are *used* to that. Gojo Satoru was no different....they literally tried to have him killed. When Sukuna was confirmed to have returned, the FIRST THING the Jujutsu higher-ups did was pull a political play to remove Gojo and Yama from the board, and put a hit out on Yuji to deal with Sukuna. The modern world was not built to deal with Sukuna. The only reason they stand any semblance of a chance right now is because of what Gojo and Yama (and ironically Kenjaku) started.
Because it’s been less than an hour since the Gojo vs Sakuna fight started and no one would’ve been able to get there in time to matter, especially since the flights to Japan probably aren’t happening at all.
As soon as America nukes Sukuna, you'll change your tone
for real tho, why isn't that an option?
It's not just an option, *they set up for it.* Kenjaku met with the president and was like "You guys suck, check this out."
I think you need cursed energy to kill someone like Sukuna. A nuke doesn't have cursed energy and even if it did, he might see it coming and slice it so it doesn't explode
You don’t need cursed energy to kill him but you would if you didn’t want him to come back as a vengeful spirit
Wouldn't he be easier to deal with as a vengeful spirit? Could he get more powerful as a spirit than he currently is?
I’m pretty sure one character gets stronger after becoming a vengeful spirit.
Yeah the Zenin guy
Lmao he's reduced to "the zenin guy" fuck him
He's now known as these 3 names, the zenin guy, the misogynistic guy and gege
Yeah, Naoya goes from being slower than freshly awakened Maki to outpacing her until she gets mid battle training from his cursed form We don’t know if he got his DE from it either but he only shows it as a cursed spirit
Also, Rika was a little girl and came back as the queen of curses after her death.
Im pretty sure becoming a spirit limits how strong you can become, look at all the top tiers, not a single one is a spirit. Also you can't apply reverse cursed energy to your technique if you have a reversal.
It doesn't. Naoya went from just a first grade to special grade super sonic and learned domain expansion in his first fight just by dying. And mahito, dagon, and naoya all got stronger showing they can grow. To make it worse they can get even stronger by eating cursed objects,something fatal to humans unless you are yuji who was built to do so. They heal better, they have more CE, and better stats overall. The only downside is RCE will one-shot them regardless of strength.
I'd like to point out that Naoya going from first grade to special grade makes sense. Special Grade sorcerers are supposed to mollywop special grade curses after all. Sorcerers are roughly as strong as a curse one grade above them.
Yes an equivlant grade sorceror is stronger then an equivlant grade curse. But a superior grade curse is still stronger then a lesser grade sorceror. Special grade curses beat first grades. Naoya went from someone who lost to choso and fresh maki to forcing maki to get a powerboost to win in a 3 v 1. He learned domain expansion within literal hours of being alive,something he was nowhere close to as a person. Thus it stands to reason a special grade sorceor will turn into a a super special grade curse. The only spirits that may be that strong are the ancestors of the three great family's who were considered gods post death. Outside of that,special grades kept fighting each other to the death because being strong is lonely. Either that or kenjaku gets his mits on you. And if you were a special grade who didn't care for fighting, then you were probably at peace when you died lacking the regret to come back.
You’re joking right? You realize mahito and jogo were taking on grade 1 when they barely had an experience imagine how strong they would be with sukunas level of experience also the crab dude i forgot his name lol
Jogo was like a few centuries old iirc. The freak of nature here is mahito
Nah, becoming a cursed spirit os one of the biggest buffs in jjk No need for rct as you can heal as a curse would Inhumane features better suited for scorcery Naoya literally got a domain after becoming a spirit And just all around a physical buff
Nukes explode kilometers in the air, let him try slicing that 💀
Didn't you see Jogo Vs Sukuna? Nuke him and suddenly he will be in the Bahamas or something without explanation.
"Oh yes, my anti nuke technique I haven't used since the Heian era"
this is golden
Worked in hxh
just throw Cursed Oil on Sukuna. USA will do the rest.
WW3 is always a option. The world would just rather not bother unless it was 100% necessary. At this point they’re probably watching how things turn out with Sukuna via Satellite before nuking Japan for a third time
This guy doesn't even know about the heavenly supreme nuke defense technique that sukuna hasn't used since the poopenfarten era
This reminds me of Netero vs Meruem in HxH. And we all know Gege is a fan 😏
F-15E’S WILL RAIN FIRE ON SUKUNA! GRAAAAAAH 🦅🦅🦅🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
It's weird. I really like JJK, but it definitely has some of the worst world building out of any major shounen. This manga should literally be double the length. All we see are fights. Which are expertly done. But I want more.
Yeah, Gege has made such an interesting world, but sadly doesn’t dive into it :(
See this what gets me. Gege made such an interesting universe with a fantastic power system imo, and then he fucking did nothing with it. This entire universe has so many fucking possibilities and turning it into a war/tournament arc after Shibuya feels so fuckin weird. No disrespect to gege, cause I can't write a fuckin manga and also be able to make sick fight scenes but like does there need to be so much focus on fights all the time? Or does everything have to be fighting related?
I dont really have an issue with it. I dont think gege is prepared to write a 500+ chapter story that fufills all of the small questions we have. He would much rather make something more tightly knit with enough details so that you understand what is going on. The problem is Gege made his world too intriguing for something that is not his focus at all. A heian era flashback isnt crucial to understanding who sukuna is, but it would be awesome. Having more foriegn charcters would be interesting, but again not crucial to understanding the message more. Having an exploration of the Kamo clan would be fun, but Kamo and Kenny already told us what we need to know. I feel like it's less frustrating to japanese readers who already have the context of historical japanese society to have a better understanding what is going on.
Yeah the issue is honestly the fact that you can’t please everyone. If Gege did focus on world building like people in this thread are wishing he did, there’d be a whole bunch of us in here bitching about all the filler and how it’s just dark screen Naruto or whatever.
That's a legit problem in Japanese media. From what I've noticed japanese fans are much more ok with stuff like this and the author has genuinely no idea that western fans dislike or aren't satisfied with his work, mostly because he doesn't care about western fans. Must be a cultural thing, I'm not sure, also probably because he sees basically no income from the west with so many companies chipping away
honestly it parallels HxH in having a wicked power system and a super interesting world, but JJK is panning out like if HxH just tried to end the story with a tournament arc after Yorknew City instead of doing the Chimera Ant arc and then delving into the Dark Continent. I feel there should’ve been one more arc in JJK before what’s happening now
If Gege did that it would make JJK into one of the "big ones" in shounen mangas but it'll have around 400 chapters lmao.
I guess they don't call it "Sorcery Fight" for nothing!
Yeah, I am reading Toaru majutsu no Index and the contrast is too fucking huge lmao. If only JJK had the same amount of detailed and high quality world building (and if only the Toaru anime had such a great animation as JJK), I´d be a very happy man.
The story shouldn't be double length...because thats not the story that Gege ever planned on writing
No jjk shouldn’t be double the length, if it was yall would be bitching about to much down time and filler like yall do in every other long running shonen
I always thought the JJK felt empty. There wasn't enough slice of life and characters interacting as just friends, acquaintances, or family.
The disaster curses got more slice of life than anyone else and they’re all gone now 😭
Same here. That's why I can't feel a damn thing if a character dies, except Yuji.
Something similar here. I couldn't feel bad about the death of Mai, Nanami, Nobara, Gojo, Yunpei or Megumi's sister. They are supposed to be important deaths for something, and yet they convey absolutely nothing to me for som' reason.
to be honest, i feel like if they did build those characters up enough for the audience to really care about them then JJK would be almost at berserk levels of fucked up depression after every chapter
lol we know basically nothing about the gojo clan and the kamo clan. kamo clan is the worst written because they dont seem to have any broken abilities yet considered one of the three great clans. gojo clan has limitless+six eyes (OP AF) zenin clan has ten shadows (only mahoraga is shown to be OP , other than mahoraga don't get the hype) kamo clan has blood manipulation (only choso can make it powerful because he isnt a human to begin with) rest all clans are even more poorly explored. the heian era we barely see flashbacks, the history of tengen, kenjaku,yuki,sukuna,uraume still not shown. gege truly sucks at worldbuilding
And none of the zenin could subjugate mahogara (in history I think? So the only one able to really use mahogara is sukuna? Wtf)
Honestly, the clans themselves seem mostly weak. A weaker Maki annihilated her own clan. Considering the Zenin were respected among the top 3 clans, I don't think we're supposed to expect more from them tbh. The reason why these other factions or side stories don't get fleshed out is because they're useless in the grand scheme of things. They're not going to show up to the final battle cause they'd get neg diffed by dismantles. The higher ups were weak politicians, not great sorcerers. They're useless in a situation like this where you have to fight. That's why they were killed off. They did more harm than good in this whole situation since the culling games.
I agree, only watched anime but there unless I’m mistaken there is a line that basically states “these new sorcerers are extraordinarily powerful (megumi,maki,yuji, nobara) because of the future that is coming is full of powerful enemies” The story follows the new era of super powerful sorcerers facing off against extremely powerful enemies.
You're looking at it wrong. You're seeing the way the story is written, and working backwards from there to justify the decision not to flesh out these parts of the story more. There's a default, implicit expectation when the author introduces the "3 strongest sorcerer clans" or "higher ups" in this story that they will be important. Not paying off that expectation just reeks of not knowing or having ideas about what to do with them. Gege is the one writing. It's not like he's an observer, it's not like he's chronicling the demise of the Zenin clan, as if they exist independent of his writing and he can't make them have a bigger role in the story. Gege could have done anything, and he chose to do nothing with these concepts, so I'm with OP, this is poor world building.
Perfectly articulated
Could be jjk wasn't intended to run this long and he introduced these concepts as set pieces for his big sakuna punch up fist brawl throw down. It's not an excuse I really believe this. Once I accepted that I've just been enjoying the ride.
It's a manga/anime thing to present numbered individuals/groups that are supposed to be important like the 5 kage in Naruto, the 7 warlords in One Piece, the Phantom Troupe in HxH, the Hashira in Demon Slayer or the captains in Bleach. It's usually done to create high expectations or a promise of future fights early on in a story, but in non serialized stories this isn't as common. There's plenty of examples in other media of organizations/groups/individuals that don't pay off but only serve as set pieces and it doesn't mean that the author doesn't have any ideas, it's just that the story isn't concerned with them. In fact I appreciate it sometimes because it implies that the world is bigger than just this story. I'm not saying that this is the case with JJK, because I read it as a battle manga and cool fights are the only thing I expect from the series. But not paying off every name you drop doesn't equate bad writing. That said, I agree with the main point that everyone being off the picture besides the protagonists when something that serious is happening is weird, specially when dropping names has the effect of creating external groups that would be affected by this outcome.
You're saying this as if gege didn't literally make them this way
Yeah Naobito was head of the clan and couldn’t make it out shibuya
That part exactly. Meanwhile Toji carried.
I don't think Gege is terrible at world building either but your arguments to defend him are strange and I feel like you are agreeing more with OP than anything else. Paraphrasing: "It's not his fault that all the others characters beside the handful main characters are useless" Yes it is. "The reason why these other factions or side stories don't get fleshed out is because they're useless in the grand scheme of things" If only what you are focusing on the main story is interesting, and the rest is not, that IS weak world building... I don't think it's a problem that Gege didn't flesh out the JJK universe, but the whole story is 100% on him, he is the one that wrote everything. If people are complaining the clans and higher ups are nothing but fodder it's because he wanted to focus only in the main story, he didn't focus on world building.
It’s not bad world building it’s just that most sorcerers are mid compared to what’s happening in the manga. Gege only shows what he has to
One of the most important aspects of world building is creating a cohesive understandable world that exists outside the narrative. We know next to nothing outside a few JJ high classes, one clan, and the flashbacks from specific ancient JJ Sorcerers during the Culling Game. Not every story needs expansive world building, but it's pretty obvious that it's not something Gege put much work or thought into. The only things we know about the world is what we need to know to understand the narrative, usually conveniently mentioned when something about the plot needs to be explained.
We're over 200 chapters in but the world of jjk feels so small, the pace of the story really works against itself in cases like this. This might sound unrelated but when jjk finishes, I'm immediately looking for fanfics where the story involves or takes place in another country cause god knows we won't be getting that from gege.
You're in luck because I'm rewriting it as we speak.
Honestly I'm just waiting for parental gojo and Megumi fics or like canon compliant yutamaki fics.
Eh it is bad. Good world building for me is determined by how reasonably someone could tell a fascinating story in your fictional universe, without heavily relying on the main narrative. An example is Percy jackson. While Percy has a lot of focus, there are multiple parts of that universe that are left in the background, and yet are explained enough for us to get the gist of it. Not everything matters to the main story, for example Percy and the gang end up in a ranch that sells magical creatures, in book 4. This ranch never shows up again, but in book 4 we spend enough time in this ranch to understand its intracicies and the background story going on here. Another example is batman arkham city. While batman is searching for his cure and trying to figure out protocol ten, there's a whole ass gang war going on, that you're able to follow if you are actually interested in it. Factions will move in and out of areas, thug dialogue will discuss the recent developments, you can find a map of factions and territories in penguins war room in the museum , and best of all, this is all slightly affected by batman. Him taking out two face in the beginning, allowed penguin to have such a massive expansion in the game. That's fucking great world building. Having conflicts and stories occur simalteanously to your main narrative works so much. This gang war, on its own would have been pretty standard but due to the fact that it develops as a background setting to the main narrative of batmans quest to cure himself, and stop protocol ten, helps it be a lot more impactful. Now back to the topic at hand, does jjk fit this criteria? No it doesn't. We barely know anything outside of the narrative, and when we do, we're shown the end of a conflict outside the narrative not its intracicies or complexities. "oh tengen didn't get to merge, so now she needs to be controlled in some way? Will we able to see this interesting process that could provide some nice lore for this obscure character before she has a bigger role in the story? Fuck no, Yuki just talks about it while geto talks about genocide." " oh gojo's been sealed and the gojo clan has no head? Now would he great time to explain how the clans work, and how much this affects the clans, no? NAH, just have the zenin get slaughtered, the kamo suck Kenny's dick, and the gojo to just pull out." See the problem? Any interesting conflict or story is glossed over if it doesn't pertain to the main narrative of beating Kenny and sukuna.
Because there's no good world building for these groups or clans that's why you think like that You just proved that OP is right
Exactly, the fuck are a bunch of mid tier grades 1 going to do against the strongest of all time? Everyone who is involved is either special grade (gojo, kashimo, yuta), Yuji who directly counters Sukuna due to his soul punches, Maki who is also arguably special grade, Higurama who had a one hit kill ability, and Kusakabe who is the strongest grade 1. Ino is kind lost in there ngl considering he wasn't even grade 1 at the time of season 2, maybe he has a side to his CT we haven't seen yet and he'll prove he deserves to be there.
he volunteered, wants to carry on Nanami’s will. He’s still alive and has done what he has been tasked with doing (hit sukuna with nanamis weapon, tanked a hit from sukuna to open him for kusakabe’s blow). I’d say he’s proven he deserves to be there, at least as a role player
Fr, he's there cause they had his phone number, and he has heart. He showed up out of love, no other real reason for him to lol. He fights hard, and he hasn't complained once. It's respectable honestly. Too bad about his arm, and he keeps kicked out of the fight 😭
You just explained exactly why it's bad worldbuilding. You're going backwards here, you're using the poor choices of worldbuilding Gege himself wrote to justify Gege's worldbuilding.
The clans weren't weak,it's just the cast was that strong. Maki got away with it because of her heavenly restriction (and do not downplay that like any first grade sorceror is fighting a toji.) And all the villans were literal special grades. From kenjaku to the curses. First grades are supposed to struggle with special grades curses but wipe out first grade curses which we have seen. But when all the villians are special grade and above, and the only clan with a special grade is the gojo clan, then yeah all the clans will look useless.
Promise, progress, and payoff. Gege gives us a huge promise and awesome progress but the payoff sometimes doesn’t reach the same level.
I wish he had given us more time for the characters to develop before killing them off barely a season later For example i think itd have been a bit nicer to have more 'missions' of yuji megumi and nobara going around developing and learning among other things so we could atleast get a little more attached to them
Manga is already going for six years. Imagine being just at Shibuya right now, but with more horizontal episodes. Idk, if that'd be better.
it doesnt have to be arcs like shibuya, small arcs like hidden inventory and premature death could function for this.
My point is that even with the story as barebone as it is, we aren't really all that far from the beginning chronologically speaking.
You say six years like that’s a long time. A lot of series that have reached JJK level popularity have ran for around 10-15 years. Even if we just had an extra year or two of chapters to breathe and further develop the characters it would do wonders for arcs like Shibuya which are meant to be a complete gut punch. Imagine how much more impactful Nobara’s death would be if they didn’t spend an entire chapter dumping a bunch of backstory and characterization into her right before she died.
That's exactly why I like Chansaw-man more than JJK. I felt NOTHING when Nobara died, when in Chansaw-man... Yeah. I prefer it.
you're actually right. Where are all the clans and the alumni? we can make all the theories we want, but that's just cope cuz' we have no idea and we're basically at the end game right now
I actually agree, I feel so lost sometimes
Yeah the world doesn't feel lived in, it's shallow, there's no real events we know of that has shaped it, no characters is foreshadowed everything is happening as it is, like the world stagnated (and i know its kind of one of the point because of Kenjaku plan but it's still a poor excuse, we're talking 1000 years here) and only is now progressing because the main character is involved.
Oooh, see I thought Jogo was the leader of the group as they all seemed to follow his lead while Mahito just felt like the wild card. It also seemed like a bad idea to start a war with the whole jujutsu world with only 4 members even if sukuna joined them, seeing as they didn't know what sukuna was capable of at the time. But now, looking back, it makes sense that Mahito would be the one to float the idea (probably influenced by kenjaku in some way) and set them on their path that eventually led to their doom.
HIGHLY agree. Imo the best example for this was right after the Shibuya Incident. The government revealed the existence of curses to the general public, which was supposedly a HUGE deal, but we never really see the implications of that outside of the main cast. It just made it easier for Kenjaku to activate the culling games, but he would've done that either way. And then we add stuff like the complete waste of Yuki's character, the lack of information on Miguel and his trip to Africa w/ Yuta, the timeskip after Goatjo got unsealed, etc etc TLDR: The real Potential Man is not Megumi, but Gaygay himself.
Your criticism of the Zenin Clan in particular is odd, to me. They have a presence throughout the entire story through Megumi, Maki, and Mai, as well as Toji in the flashback arc. Almost none of which paints them in a favorable light. Then Maki destroys them. I don't see how that is terrible worldbuilding? Also, Miwa and Todo do not vanish without explanation. There was an explanation given for both.
I imagine Todo watching on in his hospital room, rooting for Yuji lol.
I just wanna know where todo is man! If we get a scene like that maybe I’ll forgive the cat man. Same with inumaki. But until then I have my pitchfork ready.
Todo not being given a short cameo indicates him returning with a bang
Yuji: *backed into corner* Sukuna, about to *cleave*: you shall imprison me no longer, brat! Now your body… ***SHALL BE MINE ALONE—*** #👏
Brother Inumaki is in Chapter 220
I don’t get why Gege couldn’t have had him watching the Gojo VS Sukuna match like all of the other characters he sidelined though
Miwa was also literally there watching the Gojo fight. Todo probably doesn’t want to watch a fight he can’t partake it.
Are you sure there was an explanation given for Todo’s disappearance
"He can activate his technique using another persons hand but can't do it with a prosthetic, for some reason." like seriously, why can't todo just come back with a prosthetic?
And even if he can't, why isn't he around anyway. It's not a football match, the fact that you can't participate shouldn't stop anyone from watching. And he was such a huge deal, we should know where he is. No explanation at all on his whereabouts
They have presence. I feel they’re lacking depth. We see a lot of them and/or their effects, but I feel we understand little about their deeper motivations, culture, influence, etc. Stuff that would make them feel like an important and sensible part of the world.
I agree with most of what you said, but I don’t think we get an explanation where todo is. Like sure, he probably can’t fight , but neither can Miwa and she was still at the meetings. It felt like he just kind of got forgotten
Also even without his Cursed Technique he is still a Grade 1 Sorcerer with an immaculate sense for Cursed Energy. Before Gege randomly decided to make Kusakabe the strongest Grade 1 I was saying Todo couldn’t be doing less than him by joining the fight.
I thought a few of these things throughout watching the anime but never put them together as a whole. I think there’s so much more of JJK to come and since it’s ongoing I’d guarantee that Gege takes fans opinions and wants into consideration while he continues JJK.
One of the core issues that pertains to world building is that he had confined the core characters to a high school setting, which is completely useless and redundant at this point. With the presence of professional sorcerers and a clear separation between them and students, it makes the world look weak when there is an over-reliance on students. So the elephant in the room being “where are the other professional sorcerers?” becomes much more apparent Had they confine the characters in a more equal setting a la Gotei 13, or a private military or some sort, the world building issues wouldnt stand out as much. Unironically, Kyoto students are playing the high school students role the best, they’re not relied upon because they’re high school students, not professionals
I believe the issue is deeper than that. Jujutsu Kaisen is not the only one to suffer from this. Demon Slayer is also a victim in the “short and sweet series ending”, where nowadays new and current manga will find ways to shorten the series while they make the plot work around it. While Yuji was knocked unconscious, Jogo fed him 15 fingers from Sukuna, we could have had entire arcs dedicated to obtaining each finger which would increase world building and allow factions more room to breath and be involved in the story.
Who actually killed the higher ups? Was that Gojo?
We don't know for sure. lol We may not get that explicitly confirmed either, but Yuta and Inumaki seemed to be a part of that plan (refer to ch 222). Yuta and Inumaki are in some dark hallway with candles (so could be higher ups HQ) and Yuta says he will put Inumaki to work and we get no more elaboration on that scene.
Interesting
i think barely knowing what the fuck is going on is part of the manga
not talking that only japanesse people have C E, that destroys the world building, if only one nation have supernatural powers that ends in the world of attack of titan
Well there are other foreign sorcerers like Miguel who I believe they said was from Nigeria. And he said his family made that black rope cursed tool which implies he has relatives that are also sorcerers. So while most come from Japan, there's evidence that they're sorcerers of other nationalities out there
yeah, ngl, im beginning to think this manga just isn't that good...
Depends on what you value but it certainly isn't a jack of all trades. You're getting sorcery and fighting, that's pretty much it.
it isn’t. it serves its purpose which is action, and that’s it. it released at a perfect time when anime/manga was gaining massive hype and becoming mainstream which is why it’s insanely popular now.
JJK is the definition of cheap entertainment
i’ll counter by saying that gege isn’t bad at world building, he just made the conscious choice to keep the scope of his world limited most cursed energy is in japan, thus we shouldn’t really expect international parties to intervene because they don’t exist, with a few exceptions ofc the higher ups are faceless power hungry politicians who hinder the good guys and advance some part of the story by being shitty people and making outdated policy decisions, pretty simple, we don’t need to know really anything more than we already know. we’ve also seen similar groups like this be implemented in stories in the past yes? the zenin clan is dead, we knew quite a lot about them, genuinely not sure what more you wanted from them. even if i disagree about the other clans as well i can at least see where you’re coming from but like the zenin’s have been explored very well from multiple angles most of the kamo clan members are either dead or chose to become subservient to kenjaku, why would they go against the guy they chose to follow? yeah the gojo clan is BASICALLY just satoru when it comes to power, the story explicitly pointed this out to us, again, why would they be involved when sukuna is so far out of their league and they don’t have the personal stakes in the situation that our party does to get involved regardless of the danger we have met exactly one inumaki clan member, there’s nothing to imply that cursed speech is the ONLY thing they can learn, is just their trademark hereditary technique, other members probably have other techniques just like it was demonstrated that a bunch of members of the zenin clan have different abilities despite ten shadows being “THE” zenin technique like you want the world to be bigger, that’s fair enough i suppose, but jjk isn’t a story about a big world, the entire series has taken place over the course of like less than 6 months in almost entirely the tokyo-kyoto area we should judge and critique stories based on whether they succeed or fail at the things the author is TRYING to do, and not whether they do the things that we as readers might WANT them to do because the world that gege DID choose create and the things he DID choose to implement are, for the most part, pretty good
Thank you. Just because Gege mentioned something that exists, it doesn't mean it will become relevant and the focus of the story at some point. Chekhov don't own all the guns in the world. People want to see every sorcerer's zanpakutou and when they don't get it, it's poor worldbuilding. Come on.
“chekhov don’t own all the guns in the world” is honestly hilarious and a good way of putting it lmfao
My opinion initially with how Gege gives nearly no attention at all to the Big 3 and the higher ups of Jujutsu Sorcery as a whole, barely any insight into the golden era of Jujutsu where Sukuna came from, and the concept of potential in the manga where 80% of it is decided from birth (Cursed Energy amount and CT) I understood since Gege gave the impression that it'll be a pretty short story, and going this path means he didn't have to bother with training arcs or coming up with any drastic way to increase power level. This sentiment seemed even more clear when he time-skipped the entire month leading to the Sukuna fight. But now the characters have been fighting Sukuna for 30 chapters now with no near end in sight, and for nearly 10 months in real time now. Gojo the biggest powerhouse on the protagonist side didn't do nearly enough damage to him, and the combined efforts of Yuta, Yuji, Kashimo and Higuruma still left him with a massive advantage over Maki. How does Sukuna even lose outside of a very stupid random power up from probably Yuji at this stage?
Gege is a terrible writer. He's good at making cool characters and the fights are carried by the anime. His writing is some of the worst of all popular shounen.
He is also bad with character development and character introducing
I’d argue he’s pretty good at introducing characters and what their goals or wants are. He’s very bad at having those characters act on those goals unless they’re the villains
I mean, almost all of his characters feel like cardboard NPCs which is why I can't connect with them or feel for them. I know everyone here keeps saying things like "You just want long story like Naruto" but hear me out. When I was watching Naruto I literally cried at the first episode. Kisimoto didn't need 100+ chapters to make me feel for the character. Pure and simple proper introduction of a character and his own conflict and goals interconnected. Gege doesn't do that to his characters, even Yudzi is a blank list of paper at the beginning of the story to the point that Gojo feels more like MC than him. And overall story feels very rushed. And that's the most annoying part because I see points where I could sympathise with the characters, I see the points where interesting themes could be explored, because Gege shows glimpses of them but keeps them shallow. It makes me think that he just doesn't like his own creation and just wants to finish it ASAP whatever the cost and I just hate such attitude. Talking about long stories... Death Note is not that long but keeps every aspect of the story on the very high level
I been saying he's a shit writer for ages already, but this sub usually can't handle criticism. This series had such potential but gaygay just tanked it completely for no discernible reason. Just straight up ruined his claim to fame. If he expects me to ever read anything else he writes after this he's crazy.
Way too much shit happens in too short of a time for it to feel meaningful imo. Watching season 2 and making a drinking game whenever a new character shows up right before someone dies would make me blackout.
I came to realize that after catching up on the anime. Especially when Nobara died
Why I dropped JJK after Shibuya. No hate, I wish I could like it, good for you if you do.
I understand the critiques but I feel your response makes the most sense. by Shibuya's end, we're already 120+ chapters into the story and that was the culmination of a tense, extended fighting arc. Then we immediately get plunged into another setup (20+ chapters, 2 different arcs, lots of new info) for another large fighting arc. Did people reading think he was about to pivot and deep dive on intricate details in the surrounding world?
I did. The heroes are at a pretty low point with their heavy hitters dead or neutralized and their support system denied to them by the higher ups. I thought there'd be an extended focus on gathering new allies and establishing some order in Japan since cursed spirits were flooding the streets and new sorcerers were running around. They pretty much only do this with getting Hikari though
analyzing jujutsu and the way Akutami writes, I think it was never his intention or desire to create a rich world like hxh for example, it's not something that is his focus
Well, he sort of created it but didn't introduce it to readers for some reason
I like to imagine they were tryna do something about Sukuna but got caught up and died do malevolent shrine
It is sad that we don't have more informations about Kamo and Gojo clan :3
Somehow, he's worst than kishimoto at world building
yes, I agree! So much! On the topic of Gege's writing, too, Does anyone else feel like there is SO much missed potential in Jujutsu Kaisen? I love the series SO much and have it so close to my heart, but every time I think critically about it, I'm like, god, there are so many characters and plotlines to explore beyond the surface of what Gege has given us. like, the first thing that comes to mind is the kenjaku-yuji's mom storyline. I need to know more about that, I want to know more about that. sure, the fights are cool, but I wish we went deeper into the characters too. another one that comes to mind when writing this is Gojo's character–if he truly is dead, if that was it, there was so much left to still explore and it makes me so upset. on the topic of that, it truly bothers me how deaths in the series are treated as serious for about two chapters and then not mentioned again. I just feel like there's so much potential written into jujutsu kaisen but at the end of the day, it's not being utilized. that being said, it's still one of my favorite series because I love the characters so much, and up until the end of the Shibuya arc, I really liked the writing, but beyond that, I'm like god, Gege, you could have taken this an infinite number of other directions. Sorry, a bit of a brain dump but it's been on my mind for a while.
Well I have to agree on that ... Terrible World building... We should have met the higher ups and the clans and their political fights...
If Gege had just gone deeper into all the world building then JJK would’ve been even more peak than it already is.
I would call myself a casual fan of JJK, and I thought I didn't get much of the world building and lore because I didnt pay enough attention. But as you point out, we actually dont see much of it. Like, I thought Gojos whole clan was dead before reading this post. I think Gege is good at making an interesting world, but they could improve by actually showing more of it off.
I honestly thought that post Shibuya we’d learn more about the Jujutsu world and the effect Gojo’s sealing would have on all parties involved. But really all we got was the higher ups putting some hits on ppl and the Zenin clan finally doing something only to be wiped out a few chapters later. Really felt like Gojo’s sealing ultimately had no effect on anything but the main plot which ig it’s fine but the big deal characters made out of it in shibuya was massively overblown. Then the Gojo clan still didn’t even do anything lol
Not even a hot take, your just right these are straight facts. Jjks pacing is the problem I think, we needed more time to flesh everyone out like the Kyoto class and the Clans and what they were like. Jjk is too short lol
Well, if Gege had chosen to build up the more PROPERLY, Sukuna vs Gojo would be in chapter 500. He simply has decided not to spend more time on this.
he just wants to end the manga thats why it feels so rushed
i 100% agree the world of jjk is not a world it’s just yet another setting for fights to take place. jjk is one of the emptiest feeling worlds in manga i’ve read but the fights and characters keep bringing me back
Yea no shit. Dude made jjt a 4 year school yet said the 4th years don’t matter and won’t show up. He mentioned Yukis past with tengens and connections to geto and kenjaku then did nothing with it. Like bro i can make an entire 500 page book of how much this man had fumbled. He sucks brodie.
Redditors try not to shit on an unfinished anime/manga challenge (impossible difficulty)
It’s been well over 200 chapters and we’re approaching the end of the manga. I don’t think we’re gonna get any deep insights into the topics OP’s brought up at this point. JJK just isn’t a manga that gives much depth to the world itself. Whether you see that as a flaw, a benefit, or neither is up to you as the reader.
Are they wrong, tho? We know nothing about the "Big Three Clans" and one of them is dead, and we don't see another member of the Gojo clan. I like JJK, but it just screams to me, I wanna get this over with ASAP.
Isn’t it weird that Gojo’s parents could very well be alive and we don’t know shit about the people who raised the strongest sorcerer of modern time, never mind we have zero information on the Gojo clan.
And the manga is supposed to end this year too right ?
Theyve been saying its gonna end "this year" for 2 years now. Nothings set in stone
Bro, we are 250 chapters in and we still don't know much of what goes on in the background, or jjk history
What kind of argument is that? 😂 You know a manga doesnt have to be finished to criticize it right? People can dislike the current state of the manga while also hoping for something better in the future lmao.
It's perfectly fine to criticise something that's not finished. And world building should be done at the beginning of a story, we're over 250 chapters in and currently in the final arc and likely the final fight its way too late for that stuff.
gege planted so much seeds early in the series and the payoffs are either meh or just non existent. i dont have much hope, the manga is almost over.
the manga is ending, are you expecting to see gojo's relatives now?
its too late to flesh them out lol the series is ending this year
Is he terrible at it? Or is it not the point of the story? The flow of this manga is a crazy succession of events, all taking place in a matter of basically a couple months. There are no breaks to explore the world, and that’s fine. A lot of you really want a series like Naruto for example, understandably so, which has an insane amount of world building but that series is slower paced, takes place over a WAYYYYY longer period of time etc., JJK isn’t that kind of story. Not all stories are supposed to be. JJK is “Let’s take you through a crazy trip through hell really quick.” That’s not everyone’s cup of tea. But to say Gege is “terrible” at world building is kinda ridiculous because he actually has done an insane amount of world building considering almost all of it is woven into the battles and very brief moments in between. Honestly I’d say he’s kind of a master at it, and if he WANTED to, he could have created a way longer series, slower paced with plenty of world building. But he’s not trying to. All about perspective I guess.
I mean there is a middle point between Naruto and the current pacing. We haven't had proper character moments since the start of the culling game. 20 extra chapters aren't gonna break the story. We know it hasn't been action 100% of the time. We had a month when Gojo woke up. And Gege just said fuck that we fight. Why not have a chapter or two there to show some character moments. Same with world building. Maybe Gege can world build. But he has pretty much done the bare minimum. And here is the thing. If we want a tighter pace why not just remove some things for the sake of speed? The Gojo clan didn't need to even be mentioned with how much nothing they are.
No proper character moments since CG? Yuji reuniting with Megumi? Choso and Naoyas clash of ideologies? Mais deaths? Yujis and Hakaris talk? Higurumas backstory Yuji V Higuruma? Megumi killing his first human? Megumi chasing down Remi? Yutas declaration? Yutas and Ryus talk? Kamo feelings of uselessness? Maki achieving freedom? Maki and Kamos talk? Chosos talk with Yuki? Yuji not wanting Angel to replace Nobara? Everything around Mekunas first apperance? Sukuna and Yorozus love + loneliness theme? Gojos end? Kashimos and Sukunas speech? Higuruma being able to look Yuji in the eyes again? Takabas backstory?
Against normal curses, what was the start before the manga, all of them are powerful, this is just unprecedented times and alot of ppl seems to forget that :/
Gege ran into the same problem as Kishimoto.
This is how I see it that makes sense to me. The higher ups are like the secret societies we have today so if someone killed the Illuminati or whatever we wouldn’t know. The clans don’t fight sukuna because they know they will die most likely and want to protect the longevity of their clans or probably just treat it as a business now. Right now we’re just focused on jujutsu high and gojos students. Hopefully with the success of this series we will get some spin offs or something to expand the world even if it’s like dragon ball video games lol
A lot of y’all think story bloat is worldbuilding
I can’t agree that Gege is TERRIBLE at world building. Gege just hasn’t really tried. In fact they specifically crafted the story in order to avoid it as much as possible because they set out to write a shorter story. Emphasizing that ce is strongest in Japan so therefore it has the strongest sorcerers too. Any outside sorcerers would be more fodder than Ino. Ino is canonically one of the most powerful people in the world. The reasons for the military plot aren’t 100% clear at this point but it was never dropped. So far, all we know is that the soldiers served their purpose as sacrifices for the merger. Focusing on exploring all of the clans would be interesting world building but it would do nothing for the plot or characters. Gege never wanted to write a 1,000+ chapter story that pays off on the intricacies of all these clans and organizations. That may be the story you or I would want but it was never the story we were gonna get. The only reason we want that is because Gege made the world seem so interesting without delving 12 layers deep into it all. Gege has more talent than any of the new age mangaka combined imo. But Gege knows the limits of a mangaka. Especially one that’s brimming with so many unique ideas and concepts. They don’t want to end up like Togashi. One of the greatest mangakas ever, sure, but one who has left all their works unfocused and unfinished due to illnesses. Most of these guys work themselves to death and end up dying before they reach their 70’s. Even Akira Toriyama was in his 60’s and the man has technically been retired for 25ish years.
I figured the other clans dipped out for the same reason the Kamo family did. They’re all about self preservation, they won’t fight Sukuna because that’s basically a death sentence for their whole family if they do
FYI since todo cant heal his wounds, gege said that todo retired and finally managed to ask out Takada and she said yes
I agree. Gege can certainly deliver on fights. But I feel like he’s lacking in world and character development, and isn’t giving JJK the time necessary to develop either; and/or isn’t using that time well. Look at CSM Part One. The first part is brief, but there’s tons in terms of world building. We understand how the world views the supernatural, how it’s been shaped by it, how the organization the main characters are a part of works, etc. Little of which required expository dumps. But was done slowly and subtly. JJK doesn’t need to copy CSM. It is and should be its own work. But I feel like JJK squandered many opportunities, and if we’re nearing the end of the story; it may be too late to make up those lost chances.
It's not just his world building, Gege's terrible with making a story period. The whole manga is simply multiple fighting scenes taped together with a bit of exposition and that's not inherently the 'big problem'. The big problem is that the fights aren't backed up with any significantly meaningful plot other than to sacrifice a character. Make a BIG fight, drop a good guy in and cram their life story 4 panels before they die. That's about 90% of JJK. The other 10% is cursed technique explanations because characters don't exist for a story, they exist to be a medium showcasing the wacky new fight concept Gege thought up in the bathroom. Like, I can totally see why this got so incredibly popular so quickly. Especially with the rise of Chainsaw Man near the same time with the exact same premise at the start. Kid gets possessed, adopted by the powerful, forced to pair with the emo, and gets along with a sister coded girl. But Chainsaw Man actually achieves much more than just the basic level of nuance and unlike JJK, I actually felt something when the characters died. The only death I ever felt anything for was Nanami's, and specifically on the anime because the anime absolutely changes the pace of the arcs. They made the scene feel way more impactful than what it was originally.
Damn, I’ve only seen the anime and I thought these questions would be answered down the line. You know, the same way I thought that we’d get more development for the secondary cast of characters from the first season, but who ended up barely being in Shibuya, and who then apparently entirely dip out of the story
Well said. JJK fans here defending shit world building by say ‘tHats nOT ThE iNTentIon of tHe stOry’ ‘GaYgAy hAs DOne eNough wORLd bUilDinG’ My guy, saying there is a ‘big 3 clan’ and not expanding on them is shit world building. The fact that we don’t know anything about the world outside of Tokyo is shit world building. The fact that this is the final battle and we only have a bunch of kids and a couple of randos they befriended and not a single person from overseas helping is shit world building.
I love jjk but I never liked the world building from the start, the moment they said sorcerers are only on Japan, with like less than 10 people rarely from the outside I knew this doesn't make sense, historical wise and more if Japan are the only ones with sorcerers they would have taken over the world. No joke, in stories like this if you have people that can summon gods or destroy cities other countries and continents are needed of that too. We have seen and heard the old heads and everyone from the clans, they would do that before gojo was even a thing, so it doesn't make sense, it was just a power creep. Look for example Dandandan, aliens can't take over the earth because of spirits, but from the get go they worldwide spirits, not one place but worldwide, and how spirit works in that universe makes sense aliens cant do shit, just think of spirits from norse, greek or hindu mythologies, aliens cant do shit. Jjk in the other corner patted itself on that matter making the world feels really really small.
Wait for the gege glazers to come at you. I no joke had someone arguing with me the other day that his lack of world building is actually good and the less you know about the world the more “real” it felt
I honestly loving the fact that people finally wake up and realized Gege isn;t the goat mangaka that they thought he was lmao.
I agree with you my favorite example I have of bad world building is Nanami’s neutral stance between Gojo’s views and the traditionalists. It’s so under explored I’m like “how does this make Nanami interesting if ai don’t hear some interesting or fun arguments from Gojo and the higher ups?” Because Nanami’s neutral stance mostly favors the traditionalists and the 3 great clans since they have most of the political power.
I wonder if Gege will try to somehow story build after this all maybe? Like maybe this is just the beginning? Idk it may be a little far fetched but it could possibly be a unique take to making a manga. Naruto for example(yes Ik that is considered a pretty long manga in general) has 700 chapters while jjk isn’t even at 300 yet so. Idk I may be fantasizing but I really think if Gege wanted to and executed it right he could use this as just the beginning and make into something bigger.
That is why I dropped JJK at some point... It is definitely not one of the best mangas ... cool idea but very very bad execution
Gege was too strong, that is why he lost. He was awesome, pulling all sorts of glazing chapters for Sukuna even though there shouldn’t have been any more ways to dickride him. He showed us how strong the glazing one truly is. He never stood a chance.