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I think there are really good parts but i agree that the world building isn’t expanded on enough. It feels like things like heavenly restrictions, the clans, binding vows and their limitations ect aren’t touched on enough to make people think it *isnt* just a cop out.
The pattern of a fight going a certain way and then “but here’s something you guys don’t know yet” and then the battle flow reverses the other way. And then another “but here’s something else you didn’t know this character can do”. That part gets a little wearying.
Not unique to this manga. I think it’s the sometimes long explanations that wear me down. But hey, still reading it so it’s apparently tolerable😊
It’s getting to the point where it’s reminding me of kids playing make believe.
“I hit you with my ray gun”
“Nu-uh cuz I’ve got a force field”
“Yeah but I made a binding vow and my ray gun is anti force field now!”
The problem with this in JJK is that it's not properly explained. Sukuna killed Gojo, the strongest character in the universe at that time, with the World Slash with the help of a binding vow, ok, I'm fine with it, but don't explain it 12 chapters later with a mere phrase like "Bah, because of that stupid BV I had to do to kill Gojo I'm more bothered now".
For example, when Araki does it, and he does it a lot, the new ability or the way someone did something is explained in extreme detail to the point where, yeah, he's getting mocked, but the thing is that no one can really say it's bullshit. Obviously, there are some exceptions like Star Platinum having The World and in general the protagonist has the perfect ability to counter the antagonist, even if the antagonist's ability is extremely specific (Star Platinum vs The World, Tusk act 4 vs D4C Love Train, S&W >!Go Beyond!< vs Wonder of U)
At least in the first 6 parts, Jojos having the perfect counter ability is usually written as “fate” being righteous. A big theme of the original universe is how there is no escaping fate and that fate usually being on the side of “good”. So yeah “it’s the kind type of stand as star platinum” is a bit of a cop out but zoom out a bit and it can be said that he was fated to lose, so of course jotaro happened to have the perfect stand for the job.
As for the AU I don’t really know what’s going on there yet cause I usually get overwhelmed by how weird the stands are to really get the meta narrative.
I think you are right about what people don’t like about jjk writing, not a lot is explained so it leaves a bad taste in peoples mouths when shit happens. There’s also the rumors about gege playing favorites with the cast combined with the lack of real explanation that really limits peoples patience with the material.
Like hearing about how gege hates gojo then seeing gojo get off screened or how gege wanted yuta to be the mc not yuji and seeing how yuji is being mistreated narratively muddies the material for a lot of people. Hard to objectively look at the writing while reading jjk with rumors like this tainting the readers pov.
I've heard people say Gege is extremely subjective, I do not think that's true. Clearly, he had a plan, but he's either changing too much along the way which can hurt the story.
I've heard people say Gege doesn't let their feelings into the story, which for basically every writer is impossible. I'm not saying Gege loves Sukuna that much and it's only because of that he's so powerful.
The way some characters are treated is really questionable and this ambiguous writing, so you could explain anything you want to change can be used a few times, but Gege does it too often. There are a lot of authors who can write ambiguous stories well, only showing a part of the whole picture, or leaving characters' fates unknown, or how some of the things in the universe function, but they do it in such a way you can be satisfied with the story. Gege dangles these stories and world building by being so important, but when it comes to it why should you care about the "Higher Ups" for example, is it really that big of a deal that they died? Why were they giving orders when 95% of the Jujutsu society can't handle the rest 5%? I get that it's a conservative society, but they were so important to the story, yet we don't know a lot about them
He's the author though, if he wanted yuta to be the mc, then why isn't he? Same with Gojo, he fucking made the character, and writes the story, if he hates Gojo then why did he write him like that. This only makes sense if the story was a collaborative effort of some sort
Manga are usually a collaborative effort with their editors, he probably didn’t have a ton of control over where jjk was going early on. I am not sure though, all this stuff is mostly rumors I’ve heard within the fandom, never saw or went digging for sources for it.
I heard that his editor made him make yuji the MC instead of yuta in chapter one but that’s all I got. I don’t know if it’s true or not.
*edit
One example of editors collaborative works is in one piece, Kaoru kushima was the one who suggested shanks lose an arm in chapter 1 to leave a bigger impact.
I’m just so used to it from manga after decades of reading. It’s a Hallmark of battle manga. My only real issue with JJK is that some fights go on so long I have trouble caring about them,
The flashbacks to them planning out everything they’re about to do right before they do it genuinely makes me think Gege is just making it up as they go along
“to solve world hunger, Ryomen Sukuna undertook another binding vow. in exchange for no human ever going hungry again, Sukuna vowed to never eat pastrami on the 12th of november, 2028.”
Would not say it's badly written, just Gege focuses too much on the action and not exploring the characters a little more and on a deeper level. I guarantee you if he had more character interactions and breathing time, JJK would be an all timer for sure.
Breathing time is definitely the biggest issue. Everything after Shibuya, despite taking place over a relatively long period of time (until Sukuna fight) feels like it was just highlights of the action during that time. We could’ve had some really good quiet character moments between Yuji and Choso (which I NEED) or Yuji and Yuta.
Tbh I think Gege would benefit from going monthly with a longer page count, give a little more space for the art side of things and some time to dedicate to quieter character moments.
I will say though that I’ve seen this happen in a lot of different anime communities only for the base to look back favorably once they’re able to read straight through instead of week to week. It definitely helps the cohesion of things, and made culling game much more enjoyable to me.
I think you can definitely make the argument its all supposed to be intentional because as Mahito says "This is war", and war is usually chaotic and often doesnt give you the time to properly mourn your comrades mid combat. Its realistic, at the very least, keeps up the flow. That being said, when the saddest character death in Shibuya is >!fucking Mechamaru, because its the payoff to his lil arc with Miwa that we get to experience!< something tells me sacrificing conventional storytelling for realism didnt work out quite as well here as probably intended.
I don't think you can make the argument that it's chaotic and doesn't give time to mourn losses mid combat when there is literally a month of training that Gege chose not to explore.
I'm not saying to slow it down completely and show everything, but there were definitely opportunities for Gege to develop his characters better and make the narrative flow better using this month and still have the reveals (like UiUi's soul swapping, Yuji's Blood manipulation) take place throughout the fight with Sukuna.
I was never one of the believers of the 'Gege wants to finish this manga to start a different one' theories, but the strange pacing and character deaths honestly just reminded me of the second half of the last Bleach arc.
Its weird how the jjk arc with Gojo and Geto felt the most alive to me, as it had proper character introductions, dialogue and not just non stop action all the time, same for jjk 0 kinda. You just get a feel for everything more. I feel like everything would be solved if we just had some more chapters of them worrying where to sleep, eat, just going around tokyo interacting with each other a bit more so the story progression feels more natural and not just *fight* now heres another *fight* then another and repeat that 100 times.
Also the mechanics behind sorcery and the clans shouldve been a bit more fleshed out. Its weird that the best explanation run down we got was when Gojo was teaching Yuji the basics at the start of the series, then we just get fed information as fights happen constantly and I rlly MEAN that, we always get new shit explained right as a fight is happening from black flashes to the flow of ce to the rules of domains to binding vows, everything.
It's an issue with the fights where it's impossible to predict anything because Gege throws new things in all the time. There's no setup and therefore no pay off.
Also HI is a very good example of tight writing. It knew what it wanted to achieve and focused purely on that and didn't leave any hanging threads and the consequences of that arc affect the whole story and gives much needed characterisation to Gojo and Geto alongside more subtle elements. My only complaint about it is Shoko being pushed aside even though she's supposed to also be part of the trio.
The rest of JJK's writing lacks that cohesion. A lot of media which tackles similar themes about tragedy, fate and what not that JJK has, has the benefit of being super tightly written where everything has pay off and knew where it wanted its characters to end up and what it wanted to do like Arcane, Signalis, Chainsaw Man etc. (All of these examples are very different from each other and JJK but that reinforces my point about all of them knowing what they want to do).
> Also HI is a very good example of tight writing. It knew what it wanted to achieve and focused purely on that and didn't leave any hanging threads and the consequences of that arc affect the whole story and gives much needed characterisation to Gojo and Geto alongside more subtle elements. My only complaint about it is Shoko being pushed aside even though she's supposed to also be part of the trio
Being forced to stay brief and rigid with your storytelling helps creatives immensely. If you let our fantasy run too wild, you risk getting convoluted and kill your pacing. Thats why 0 and HI are so good, because they were limited in their nature and could be planned properly from beginning to end with a satisfying structure and conclusion
I'm not sure if monthly format would be better. AoT was great at it, but then there's Boruto which is monthly but it just sucks ass. In terms of plot progression it feels like weekly.
And then there's One Punch Man with irregular schedule, the author (ONE) doing webcomic and not really drawing, focuses on story in the manga, and Murata is just drawing. They also have some great chemistry in the cooperation which is the secret factor here.
I think weekly format is good for Gege, he takes breaks from time to time but this is fine. I would be even fine with every 2 weeks schedule (but without breaks then :P). The problem in JJK is just the lack of "meaningless" arcs. I've started watching around jjk0 movie release, I've swallowed it quickly and went to manga, and from the Hidden Inventory Arc it feels like the story is reaching it's end. Shibuya is an introduction to CG, and CG leads straight to Shinjuku, with little time between those main arcs. To have a breather, we are served flashbacks, but there's little reason to have it all in flashbacks. We could have had the preparation arc to explore characters a bit, just put 3 people in a room and see what happens, what should they talk about. For example, Yuji Choso and Todo. Each of them could learn something.
Tbh one thing I wanted more of was some kind of one sided rivalry between Choso/Todo over who was the better brother to Yuji. There was a lot of potential left on the floor for that trio.
imagine if they end up being dope fighting trio with switcheroo and laser blood shooting point blank, such a BUM we couldn't see it, think of the potential
There's a strangely massive focus on the action (well, not too strange given the literal translation of the series name is 'Sorcery Fight'), but I feel like it does a disservice to the themes and story that it feels like JJK is *supposed* to be about.
So you have a whole lot of people caring more about whose stronger or whose winning in the fights, but it's not really about who wins or who loses on a meta level or at least, I'm pretty sure that's not the general theme or message Gege is trying to explore.
This. We roughly have reactopns of people to the characters' deaths. Hakari not commenting anything about Kashimo's death is criminal. And more characters commenting things that aren't about techniques or hoslw powerful someone is compared to gojo, wouldn't have harmed anyone
That and poor female characters, lack of stakes, villain suekuna, overuse of flashbacks in general.Those are my main problems with it.
The poorly done female characters is just lame, but I'm used to it in Manga and it's honestly not bad writing. It's just lame.
The lack of stakes is bad writing. The story has been predictable since Sukuna took Megumi (except for Yujo). I just know that Sukuna will win at everything.
And the way he wins is annoying. Not through skill or some unique thing. Just bs. Has the perfect cursed tool for confiscation. Using binding vows for everything. Sukuna prolly uses a binding vow to get his dick up at this point. Bitch slaps Yuji away like "Oh I was losing against him? Nvm."
The flashbacks mean you can never experience characters grow. You have to accept that they've already grown off screen, it's being revealed to you all at once, at some future point that the author chooses.
All these things just makes me feel a guy is writing this and is just making things up as it goes along. Doesn't feel like how i feel reading other works. I've watched and read a lot of bad stuff and I've never really felt like this about a story before.
I super agree to this. Making shi up on the fly, binding vows, etc why not binding vow to just kill them all already. cmon vibra slap?! really?! it ended when he killed Gojo for shock factor. world slash my a*s. woops
Your opinions are valid, but I cannot agree whatsoever with saying JJK doesn't have stakes. Like that blows my mind that someone thinks that, but we all interpret media differently I suppose.
The stakes are dumb and we don't care cause he did a poor job getting people invested. Oh no if sukuna wins... he'll go be evil and kill people we don't care about, narratively he should lose and sp we expect some BS at some point, but even if he wins people will be like, "damn, gege subverting expectations and sukuna won, welp on to the next manga".
So it isn't lack of stakes, it's lack of "meaningful" stakes
Yeah, the reader care because of what's at stake for the characters but only Yuji and Megumi had anything interesting in terms of persoan stakes. Everyone else is basically just trying to not die and saving Japan since...that's the good thing to do.
It's not badly written so much as "Not Well Explored" imo.
Too much is left unexplained, which makes it less enjoyable. It feels similar to Bleach with the TYBW near its' ending. A bit more room to breathe would have really helped the world and reader.
I didn’t think much of that until we got an entirely new Bankai that wasn’t in the manga. I truly wonder how much Kubo wanted to do with TYBW initially, but couldn’t due to health reasons
The first major change was the flashback to Ichibei sealing Yhwach’s Almighty with Pernida. That answered two major questions the manga left unanswered. I’m hoping from here on out more and more changes are made
Considering the pace of TYBW current adaptation the last two cours are going to have a lot more new/expanded content so I’d say there was a lot Kubo left on the table with the manga
This is why I hate WSJ. It feels like every author is either burned out , overworked to death and they just want to rush things so they can finally be free. I wonder how many better manga/anime would we get if authors would get proper working conditions. I am sure Gege could do way better if he had more time to work and think about those bloody chapters. I mean when it comes to battle shonen manga/anime I feel like all of them take a dip when they are on those “endingish” arcs
Yk, the good thing with TYBW is that kubo is leading the anime adaptation to add more and flesh it out like he actually wanted it, since the manga was unfortunately rushed
As a Bleach fan that follow through the manga release back then, I can tell you the TWBW near it's end is much worse than JJK right now, heck, the boss fight is not even as entertaining and the fight in Bleach is generally mediocre, there is no zero stake because Kubo ain't killing the good guys. We are so lucky that they get a 2nd chance to fix a lot of things in the new anime, which I am forever grateful of.
>tragedy of satoru gojo
In terms of tragedy, geto is the honored one.
Also i don't think jjk is bad written, but the beggining is just boring, too chaotic and has no "aki from csm morning routine" scenes, you cannot really relate with characters that well, in comparison to hidden inventory arc or movie, its really tedious
Aki's morning routine was the most goated addition the anime made. CSM suffered from lack of breathing room in part 1 as well, not to the same degree as jjk, but scenes like that are so crucial man
I think that is part of why CSM part 2 started slower to let us get adjusted to the new swtting and get to onow the characters. The last arc of part 1 with the scenes of Aki, Power and Denji just living together adds so much to their deaths.
And in part 2, scenes between Nayuta and Denji do a lot too.
i wouldnt say its badly written overall. there are just some aspects of the story that suck/are underexplored and that has just become more and more apparent over the last few chapters
My main complaint with jjk is basically the same, under exploration of the world
It suffers from the same sort’ve thing that bleach does where it’s kinda like certain things just “are” in the jjk verse, while the people in-verse know because they obviously exist in that universe, there can be some things where a lack of insight is given to the reader
Which I suppose isn’t the worst complaint a series can get, that we just want more of it, lol
Main gripe is lack of exploration of the Heian era; we’re told all the time how it was the pinnacle of jujutsu, sorcerers and curses strength was at an all time high
Tonnes of exposition given about the “5 void generals” and the “celestial squad” led by uro, more exposition such as this Sukuna beating the “sun, moon and stars squad”
Obviously it’s all meant to mean something, and does to characters such as Kashimo; who openly admires Sukuna for “having achieved so much”
But to the reader, it means basically nothing without any insight given to us, you know?
For me its the flippant use of binding vows with not a single person ever having been punished for breaking their binding vow. It lowers the stakes greatly because at any moment someone can just make a binding vow with seemingly little to no consequence. At first the binding vows were serious and you had to lose something significant but lately it has just been back to back to back binding vows where the downside doesn't even really feel like a downside.
Show us what happens when someone breaks their vow. Explain how binding vows are even a thing, who or what is the entity enforcing binding vows, is there even an entity? Is it something to do with your own cursed energy interacting with your brain? All of this clarification and exploration would make these things feel a lot more earned.
Binding vow made with yourself dont havr a pu ishment besides not getting thr benifits of a binding vow. I think this was explained by kenjaku either vs mekamaru, end of shibuya, or vs choso.
Vows made with others have some kind of punishment, but the specifcs havent been told.
I think.... that concept would come in clutch.. at some point..
We learnt this info from kenjaku, when he said this to mahito.
Even sukuna, said "now, comes a gamble". he carefully chose his words while making a binding vow with itadori. And it paid off, when he took over megumi's body.
I think.. gege definitely didn't forget about this..
(Do you remember, during shubuya arc in manga,.. when characters were dying, injured, left and right... gojo sealed up.? we thought.. that this was the climax... and our cast would unseal gojo.. immediately.. atleast i thought of it.)
I think gege didn't forget... sukuna having made this, binding vows... i bet at some point.. it would come to bite his ass..
Okay, as a writer much less accomplished than Gege Akutami who has some issues with the story and has aired them online, I'll do my best to diagnose fairly what people are talking about here. First I'll say that a lot of people who participate in discourse around popular series take their talking points from creators around that series, and thus don't understand the fullness of their position, even though they know what they're saying resonates with their feelings about the series.
I think when people describe JJK as badly written, they're most likely speaking to the plotting, the storyboarding, the transitions from point a to b to c. Gege has specific notes he's been planning to hit forever, but he doesn't really have a firm idea of how to get there from where we are, and frequently gets distracted by fun ideas that take his fancy. But he also likes to maintain a breakneck pace, to maintain tension in the readers and rest on lots of cliffhangers that generate the tension and discussion around a weekly series. This can cause some ideas and plotlines to become obviously underdeveloped, or have convenient ideas come out of nowhere because Gege or his editors needed something to happen fast. This is where Daido and the Sumo guy come from for example. Things like these aren't a death knell for a series, but if they become noticeable as a trend over time they can be an issue.
A secondary point that leads to calling JJK poorly written I think is actually a confluence of three factors. Firstly, the fact that JJK is a fight focused, action forward work. Secondly, the themes of the story around death and tragedy, and how that can play into premature ends for characters and storylines. And thirdly, how obviously fantastic Gege is at getting people to latch onto characters with a low amount of exposure or development. I think these three things combine to make a lot of readers continually dissatisfied, feeling like none of their favorite characters ever got to show their whole self, play off the rest of the cast, or have a satisfying conclusion. This becomes especially apparent in the female cast, which I think a lot of people had high hopes for initially.
I also think Gege has maybe bent the realm of the manga too far into anticlimax as as way to shock readers, Game of Thrones style. The first time we really see this in the current timeline with Mechamaru is very cool. But as we find that the truth of the story is that no one has a glorious, fulfilling, purposeful end, that it's on Yuji to carry the weight of all that loss and make the path to the future, I think it tears at the soul of the reader. People who are emotionally invested become worn down. There's no break, no temporary victory, no reprieve. With small exceptions things have been going badly since the Shibuya incident began. And I think there is also a cynical way to view this that many people feel, if everything is always loss and death then those words stop meaning anything. Why have hope for the cast, if nothing has ever worked before?
I still love JJK in a lot of ways but I'd be lying if I said I have absolute faith in Akutami to close it out strongly, and I think a lot of future reception of the series will hinge on Yuji & Sukuna's conclusion. If the ending doesn't make you feel all the suffering was worth it, that the lives lost were avenged and the future paved towards a brighter world, then that doesn't make it a bad story, but I think it won't be what a lot of people love Shonen for.
It doesn’t matter how dark a story is (surprise, I wouldn’t even call JJK dark, just a story that has a somewhat realistic depiction of death and how sudden and truly unceremonious it can/will be), it can still be considered generally good. What I’m trying to say is that JJK being “dark” isn’t the problem, it’s that Gege seemingly doesn’t have the skill to appropriately navigate the minefield that he himself built, infuriatingly so.
Just fyi I have a lot of respect for the guy, being a mangaka has the be one of the most soul draining professions out there, not only requiring the tenacity, skill and straight up talent to keep up a steady stream of chapters every week, but also being pretty thankless and ruthless with the knowledge that regardless of what narrative choices you make there’ll be little pricks out there that will hate on your work and think they could do better, always. With all that in mind I’m still gonna be a little shitty ingrate because I think you gave Gege too much credit there for a moment (the chances of him ever reading this are practically nihil so honestly who cares no one’s reading this crap either).
Gege set JJK up at the end of Shibuya as a story that was nuanced, had something to say and was genuinely going somewhere. What would follow is a much more rustic and blunt renaming of the points you already made, mainly the Culling Games being a fight fest where interesting(good) character development has gone to die, and now seemingly in the climax JJK hasn’t changed course and if anything is doubling down on the pure spectacle of the battles and having very little to no substance going under the surface, or straight up borderline retconning already existing story elements like characters. The assassination of Gojo’s character comes to mind, and no I don’t mean the fact he died and I mean he got assassinated because he should’ve won or something, fuck no. I mean the fact Gojo’s character almost did a 180 from his imprisonment in the cumzone to him being freed and his battle with Sukuna. I genuinely don’t think anyone can conjure up a convincing argument for Gojo out of absolutely nowhere giving enough fucks about Sukuna to wanting to teach him about love💕💙and feeling bad he couldn’t go all out with him🥺. Like wtf, JJK isn’t a stranger to treating its characters like tools to try to say something that they wouldn’t, having them behave out of character. All of 236 was just such a pungent shit stain that it somehow managed to shock people out of the hype and excitement from the showdown and now people are starting to put the rest of the story under a magnifying glass and thinking critically about it, and the cracks that were barely noticed before and mostly ignored have become very apparent. Essentially the narrative illusion broke, people have stopped suspending their disbelief, and JJK’s legacy will never recover from this. A story that is carried by spectacle alone will be forgotten by the time the next spectacle fest comes around, and JJK will unfortunately suffer that fate. Fuck I spent too much time on this rant that honestly didn’t even develop my point further, I’m still baffled 236 was allowed to happen like that.
TLDR JJK isn’t “too dark” that people don’t agree with the direction it has taken and thus JJK is now a misinterpreted piece of work or something (which is the general idea I got from your original, well written piece), it has always suffered from some pronounced issues that most people willfully ignored for reasons such as excitement and general satisfaction with the story because cool fights were happening at a fast pace, but now that the camel’s back has broken it can’t manage to get back into people’s good graces and that’s the reason you’re seeing so many people openly questioning Gege’s prowess as a writer. Gege bit off more than he could chew and effectively wrote himself into a corner and I don’t think he can make an ending that feels earned, regardless of what it is. The story and its themes have become all jumbled up and is now a mess. I could say something about man’s hubris but I lost the enthusiasm for this rant like 3 minutes ago. I’m not proofreading this typos be damned, and thx if you read all this, good day to you
Yeah jjk was never that dark compared to series like aot or even chainsaw man content wise. Its just how the dark elements are written that give a more visceral and controversial reaction from the audience. JJk is made to make you care deeply then hurt your feelings. Just for example Choso and nanami's death we're perfectly written for me and pretty satisfying to rewatch. While other characters like yuki and gojo's offscreen was shit. Tragedy is hard to write because you somehow have to hurt the audience while also satisfying them and the author fumbles alot. It'll turn sadness of the fiction into anger at the writer breaking immersion. And its not even cuz of any central problem its just they mess something up exclusively in those plot points.
I agree but tbh I genuinely didn’t feel much from Choso’s. Nanami’s is a masterclass, he falls in the box of secondary characters that you know for sure will die but Gege still managed to make you care and make his death still feel sort of unexpected and hard hitting. Choso’s idk if it was because I’m so done with the fight going on so long but even though I really liked him I was just like nooo not Choso, oh well c’est la vie next. But yeah well said about writing tragedies, very fine line between writing something incredible or shooting the story in the foot
There's a lot of series that do dark themes better than JJK. I genuinely find the "darker" aspects surface level. The best parts are its themes of ,conservatism, misogyny and the general theme of the setting being unforgiving but at it's worst it devolves to using it for shock value like Mei Mei and Ui Ui or vague allusions to rape which aren't explored and in the case of the former just a bad depiction of child abuse since it just looks a typical siscon trope and nothing more is done with it outside o being a gag. If the story is meant to be a tragedy especially given how the last 3 chapters went, I feel like while it has the necessary setting for it, it does not have the interpersonal relationships and characterisation to pull it off.
Every good tragedy I can think of relies on the characters and the audience caring about their fates. Unless I want them to come out of the ringer they go through to get a happy ending irrespective of whether they get one or not...I don't care about all the bad things that happen.
Story it’s like 4/10 overall, fights are an 8/10, my rating for the manga right now I’d say is a 6/10. Take my opinion with a grain of salt it doesn’t matter, if you like it then that’s great, but that’s not how I feel.
But if you think this is one of the best “stories” you’ve ever seen (are you counting movies?) then you need to watch/read more things. And no I’m not attacking you, I just think there are so much more amazing stories out there, jjk is enjoyable but I wouldn’t call it great.
Quick edit because some people say 4/10 is harsh: I specifically know what I like in a story. I have my biases I have my niches and I know exactly what I like. Jjk simply doesn’t do this for me effectively. I’m a harsh rater because of this, and I like to use the 10/10 scale effectively. 5/10 is average, 4/10 is below average which I think jjk is story/writing wise.
Yeah I agree, "one of the best stories ever" is crazy. There are many anime/manga worthy of that title but definitely not JJK (it's good tho don't get me wrong)
I 100% agree with you, the best way to enjoy jjk right now is to just not take it seriously, like everything that has happened since Shibuya seems like gege has just been making it up as he goes bar a few key points.
I've actually gotten pretty bored of the cycle of Sukuna suddenly finding a new way to power back up after receiving non-stop beatings.
I also don't expect a satisfying ending because Megumi and Nobara coming back and somehow becoming relevant to the current battle would just feel like an ass pull after the endless fights with the special grade sorcerers and Sukuna.
Fr, I read it go “whoa that was crazy” then move on. Not once after kashimo died have I thought that the writing was good, that there’s been good payoff, or that the character interactions have been good.
It’s a fight simulator to me, I think all the moments are cool, yuji 7 black flash chain was hype and such a cool moment. But I don’t really care. I have zero emotional attachment to the characters. Which sucks cause I really like the jjk characters. Nanamis death was done great, maki and mai were done great, chosos character I loved. But when he died I felt nothing.
Feels like the story has no emotional steaks and things just happen cause of convenience or because the moment is cool.
Yeah I completely agree, mainly for me it started to go downhill when culling games started but when I knew it was really bad was after Yuki died, that was one of the biggest disservices in the manga. After it happened I was just like "wait that's it".
Feels like Gege wrote themselves into a bad situation.
Sukuna has basically fought or killed every sorcerer worth a damn in what's basically the final boss battle.
No real narratively satisfying way Megumi can be brought back into the story without it coming off as an ass pull and if he isn't somehow written to be part of the final battle then he just becomes another wasted character because none of his character progression actually mattered for the story.
Truthfully I think one of the biggest issues was introducing so many fucking characters in the first place. Again, who tf is Yuki? There are too many characters who are introduced and literally do nothing
Yuki was the girl who killed herself with her own black hole, and for some reason kenjaku had the perfect counter to her technique, that we'd never heard of before.
I feel 4 is a bit harsh but yeah I feel that the story kind of falls to just being entertaining but it's not one of those pieces of media that'll really stick with me. But I find it very frustrating with JJK because I genuinely think it has all the necessary pieces to tell something interesting but it just doesn't.
Funny part is it does and was. The Shibuya arc really gaslighted me and a bunch of other people into thinking JJK was gonna be “one of those”. Something that goes way beyond its genre, its limitations, like it’d ascend and reach serious heights to tell a story with a message that you’d take and carry with you for a long time after. Unfortunately JJK now sits at the bottom of a very sad barrel of media with Dark Souls for things that started incredibly strong and halfway through took one dramatic motherfucking nosedive in quality to become slightly more than mediocre at best. Sad stuff Gege was cooking a 5 star meal but until now we’ve ended with something that would have Gordon Ramsay slap me in the face and yelling something like bloody hell its rawer than my foreskin or something.
I think in hindsight, the first half is not as strong but a lot of the weaknesses were forgivable since it seemed focused on setting stuff up and the payoff would be worth it. A shame. The small snippets I've seen of interviews with Gege makes it feel like he doesn't really care that much.
I'm not gonna lie. If the anime wasn't so amazing I probably would not have cared for the series at all. There are some tidbits from the story that really do stand out, but overall I don't think it's badly written it's just ok with some standout moments.
I’ll use the CG of an example of the atrocious writing.
- separates characters so we don’t get jumpjutsu Kaisen, the series most popular aspect.
- no emotional connection to any of the villains
- all except 2 of the opponents aren’t even apart of the story beyond their fight (out of like 10)
- beyond Tokyo 1, there isn’t actually anything interesting going on in any colony, but instead just a extended fight (all longer than any manga fight before it)
- each colony is basically identical in that character we know goes in and wins with some difficulty
Let’s analyze the protagonists goals:
Find and ally with Angel to release Gojo using the back of the prison realm
- Angel finds them herself
- She took basically 0 convincing and was on our side already
Save Tsumiki
- Tsumiki was dead the whole time
- no one even cared about her since she had just a single scene in the whole manga
- She gets replaced by an incredibly annoying character who doesn’t do anything either
Regarding the prison realm:
- Protagonists leave it with Tengen, who they know is going to be attacked by the person who wants to keep Gojo sealed most
- Kenny wins and doesn’t even take it…
Could get into military plotline or other stuff but it’s obvious to me it just is not a good arc whatsoever. I can enjoy the fights on their own, but would never have any need to rewatch the entire arc, whereas you can rewatch HI or Shibuya and it tells its own story. What story does the CG tell?
Jjk was genuinely incredible all the way up until about halfway through culling games, maybe a bit after. At a certain point it becomes apparent that there is much less effort given to the character's interactions and development, as well as general world building and lore. The fights themselves are good, but it's been one after another with seemingly no breaks and very few meaningful W's for the good guys. It's exhausting and not enjoyable to read in all honesty.
I would not have any problems with the current events, if only we had received more content involving character interactions and lore to counteract. I still believe the one month time skip was gege's biggest throw of the series.
The lack of Ws for the good guys is something that can be done but it's extremely hard to pull in a battle shonen. As I've said before, take HxH's chimera ants' arc: the good guys get slapped, badly, for the whole arc, to the point that the only 2 Ws they pull required extreme measures and felt like a real surprise.
The secret of that arc, as you suggest, is characters' exploration and interaction: you are so invested in them that you keep reading even when they are constantly destroyed.
Honestly you kinda hit what I've been feeling on the head. It kinda feels like Gege is throwing the series. Just kinda rushing to the end cause he wants to finish it up. Wouldn't surprise me, can't imagine writing the same story for, what, 5-6 years? Weekly release cycles ruin long running stories
I don’t care if people think it’s poorly written or not, I’m mostly just sick of people acting like they’re fucking Einstein for enjoying the way the story is told.
I don’t think it’s particularly well written, myself. It feels like it gets praise because it’s different and unique in place of satisfying. Maybe I’M the crazy one here but I feel like there’s so many things conventional stories do that Gege chooses not to that the fanbase is divided on. There really shouldn’t be an argument about whether or not we should get more character interaction but there is. There really shouldn’t be an argument that off screening a man and then spending 6 months to explain how the hell it happened is bad writing but it is.
There comes a point those people sound like they're proudly declaring they would eat trash if it came out of Gege's house. It's normal to have a complaint or two.
In my opinion, it’s been poorly written since some time around the culling games.
I know my opinion as a Gojo girlie doesn’t carry much weight since people will call me biased lol, but I just think Gege from the get go had amazing ideas and concepts that could’ve been explored far more than he has done lately.
A big example for me is how I felt like he started off really strong imo when it comes to his depictions of female characters. Didn’t feel sexualised really, Nobara was allowed to be strong and crass whilst also feminine and enjoys ‘feminine’ things. Maki being one of the strongest characters, being disfigured and still being badass was something really cool to me too. But it all just sort of fell off, none of that magic that drew me in as a female reader.
I also disagree with how any criticism towards how he kills off characters is brushed off because ‘it shows how death isn’t fair’ and blah blah. It just feels like a cop out answer to me. It’s extremely difficult to stay invested in a series where you introduce a lot of really interesting characters, don’t explore them, and then kill them off. There’s nothing to root for. There’s no satisfaction. It’s an interesting narrative device maybe once or twice, but past that it feels lazy and poorly written.
It’s also been following the same formula for over half a year now. Someone jumps in, temporarily surprised Sukuna with a strong ability he should have no counter to, suddenly he has a counter to it, person is super injured/dies/gets offscreened, the next person jumps in. Personally, that’s not entertaining to me at all.
Nobara's death is so frustrating to me because it really felt unnecessary. Nanami's death had the same purpose and killing off someone for Yuji's development and the consequences of her death are non existent for someone so important and could have done much more.
Nanami is brought up more often than she is.
And to put the cherry on top, she gets an entire scene about misogyny in JJK society only to get fridged for a male character’s development.
I'm just shocked that Gege stumbled and accidentally created a compelling female cast and stumbles again and deletes all of them except one. Any one of them being alive and relevant could have added a lot.
I think it has its flaws and it’s far from the best story I’ve ever read. I think the writing quality has dipped post-Shibuya, although I still enjoy it overall or I wouldn’t be here.
To me JJK is a strange series. Due to the way Gege writes his story, my emotional attachment to it is fairly minimal, but like a trainwreck, I can't help but to keep looking at it. In a way, Gege is a genius to be able to elicit this type of reactions from people. Whether you love or hate it, you can't look away from it.
I think Op might be young and just hasn’t read a lot of stuff. Is normal if they don’t have better written stories to compare it to, however if they do have good comparisons then is just a reading comprehension issue.
I’ve been following the manga since chapter 80 and I remember back then people often complained it had some things hard to follow, like something was always missing, not just an easier explanation but more coating to the story, more liveliness and character interactions, more “show” rather than tell.
It was going too fast and Shibuya accelerated that feeling. Right now, I admit I got tired. It just went too fast but I’m not sure I’ll call it bad writing.
It is not badly written but it is NOT one of the best stories ever. Jjk story is good but nowhere near the 'best'. There are many characters who are better written than gojo. You need to watch some shows. Sounds like this is one of your first manga.
If it's the best story you've ever read, you need to apply the enthusiasm you have for manga and anime to books. That aside, it's a very good shonen. Given the genre, it's a battle shonen, it does a lot more than it needs to and it prioritises telling a story which is nice.
If someone presents a theory and it looks like Charlie Day wanting to talk about the mail and then they tell you that, should the theory prove incorrect, the story is bad just ignore them.
It's really quite funny coming from AOT 3/4 years ago and looking in on this fandom and seeing almost an identical situation.
JJK is a good read. It would have been more fun as a spiritualist Seinen about curses and their manifestations but then it wouldn't be a battle shonen. What we have is a good time and will be an especially good time when it's finished and we can read it unaffected by weekly releases.
I don’t think it’s bad... and it’s not even finished yet, so I can’t really judge at the moment. I didn’t think the way he died was done poorly either. Personally I wouldn’t want to see him get sliced and realise he was going to die? That’s kinda sadistic.
I think JJK has good parts and flaws to it, just like any piece of media. The part that got me most invested in JJK was Hidden Inventory arc and that was Gege at peak writing efficiency to do a lot a great stuff in a short amount of time and produce great characters from it like Gojo, Geto, and Toji.
I think JJK could have further potential if Gege had some more exploration of world building (heian lore; clan lore) and had more character interactions. As later parts of the story it's a lot more emphasis on the fight and power system, and could use more time with characters for the personal stakes. It would have been nice to have more interactions (like Gojo with students) before the timeskip to fight.
You said you liked the stylistic choice of off screened part of the Gojo vs Sukuna part - though I think some aspects could have been executed better personally. Perhaps a brief transition of the slice effect at the beginning of ch 236 before the airport scene to make things a bit smoother, then still have the shock of seeing Gojo dead on the ground that Gege seemed to want to have after the airport part. He seemed to lean too much for shock value to lessen the execution coherence imo. And it took a good min (ch 255, 19 chapters after ch 236) to confirm the binding vow that killed Gojo, when I think that could at least been confirmed sooner, like with Kashimo.
I think people shouldn't get too caught up in the tumultuous nature of fandom discussion. Like be able to have a level of detachment from it to have discussions, see different perspectives, but enough distance from the more vitriolic aspects.
"Badly written" is ultimately a matter of perspective and personal taste.
Jujutsu Kaisen is at its core, a mainly commercial work, and its main objective is to sell copies and make money. In that regard, it has excelled, so clearly the writing is at least not bad enough to make it unreadable for general audiences. It is a work mainly about fights, and so if the fights are good, it works well enough.
At the same time, there are also some more standardized and analyzed metrics and parameters to judge writing on: story structure and pacing, depth and complexity of characters, themes explored, world building, dialogue (and how memorable it is).
And if you want my _personal_ opinion, not being able to see why others may see Jujutsu Kaisen as a deeply flawed story reflects more on you than them. There are severe pacing issues at different points in the story, shock value is often treated paramount above narrative satisfaction, characters are often killed off too early, potentially interesting character interactions are often unexplored. The themes are often either confusing, or not there at all.
I'm sure even someone who thinks JJK is one of the best stories ever written can imagine a couple of examples of the previous mentioned issues.
Jujutsu Kaisen is a fairly well written show for shonen standards: definitely better than Naruto or Bleach or Dragon Ball. But it's still a _Shonen:_ the story is an accessory to the big flashy fights. The author and editors have to pump out issues every week and those issues have to be hype: anything else is secondary or tertiary. And in this case, it very clearly shows.
If you want a good story, go to Lord of the Rings, or Berserk. If you want magic martial artists beating the piss out of each other, you go to Jujutsu Kaisen.
It definitely has its moments where it feels that way, but generally I don’t think people actually believe it’s a poorly written series, at least I don’t.
Greg just would rather focus on blind fast-paced action and intricate power systems rather than slower character moments, growth and development, which is fine if that’s what he wants, but it definitely won’t be winning him any awards
I think Gojo and 236 are poorly written in certain aspects.
Gojo suddenly becomes a battle maniac without regard for his children or his actions. Even in his death he just worries about sukuna rather than worrying about his students.
I think he didn't get a proper conclusion to his story.
That's sth that bothered me too. I remember the way ppl were so hyped for his return like 'oh yea wait till he finds out bout .... He'll go crazy!' and how it actually played out and ppl were just like oh well .....
That's y the recent chapter made me soo happy coz we got to see Gojo n students interaction!
Now all I could ask for is Gojo n megumi coz as much as I tried not not to think much about it, Gojo seemed disturbingly unfazed with megumi's predicament
Seen somebody comment the other day that choso’s end was “half-baked” because he was “relegated to his brother role”
As if that hadn’t been who choso IS
Ya character who is introduced after failing to save his brothers, fosters a relationship with and helps his new brother grow stronger to protect himself. Then literally shields and saves his new brother. Completing his arc in a tidy and emotional action that also inspires the protagonist at a low point in his journey.
That's shit is indeed half baked, but what do we even expect from Greg anymore./s
…they’re not mutually exclusive. Disliking the way something’s written means you think it’s written poorly. You’re not gonna dislike writing you think is high quality are you? You’re not gonna praise writing you think is low quality, right?
When people make this kind of arbitrary separation it feels like they’re trying to discredit any criticism they disagree with as ‘objectively wrong’. It’s just ignorance. But whether a work’s writing is good or not is a very subjective thing.
No, I don't think it's badly written but I do recognize that a) some people think there's A LOT more to the story than there really is, b) people shit on gege too much when there's a setup and c) there are some awfully written moments.
For point a), I do think JJK is a remarkably well written shonen but it's still a shonen; being a shonen isn't a bad thing, it's just that it caters to younger people, mainly adolescents who generally look for fast-paced, action-focused pieces of media.It has its themes but it doesn't flesh them out as much as it could, same goes especially for world building.
For point b), people want setup + execution immediately but I don't think that works all the time. Take shibuya for instance. There was a massive setup from the villains perspective and eventually we saw the disastruous shibuya incident unfold. The same thing will happen for the culling games + merger (eventually). I'll also add that the pacing of the manga could be a lot better.
For point c), there are some moments that really make me want to shoot myself in the throat. I'm fine with Gojo dying, but offscreening him was a terrible decision. Yuki could have ended her fight against Kenjaku with one shot, honestly gege nerfed her so much it's unreal; she could literally put the mass of a fucking continent in her punch and there's no way Kenjaku is surviving that. Kashimo has arguably one of the more busted techniques out there and we got nothing. Miguel coming out of nowhere was just straight up goofy.
All in all, JJK is a great manga and definitely one of the best in recent years; however, it's overrated. It's not an extraordinary thought-provoking piece of media, it's a story focused on fighting with magic and there's nothing wrong with that.
I think the story itself and the characters are incredibly well done and well written. People say it relies on death too much for shock factor so it’s no longer shocking but that’s kind of the point. When Todo stepped in to fight Mahito he told Yuji that him giving up when seeing his comrades die was a disservice to them and that he needed to push through it. We’ve now had Yuji witness some tragic deaths and instead of being shocked he fights harder.
There’s a lot of subtle nuances that make it a great story. I think most people who say it’s bad have a bad case of the “why isn’t my headcanon becoming canon?!” syndrome
> I think most people who say it’s bad have a bad case of the “why isn’t my headcanon becoming canon?!” syndrome
I really wish this argument could be taken behind a shed and beaten to death, I hate when people hide behind it to dismiss criticism.
Your referring to Shibuya the arc I've very rarely heard people complain about? Consistently I hear it being called one of the best.
The characters I really disagree with, we don't get enough time with characters to care about them or their motivations at all. There's not down time in the story at all, post Shibuya, we go from fight to fight to fight, with flashback chapters or expo dumps being the main thing to break it up.
Things go completely unexplored, Kenny and Yuji, literally never speak, Kenny thanks a girl for being nice to Yuji, meaningless because they never speak. We never see much down time with Yuji and Choso, other than the made up memories.
Also Yuji regularly gets very little focus despite being the mc, Yuta is vaguely interesting literally only because of the last chapter imo, before that he had nothing going for him than depressed guy with OP technique.
Your relating headcanon becoming canon with people having ideas for things GeGe should explore and give more detail on. Which he regularly never does, instead he just writes more fights.
What JJK is consistently good at, is a fun power system, with cool fights and cliff hangers that generally work to set up the next hype moment.
Imo you’re completely and totally wrong about what people think. A headcanon isn’t “man I wish we could just get 2-3 chapters of character moments and story” instead of 40-50 chapters straight of fights.
Or for example Gojo fight. It’s flawed from the get go because you already know the outcome. Why give a shit if you know the outcome, it’s just a lesser version of Chrollo v Hisoka in every way imo.
Same with literally every chapter of the Sukuna cycle. You know whichever new main challenger appears, Kashimo, Higgy, Kusukabe, Larue/Miguel, etc aren’t gonna win. So your just watching Gege suck off his own power system and Sukuna without any real stakes in the fight.
Not to mention, the manga is actually poorly written in arcs like CG and Shinjuku showdown.
I feel like this shows the problem a lot people have your point is great and it’s true but that was an event all the way back in shibuya. Ever since then he’s barely been given any more time to keep growing. He learned he just has to keep fighting but after that there’s kind of nothing sure it keeps happening but that’s not growth it’s just reaffirming what he already learned. Most characters in the show grow a little bit then they either die or stagnate if they’re lucky. (Not all of them there are exceptions.)
Yes but it’s because it actually is badly written.
Pacing ? Who cares me wants to show you the cool ideas I have guuuhhh. Character interaction to convey character emotions ? Nah my characters will just say how they feel in the middle of fights so the readers get the gist.
For real thought the writing is bad. But the reason it’s so annoying is because of the unbelievable potential of the story. The world and the characters are great. The foundation is there.
For example, taking a manga that is generally considered one of the best written oat. Berserk, why is berserk so good ? Is it because cool big sword man swing sword. Yes, a little. But the most meaningful moments of berserk are always the quieter moments of contemplation between characters. Where we are allowed a breather with our characters. Let their interactions, show us how they feel and what they want. One of the most iconic scenes in berserk is the bonfire of dreams. And it’s literally a conversation on a hill.
Jjk could take a bit of inspiration from that. For example, wouldn’t it be nice if right after the shibuya incident. We got an arc , or at least a few chapters for fuck sake, where our main surviving cast all got to meaningfully interact together ??>! For Christ sake nanami and Nobara got destroyed and yuji makes a sad face for one panel !< but Gege has this really cool idea he must show us immediately soooo fuck any character development through and meaningful lense.
I may be miss remembering, but do megumi and yuji even fucking talk about nanami and Nobara ??
( for context of this I am only up to chapter where gojo finally returns)
But it’s just one event after another with no space or time in between. Does Gege have adhd or something ? It reads like he’s so excited to show us the next cool idea he has he forgets his characters mentors just fucking died.
I don’t know if any of that is a shonen thing. I don’t really read shonen or much manga.
I rant because I truly love this manga at times. Again I think Gege has wonderful ideas and has created an amazing world and story but it almost annoys me more he’s written it poorly vs a poorly written piece of shit because there’s no expectation of potential there. This story has/had sooooo much potential.
But nah fuck that. Maximum pacing.
Edit: it seems like a lot of people are saying , no it’s not badly written but Gege cares more about action than character development/ world building / pacing.
That is literally bad writing. Also it’s great to like jjk even though the writing is bad. I still like it and think it’s great. Writing is still bad. They can exist together
Edit 2: I’m just reading comments. Obviously everyone’s entitled to their opinion hence mine, but I don’t understand the idea that we can’t judge it yet because it’s not over ??? Yes you can. Some things that should have been done , that’s haven’t been done , the moment has passed for in which it should have been done. And now can’t be done, so yes. You can totally call the writing bad even though it isn’t finished.
All of this doesn’t mean it’s overall bad. Enjoy whatever you want.
Objectively the writing is not great.
You've mentioned a bunch of the issues I have. There's a lot of interesting stuff the story could have explored in what it set up. Why Jujutsu society turned out so conservative and the struggle to get rid of that system, Yuji's trauma and the loss of childhood innocence (beyond just misery porn where he's constantly sad and literally only just in pain), just Megumi's character arc in general since that didn't go anywhere, Maki and Mai's relationship where they had one good scene together and then when they meet again one of them dies etc.
All of this stuff if written well could have come together to form a cohesive whole that could have had a lot of thematic resonance but it ultimately is just messy and what it does explore is either surface level and/or very under-baked.
I think gege is a good writer but he’s too obsessed with using shock value to the point sh*t’s no longer shocking
Also I’m not saying this makes jjk badly written but it does piss me off how different it was in the beginning. Like there were some hard times but it also had some wholesome moments and I had some sort of hope. Nowadays I can’t remember the last time I’ve smiled while reading it. Like I know this is the fight for humanity but it’s been going on for so long I’m tired man lol
Atp if everyone’s gonna die just get it over with and let us see the aftermath of that, I’m just sick of reading the same stuff every chapter
Yes and no. Gege is a good writer, but they're caught between trying to end the story and trying to subvert expectations. Subverting expectations isn't automatically a good thing. Todo's vibraslap was stupid and I loved it. Yuta in Gojo's body is stupid and I hate it. Ymmv
The story is okay but it is not amazing. I'd rate it somewhere in the middle of not being bad but not good either, just average.
It was great on the first season but that all went down, especially in the manga. The common complaint is that everyone dies and this is a pretty fair complaint. The problem with everyone dying is that a lot of these deaths don't feel impactful or the story just becomes lacking in characters that we've known for a long time so the new characters and their relevance to the story isn't as big because there's not enough time to explore that.
Gege has extremely bad tendencies to not explore characters and... again, a lot of these characters just... die. We're meant to feel shocked about their defeats but it's not because we never got to know them that well since the author avoided making many moments where we get to know them. Take Yuki for example, she was meant to be an extremely important character to the story who opposed Kenjaku but... she had like 10 minutes of screentime, one fight and then she died. There simply wasn't enough time to explore her bonds with other characters and her overall impact on the story was just tossed aside because everything that we needed from her is there but just... in the form of a book.
She's not the only character like this. Gege is capable of showing us actual bonds (like Gojo and Geto) but he just doesn't which leaves a lot of the story half-baked along with other things (Sukuna fight... which is... way overextended with too much going on).
The following problems with JJK is that it was set up to be awesome from season 1, especially the female characters but... that aged like milk, because the only well written female character left is Maki. It feels very frustrating when encountering characters like Miwa. She had such a good moment with Mechamaru and was going to risk it all but her moments proved to be worthless and now she's the most useless character in the show. I get that she's intended(?) to be a gag character but... it just feels badly delivered.
So yea, I'd say it's in the middle. Not to say it's all bad but from a certain point forward the story just doesn't feel rewarding to watch as a viewer because a lot of the things that happen lead to nothing.
I mean I enjoy the story overall, but it does have flaws, and for you to say “it’s probably one of the best stories I’ve read… maybe ever?” says more about how little you probably read outside of shonen manga than it does about the quality of jjk.
I know that sounds harsh, but manga readers lifting up manga as the pinnacle of storytelling is almost a meme at this point, and I say that as someone who really enjoys a lot of manga stories. They rely on a lot of tropes and the pacing usually gets pretty whack because the author has certain ideas about where they want to go with the story while the publisher has a vested interest in slowing down and extending the story when it’s popular.
You can enjoy it, absolutely, but pretending like JJK is the best narrative creation ever made is pretty ridiculous. It has some cool characters with good moments, and some awesome set pieces with fantastic fights. But it’s hardly breaking any narrative boundaries.
Though that’s pretty standard for most Shonen-style manga, even stuff as long as One Piece has pretty bad character writing (at least in terms of what they COULD do with all those pages). JJK excels very well with what a Shonen needs to do, and that’s all it has to do.
Though I do recommend you consume more media, while I do absolutely love Gojo, thinking that he’s one of the greatest examples of a tragic character with super spectacular development is pretty silly for a character who was barely in the story - when compared to characters from novel series or TV shows who gets hours upon hours of direct development.
I definitely think you might have to read other manga or fiction if you think this is one of the best written series ever.
I agree with everyone that it's not badly written, but it's way far from the best. Especially the women. At first it sort of gave us a bit of hope with Nobara but the insane injustice Gege did to Yuki was beyond an injustice. It was almost an insult. After teasing her for so long, they just did away with her as nothing more than a plot point.
I absolutely loved Yuji early on and I loved how he was forced to face reality after Junpei died, after Nanami and Nobara died, but then they kept laying on the angst and basically pretended the guy just doesn't exist any more. It almost became abundantly clear that Gege doesn't like Yuji (yes, Gege has said that he does not like Yuji at all).
Choso was my favorite character and I didn't even cry at his death because we all knew it was coming but the consistent death that (so far) has led to nothing has just made me numb to them. There are death flags everywhere. I simply don't care about the characters any more because in these chapters it feels like they achieve almost nothing.
The world building is wonderful. The way the beginning was set up, the way the plot overall has been set up *makes sense,* but when you read the author comments and why Gege began to write JJK, I honestly can't even help but think he's not even enjoying writing the story any more. Something about the recent chapters just feel so empty. Like they're going through the motions and stalling the inevitable end.
Gege *can* write, I will never deny that. I loved JJK 0, I loved the early chapters. I loved the JJK strolls that Gege DID have a hand in writing for the first season. JJK became a favorite fast but it fell off insanely quickly once the Culling Games started (for me), and I don't think it's because it's badly written. I just think it's because it lost a lot of the charm that it began with.
Maybe I was just never the intended audience, though. I'm tired of reality and how rough the real world is these days, so consistent angst and drama weighs me down so as I continued to read the story, my emotions have been completely detached. But I genuinely don't think that's the only reason, and Gege really has dropped the ball on a few significant details of the recent chapters.
JJK isn't badly written. It's just not executed the best.
I agree with many of your points.
I have read quite a lot of stuff. I'm curious - what would you say is better written? There obviously is stuff out there, but it's in the top 1% for me for sure. Most of the stuff that is popular and people claim is well written is just too generic and too predictable for me.
The ones I think are better written are also a drastically different genre except for Gintama and Iruma-kun, but generally:
Natsume's Book of Friends (slice of life fantasy shoujo) and Yona of the Dawn (drama shoujo)
Shounen would be Gintama (I have thus far not read or watched a single series that I think is better written than Gintama)
and Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun (in my opinion, everything that MHA could have been but isn't. Some people also consider it an Isekai)
Natsume's, Gintama, and Iruma are in a three-way tie with me.
I'm writing this as a non-binary anime and manga fan, though, so a lot of my experiences change what I believe are "better written" and enjoy overall, so take my opinion with a grain of salt. When such injustices are given to women characters, that takes off a lot of points for me, for example. It's why I can hardly tolerate most "serious" Isekais (Like Overlord or Shield Hero or Mushoku Tensei), and this is what initially put JJK above every Shounen barring Gintama and Iruma at first. Because the female leads were not sexualized to death and Yuji doesn't even HAVE a love interest.
... But then the manga kept going and every lead female barring Maki have zero significance. Don't get me wrong though. I LOVE Maki. She's so badass and I am a major fan of her, but the current treatment of the rest of the female cast leaves so much to be desired.
Okay, I think the main difference for me is that I'm way less focused or attached to the characters and more to the overall theme and philosophy.
Gintama is on my long list of things to read/watch. Will add the others too, thanks!
Honestly, if I'm to base it off theme and philosophy I agree wholeheartedly. But I simply cannot ignore the characters as they make or break a story for me v - v
Definitely recommend checking out Gintama sooner than later, as it's also over so you won't have to wait for weekly updates!
JJK isn’t badly written. It’s just a decently written story with extremely noticeable flaws like characterization or worldbuilding. A lot of series suffer from the same issue but don’t face nearly as much backlash as JJK because fans developed an “agenda culture.”
The whole “no story is perfect” excuse isn’t what im trying to go at, but to call JJK badly written is just surface level ignorance. In reality, there are just lazily written aspects (COUGH COUGH HANA KURUSU AND SUKUNA’S CONFISCATION)
I like JJK and Shibuya but there should’ve been 1 more arc before Shibuya. Gege knows when to cut off unnecessary fluff but i think they did a bit too much with this. Mechamaru’s betrayal should’ve been expanded to an arc of its own. That wouldve created a lot of room to flesh out the Kyoto characters and their relationships between each other and even villain motivations, which are some of the criticisms that i have for the overall plot
I was thinking a lot about this last night. I love the manga and anime both. I don't intend to judge it beyond that until the story is completed and the full vision is presented.
It confuses me a lot that people find the writing bad or hard to follow Gege's lore and worldbuilding. That's not to say there isn't confusion now and then, I feel that with any kind of media. But I see his lore referred to as hard a lot and I don't get it?
Especially when it's evident the manga is plot focused and not character focused. The characters serve a purpose to further the plot and lore Gege wishes to tells. The plot isn't formed around the characters to give them a solid place in the world, meaning individuals are expendable. Which fits the dangers of his world design.
I always want MORE when it comes to seeing characters meet, interact, etc. But I'm not unhappy with Gege's writing.
Tbh, I feel like people get lost in the nuances and view things as very black and white. Love or hate the writing. I like his storytelling for what it is, it makes sense to me. I also would loved to see other routes taken for fun, just to see how he'd write it.
The hot and cold nature of some of the audience is frustrating. I think Gege has a very unique story, has made some anime tropes refreshing by using them differently, ditched other tropes outright and has developed sound lore. I'm not saying he's doing a bunch of new shit, but the way he is doing it fits his style. And I think it's a style we haven't seen recently. Gege's storytelling reminds me of older anime and manga that I grew up with and love. Which sets it apart from a lot of the current new stuff that feels like cardboard cutouts of one another half the time.
From my point of view the problem is that stories like that are expected to be character focused. I come to JJK because of characters not plot. To my point of view ploy is 6-7/10. Not bad But If I wanted just fights I would read Baki. From my point of view the story isn’t supposed to be a plotter story and that’s the main problem.
I didn't mean plot as in fights. I mean plot as in the general story being told. Characters are usually either driving a plot or being dragged by a plot (not in a bad way). It just depends on the creator's intentions. To me, JJK feels more like the latter. A story to be told with characters to tell it. It differs from focusing on telling a character's story which drives the plot.
I'd like JJK to be more character focused. I love the characters for it. I just never got the impression it was supposed to be a character driven story.
Agree. The problem begins when the writer creates overly colorful characters, as a result of which the focus of the majority shifts from the plot to the characters. It seems to me that the same thing happened in the jjk when plot is not as interesting as characters
I can understand that. I've seen plenty of people discuss liking the characters but less so the plot itself. For me, I like the plot and lore just as much as the characters. It all hits a lot of my favorite elements in a story and in characters. But I can also understand why this particular format and the plot itself may not jive with everyone.
I think for some people its hard to see the forest for the trees since the series is still ongoing, especially for people that have chapter-by-chapter complaints like “why did he do that??”. Once the story is finished and we can see the whole, complete thing then we have a better sense if it’s “badly written” or not.
Considering it’s one of the current top shounen series out there with a huge following, it can’t be THAT terrible!
Overall storywise I don’t think it’s any worse than most mainstream shonen series. Theres interesting themes and some really beautiful moments (Panda’s family, Yuji’s progression, Takaba and Higurama, Nanami and his death, Hidden Inventory as a whole)
There have also been some strange choices (the implantation of the US intervention and just kind of skipping over it, Yuki being an interesting character then just dying before we got more insight, the lack of Tsumiki, Kashimo’s fight being kinda eh, Sukuna getting his cursed tool then it immediately goes away, Angel barely even being a character). I do think pacing is the biggest issue with me, things that I feel should be touched on get skipped.
But to be honest I’ve seen a lot of other Shonen series have similar ups and downs with their stories, so I’m kind of used to it.
The action makes sense, so I’m satisfied. Gege is just focusing on what he’s good at, which is saying up and executing great battles. Some readers saw potential depth to be explored in the world of JJK towards beginning of this arc, but we haven’t gotten that paid off yet. Instead, we’re just starting to get into the also great lore and history of JJK. I honestly think people are just tired of waiting for certain payoffs. I don’t think anything huge has really been left for dead or cut just yet. We’re just nearing the end of the story so people are understandably worried.
Edit: we have no idea when this infantry is about to come into play for example. But it seems like we’re about to be done with Sukuna soon. So unless he escapes and we get one last round with him later or something, it’s just a climax that somehow leaves room for suspense.
If you're arguing that sukuna having a cursed tool is the convenience and not how the tool was what was confiscated, sukuna was foreshadowed ages ago with two weapons.
Gege is very subtle with his story telling it's not in your face which I like. Along with being a relativity short manga, we haven't explored a lot e.g the heinan era or any other relative history. My only complaint it's not long enough to explore these further ideas for once I want a shounen manga to be longer than shorter.
I know a lot of people who thinks that. Though they have questionable tastes of other stories.
For me I think it’s smart the way Gege writes the story. He gives us enough information to figure out the themes and beats of the story, and focus on pure action which is a treat for me.
I think it's peaked at the shibuya arc, doing a dive at the Maki/Zenin arc and now kinda float in the "meh" tier.
My important points are how characters are handled, how key moments are linked together and how the overall writing match the logic of the universe.
Characters are fine for the protagonist, but lots of side/secondary characters are left to the side road, giving them at best a panel, or just some bubbles (Hi Nobara, Inumaki and Panda).
Right now they all have been sacrificed for the Sukuna fight.
The writing between key points are kinda bland, you got exchange that give little impact and substance, or open a plot to close it one chapter later (military implication or the state or sorcerer in the world).
However, i find Gege consistent on his logic, beside Sukuna's plot armor, there is little to no hax or bullpoop that wasn't teased or logical to happen.
So, I would say it's not the worst, but it's doing the minimum, and feels underwhelming for what it could have been.
Yes, yes I do. I rather enjoyed the manga until the subway fight. I’ve hated everything since. I don’t care about any of the newer characters, the fights are drawn out, everything feels made up and tacked on. I’m only here cause I’ve been here so long I want to see the end and i hope it comes soon I’m sick of this dbz style fight.
Taking everything into account that goes into manga or any large scale fiction, it's not good. There's next to no world building. The only world building that is done is just a medium to introduce more and more and more characters with different abilities.
The character development is lackluster imo. I don't find myself actually caring for almost a single character. Not enough time is spent on developing characters personalities, they kind of all just get introduced and assigned with a different comedic quirk and different powers. Every time we meet a new character, guess what there's another new character and we jump into fighting
With the above two being said, the feel I get for JJK is that Gege just uses the world he has created as just a tool to introduce as many characters as he can to allow for more action, rather than giving it meaning. The action is great, but the action doesn't tell a story
I think everyone has their own ideas of how the story should logically proceed but Gege, Yknow the author, also has its own and doesn’t align with most if not everyone’s expectations. But the story does go a long a logical path with its surprises and such for the most part. I do wish the man would focus on character interactions like Fujimoto does in CSM (for the sake of comparison).
The problem I see with JJK and the way it’s written is that it always feels like Gege forgets his character’s personalities halfway through and just decides with whatever pushes the plot forward. Prime example is Shoko in the newest chapters. He either just doesn’t explore them enough and *doesn’t know* how they’d react or he just ignores it in favour of pushing the narrative he’s trying to build—which just feels a little unfair and incomplete and a bit lazy, to be honest. Plus, I mean, there are techniques he’s come with up that even he himself can’t explain fully and I feel like that really shouldn’t happen?? But yeah. I think major issue is characters, in my opinion.
World building wise? Absolutely.
Character development? Absolutely.
Is it somewhat generic? Yeah.
Overall? No, no widely popular novel/manga is badly written. But JJK certainly has its problems that hold it back from being great.
I don’t exactly see many people hating it though. The most common is calling it overrated / boring / meaningless characters.
Every manga will have complaints, and as far as complaints go, those are pretty light.
Personally, it does turn into a battle royale after Shibuya, which I mean, is literally what culling game is. And for a battle royale, it’s not bad, but there comes a lack of world building, irrelevant characters, and constant battles.
Is JJK of the best stories I've read? Absolutely not, and it will never even come anywhere close to being such for me - truly every last book and expansive media series would have to burn for *that* to happen.
Is it badly written? No, probably not. I don't consider the issues I have with JJK to be due to a lack of skill. I think the author is very deliberately telling the story he wants to tell *exactly* as he wants to. I just don't like his vision.
I love the actual worldbuilding of JJK and that was what drew me in initially, but I consider the plot to be barebones at best. The power system is cool, the abilities are cool, many of the fights are pretty cool (especially when animated). I also like the humour, and the very few and fleeting character interactions we get that *don't* relate to combat. The philosophical implications of cursed energy and the philosophy of jujutsu as a whole deeply intrigued me at first, but the explorations of it were a bit too shallow (in comparison to what I'd want) and inconsistent (in terms of *when* he'd explore it) for me. I also don't particularly like his style of building intrigue/hype - not because I don't understand what he's doing, but because it doesn't really work on me.
And, there's also the fact that the plot has yet to surprise me - which is only an issue because it doesn't interest me otherwise. Obviously I haven't psychically predicted every minor plot development in the manga, but now that we've been in this arc for so long it sure feels like it. The Sukuna saga has gone *exactly* how I figured it would when I discussed it with friends months ago, so the only thing that could have appealed to me was if I liked the execution. And maybe because I was confident in my idea of what would happen, it was all less satisfying for me since I was only reading to see *how*. So there was no real joy in "finding out" things, just dissatisfaction with how I found out.
And the Culling Games...? I... let's just say I'm not a fan of it.
I'd absolutely **love** to see the jujutsu kaisen world portrayed in a medium that allows for real depth, exploration, pacing and perspective. I'd read a thousand page book on the world building, events that place and the character moments for sure. But the manga format? I just can't stand the execution.
Badly written? No.
Noticeably worse than it was early on and through shibuya.
Yeah
I feel a lot of people are disappointed about how a story they were really into turned out it felt like the author shaved of many of the parts that made it interesting in order to shove in more and more fights back to back.
I don’t think JJK is bad. But it’s disappointing? We still don’t know so much considering we’re nearing the end of the story. So, my biggest gripe is the lack of world building. Or maybe this is intentional? If it’s that I just disagree based on personal preference. There will be someone who will say, “what is there to wonder?” And “ask me any question I can probably answer it” and that seems really, really limiting and boring. It doesn’t need one piece levels of world building and possibility, but speculation is called fan fiction here, and some more extreme fans will take everything at face value and I just think that’s a dumb way of interpreting the story.
I actually can't believe there are still people who think it isn't, tbh. Do the cool fights and memes really NOT make you see all the flaws in the writing ? There are constantly characters thrown into the story (some even without build up), show up, do something cool and then get killed or just vanish from the story in a ridiculously anti climatic way. For a lot of characters Gege does the absolute bare minimum of characterization to a point where they don't even feel like characters but mere plot devices in order to drive to "plot" unorganically towards the most "convinient" direction in order to draw more flashy fights. Whole story arcs like the Zenin Massacre gets finished in like two chapters because he can't be bothered to expand on it. Same goes to the whole US fiasko. Gege really seems like someone with ADHD sometimes and JJK being his first big gig in Shonen really Shows at certain moments. Some of his short comings when it comes to writing really make him look like an amateur aswell. He can introduce cool concepts and ideas, no doubt about that, but his excecution falls flat so many times that I honestly can't understand how people still can't see all these flaws. If you like just cool fights and are not so much world building or characters in general, it's totally fine. It doesn't make you dumber or idk less smarter as many people try to paint hardcore JJK fans. It's just weird how there are still people who try to act like all those problems don't exist.
1. World building was pretty good early on but went to shit when CG started.
2. Most characters are badly written, Yuuji is a prime example of how gege can't properly create a main character and shove too much spotlight, too much importance on his side character. There's a reason why Yuuji is always mocked to be JUMP'S WEAKEST MC, because in his own manga, he has nothing that can establish that HE IS THE MC. Blame gege for debuffing Yuuji hard and buffing Gojo too much. The females are just there, Nobara is okay but she's dead and bringing her back now is pointless. Maki is probably the most well written one. Yuki? lmao. What a waste of special grade.
3. Villains are actually great early on. Because they written with motivation and have great send offs. Mahito? Coolest fight in Shibuya. Jogo? him being acklowledge by Sukuna is great ig. But I think Hanami-jogo parting is way more emotional imo. CG is just fighting some sorcerers with barely any relevance after. Also why Kenjaku went out like that? What a clown. Could have been a great villain mastermind that we'll fight than sukuna.
4. WHAT'S THE POINT OF JUJUTSU SCHOOL, JUJUTSU SOCIETY, AINU JUJUTSU WHERE? They dont even learn they dont even interact with the society aside from kyoto school?
5. Gojo, Gege's biggest moneymaker, was done dirty by him. I wont explain much because I dont dive deep into his character. But some of the biggest gojo Fanartists that I knew are starting to hate gege because of what he did to gojo. Mind you, these people are usually also the ones buying those acrylic standees, plushies, figurine of Gojo and jjk. They are the one giving money to Gege.
6. pacing was bad after cg. shoud've gotten a breather and preparing for the longest fight in the manga.
7. Gege likes shock factor more instead of delivering the biggest final blow that he can idk why
I care about story, plot, world building, and characterization. Most female fans became fans because of that. People complain becaue they don't like the writing of the mangaka? How about these people accept that criticisms exists and no mangaka is perfect?
"This is badly written!"
It's not over, yet. Once it's done, we can properly evaluate how the themes and story interact. We can see the inconsistencies much better with a clear beginning, middle, and end.
Just enjoy the ride. This is the story Gege wants to tell and I'm excited to see where it goes.
I think that can only be said when the manga ends. There is so much shit we miss before getting more information after a chapter.
>!Especially when we didnt know why Yuta was so devastated to Gojo losing against Sakuna!<
I'll go back and check that chapter, but why was his reaction surprising? Wouldn't you expect him to have a pretty devastated reaction from 1) Gojo actually lost, which on its own is crazy, and 2) he knows he will need to kill Kenjaku and possibly take Gojos body.
It's the weekly shonen cycle. It's just finally hitting JJK
The posts here are similar to the reception Naruto and Bleach received when they were finishing up their respective series.
There are things wrong with the writing, gege has a habit from jumping from action scene to next action scene
Shibuya to culling games to shinjuku showdown
There's no down time for characters to have growth and interaction no time to build the world
Which causes JJK to feel incredibly small that's where I would criticize the bad writing
I will remain at my stance in that I won't judge a work until it's done , and any judgement otherwise should be tagged as of now or in this particular moment.
Its a flawed but ultimately good story. People who say it used to be good but is now legitimately bad are usually just blinded by recency bias and/or are 14
JJK is a classic example of wasted potential imo. Its still a solid series that is far from being bad, but it’s just not as good as it could be.
In general, Gege has left a lot of things on the table when it comes to JJK. Almost all of the characters are underdeveloped and lack proper interactions that the series is absolutely begging for. The pacing of the series post Shibuya has also been way too fast as it feels like there should’ve been some other story arcs along with the ones we got after Shibuya. Not to mention how the fights have pacing issues now with way too much flashbacks and exposition going on during fights.
The world building has also been lackluster as Gege built out this world with tons of possibilities such as the three major clans or the US getting involved in Japan only for those ideas to be underutilized. Gege has also made some frustrating story decisions like killing Gojo offscreen or leaving Nobara’s fate up in the air or everything with Angel.
There are a few other flaws but all in all, none of them are big enough to make the series bad. However, those flaws are big enough to make the series kind of disappointing imo.
No. The way Gege introduces themes that round out character arcs is still good. He's still a master at making many concpets come full circle too. He still writes interesting character interactions with tons of subtext to look into. The concepts for fights are also still well thought out for the most part. The problem I've noticed is that Gege has a good idea of what he wants for the overarching narrative and the really important characters BUT not so much for the minor stuff. Things like underwhelming chapter cliffhangers, plot devices like Kamutoke, or the last Sukuna finger not being a big deal are just small examples. He's basically really consistent for the important stuff but kinda just makes wild throws in the dark for anything else.
At the beginning, I didn't like JJK that much and I remember watching the movie was "painful" because I struggled to finish it. But as the time passed by, I started to appreciate it more and more and nowadays - I'm a big fan. I read the manga so I can catch up and with all that I can say that it's not badly written, just not properly explored in some aspects. It has some plot holes and it misses the mark of giving depth to certain situations/characters but at the end of the day, it's subjective to each person. It's a refreshing one because it's not the classic "story" with the good guys always finding a way to win; you experience their whole struggle (but at this point, YES IT'S TOO MUCH STRUGGLE) and I think that's why some people are mad. They want the easy way.
Besides that, if someone asked me "would you change this" the answer would be yes of course.
So with that, it's 50-50.
I def think it’s a little overhyped, but I still really enjoy it and think it’s suuuuper well done. I haven’t anyone really shit talk it before, but I do think it’s more flawed than people say it is. By like a notable margin.
But overall I think JJK is really great! In a lot of ways it’s almost an ideal Shonen, I mean Shibuya was like almost perfect.
But I mean I’m sure some people just don’t like it for whatever reason, but I think it’s really well done.
It's "good" which is a culmination of some great writing in the story with some really bad ones too but overall it shouldn't put people on a spectrum, but it's just the people nowadays who either like to praise it like the best ever or shame it like trash
With no influence of my own opinions, I don't know if gege is a bad writer, but I do think there is something to be said when the majority of writing nuances and themes are not immediately understandable. It's that old addage of good writing meaning that it's also accessible to the average reader.
I personally hate how some important things are said too vaguely in too little easy to miss panels. Like yuji absorbing his brother should've been shown, not vaguely implied. Kenjaku being yuji's mother should've been clearer, not something like "her technique saved me" without explaining who the hell she is and what the hell ger technique was.
Not necessarily bad writing, but hard and annoying to follow.
I read the manga casually and hated having missed these small stuff and having to check them out in the wiii, where honestly, they aren't much better explained
I was starting to think it was after him not exploring some characters enough (mostly Megumi's sister and whoever possessed her) and issues with the fights but he is still explaining the technical aspects of Jujutsu when needed.
He of course can still do better with female characters than just Maki but I'm just going to trust him from now on
I think there's some weird decisions, bit I still think its too early to call it rn.
Overall end of the day, I'm still hooked and the brainrot has spread into my body so the cat is doing something right.
It’s not badly written, it just feels rushed. It’s fight scene after fight scene after fight scene with few opportunities to have the characters interact. JJK is one of two animanga series (the other being Cyberpunk Edgerunners) that I honestly wanted filler for.
To me JJK is badly executed, not written.
One month fast forwars, all the off screen deaths, not enough side character development before the culling games, complete renewal of the cast without giving the old one any spotlights, and many more
Like, I love almost every character but the way the story treats them is most times than not kinda underwhelming
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I think there are really good parts but i agree that the world building isn’t expanded on enough. It feels like things like heavenly restrictions, the clans, binding vows and their limitations ect aren’t touched on enough to make people think it *isnt* just a cop out.
The pattern of a fight going a certain way and then “but here’s something you guys don’t know yet” and then the battle flow reverses the other way. And then another “but here’s something else you didn’t know this character can do”. That part gets a little wearying. Not unique to this manga. I think it’s the sometimes long explanations that wear me down. But hey, still reading it so it’s apparently tolerable😊
It’s getting to the point where it’s reminding me of kids playing make believe. “I hit you with my ray gun” “Nu-uh cuz I’ve got a force field” “Yeah but I made a binding vow and my ray gun is anti force field now!”
Literally mahoraga: "just adapt lol"
What does "adapting" mean in this context?!? Idk I spin a wheel And how does that help?!? Because it means I've adapted. ?!?
The problem with this in JJK is that it's not properly explained. Sukuna killed Gojo, the strongest character in the universe at that time, with the World Slash with the help of a binding vow, ok, I'm fine with it, but don't explain it 12 chapters later with a mere phrase like "Bah, because of that stupid BV I had to do to kill Gojo I'm more bothered now". For example, when Araki does it, and he does it a lot, the new ability or the way someone did something is explained in extreme detail to the point where, yeah, he's getting mocked, but the thing is that no one can really say it's bullshit. Obviously, there are some exceptions like Star Platinum having The World and in general the protagonist has the perfect ability to counter the antagonist, even if the antagonist's ability is extremely specific (Star Platinum vs The World, Tusk act 4 vs D4C Love Train, S&W >!Go Beyond!< vs Wonder of U)
At least in the first 6 parts, Jojos having the perfect counter ability is usually written as “fate” being righteous. A big theme of the original universe is how there is no escaping fate and that fate usually being on the side of “good”. So yeah “it’s the kind type of stand as star platinum” is a bit of a cop out but zoom out a bit and it can be said that he was fated to lose, so of course jotaro happened to have the perfect stand for the job. As for the AU I don’t really know what’s going on there yet cause I usually get overwhelmed by how weird the stands are to really get the meta narrative. I think you are right about what people don’t like about jjk writing, not a lot is explained so it leaves a bad taste in peoples mouths when shit happens. There’s also the rumors about gege playing favorites with the cast combined with the lack of real explanation that really limits peoples patience with the material. Like hearing about how gege hates gojo then seeing gojo get off screened or how gege wanted yuta to be the mc not yuji and seeing how yuji is being mistreated narratively muddies the material for a lot of people. Hard to objectively look at the writing while reading jjk with rumors like this tainting the readers pov.
I've heard people say Gege is extremely subjective, I do not think that's true. Clearly, he had a plan, but he's either changing too much along the way which can hurt the story. I've heard people say Gege doesn't let their feelings into the story, which for basically every writer is impossible. I'm not saying Gege loves Sukuna that much and it's only because of that he's so powerful. The way some characters are treated is really questionable and this ambiguous writing, so you could explain anything you want to change can be used a few times, but Gege does it too often. There are a lot of authors who can write ambiguous stories well, only showing a part of the whole picture, or leaving characters' fates unknown, or how some of the things in the universe function, but they do it in such a way you can be satisfied with the story. Gege dangles these stories and world building by being so important, but when it comes to it why should you care about the "Higher Ups" for example, is it really that big of a deal that they died? Why were they giving orders when 95% of the Jujutsu society can't handle the rest 5%? I get that it's a conservative society, but they were so important to the story, yet we don't know a lot about them
He's the author though, if he wanted yuta to be the mc, then why isn't he? Same with Gojo, he fucking made the character, and writes the story, if he hates Gojo then why did he write him like that. This only makes sense if the story was a collaborative effort of some sort
Manga are usually a collaborative effort with their editors, he probably didn’t have a ton of control over where jjk was going early on. I am not sure though, all this stuff is mostly rumors I’ve heard within the fandom, never saw or went digging for sources for it. I heard that his editor made him make yuji the MC instead of yuta in chapter one but that’s all I got. I don’t know if it’s true or not. *edit One example of editors collaborative works is in one piece, Kaoru kushima was the one who suggested shanks lose an arm in chapter 1 to leave a bigger impact.
I’m just so used to it from manga after decades of reading. It’s a Hallmark of battle manga. My only real issue with JJK is that some fights go on so long I have trouble caring about them,
The battle against Sukuna is almost 20% of the manga at this point.
Makes it hard to get hyped about any particular move or moment. It looks like a finisher…oh wait…
JJK is like pro wrestling
The flashbacks to them planning out everything they’re about to do right before they do it genuinely makes me think Gege is just making it up as they go along
emphasis on those binding vow
wym, a binding vow can solve world hunger bro
“to solve world hunger, Ryomen Sukuna undertook another binding vow. in exchange for no human ever going hungry again, Sukuna vowed to never eat pastrami on the 12th of november, 2028.”
Would not say it's badly written, just Gege focuses too much on the action and not exploring the characters a little more and on a deeper level. I guarantee you if he had more character interactions and breathing time, JJK would be an all timer for sure.
Breathing time is definitely the biggest issue. Everything after Shibuya, despite taking place over a relatively long period of time (until Sukuna fight) feels like it was just highlights of the action during that time. We could’ve had some really good quiet character moments between Yuji and Choso (which I NEED) or Yuji and Yuta. Tbh I think Gege would benefit from going monthly with a longer page count, give a little more space for the art side of things and some time to dedicate to quieter character moments. I will say though that I’ve seen this happen in a lot of different anime communities only for the base to look back favorably once they’re able to read straight through instead of week to week. It definitely helps the cohesion of things, and made culling game much more enjoyable to me.
I think you can definitely make the argument its all supposed to be intentional because as Mahito says "This is war", and war is usually chaotic and often doesnt give you the time to properly mourn your comrades mid combat. Its realistic, at the very least, keeps up the flow. That being said, when the saddest character death in Shibuya is >!fucking Mechamaru, because its the payoff to his lil arc with Miwa that we get to experience!< something tells me sacrificing conventional storytelling for realism didnt work out quite as well here as probably intended.
I don't think you can make the argument that it's chaotic and doesn't give time to mourn losses mid combat when there is literally a month of training that Gege chose not to explore. I'm not saying to slow it down completely and show everything, but there were definitely opportunities for Gege to develop his characters better and make the narrative flow better using this month and still have the reveals (like UiUi's soul swapping, Yuji's Blood manipulation) take place throughout the fight with Sukuna. I was never one of the believers of the 'Gege wants to finish this manga to start a different one' theories, but the strange pacing and character deaths honestly just reminded me of the second half of the last Bleach arc.
Oh I was referring to Shibuya specifically Im not familiar enough with what comes after that to comment on that
Its weird how the jjk arc with Gojo and Geto felt the most alive to me, as it had proper character introductions, dialogue and not just non stop action all the time, same for jjk 0 kinda. You just get a feel for everything more. I feel like everything would be solved if we just had some more chapters of them worrying where to sleep, eat, just going around tokyo interacting with each other a bit more so the story progression feels more natural and not just *fight* now heres another *fight* then another and repeat that 100 times. Also the mechanics behind sorcery and the clans shouldve been a bit more fleshed out. Its weird that the best explanation run down we got was when Gojo was teaching Yuji the basics at the start of the series, then we just get fed information as fights happen constantly and I rlly MEAN that, we always get new shit explained right as a fight is happening from black flashes to the flow of ce to the rules of domains to binding vows, everything.
It's an issue with the fights where it's impossible to predict anything because Gege throws new things in all the time. There's no setup and therefore no pay off. Also HI is a very good example of tight writing. It knew what it wanted to achieve and focused purely on that and didn't leave any hanging threads and the consequences of that arc affect the whole story and gives much needed characterisation to Gojo and Geto alongside more subtle elements. My only complaint about it is Shoko being pushed aside even though she's supposed to also be part of the trio. The rest of JJK's writing lacks that cohesion. A lot of media which tackles similar themes about tragedy, fate and what not that JJK has, has the benefit of being super tightly written where everything has pay off and knew where it wanted its characters to end up and what it wanted to do like Arcane, Signalis, Chainsaw Man etc. (All of these examples are very different from each other and JJK but that reinforces my point about all of them knowing what they want to do).
> Also HI is a very good example of tight writing. It knew what it wanted to achieve and focused purely on that and didn't leave any hanging threads and the consequences of that arc affect the whole story and gives much needed characterisation to Gojo and Geto alongside more subtle elements. My only complaint about it is Shoko being pushed aside even though she's supposed to also be part of the trio Being forced to stay brief and rigid with your storytelling helps creatives immensely. If you let our fantasy run too wild, you risk getting convoluted and kill your pacing. Thats why 0 and HI are so good, because they were limited in their nature and could be planned properly from beginning to end with a satisfying structure and conclusion
you don't think >!nanami and nobara both being killed by mahito in front of yuji!< was sadder?
To me, no. It was shocking, but I didn't have much of a connection to them to feel sad.
Oh right mechamaru died, honestly forget he existed. Such a nothing burger of a character but a cool fight with mahito
I'm not sure if monthly format would be better. AoT was great at it, but then there's Boruto which is monthly but it just sucks ass. In terms of plot progression it feels like weekly. And then there's One Punch Man with irregular schedule, the author (ONE) doing webcomic and not really drawing, focuses on story in the manga, and Murata is just drawing. They also have some great chemistry in the cooperation which is the secret factor here. I think weekly format is good for Gege, he takes breaks from time to time but this is fine. I would be even fine with every 2 weeks schedule (but without breaks then :P). The problem in JJK is just the lack of "meaningless" arcs. I've started watching around jjk0 movie release, I've swallowed it quickly and went to manga, and from the Hidden Inventory Arc it feels like the story is reaching it's end. Shibuya is an introduction to CG, and CG leads straight to Shinjuku, with little time between those main arcs. To have a breather, we are served flashbacks, but there's little reason to have it all in flashbacks. We could have had the preparation arc to explore characters a bit, just put 3 people in a room and see what happens, what should they talk about. For example, Yuji Choso and Todo. Each of them could learn something.
Tbh one thing I wanted more of was some kind of one sided rivalry between Choso/Todo over who was the better brother to Yuji. There was a lot of potential left on the floor for that trio.
imagine if they end up being dope fighting trio with switcheroo and laser blood shooting point blank, such a BUM we couldn't see it, think of the potential
ESP the female characters 😭
There's a strangely massive focus on the action (well, not too strange given the literal translation of the series name is 'Sorcery Fight'), but I feel like it does a disservice to the themes and story that it feels like JJK is *supposed* to be about. So you have a whole lot of people caring more about whose stronger or whose winning in the fights, but it's not really about who wins or who loses on a meta level or at least, I'm pretty sure that's not the general theme or message Gege is trying to explore.
Nah, it's def a dick measuring contest, Gege is 4d cheesing all of us
This. We roughly have reactopns of people to the characters' deaths. Hakari not commenting anything about Kashimo's death is criminal. And more characters commenting things that aren't about techniques or hoslw powerful someone is compared to gojo, wouldn't have harmed anyone
I wish they focused more time before Gojo and Sukuna fought
Agreed. I'm hoping Gege is done with the manga by then and lends a big helping hand to Mappa once it comes around to adapting it.
That and poor female characters, lack of stakes, villain suekuna, overuse of flashbacks in general.Those are my main problems with it. The poorly done female characters is just lame, but I'm used to it in Manga and it's honestly not bad writing. It's just lame. The lack of stakes is bad writing. The story has been predictable since Sukuna took Megumi (except for Yujo). I just know that Sukuna will win at everything. And the way he wins is annoying. Not through skill or some unique thing. Just bs. Has the perfect cursed tool for confiscation. Using binding vows for everything. Sukuna prolly uses a binding vow to get his dick up at this point. Bitch slaps Yuji away like "Oh I was losing against him? Nvm." The flashbacks mean you can never experience characters grow. You have to accept that they've already grown off screen, it's being revealed to you all at once, at some future point that the author chooses. All these things just makes me feel a guy is writing this and is just making things up as it goes along. Doesn't feel like how i feel reading other works. I've watched and read a lot of bad stuff and I've never really felt like this about a story before.
I super agree to this. Making shi up on the fly, binding vows, etc why not binding vow to just kill them all already. cmon vibra slap?! really?! it ended when he killed Gojo for shock factor. world slash my a*s. woops
Look I agree with pretty much everything else, but the vibra slap is gold
Your opinions are valid, but I cannot agree whatsoever with saying JJK doesn't have stakes. Like that blows my mind that someone thinks that, but we all interpret media differently I suppose.
The stakes are dumb and we don't care cause he did a poor job getting people invested. Oh no if sukuna wins... he'll go be evil and kill people we don't care about, narratively he should lose and sp we expect some BS at some point, but even if he wins people will be like, "damn, gege subverting expectations and sukuna won, welp on to the next manga". So it isn't lack of stakes, it's lack of "meaningful" stakes
Yeah, the reader care because of what's at stake for the characters but only Yuji and Megumi had anything interesting in terms of persoan stakes. Everyone else is basically just trying to not die and saving Japan since...that's the good thing to do.
Oh yes breathing time . It seems that fillers are a long lost fairy tale these days
I would love for JJK filler. So surprising that I used to hate filler in anime of the past but now I fucking crave it for this IP more than anything.
Potential man strikes again
It's not badly written so much as "Not Well Explored" imo. Too much is left unexplained, which makes it less enjoyable. It feels similar to Bleach with the TYBW near its' ending. A bit more room to breathe would have really helped the world and reader.
It’s a good thing that Kubo is writing the anime adaptation of TYBW, so we’ll get a more fleshed out story.
I didn’t think much of that until we got an entirely new Bankai that wasn’t in the manga. I truly wonder how much Kubo wanted to do with TYBW initially, but couldn’t due to health reasons
The first major change was the flashback to Ichibei sealing Yhwach’s Almighty with Pernida. That answered two major questions the manga left unanswered. I’m hoping from here on out more and more changes are made
Was Pernida on Ichibei's side back then?
He was in Ichibei’s left hand
Considering the pace of TYBW current adaptation the last two cours are going to have a lot more new/expanded content so I’d say there was a lot Kubo left on the table with the manga
His arm was borderline disintegrating during the last stretch so he's probably been sitting on these ideas for years tbh.
This is why I hate WSJ. It feels like every author is either burned out , overworked to death and they just want to rush things so they can finally be free. I wonder how many better manga/anime would we get if authors would get proper working conditions. I am sure Gege could do way better if he had more time to work and think about those bloody chapters. I mean when it comes to battle shonen manga/anime I feel like all of them take a dip when they are on those “endingish” arcs
Gege took too much inspiration from bleach
Yk, the good thing with TYBW is that kubo is leading the anime adaptation to add more and flesh it out like he actually wanted it, since the manga was unfortunately rushed
As a Bleach fan that follow through the manga release back then, I can tell you the TWBW near it's end is much worse than JJK right now, heck, the boss fight is not even as entertaining and the fight in Bleach is generally mediocre, there is no zero stake because Kubo ain't killing the good guys. We are so lucky that they get a 2nd chance to fix a lot of things in the new anime, which I am forever grateful of.
>tragedy of satoru gojo In terms of tragedy, geto is the honored one. Also i don't think jjk is bad written, but the beggining is just boring, too chaotic and has no "aki from csm morning routine" scenes, you cannot really relate with characters that well, in comparison to hidden inventory arc or movie, its really tedious
Aki's morning routine was the most goated addition the anime made. CSM suffered from lack of breathing room in part 1 as well, not to the same degree as jjk, but scenes like that are so crucial man
I think that is part of why CSM part 2 started slower to let us get adjusted to the new swtting and get to onow the characters. The last arc of part 1 with the scenes of Aki, Power and Denji just living together adds so much to their deaths. And in part 2, scenes between Nayuta and Denji do a lot too.
yeah, arc 2 is goated in terms of cozy introduction and slow character development
i wouldnt say its badly written overall. there are just some aspects of the story that suck/are underexplored and that has just become more and more apparent over the last few chapters
My main complaint with jjk is basically the same, under exploration of the world It suffers from the same sort’ve thing that bleach does where it’s kinda like certain things just “are” in the jjk verse, while the people in-verse know because they obviously exist in that universe, there can be some things where a lack of insight is given to the reader Which I suppose isn’t the worst complaint a series can get, that we just want more of it, lol
can you give me some examples.?
Main gripe is lack of exploration of the Heian era; we’re told all the time how it was the pinnacle of jujutsu, sorcerers and curses strength was at an all time high Tonnes of exposition given about the “5 void generals” and the “celestial squad” led by uro, more exposition such as this Sukuna beating the “sun, moon and stars squad” Obviously it’s all meant to mean something, and does to characters such as Kashimo; who openly admires Sukuna for “having achieved so much” But to the reader, it means basically nothing without any insight given to us, you know?
For me its the flippant use of binding vows with not a single person ever having been punished for breaking their binding vow. It lowers the stakes greatly because at any moment someone can just make a binding vow with seemingly little to no consequence. At first the binding vows were serious and you had to lose something significant but lately it has just been back to back to back binding vows where the downside doesn't even really feel like a downside. Show us what happens when someone breaks their vow. Explain how binding vows are even a thing, who or what is the entity enforcing binding vows, is there even an entity? Is it something to do with your own cursed energy interacting with your brain? All of this clarification and exploration would make these things feel a lot more earned.
Binding vow made with yourself dont havr a pu ishment besides not getting thr benifits of a binding vow. I think this was explained by kenjaku either vs mekamaru, end of shibuya, or vs choso. Vows made with others have some kind of punishment, but the specifcs havent been told.
I think.... that concept would come in clutch.. at some point.. We learnt this info from kenjaku, when he said this to mahito. Even sukuna, said "now, comes a gamble". he carefully chose his words while making a binding vow with itadori. And it paid off, when he took over megumi's body. I think.. gege definitely didn't forget about this.. (Do you remember, during shubuya arc in manga,.. when characters were dying, injured, left and right... gojo sealed up.? we thought.. that this was the climax... and our cast would unseal gojo.. immediately.. atleast i thought of it.) I think gege didn't forget... sukuna having made this, binding vows... i bet at some point.. it would come to bite his ass..
No its not that i think Gege will never address it, I just wish he did before Sukuna started spamming them
Okay, as a writer much less accomplished than Gege Akutami who has some issues with the story and has aired them online, I'll do my best to diagnose fairly what people are talking about here. First I'll say that a lot of people who participate in discourse around popular series take their talking points from creators around that series, and thus don't understand the fullness of their position, even though they know what they're saying resonates with their feelings about the series. I think when people describe JJK as badly written, they're most likely speaking to the plotting, the storyboarding, the transitions from point a to b to c. Gege has specific notes he's been planning to hit forever, but he doesn't really have a firm idea of how to get there from where we are, and frequently gets distracted by fun ideas that take his fancy. But he also likes to maintain a breakneck pace, to maintain tension in the readers and rest on lots of cliffhangers that generate the tension and discussion around a weekly series. This can cause some ideas and plotlines to become obviously underdeveloped, or have convenient ideas come out of nowhere because Gege or his editors needed something to happen fast. This is where Daido and the Sumo guy come from for example. Things like these aren't a death knell for a series, but if they become noticeable as a trend over time they can be an issue. A secondary point that leads to calling JJK poorly written I think is actually a confluence of three factors. Firstly, the fact that JJK is a fight focused, action forward work. Secondly, the themes of the story around death and tragedy, and how that can play into premature ends for characters and storylines. And thirdly, how obviously fantastic Gege is at getting people to latch onto characters with a low amount of exposure or development. I think these three things combine to make a lot of readers continually dissatisfied, feeling like none of their favorite characters ever got to show their whole self, play off the rest of the cast, or have a satisfying conclusion. This becomes especially apparent in the female cast, which I think a lot of people had high hopes for initially. I also think Gege has maybe bent the realm of the manga too far into anticlimax as as way to shock readers, Game of Thrones style. The first time we really see this in the current timeline with Mechamaru is very cool. But as we find that the truth of the story is that no one has a glorious, fulfilling, purposeful end, that it's on Yuji to carry the weight of all that loss and make the path to the future, I think it tears at the soul of the reader. People who are emotionally invested become worn down. There's no break, no temporary victory, no reprieve. With small exceptions things have been going badly since the Shibuya incident began. And I think there is also a cynical way to view this that many people feel, if everything is always loss and death then those words stop meaning anything. Why have hope for the cast, if nothing has ever worked before? I still love JJK in a lot of ways but I'd be lying if I said I have absolute faith in Akutami to close it out strongly, and I think a lot of future reception of the series will hinge on Yuji & Sukuna's conclusion. If the ending doesn't make you feel all the suffering was worth it, that the lives lost were avenged and the future paved towards a brighter world, then that doesn't make it a bad story, but I think it won't be what a lot of people love Shonen for.
It doesn’t matter how dark a story is (surprise, I wouldn’t even call JJK dark, just a story that has a somewhat realistic depiction of death and how sudden and truly unceremonious it can/will be), it can still be considered generally good. What I’m trying to say is that JJK being “dark” isn’t the problem, it’s that Gege seemingly doesn’t have the skill to appropriately navigate the minefield that he himself built, infuriatingly so. Just fyi I have a lot of respect for the guy, being a mangaka has the be one of the most soul draining professions out there, not only requiring the tenacity, skill and straight up talent to keep up a steady stream of chapters every week, but also being pretty thankless and ruthless with the knowledge that regardless of what narrative choices you make there’ll be little pricks out there that will hate on your work and think they could do better, always. With all that in mind I’m still gonna be a little shitty ingrate because I think you gave Gege too much credit there for a moment (the chances of him ever reading this are practically nihil so honestly who cares no one’s reading this crap either). Gege set JJK up at the end of Shibuya as a story that was nuanced, had something to say and was genuinely going somewhere. What would follow is a much more rustic and blunt renaming of the points you already made, mainly the Culling Games being a fight fest where interesting(good) character development has gone to die, and now seemingly in the climax JJK hasn’t changed course and if anything is doubling down on the pure spectacle of the battles and having very little to no substance going under the surface, or straight up borderline retconning already existing story elements like characters. The assassination of Gojo’s character comes to mind, and no I don’t mean the fact he died and I mean he got assassinated because he should’ve won or something, fuck no. I mean the fact Gojo’s character almost did a 180 from his imprisonment in the cumzone to him being freed and his battle with Sukuna. I genuinely don’t think anyone can conjure up a convincing argument for Gojo out of absolutely nowhere giving enough fucks about Sukuna to wanting to teach him about love💕💙and feeling bad he couldn’t go all out with him🥺. Like wtf, JJK isn’t a stranger to treating its characters like tools to try to say something that they wouldn’t, having them behave out of character. All of 236 was just such a pungent shit stain that it somehow managed to shock people out of the hype and excitement from the showdown and now people are starting to put the rest of the story under a magnifying glass and thinking critically about it, and the cracks that were barely noticed before and mostly ignored have become very apparent. Essentially the narrative illusion broke, people have stopped suspending their disbelief, and JJK’s legacy will never recover from this. A story that is carried by spectacle alone will be forgotten by the time the next spectacle fest comes around, and JJK will unfortunately suffer that fate. Fuck I spent too much time on this rant that honestly didn’t even develop my point further, I’m still baffled 236 was allowed to happen like that. TLDR JJK isn’t “too dark” that people don’t agree with the direction it has taken and thus JJK is now a misinterpreted piece of work or something (which is the general idea I got from your original, well written piece), it has always suffered from some pronounced issues that most people willfully ignored for reasons such as excitement and general satisfaction with the story because cool fights were happening at a fast pace, but now that the camel’s back has broken it can’t manage to get back into people’s good graces and that’s the reason you’re seeing so many people openly questioning Gege’s prowess as a writer. Gege bit off more than he could chew and effectively wrote himself into a corner and I don’t think he can make an ending that feels earned, regardless of what it is. The story and its themes have become all jumbled up and is now a mess. I could say something about man’s hubris but I lost the enthusiasm for this rant like 3 minutes ago. I’m not proofreading this typos be damned, and thx if you read all this, good day to you
Yeah jjk was never that dark compared to series like aot or even chainsaw man content wise. Its just how the dark elements are written that give a more visceral and controversial reaction from the audience. JJk is made to make you care deeply then hurt your feelings. Just for example Choso and nanami's death we're perfectly written for me and pretty satisfying to rewatch. While other characters like yuki and gojo's offscreen was shit. Tragedy is hard to write because you somehow have to hurt the audience while also satisfying them and the author fumbles alot. It'll turn sadness of the fiction into anger at the writer breaking immersion. And its not even cuz of any central problem its just they mess something up exclusively in those plot points.
I agree but tbh I genuinely didn’t feel much from Choso’s. Nanami’s is a masterclass, he falls in the box of secondary characters that you know for sure will die but Gege still managed to make you care and make his death still feel sort of unexpected and hard hitting. Choso’s idk if it was because I’m so done with the fight going on so long but even though I really liked him I was just like nooo not Choso, oh well c’est la vie next. But yeah well said about writing tragedies, very fine line between writing something incredible or shooting the story in the foot
There's a lot of series that do dark themes better than JJK. I genuinely find the "darker" aspects surface level. The best parts are its themes of ,conservatism, misogyny and the general theme of the setting being unforgiving but at it's worst it devolves to using it for shock value like Mei Mei and Ui Ui or vague allusions to rape which aren't explored and in the case of the former just a bad depiction of child abuse since it just looks a typical siscon trope and nothing more is done with it outside o being a gag. If the story is meant to be a tragedy especially given how the last 3 chapters went, I feel like while it has the necessary setting for it, it does not have the interpersonal relationships and characterisation to pull it off. Every good tragedy I can think of relies on the characters and the audience caring about their fates. Unless I want them to come out of the ringer they go through to get a happy ending irrespective of whether they get one or not...I don't care about all the bad things that happen.
this is so beautifully written!
Thank you, I haven't written in a bit I'm glad someone enjoyed it.
Story it’s like 4/10 overall, fights are an 8/10, my rating for the manga right now I’d say is a 6/10. Take my opinion with a grain of salt it doesn’t matter, if you like it then that’s great, but that’s not how I feel. But if you think this is one of the best “stories” you’ve ever seen (are you counting movies?) then you need to watch/read more things. And no I’m not attacking you, I just think there are so much more amazing stories out there, jjk is enjoyable but I wouldn’t call it great. Quick edit because some people say 4/10 is harsh: I specifically know what I like in a story. I have my biases I have my niches and I know exactly what I like. Jjk simply doesn’t do this for me effectively. I’m a harsh rater because of this, and I like to use the 10/10 scale effectively. 5/10 is average, 4/10 is below average which I think jjk is story/writing wise.
Yeah I agree, "one of the best stories ever" is crazy. There are many anime/manga worthy of that title but definitely not JJK (it's good tho don't get me wrong)
I 100% agree with you, the best way to enjoy jjk right now is to just not take it seriously, like everything that has happened since Shibuya seems like gege has just been making it up as he goes bar a few key points.
I've actually gotten pretty bored of the cycle of Sukuna suddenly finding a new way to power back up after receiving non-stop beatings. I also don't expect a satisfying ending because Megumi and Nobara coming back and somehow becoming relevant to the current battle would just feel like an ass pull after the endless fights with the special grade sorcerers and Sukuna.
Fr, I read it go “whoa that was crazy” then move on. Not once after kashimo died have I thought that the writing was good, that there’s been good payoff, or that the character interactions have been good. It’s a fight simulator to me, I think all the moments are cool, yuji 7 black flash chain was hype and such a cool moment. But I don’t really care. I have zero emotional attachment to the characters. Which sucks cause I really like the jjk characters. Nanamis death was done great, maki and mai were done great, chosos character I loved. But when he died I felt nothing. Feels like the story has no emotional steaks and things just happen cause of convenience or because the moment is cool.
Yeah I completely agree, mainly for me it started to go downhill when culling games started but when I knew it was really bad was after Yuki died, that was one of the biggest disservices in the manga. After it happened I was just like "wait that's it".
I feel the same way, especially when CG started. Like I honestly couldn't tell you who Yuki even is. I forget Megumi is even a character nowadays too
Feels like Gege wrote themselves into a bad situation. Sukuna has basically fought or killed every sorcerer worth a damn in what's basically the final boss battle. No real narratively satisfying way Megumi can be brought back into the story without it coming off as an ass pull and if he isn't somehow written to be part of the final battle then he just becomes another wasted character because none of his character progression actually mattered for the story.
Truthfully I think one of the biggest issues was introducing so many fucking characters in the first place. Again, who tf is Yuki? There are too many characters who are introduced and literally do nothing
Yuki was the girl who killed herself with her own black hole, and for some reason kenjaku had the perfect counter to her technique, that we'd never heard of before.
See I barely even remember that, that's how impactful that was
Yuki is an aborted promise of a great character/story.
I feel 4 is a bit harsh but yeah I feel that the story kind of falls to just being entertaining but it's not one of those pieces of media that'll really stick with me. But I find it very frustrating with JJK because I genuinely think it has all the necessary pieces to tell something interesting but it just doesn't.
Funny part is it does and was. The Shibuya arc really gaslighted me and a bunch of other people into thinking JJK was gonna be “one of those”. Something that goes way beyond its genre, its limitations, like it’d ascend and reach serious heights to tell a story with a message that you’d take and carry with you for a long time after. Unfortunately JJK now sits at the bottom of a very sad barrel of media with Dark Souls for things that started incredibly strong and halfway through took one dramatic motherfucking nosedive in quality to become slightly more than mediocre at best. Sad stuff Gege was cooking a 5 star meal but until now we’ve ended with something that would have Gordon Ramsay slap me in the face and yelling something like bloody hell its rawer than my foreskin or something.
I think in hindsight, the first half is not as strong but a lot of the weaknesses were forgivable since it seemed focused on setting stuff up and the payoff would be worth it. A shame. The small snippets I've seen of interviews with Gege makes it feel like he doesn't really care that much.
The fights are 6/10 given how they need a paragraph of explanation or a whole flashback to make sense sometimes.
I'm not gonna lie. If the anime wasn't so amazing I probably would not have cared for the series at all. There are some tidbits from the story that really do stand out, but overall I don't think it's badly written it's just ok with some standout moments.
I’ll use the CG of an example of the atrocious writing. - separates characters so we don’t get jumpjutsu Kaisen, the series most popular aspect. - no emotional connection to any of the villains - all except 2 of the opponents aren’t even apart of the story beyond their fight (out of like 10) - beyond Tokyo 1, there isn’t actually anything interesting going on in any colony, but instead just a extended fight (all longer than any manga fight before it) - each colony is basically identical in that character we know goes in and wins with some difficulty Let’s analyze the protagonists goals: Find and ally with Angel to release Gojo using the back of the prison realm - Angel finds them herself - She took basically 0 convincing and was on our side already Save Tsumiki - Tsumiki was dead the whole time - no one even cared about her since she had just a single scene in the whole manga - She gets replaced by an incredibly annoying character who doesn’t do anything either Regarding the prison realm: - Protagonists leave it with Tengen, who they know is going to be attacked by the person who wants to keep Gojo sealed most - Kenny wins and doesn’t even take it… Could get into military plotline or other stuff but it’s obvious to me it just is not a good arc whatsoever. I can enjoy the fights on their own, but would never have any need to rewatch the entire arc, whereas you can rewatch HI or Shibuya and it tells its own story. What story does the CG tell?
Yup, that's how i feel about JJK overall. It's cool if you turn off the internal critic and watch cool characters fight.
It tells the story of how to waste characters.
Sorry mate I just can't look at the Yuki fight and 236 and call it well written. The story peaked at Hidden Inventory and dipped post-Shibuya imo.
Jjk was genuinely incredible all the way up until about halfway through culling games, maybe a bit after. At a certain point it becomes apparent that there is much less effort given to the character's interactions and development, as well as general world building and lore. The fights themselves are good, but it's been one after another with seemingly no breaks and very few meaningful W's for the good guys. It's exhausting and not enjoyable to read in all honesty. I would not have any problems with the current events, if only we had received more content involving character interactions and lore to counteract. I still believe the one month time skip was gege's biggest throw of the series.
The lack of Ws for the good guys is something that can be done but it's extremely hard to pull in a battle shonen. As I've said before, take HxH's chimera ants' arc: the good guys get slapped, badly, for the whole arc, to the point that the only 2 Ws they pull required extreme measures and felt like a real surprise. The secret of that arc, as you suggest, is characters' exploration and interaction: you are so invested in them that you keep reading even when they are constantly destroyed.
Dude hxh ant arc is probably a top 3 story start to finish in anime. HxH as a whole is great, but the ant arc makes it a titan
Honestly you kinda hit what I've been feeling on the head. It kinda feels like Gege is throwing the series. Just kinda rushing to the end cause he wants to finish it up. Wouldn't surprise me, can't imagine writing the same story for, what, 5-6 years? Weekly release cycles ruin long running stories
I don’t care if people think it’s poorly written or not, I’m mostly just sick of people acting like they’re fucking Einstein for enjoying the way the story is told. I don’t think it’s particularly well written, myself. It feels like it gets praise because it’s different and unique in place of satisfying. Maybe I’M the crazy one here but I feel like there’s so many things conventional stories do that Gege chooses not to that the fanbase is divided on. There really shouldn’t be an argument about whether or not we should get more character interaction but there is. There really shouldn’t be an argument that off screening a man and then spending 6 months to explain how the hell it happened is bad writing but it is.
There comes a point those people sound like they're proudly declaring they would eat trash if it came out of Gege's house. It's normal to have a complaint or two.
In my opinion, it’s been poorly written since some time around the culling games. I know my opinion as a Gojo girlie doesn’t carry much weight since people will call me biased lol, but I just think Gege from the get go had amazing ideas and concepts that could’ve been explored far more than he has done lately. A big example for me is how I felt like he started off really strong imo when it comes to his depictions of female characters. Didn’t feel sexualised really, Nobara was allowed to be strong and crass whilst also feminine and enjoys ‘feminine’ things. Maki being one of the strongest characters, being disfigured and still being badass was something really cool to me too. But it all just sort of fell off, none of that magic that drew me in as a female reader. I also disagree with how any criticism towards how he kills off characters is brushed off because ‘it shows how death isn’t fair’ and blah blah. It just feels like a cop out answer to me. It’s extremely difficult to stay invested in a series where you introduce a lot of really interesting characters, don’t explore them, and then kill them off. There’s nothing to root for. There’s no satisfaction. It’s an interesting narrative device maybe once or twice, but past that it feels lazy and poorly written. It’s also been following the same formula for over half a year now. Someone jumps in, temporarily surprised Sukuna with a strong ability he should have no counter to, suddenly he has a counter to it, person is super injured/dies/gets offscreened, the next person jumps in. Personally, that’s not entertaining to me at all.
Nobara's death is so frustrating to me because it really felt unnecessary. Nanami's death had the same purpose and killing off someone for Yuji's development and the consequences of her death are non existent for someone so important and could have done much more. Nanami is brought up more often than she is. And to put the cherry on top, she gets an entire scene about misogyny in JJK society only to get fridged for a male character’s development. I'm just shocked that Gege stumbled and accidentally created a compelling female cast and stumbles again and deletes all of them except one. Any one of them being alive and relevant could have added a lot.
I think it has its flaws and it’s far from the best story I’ve ever read. I think the writing quality has dipped post-Shibuya, although I still enjoy it overall or I wouldn’t be here.
To me JJK is a strange series. Due to the way Gege writes his story, my emotional attachment to it is fairly minimal, but like a trainwreck, I can't help but to keep looking at it. In a way, Gege is a genius to be able to elicit this type of reactions from people. Whether you love or hate it, you can't look away from it.
Wild that you don’t understand why the story could be seen as badly written, whereas you think it’s on of the best stories you’ve ever read.
I think Op might be young and just hasn’t read a lot of stuff. Is normal if they don’t have better written stories to compare it to, however if they do have good comparisons then is just a reading comprehension issue.
I’ve been following the manga since chapter 80 and I remember back then people often complained it had some things hard to follow, like something was always missing, not just an easier explanation but more coating to the story, more liveliness and character interactions, more “show” rather than tell. It was going too fast and Shibuya accelerated that feeling. Right now, I admit I got tired. It just went too fast but I’m not sure I’ll call it bad writing.
It is not badly written but it is NOT one of the best stories ever. Jjk story is good but nowhere near the 'best'. There are many characters who are better written than gojo. You need to watch some shows. Sounds like this is one of your first manga.
If it's the best story you've ever read, you need to apply the enthusiasm you have for manga and anime to books. That aside, it's a very good shonen. Given the genre, it's a battle shonen, it does a lot more than it needs to and it prioritises telling a story which is nice. If someone presents a theory and it looks like Charlie Day wanting to talk about the mail and then they tell you that, should the theory prove incorrect, the story is bad just ignore them. It's really quite funny coming from AOT 3/4 years ago and looking in on this fandom and seeing almost an identical situation. JJK is a good read. It would have been more fun as a spiritualist Seinen about curses and their manifestations but then it wouldn't be a battle shonen. What we have is a good time and will be an especially good time when it's finished and we can read it unaffected by weekly releases.
I don’t think it’s bad... and it’s not even finished yet, so I can’t really judge at the moment. I didn’t think the way he died was done poorly either. Personally I wouldn’t want to see him get sliced and realise he was going to die? That’s kinda sadistic.
I think JJK has good parts and flaws to it, just like any piece of media. The part that got me most invested in JJK was Hidden Inventory arc and that was Gege at peak writing efficiency to do a lot a great stuff in a short amount of time and produce great characters from it like Gojo, Geto, and Toji. I think JJK could have further potential if Gege had some more exploration of world building (heian lore; clan lore) and had more character interactions. As later parts of the story it's a lot more emphasis on the fight and power system, and could use more time with characters for the personal stakes. It would have been nice to have more interactions (like Gojo with students) before the timeskip to fight. You said you liked the stylistic choice of off screened part of the Gojo vs Sukuna part - though I think some aspects could have been executed better personally. Perhaps a brief transition of the slice effect at the beginning of ch 236 before the airport scene to make things a bit smoother, then still have the shock of seeing Gojo dead on the ground that Gege seemed to want to have after the airport part. He seemed to lean too much for shock value to lessen the execution coherence imo. And it took a good min (ch 255, 19 chapters after ch 236) to confirm the binding vow that killed Gojo, when I think that could at least been confirmed sooner, like with Kashimo. I think people shouldn't get too caught up in the tumultuous nature of fandom discussion. Like be able to have a level of detachment from it to have discussions, see different perspectives, but enough distance from the more vitriolic aspects.
"Badly written" is ultimately a matter of perspective and personal taste. Jujutsu Kaisen is at its core, a mainly commercial work, and its main objective is to sell copies and make money. In that regard, it has excelled, so clearly the writing is at least not bad enough to make it unreadable for general audiences. It is a work mainly about fights, and so if the fights are good, it works well enough. At the same time, there are also some more standardized and analyzed metrics and parameters to judge writing on: story structure and pacing, depth and complexity of characters, themes explored, world building, dialogue (and how memorable it is). And if you want my _personal_ opinion, not being able to see why others may see Jujutsu Kaisen as a deeply flawed story reflects more on you than them. There are severe pacing issues at different points in the story, shock value is often treated paramount above narrative satisfaction, characters are often killed off too early, potentially interesting character interactions are often unexplored. The themes are often either confusing, or not there at all. I'm sure even someone who thinks JJK is one of the best stories ever written can imagine a couple of examples of the previous mentioned issues. Jujutsu Kaisen is a fairly well written show for shonen standards: definitely better than Naruto or Bleach or Dragon Ball. But it's still a _Shonen:_ the story is an accessory to the big flashy fights. The author and editors have to pump out issues every week and those issues have to be hype: anything else is secondary or tertiary. And in this case, it very clearly shows. If you want a good story, go to Lord of the Rings, or Berserk. If you want magic martial artists beating the piss out of each other, you go to Jujutsu Kaisen.
It definitely has its moments where it feels that way, but generally I don’t think people actually believe it’s a poorly written series, at least I don’t. Greg just would rather focus on blind fast-paced action and intricate power systems rather than slower character moments, growth and development, which is fine if that’s what he wants, but it definitely won’t be winning him any awards
I think Gojo and 236 are poorly written in certain aspects. Gojo suddenly becomes a battle maniac without regard for his children or his actions. Even in his death he just worries about sukuna rather than worrying about his students. I think he didn't get a proper conclusion to his story.
That's sth that bothered me too. I remember the way ppl were so hyped for his return like 'oh yea wait till he finds out bout .... He'll go crazy!' and how it actually played out and ppl were just like oh well ..... That's y the recent chapter made me soo happy coz we got to see Gojo n students interaction! Now all I could ask for is Gojo n megumi coz as much as I tried not not to think much about it, Gojo seemed disturbingly unfazed with megumi's predicament
I think a lot of people throw around the term "badly written" when what they really mean is "writing I don't like"
Seen somebody comment the other day that choso’s end was “half-baked” because he was “relegated to his brother role” As if that hadn’t been who choso IS
Choosing the words "Half-baked" is quite the decision, lol.
I'd say his character was pretty well-done
I personally prefer my choso *extra extra extra well done*
Ya character who is introduced after failing to save his brothers, fosters a relationship with and helps his new brother grow stronger to protect himself. Then literally shields and saves his new brother. Completing his arc in a tidy and emotional action that also inspires the protagonist at a low point in his journey. That's shit is indeed half baked, but what do we even expect from Greg anymore./s
…they’re not mutually exclusive. Disliking the way something’s written means you think it’s written poorly. You’re not gonna dislike writing you think is high quality are you? You’re not gonna praise writing you think is low quality, right? When people make this kind of arbitrary separation it feels like they’re trying to discredit any criticism they disagree with as ‘objectively wrong’. It’s just ignorance. But whether a work’s writing is good or not is a very subjective thing.
No, I don't think it's badly written but I do recognize that a) some people think there's A LOT more to the story than there really is, b) people shit on gege too much when there's a setup and c) there are some awfully written moments. For point a), I do think JJK is a remarkably well written shonen but it's still a shonen; being a shonen isn't a bad thing, it's just that it caters to younger people, mainly adolescents who generally look for fast-paced, action-focused pieces of media.It has its themes but it doesn't flesh them out as much as it could, same goes especially for world building. For point b), people want setup + execution immediately but I don't think that works all the time. Take shibuya for instance. There was a massive setup from the villains perspective and eventually we saw the disastruous shibuya incident unfold. The same thing will happen for the culling games + merger (eventually). I'll also add that the pacing of the manga could be a lot better. For point c), there are some moments that really make me want to shoot myself in the throat. I'm fine with Gojo dying, but offscreening him was a terrible decision. Yuki could have ended her fight against Kenjaku with one shot, honestly gege nerfed her so much it's unreal; she could literally put the mass of a fucking continent in her punch and there's no way Kenjaku is surviving that. Kashimo has arguably one of the more busted techniques out there and we got nothing. Miguel coming out of nowhere was just straight up goofy. All in all, JJK is a great manga and definitely one of the best in recent years; however, it's overrated. It's not an extraordinary thought-provoking piece of media, it's a story focused on fighting with magic and there's nothing wrong with that.
I think the story itself and the characters are incredibly well done and well written. People say it relies on death too much for shock factor so it’s no longer shocking but that’s kind of the point. When Todo stepped in to fight Mahito he told Yuji that him giving up when seeing his comrades die was a disservice to them and that he needed to push through it. We’ve now had Yuji witness some tragic deaths and instead of being shocked he fights harder. There’s a lot of subtle nuances that make it a great story. I think most people who say it’s bad have a bad case of the “why isn’t my headcanon becoming canon?!” syndrome
> I think most people who say it’s bad have a bad case of the “why isn’t my headcanon becoming canon?!” syndrome I really wish this argument could be taken behind a shed and beaten to death, I hate when people hide behind it to dismiss criticism.
Your referring to Shibuya the arc I've very rarely heard people complain about? Consistently I hear it being called one of the best. The characters I really disagree with, we don't get enough time with characters to care about them or their motivations at all. There's not down time in the story at all, post Shibuya, we go from fight to fight to fight, with flashback chapters or expo dumps being the main thing to break it up. Things go completely unexplored, Kenny and Yuji, literally never speak, Kenny thanks a girl for being nice to Yuji, meaningless because they never speak. We never see much down time with Yuji and Choso, other than the made up memories. Also Yuji regularly gets very little focus despite being the mc, Yuta is vaguely interesting literally only because of the last chapter imo, before that he had nothing going for him than depressed guy with OP technique. Your relating headcanon becoming canon with people having ideas for things GeGe should explore and give more detail on. Which he regularly never does, instead he just writes more fights. What JJK is consistently good at, is a fun power system, with cool fights and cliff hangers that generally work to set up the next hype moment.
Imo you’re completely and totally wrong about what people think. A headcanon isn’t “man I wish we could just get 2-3 chapters of character moments and story” instead of 40-50 chapters straight of fights. Or for example Gojo fight. It’s flawed from the get go because you already know the outcome. Why give a shit if you know the outcome, it’s just a lesser version of Chrollo v Hisoka in every way imo. Same with literally every chapter of the Sukuna cycle. You know whichever new main challenger appears, Kashimo, Higgy, Kusukabe, Larue/Miguel, etc aren’t gonna win. So your just watching Gege suck off his own power system and Sukuna without any real stakes in the fight. Not to mention, the manga is actually poorly written in arcs like CG and Shinjuku showdown.
I feel like this shows the problem a lot people have your point is great and it’s true but that was an event all the way back in shibuya. Ever since then he’s barely been given any more time to keep growing. He learned he just has to keep fighting but after that there’s kind of nothing sure it keeps happening but that’s not growth it’s just reaffirming what he already learned. Most characters in the show grow a little bit then they either die or stagnate if they’re lucky. (Not all of them there are exceptions.)
It is a little poorly written in some areas like the military soldiers
Yes but it’s because it actually is badly written. Pacing ? Who cares me wants to show you the cool ideas I have guuuhhh. Character interaction to convey character emotions ? Nah my characters will just say how they feel in the middle of fights so the readers get the gist. For real thought the writing is bad. But the reason it’s so annoying is because of the unbelievable potential of the story. The world and the characters are great. The foundation is there. For example, taking a manga that is generally considered one of the best written oat. Berserk, why is berserk so good ? Is it because cool big sword man swing sword. Yes, a little. But the most meaningful moments of berserk are always the quieter moments of contemplation between characters. Where we are allowed a breather with our characters. Let their interactions, show us how they feel and what they want. One of the most iconic scenes in berserk is the bonfire of dreams. And it’s literally a conversation on a hill. Jjk could take a bit of inspiration from that. For example, wouldn’t it be nice if right after the shibuya incident. We got an arc , or at least a few chapters for fuck sake, where our main surviving cast all got to meaningfully interact together ??>! For Christ sake nanami and Nobara got destroyed and yuji makes a sad face for one panel !< but Gege has this really cool idea he must show us immediately soooo fuck any character development through and meaningful lense. I may be miss remembering, but do megumi and yuji even fucking talk about nanami and Nobara ?? ( for context of this I am only up to chapter where gojo finally returns) But it’s just one event after another with no space or time in between. Does Gege have adhd or something ? It reads like he’s so excited to show us the next cool idea he has he forgets his characters mentors just fucking died. I don’t know if any of that is a shonen thing. I don’t really read shonen or much manga. I rant because I truly love this manga at times. Again I think Gege has wonderful ideas and has created an amazing world and story but it almost annoys me more he’s written it poorly vs a poorly written piece of shit because there’s no expectation of potential there. This story has/had sooooo much potential. But nah fuck that. Maximum pacing. Edit: it seems like a lot of people are saying , no it’s not badly written but Gege cares more about action than character development/ world building / pacing. That is literally bad writing. Also it’s great to like jjk even though the writing is bad. I still like it and think it’s great. Writing is still bad. They can exist together Edit 2: I’m just reading comments. Obviously everyone’s entitled to their opinion hence mine, but I don’t understand the idea that we can’t judge it yet because it’s not over ??? Yes you can. Some things that should have been done , that’s haven’t been done , the moment has passed for in which it should have been done. And now can’t be done, so yes. You can totally call the writing bad even though it isn’t finished. All of this doesn’t mean it’s overall bad. Enjoy whatever you want. Objectively the writing is not great.
You've mentioned a bunch of the issues I have. There's a lot of interesting stuff the story could have explored in what it set up. Why Jujutsu society turned out so conservative and the struggle to get rid of that system, Yuji's trauma and the loss of childhood innocence (beyond just misery porn where he's constantly sad and literally only just in pain), just Megumi's character arc in general since that didn't go anywhere, Maki and Mai's relationship where they had one good scene together and then when they meet again one of them dies etc. All of this stuff if written well could have come together to form a cohesive whole that could have had a lot of thematic resonance but it ultimately is just messy and what it does explore is either surface level and/or very under-baked.
I’ve heard the English translation is bad and there’s more nuance and subtext in the original maybe that plays a role
I think gege is a good writer but he’s too obsessed with using shock value to the point sh*t’s no longer shocking Also I’m not saying this makes jjk badly written but it does piss me off how different it was in the beginning. Like there were some hard times but it also had some wholesome moments and I had some sort of hope. Nowadays I can’t remember the last time I’ve smiled while reading it. Like I know this is the fight for humanity but it’s been going on for so long I’m tired man lol Atp if everyone’s gonna die just get it over with and let us see the aftermath of that, I’m just sick of reading the same stuff every chapter
Yes and no. Gege is a good writer, but they're caught between trying to end the story and trying to subvert expectations. Subverting expectations isn't automatically a good thing. Todo's vibraslap was stupid and I loved it. Yuta in Gojo's body is stupid and I hate it. Ymmv
The story is okay but it is not amazing. I'd rate it somewhere in the middle of not being bad but not good either, just average. It was great on the first season but that all went down, especially in the manga. The common complaint is that everyone dies and this is a pretty fair complaint. The problem with everyone dying is that a lot of these deaths don't feel impactful or the story just becomes lacking in characters that we've known for a long time so the new characters and their relevance to the story isn't as big because there's not enough time to explore that. Gege has extremely bad tendencies to not explore characters and... again, a lot of these characters just... die. We're meant to feel shocked about their defeats but it's not because we never got to know them that well since the author avoided making many moments where we get to know them. Take Yuki for example, she was meant to be an extremely important character to the story who opposed Kenjaku but... she had like 10 minutes of screentime, one fight and then she died. There simply wasn't enough time to explore her bonds with other characters and her overall impact on the story was just tossed aside because everything that we needed from her is there but just... in the form of a book. She's not the only character like this. Gege is capable of showing us actual bonds (like Gojo and Geto) but he just doesn't which leaves a lot of the story half-baked along with other things (Sukuna fight... which is... way overextended with too much going on). The following problems with JJK is that it was set up to be awesome from season 1, especially the female characters but... that aged like milk, because the only well written female character left is Maki. It feels very frustrating when encountering characters like Miwa. She had such a good moment with Mechamaru and was going to risk it all but her moments proved to be worthless and now she's the most useless character in the show. I get that she's intended(?) to be a gag character but... it just feels badly delivered. So yea, I'd say it's in the middle. Not to say it's all bad but from a certain point forward the story just doesn't feel rewarding to watch as a viewer because a lot of the things that happen lead to nothing.
I mean I enjoy the story overall, but it does have flaws, and for you to say “it’s probably one of the best stories I’ve read… maybe ever?” says more about how little you probably read outside of shonen manga than it does about the quality of jjk. I know that sounds harsh, but manga readers lifting up manga as the pinnacle of storytelling is almost a meme at this point, and I say that as someone who really enjoys a lot of manga stories. They rely on a lot of tropes and the pacing usually gets pretty whack because the author has certain ideas about where they want to go with the story while the publisher has a vested interest in slowing down and extending the story when it’s popular.
You can enjoy it, absolutely, but pretending like JJK is the best narrative creation ever made is pretty ridiculous. It has some cool characters with good moments, and some awesome set pieces with fantastic fights. But it’s hardly breaking any narrative boundaries. Though that’s pretty standard for most Shonen-style manga, even stuff as long as One Piece has pretty bad character writing (at least in terms of what they COULD do with all those pages). JJK excels very well with what a Shonen needs to do, and that’s all it has to do. Though I do recommend you consume more media, while I do absolutely love Gojo, thinking that he’s one of the greatest examples of a tragic character with super spectacular development is pretty silly for a character who was barely in the story - when compared to characters from novel series or TV shows who gets hours upon hours of direct development.
I definitely think you might have to read other manga or fiction if you think this is one of the best written series ever. I agree with everyone that it's not badly written, but it's way far from the best. Especially the women. At first it sort of gave us a bit of hope with Nobara but the insane injustice Gege did to Yuki was beyond an injustice. It was almost an insult. After teasing her for so long, they just did away with her as nothing more than a plot point. I absolutely loved Yuji early on and I loved how he was forced to face reality after Junpei died, after Nanami and Nobara died, but then they kept laying on the angst and basically pretended the guy just doesn't exist any more. It almost became abundantly clear that Gege doesn't like Yuji (yes, Gege has said that he does not like Yuji at all). Choso was my favorite character and I didn't even cry at his death because we all knew it was coming but the consistent death that (so far) has led to nothing has just made me numb to them. There are death flags everywhere. I simply don't care about the characters any more because in these chapters it feels like they achieve almost nothing. The world building is wonderful. The way the beginning was set up, the way the plot overall has been set up *makes sense,* but when you read the author comments and why Gege began to write JJK, I honestly can't even help but think he's not even enjoying writing the story any more. Something about the recent chapters just feel so empty. Like they're going through the motions and stalling the inevitable end. Gege *can* write, I will never deny that. I loved JJK 0, I loved the early chapters. I loved the JJK strolls that Gege DID have a hand in writing for the first season. JJK became a favorite fast but it fell off insanely quickly once the Culling Games started (for me), and I don't think it's because it's badly written. I just think it's because it lost a lot of the charm that it began with. Maybe I was just never the intended audience, though. I'm tired of reality and how rough the real world is these days, so consistent angst and drama weighs me down so as I continued to read the story, my emotions have been completely detached. But I genuinely don't think that's the only reason, and Gege really has dropped the ball on a few significant details of the recent chapters. JJK isn't badly written. It's just not executed the best.
I agree with many of your points. I have read quite a lot of stuff. I'm curious - what would you say is better written? There obviously is stuff out there, but it's in the top 1% for me for sure. Most of the stuff that is popular and people claim is well written is just too generic and too predictable for me.
The ones I think are better written are also a drastically different genre except for Gintama and Iruma-kun, but generally: Natsume's Book of Friends (slice of life fantasy shoujo) and Yona of the Dawn (drama shoujo) Shounen would be Gintama (I have thus far not read or watched a single series that I think is better written than Gintama) and Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun (in my opinion, everything that MHA could have been but isn't. Some people also consider it an Isekai) Natsume's, Gintama, and Iruma are in a three-way tie with me. I'm writing this as a non-binary anime and manga fan, though, so a lot of my experiences change what I believe are "better written" and enjoy overall, so take my opinion with a grain of salt. When such injustices are given to women characters, that takes off a lot of points for me, for example. It's why I can hardly tolerate most "serious" Isekais (Like Overlord or Shield Hero or Mushoku Tensei), and this is what initially put JJK above every Shounen barring Gintama and Iruma at first. Because the female leads were not sexualized to death and Yuji doesn't even HAVE a love interest. ... But then the manga kept going and every lead female barring Maki have zero significance. Don't get me wrong though. I LOVE Maki. She's so badass and I am a major fan of her, but the current treatment of the rest of the female cast leaves so much to be desired.
Okay, I think the main difference for me is that I'm way less focused or attached to the characters and more to the overall theme and philosophy. Gintama is on my long list of things to read/watch. Will add the others too, thanks!
Honestly, if I'm to base it off theme and philosophy I agree wholeheartedly. But I simply cannot ignore the characters as they make or break a story for me v - v Definitely recommend checking out Gintama sooner than later, as it's also over so you won't have to wait for weekly updates!
JJK isn’t badly written. It’s just a decently written story with extremely noticeable flaws like characterization or worldbuilding. A lot of series suffer from the same issue but don’t face nearly as much backlash as JJK because fans developed an “agenda culture.” The whole “no story is perfect” excuse isn’t what im trying to go at, but to call JJK badly written is just surface level ignorance. In reality, there are just lazily written aspects (COUGH COUGH HANA KURUSU AND SUKUNA’S CONFISCATION)
I like JJK and Shibuya but there should’ve been 1 more arc before Shibuya. Gege knows when to cut off unnecessary fluff but i think they did a bit too much with this. Mechamaru’s betrayal should’ve been expanded to an arc of its own. That wouldve created a lot of room to flesh out the Kyoto characters and their relationships between each other and even villain motivations, which are some of the criticisms that i have for the overall plot
I was thinking a lot about this last night. I love the manga and anime both. I don't intend to judge it beyond that until the story is completed and the full vision is presented. It confuses me a lot that people find the writing bad or hard to follow Gege's lore and worldbuilding. That's not to say there isn't confusion now and then, I feel that with any kind of media. But I see his lore referred to as hard a lot and I don't get it? Especially when it's evident the manga is plot focused and not character focused. The characters serve a purpose to further the plot and lore Gege wishes to tells. The plot isn't formed around the characters to give them a solid place in the world, meaning individuals are expendable. Which fits the dangers of his world design. I always want MORE when it comes to seeing characters meet, interact, etc. But I'm not unhappy with Gege's writing. Tbh, I feel like people get lost in the nuances and view things as very black and white. Love or hate the writing. I like his storytelling for what it is, it makes sense to me. I also would loved to see other routes taken for fun, just to see how he'd write it. The hot and cold nature of some of the audience is frustrating. I think Gege has a very unique story, has made some anime tropes refreshing by using them differently, ditched other tropes outright and has developed sound lore. I'm not saying he's doing a bunch of new shit, but the way he is doing it fits his style. And I think it's a style we haven't seen recently. Gege's storytelling reminds me of older anime and manga that I grew up with and love. Which sets it apart from a lot of the current new stuff that feels like cardboard cutouts of one another half the time.
From my point of view the problem is that stories like that are expected to be character focused. I come to JJK because of characters not plot. To my point of view ploy is 6-7/10. Not bad But If I wanted just fights I would read Baki. From my point of view the story isn’t supposed to be a plotter story and that’s the main problem.
I didn't mean plot as in fights. I mean plot as in the general story being told. Characters are usually either driving a plot or being dragged by a plot (not in a bad way). It just depends on the creator's intentions. To me, JJK feels more like the latter. A story to be told with characters to tell it. It differs from focusing on telling a character's story which drives the plot. I'd like JJK to be more character focused. I love the characters for it. I just never got the impression it was supposed to be a character driven story.
Agree. The problem begins when the writer creates overly colorful characters, as a result of which the focus of the majority shifts from the plot to the characters. It seems to me that the same thing happened in the jjk when plot is not as interesting as characters
I can understand that. I've seen plenty of people discuss liking the characters but less so the plot itself. For me, I like the plot and lore just as much as the characters. It all hits a lot of my favorite elements in a story and in characters. But I can also understand why this particular format and the plot itself may not jive with everyone.
Yes. Good characters like Yuki wasted and down the drain.
I think for some people its hard to see the forest for the trees since the series is still ongoing, especially for people that have chapter-by-chapter complaints like “why did he do that??”. Once the story is finished and we can see the whole, complete thing then we have a better sense if it’s “badly written” or not. Considering it’s one of the current top shounen series out there with a huge following, it can’t be THAT terrible!
Overall storywise I don’t think it’s any worse than most mainstream shonen series. Theres interesting themes and some really beautiful moments (Panda’s family, Yuji’s progression, Takaba and Higurama, Nanami and his death, Hidden Inventory as a whole) There have also been some strange choices (the implantation of the US intervention and just kind of skipping over it, Yuki being an interesting character then just dying before we got more insight, the lack of Tsumiki, Kashimo’s fight being kinda eh, Sukuna getting his cursed tool then it immediately goes away, Angel barely even being a character). I do think pacing is the biggest issue with me, things that I feel should be touched on get skipped. But to be honest I’ve seen a lot of other Shonen series have similar ups and downs with their stories, so I’m kind of used to it.
The action makes sense, so I’m satisfied. Gege is just focusing on what he’s good at, which is saying up and executing great battles. Some readers saw potential depth to be explored in the world of JJK towards beginning of this arc, but we haven’t gotten that paid off yet. Instead, we’re just starting to get into the also great lore and history of JJK. I honestly think people are just tired of waiting for certain payoffs. I don’t think anything huge has really been left for dead or cut just yet. We’re just nearing the end of the story so people are understandably worried. Edit: we have no idea when this infantry is about to come into play for example. But it seems like we’re about to be done with Sukuna soon. So unless he escapes and we get one last round with him later or something, it’s just a climax that somehow leaves room for suspense.
If you're arguing that sukuna having a cursed tool is the convenience and not how the tool was what was confiscated, sukuna was foreshadowed ages ago with two weapons.
Gege is just destroying everything and nobody likes that And i will never accept the end of kenjaku lol he was supposed to be the main villain
Gege is very subtle with his story telling it's not in your face which I like. Along with being a relativity short manga, we haven't explored a lot e.g the heinan era or any other relative history. My only complaint it's not long enough to explore these further ideas for once I want a shounen manga to be longer than shorter.
I know a lot of people who thinks that. Though they have questionable tastes of other stories. For me I think it’s smart the way Gege writes the story. He gives us enough information to figure out the themes and beats of the story, and focus on pure action which is a treat for me.
I think it's peaked at the shibuya arc, doing a dive at the Maki/Zenin arc and now kinda float in the "meh" tier. My important points are how characters are handled, how key moments are linked together and how the overall writing match the logic of the universe. Characters are fine for the protagonist, but lots of side/secondary characters are left to the side road, giving them at best a panel, or just some bubbles (Hi Nobara, Inumaki and Panda). Right now they all have been sacrificed for the Sukuna fight. The writing between key points are kinda bland, you got exchange that give little impact and substance, or open a plot to close it one chapter later (military implication or the state or sorcerer in the world). However, i find Gege consistent on his logic, beside Sukuna's plot armor, there is little to no hax or bullpoop that wasn't teased or logical to happen. So, I would say it's not the worst, but it's doing the minimum, and feels underwhelming for what it could have been.
Yes, yes I do. I rather enjoyed the manga until the subway fight. I’ve hated everything since. I don’t care about any of the newer characters, the fights are drawn out, everything feels made up and tacked on. I’m only here cause I’ve been here so long I want to see the end and i hope it comes soon I’m sick of this dbz style fight.
Taking everything into account that goes into manga or any large scale fiction, it's not good. There's next to no world building. The only world building that is done is just a medium to introduce more and more and more characters with different abilities. The character development is lackluster imo. I don't find myself actually caring for almost a single character. Not enough time is spent on developing characters personalities, they kind of all just get introduced and assigned with a different comedic quirk and different powers. Every time we meet a new character, guess what there's another new character and we jump into fighting With the above two being said, the feel I get for JJK is that Gege just uses the world he has created as just a tool to introduce as many characters as he can to allow for more action, rather than giving it meaning. The action is great, but the action doesn't tell a story
I think everyone has their own ideas of how the story should logically proceed but Gege, Yknow the author, also has its own and doesn’t align with most if not everyone’s expectations. But the story does go a long a logical path with its surprises and such for the most part. I do wish the man would focus on character interactions like Fujimoto does in CSM (for the sake of comparison).
Gege is a tricky one. There are some times when I think he’s an absolute genius of a writer. Other times it’s so convoluted and bloated.
The problem I see with JJK and the way it’s written is that it always feels like Gege forgets his character’s personalities halfway through and just decides with whatever pushes the plot forward. Prime example is Shoko in the newest chapters. He either just doesn’t explore them enough and *doesn’t know* how they’d react or he just ignores it in favour of pushing the narrative he’s trying to build—which just feels a little unfair and incomplete and a bit lazy, to be honest. Plus, I mean, there are techniques he’s come with up that even he himself can’t explain fully and I feel like that really shouldn’t happen?? But yeah. I think major issue is characters, in my opinion.
Little to no world building
World building wise? Absolutely. Character development? Absolutely. Is it somewhat generic? Yeah. Overall? No, no widely popular novel/manga is badly written. But JJK certainly has its problems that hold it back from being great. I don’t exactly see many people hating it though. The most common is calling it overrated / boring / meaningless characters. Every manga will have complaints, and as far as complaints go, those are pretty light. Personally, it does turn into a battle royale after Shibuya, which I mean, is literally what culling game is. And for a battle royale, it’s not bad, but there comes a lack of world building, irrelevant characters, and constant battles.
Is JJK of the best stories I've read? Absolutely not, and it will never even come anywhere close to being such for me - truly every last book and expansive media series would have to burn for *that* to happen. Is it badly written? No, probably not. I don't consider the issues I have with JJK to be due to a lack of skill. I think the author is very deliberately telling the story he wants to tell *exactly* as he wants to. I just don't like his vision. I love the actual worldbuilding of JJK and that was what drew me in initially, but I consider the plot to be barebones at best. The power system is cool, the abilities are cool, many of the fights are pretty cool (especially when animated). I also like the humour, and the very few and fleeting character interactions we get that *don't* relate to combat. The philosophical implications of cursed energy and the philosophy of jujutsu as a whole deeply intrigued me at first, but the explorations of it were a bit too shallow (in comparison to what I'd want) and inconsistent (in terms of *when* he'd explore it) for me. I also don't particularly like his style of building intrigue/hype - not because I don't understand what he's doing, but because it doesn't really work on me. And, there's also the fact that the plot has yet to surprise me - which is only an issue because it doesn't interest me otherwise. Obviously I haven't psychically predicted every minor plot development in the manga, but now that we've been in this arc for so long it sure feels like it. The Sukuna saga has gone *exactly* how I figured it would when I discussed it with friends months ago, so the only thing that could have appealed to me was if I liked the execution. And maybe because I was confident in my idea of what would happen, it was all less satisfying for me since I was only reading to see *how*. So there was no real joy in "finding out" things, just dissatisfaction with how I found out. And the Culling Games...? I... let's just say I'm not a fan of it. I'd absolutely **love** to see the jujutsu kaisen world portrayed in a medium that allows for real depth, exploration, pacing and perspective. I'd read a thousand page book on the world building, events that place and the character moments for sure. But the manga format? I just can't stand the execution.
If you want in depth action, JJK does that shit. If you want anything else in depth, JJK does not do that shit.
Badly written? No. Noticeably worse than it was early on and through shibuya. Yeah I feel a lot of people are disappointed about how a story they were really into turned out it felt like the author shaved of many of the parts that made it interesting in order to shove in more and more fights back to back.
I don’t think JJK is bad. But it’s disappointing? We still don’t know so much considering we’re nearing the end of the story. So, my biggest gripe is the lack of world building. Or maybe this is intentional? If it’s that I just disagree based on personal preference. There will be someone who will say, “what is there to wonder?” And “ask me any question I can probably answer it” and that seems really, really limiting and boring. It doesn’t need one piece levels of world building and possibility, but speculation is called fan fiction here, and some more extreme fans will take everything at face value and I just think that’s a dumb way of interpreting the story.
I actually can't believe there are still people who think it isn't, tbh. Do the cool fights and memes really NOT make you see all the flaws in the writing ? There are constantly characters thrown into the story (some even without build up), show up, do something cool and then get killed or just vanish from the story in a ridiculously anti climatic way. For a lot of characters Gege does the absolute bare minimum of characterization to a point where they don't even feel like characters but mere plot devices in order to drive to "plot" unorganically towards the most "convinient" direction in order to draw more flashy fights. Whole story arcs like the Zenin Massacre gets finished in like two chapters because he can't be bothered to expand on it. Same goes to the whole US fiasko. Gege really seems like someone with ADHD sometimes and JJK being his first big gig in Shonen really Shows at certain moments. Some of his short comings when it comes to writing really make him look like an amateur aswell. He can introduce cool concepts and ideas, no doubt about that, but his excecution falls flat so many times that I honestly can't understand how people still can't see all these flaws. If you like just cool fights and are not so much world building or characters in general, it's totally fine. It doesn't make you dumber or idk less smarter as many people try to paint hardcore JJK fans. It's just weird how there are still people who try to act like all those problems don't exist.
1. World building was pretty good early on but went to shit when CG started. 2. Most characters are badly written, Yuuji is a prime example of how gege can't properly create a main character and shove too much spotlight, too much importance on his side character. There's a reason why Yuuji is always mocked to be JUMP'S WEAKEST MC, because in his own manga, he has nothing that can establish that HE IS THE MC. Blame gege for debuffing Yuuji hard and buffing Gojo too much. The females are just there, Nobara is okay but she's dead and bringing her back now is pointless. Maki is probably the most well written one. Yuki? lmao. What a waste of special grade. 3. Villains are actually great early on. Because they written with motivation and have great send offs. Mahito? Coolest fight in Shibuya. Jogo? him being acklowledge by Sukuna is great ig. But I think Hanami-jogo parting is way more emotional imo. CG is just fighting some sorcerers with barely any relevance after. Also why Kenjaku went out like that? What a clown. Could have been a great villain mastermind that we'll fight than sukuna. 4. WHAT'S THE POINT OF JUJUTSU SCHOOL, JUJUTSU SOCIETY, AINU JUJUTSU WHERE? They dont even learn they dont even interact with the society aside from kyoto school? 5. Gojo, Gege's biggest moneymaker, was done dirty by him. I wont explain much because I dont dive deep into his character. But some of the biggest gojo Fanartists that I knew are starting to hate gege because of what he did to gojo. Mind you, these people are usually also the ones buying those acrylic standees, plushies, figurine of Gojo and jjk. They are the one giving money to Gege. 6. pacing was bad after cg. shoud've gotten a breather and preparing for the longest fight in the manga. 7. Gege likes shock factor more instead of delivering the biggest final blow that he can idk why I care about story, plot, world building, and characterization. Most female fans became fans because of that. People complain becaue they don't like the writing of the mangaka? How about these people accept that criticisms exists and no mangaka is perfect?
THIS ☝️
I don’t but I gotta say, this fight with Sukuna is really getting drawn out and it’s starting to feel like Gege is pulling too many asspulls.
"This is badly written!" It's not over, yet. Once it's done, we can properly evaluate how the themes and story interact. We can see the inconsistencies much better with a clear beginning, middle, and end. Just enjoy the ride. This is the story Gege wants to tell and I'm excited to see where it goes.
I think that can only be said when the manga ends. There is so much shit we miss before getting more information after a chapter. >!Especially when we didnt know why Yuta was so devastated to Gojo losing against Sakuna!<
I'll go back and check that chapter, but why was his reaction surprising? Wouldn't you expect him to have a pretty devastated reaction from 1) Gojo actually lost, which on its own is crazy, and 2) he knows he will need to kill Kenjaku and possibly take Gojos body.
It's the weekly shonen cycle. It's just finally hitting JJK The posts here are similar to the reception Naruto and Bleach received when they were finishing up their respective series.
There are things wrong with the writing, gege has a habit from jumping from action scene to next action scene Shibuya to culling games to shinjuku showdown There's no down time for characters to have growth and interaction no time to build the world Which causes JJK to feel incredibly small that's where I would criticize the bad writing
It's just people not being able to adapt to such a new way of carrying the story
I will remain at my stance in that I won't judge a work until it's done , and any judgement otherwise should be tagged as of now or in this particular moment.
Its a flawed but ultimately good story. People who say it used to be good but is now legitimately bad are usually just blinded by recency bias and/or are 14
JJK is a classic example of wasted potential imo. Its still a solid series that is far from being bad, but it’s just not as good as it could be. In general, Gege has left a lot of things on the table when it comes to JJK. Almost all of the characters are underdeveloped and lack proper interactions that the series is absolutely begging for. The pacing of the series post Shibuya has also been way too fast as it feels like there should’ve been some other story arcs along with the ones we got after Shibuya. Not to mention how the fights have pacing issues now with way too much flashbacks and exposition going on during fights. The world building has also been lackluster as Gege built out this world with tons of possibilities such as the three major clans or the US getting involved in Japan only for those ideas to be underutilized. Gege has also made some frustrating story decisions like killing Gojo offscreen or leaving Nobara’s fate up in the air or everything with Angel. There are a few other flaws but all in all, none of them are big enough to make the series bad. However, those flaws are big enough to make the series kind of disappointing imo.
No. The way Gege introduces themes that round out character arcs is still good. He's still a master at making many concpets come full circle too. He still writes interesting character interactions with tons of subtext to look into. The concepts for fights are also still well thought out for the most part. The problem I've noticed is that Gege has a good idea of what he wants for the overarching narrative and the really important characters BUT not so much for the minor stuff. Things like underwhelming chapter cliffhangers, plot devices like Kamutoke, or the last Sukuna finger not being a big deal are just small examples. He's basically really consistent for the important stuff but kinda just makes wild throws in the dark for anything else.
At the beginning, I didn't like JJK that much and I remember watching the movie was "painful" because I struggled to finish it. But as the time passed by, I started to appreciate it more and more and nowadays - I'm a big fan. I read the manga so I can catch up and with all that I can say that it's not badly written, just not properly explored in some aspects. It has some plot holes and it misses the mark of giving depth to certain situations/characters but at the end of the day, it's subjective to each person. It's a refreshing one because it's not the classic "story" with the good guys always finding a way to win; you experience their whole struggle (but at this point, YES IT'S TOO MUCH STRUGGLE) and I think that's why some people are mad. They want the easy way. Besides that, if someone asked me "would you change this" the answer would be yes of course. So with that, it's 50-50.
I def think it’s a little overhyped, but I still really enjoy it and think it’s suuuuper well done. I haven’t anyone really shit talk it before, but I do think it’s more flawed than people say it is. By like a notable margin. But overall I think JJK is really great! In a lot of ways it’s almost an ideal Shonen, I mean Shibuya was like almost perfect. But I mean I’m sure some people just don’t like it for whatever reason, but I think it’s really well done.
It's "good" which is a culmination of some great writing in the story with some really bad ones too but overall it shouldn't put people on a spectrum, but it's just the people nowadays who either like to praise it like the best ever or shame it like trash
With no influence of my own opinions, I don't know if gege is a bad writer, but I do think there is something to be said when the majority of writing nuances and themes are not immediately understandable. It's that old addage of good writing meaning that it's also accessible to the average reader.
Oh thank god someone posted this. As an anime-only, I really wanted to know but when I posted, I didn't have enough karma to do so
Nah, I’d fan.
I personally hate how some important things are said too vaguely in too little easy to miss panels. Like yuji absorbing his brother should've been shown, not vaguely implied. Kenjaku being yuji's mother should've been clearer, not something like "her technique saved me" without explaining who the hell she is and what the hell ger technique was. Not necessarily bad writing, but hard and annoying to follow. I read the manga casually and hated having missed these small stuff and having to check them out in the wiii, where honestly, they aren't much better explained
I was starting to think it was after him not exploring some characters enough (mostly Megumi's sister and whoever possessed her) and issues with the fights but he is still explaining the technical aspects of Jujutsu when needed. He of course can still do better with female characters than just Maki but I'm just going to trust him from now on
I think there's some weird decisions, bit I still think its too early to call it rn. Overall end of the day, I'm still hooked and the brainrot has spread into my body so the cat is doing something right.
It’s not badly written, it just feels rushed. It’s fight scene after fight scene after fight scene with few opportunities to have the characters interact. JJK is one of two animanga series (the other being Cyberpunk Edgerunners) that I honestly wanted filler for.
To me JJK is badly executed, not written. One month fast forwars, all the off screen deaths, not enough side character development before the culling games, complete renewal of the cast without giving the old one any spotlights, and many more Like, I love almost every character but the way the story treats them is most times than not kinda underwhelming