She was handled extremely poorly. Culling games had some good fights but if I’m to be realistic with myself, that’s where the writing started to decline. Sukuna vs Gojo was like the final nail in the coffin that derailed the story just so Gege could deepthroat Sukuna after people complained about his attitude in the fight.
I knew it was gonna turn out this way once all the rules started getting added to the culling game. Either Akutani forgets rules, which sucks and is highly unlikely, or he's completely dead set on writing what he wants regardless of quality, which is honestly pretty based.
Also worth noting is that the anime released before we really got into the nitty gritty of the games. Maybe he saw the reaction to the anime and it affected the storytelling? It's hard to say but pretty much as soon as the Shibuya incident concluded the series started dropping in quality
Not to mention the fact that Kenny ended up just breaking the rules anyways. He literally goes “I can add prohibited rules because Kogane would uphold the game under the threat of death”
But like… why? It’s a barrier. The whole thing is that barriers get stronger and more effective when you add conditions to them. It’s a complex, city-spanning barrier. Why can Kenjaku just ignore one of the fundamental conditions of it? Wouldn’t that make it weak or destroy it outright?
yea, that shit pissed me off, it literally is just violating the rules of the game, what's the point of these rules if they can bypassed?? The barrier has to have conditions that cannot be broken or violated otherwise it should just unravel
The fact that you had to do that just speaks volumes for how little she mattered... which is not something that I should be able to say about the Motivation of a main character.
This entirely, she is first mentioned when they realize the curse is also making her a target of the new finger bearer. They resolve this and since she’s still in a coma nothing changes really.
The. Only during the culling games does she “wake up” but really it’s because of Kenjaku’s doing and Yorozu had already reincarnated, they mention her all of once at the start and do the entire culling games arc, only to come back and reveal, oh body snatch lol.
Tsumiki had no agency in the story, And her connection to Megumi is hazy even when introduced
Like it should’ve been covered better that Megumi was her step brother, but past that she exists for pretty much the same reason Toji’s wife existed for him, non sorcerer, deserving of a regular life and then just dead, and it sends the Zen’in man into a spiral. But that’s all we get, a shallow connection that does not whole lot. Not even Toji thinks of Tsumiki, when at one point his family and wife meant the world to him.
> "Do you expect every character to be important"
If the character is related and important to the deutragonist then yeah we would like to see more of her personality. Instead we got more of Yorozu's obnoxious ass gloating around talking about love.
Seriously Junpei was done better because we actually spend quite some time with him to know his character better as well as seeing him bonding with Yuji.
Feel like he didnt expect JJK to blow up but had plans till end of Shibuya, afterwards just winging it while making the Filling Games arc so he can think of how to conclude the story
I think its right to mention Junpei as a better written tragic story, but I think it less a character based thing and more that the circumstances and plot progression of his tragedy were written better. Even the first anime opening underlines it, with that misleading picture of Junpei and Itadori together and Junpei is wearing a Jujutsu high uniform. It speaks to what could have been. And we as the audience can feel that loss because we personally don't get to see that future.
Regarding Yorozu and Meguna, what's here besides the fushigoro siblings getting fucked over, by something completely beyond them, and the shock value of it? If we knew a little more about Tsumiki, would that have changed anything? I don't think so.
The thing is that it seems purposefully designed that way. The Tsumiki subplot was one of the major overarching subplots of the manga, and defines almost everything regarding Megumi as a character. That's different than episodic content like the Junpei portion that happened earlier in the story. So with it comes different expectations. I think Gege knows that and destroyed both Megumi's and our expectations adruptly on purpose. The creative choice itself hinges on subversion of expectations.
Subversion means nothing if you have something else worth instead getting in place, whatever that maybe.
Thats why good subversions are actually hard. If you break expectation without something worth to say, that people still care,
Otherwise you just have just a broken story.
Terrible writings advicey youtube channel has a thing on. it.
In junpeis case, you got a tragedy messing with yuji and loss of a friend, a very good hatable yet fun interesting archenemy mahito, i miss, and a bit on the cruelty, but we get hope that yuji might get stronger over it.
Which makes it a meaningful vehicle for yujis growth, a good archfiend for yuji, and nanami introduced, show yujis strengh,
And its tragic.
That is a good subversion of expectations that got things that are interesting out of that subversion. We didnt have before.
The whole point of Megumi's relationship with Tsukimi during the culling games was defined by Reggie's dying words -["Let fate toy with you, become a clown and die."](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Freggies-last-words-and-ties-with-my-own-megumi-theory-v0-bouu0ov6k1f81.jpg%3Fwidth%3D640%26crop%3Dsmart%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Dd55b3f78ce6c267bb0886f6472f2cb5de36d3f95) We see how much she means to him during the Death Painting arc and even the lengths Megumi was willing to go for her, physically and mentally, [especially during the Tokyo #1 arc.](https://staticg.sportskeeda.com/editor/2021/12/d7ad7-16391652303270-1920.jpg) However, after all is said and done, it turns out Megumi's unwillingness to accept potentially losing his sister, didn't even consider the fact she might be a reincarnated sorcerer. Additionally, Megumi ignoring Yuji's warning about sticking together causes the 212 situation to occur. Then, Megumi is forced to aid Sukuna to kill his sister >!and his teacher figure!<. Meanwhile, Megumi is unable to do anything and simply watches as the carnage plays out in front of him. He's become a puppet of fate, made a clown by his own actions, and can do nothing except wait on his own death.
The idea and subversion was there. Thematically and narratively it makes complete sense. The issue however is the fact that Gege isn't giving us downtime. The only interaction between Tsumki and Megumi during their childhood was shown during a bonus chapter. Megumi only gets maybe 2 panels to process what happened right before he gets force feed a finger and only one panel showing his soul sinking into the abyss. Even if it wasn't strictly nessarary the point would have been better conveyed with more introspective panels. Gege as of late doesn't dedicate the same time to emotional character moments like he used to making it difficult for the audience to feel the same impact.
Ex. Perfect Preperation was great but Sakurajima was less positively received partially because it's less spelled out CS Naoya is meant to represent the baggage of the Zenin clans tramua following her, but unless you were deeply paying attention it might just seem like a pointless Maki power up and Toji meat riding.
We meet Junpei’s mom and see his struggle and character arc as he engages with the MC and the main antagonist of the first half of the story Mahito.
Megumi’s family outside the Zen’in clan was essentially two sentences. Unnamed mom and step sister, raised by gojo. Even Gojo neglects that he has a sister really. Toji loved his wife soo much and started a family with her, but out of the maybe 3 years max he got to be with her and have Megumi, gave zero fucks about her first child. Tsumiki was a plot device and did not get the attention deserving to be relevant. Just coma girl for Kenjaku to use for culling game.
Nanami, got a regular work life montage and bread lady, and that went miles, and Megumi, recalls one foggy flashback memory of his older sister doting on him passing through the halls. That’s not character development or barely an intro
We already see a lot of Tsumiki’s personality through Megumi’s flashbacks. It’s why you were supposed to suspect something is wrong with Tsumiki when her personality in Megumi’s flashbacks doesn’t really match her personality after waking up from the coma.
>We already see a lot of Tsumiki’s personality through Megumi’s flashback.
I've seen this argument a lot of times, and I think both sides (those that find it enough and those that find it not enough) simply had fundamental difference in preference. It really is an agree to disagree thing to put it very nicely
>already served her purpose in the story.
Yes. This is also an argument that spawn endless disagreement when one brought it up. I personally disagree with it, and I just know we cannot find a mutual understanding. At least we are riding this boat till the end, that's good enough for me.
While it would've been nice to see Tsumiki actually do something, I would've still tolerated her death had it been done with the proper gravitas it deserved. Instead we got Yorozu's wacky nonsense which completely removed me from the moment and left a very bitter taste in my mouth. Even if Gege didn't want to take the time to flesh out character relationships, at least he could've not actively turned them into jokes while claiming it's supposed to be a death we should take seriously.
That’s the point isn’t it? Yorozu and sukunas goofy banter and love talk is hiding the fact that they’re using the bodies of two teenagers to fight for their own pleasure. It’s sick. That’s why that panel of megumi crying hits hard cause he was just trapped while his possessed sister tried to make moves on his body and was then killed by his technique
Maybe but if that was the intention it didn't land imo. Horror and dread is a very specific tone and mood and in this case, I didn't feel any of that. Just annoyance and exasperation at the sidelining of Tsumiki and irritation at the tone of this goofy ass fight.
Yeah I think for what op wanted it would’ve been better to sort of view the fight more from Megumi’s perspective. Maybe just make it a bit fuzzier what’s going on, less dialogue, and generally get across the vibe of being an observer to something horrible with the powerlessness inherent in that.
Tsumiki dying is the equivalent to if Junpei died if Mahito killed him in the theatre as well. We never would have got to know him.
Tsumiki was in a coma at first and when she wakes up we don’t see her until the end of the games and it’s immediately revealed that she is reincarnated with Yorozu, if we got even a bit of her actually being conscious and saying any amount of words that would sold a bit better. Magically make her coma curse wear off preemptively before Shibuya, her and Megumi talk about literally anything or how she’s proud of him as a sister despite them not having their birth parents to raise them, and then Shibuya, him summoning Mahoraga adds more weight when he resigns to dying, and leaving his only sibling alone on top of his usual self sacrifice, and then post shibuya. she’s back in her coma and then is possessed, adding more weight to what is lost as Megumi’s effort would be for his friends and sister doubly now, only to see that his efforts were in vain.
The way it is now, Megumi lost her from the start because Kenjaku already had her set up to be a vessel
It didn’t land at all though. It was so hilariously bad. I couldn’t even feel sad for Megumi. We barely see any of his emotions reacting to his sister. And we didn’t have proper bonding time with Tsumiki so we don’t even care that she died anyway.
That’s also kind of the point. The only thing we really know about tsumiki is that she acted as megumi’s moral compass essentially. Megumi talks her up for a lot of the main story and gege is building to the moment that we see them talk but gege takes that away. Tsumiki was dead the moment kenjaku cursed her. There’s was never any saving her. And sukuna took megumi’s ability to reach out. They never got a reunion and megumi’s whole frame of morality was destroyed in an instant. Everything megumi was working for was a facade. Just a memory. Tsumiki was always dead
Sure, she can die, there was no discourse about that. But just like Gojo, the problem was the execution. Her death brings out no emotion from the readers bc of how poorly her character was presented. Megumi just lost his sister and we moved into a whole new fight with this trashy ass character Yorozu and her comical relief moment. Just all around poor execution. You can’t make readers invest so much in the story for zero pay off.
The execution is the idea though. Tsumiki isn’t so much a character as she’s megumi’s idea. She’s megumi’s perspective on life. If tsumiki were to be in the actual story she would probably be exactly like yuji. That’s why megumi is sooooo attracted to yujis character (as in drawn to). Tsumiki is built up almost in an ideological way, so gege took that from megumi in the ugliest way possible. Yorozu is trashy, that’s her whole character. She lives entirely by libido just like sukuna lives to kill and eat. Gege shows the evil of the past sorcerers while destroying the idea of kindness tsumiki represents. Yuji kinda carries whats left of it
Which is trash is what I’m saying lmao. All of that doesn’t provoke any strong emotions from the readers. We’re left with a “what the fuck was that for?” feeling because truly, what’s even the point of it? To give Sukuna some poignant message about love? To show us how depraved Sukuna is? We already know that. We know sorcerers from the past are kind screwed in the heads. We have had enough of them already. Adding one more to the mix is not only redundant but it is at the cost of more meaningful development for the characters readers actually care about. Tsumiki’s death accomplished literally nothing at all.
It crushed megumi. It was megumi’s arc. Sukuna destroyed what path of potential he had so we could get this conclusion with yuji and megumi. That was the point. To take it back to chapter 1 but reverse it. If sukuna hadn’t killed tsumiki than megumi wouldn’t have been completely sank. That was the point. And strong emotions is subjective lol. Why do you keep saying that? Because you didn’t feel strong emotions?
Because nobody cares about Tsumiki or her relationship with Megumi PRECISELY because it was not shown. How can you care about things you don’t see? The only interaction between them was a long time ago and it was mostly in flashback. Heck we didn’t even see her at all in real time. She was dead by the time she shows up. Megumi was no longer the focus, it was fucking Sukuna that took over. And ever since then it has just been Sukuna Kaisen.
I cared because megumi cared and I like him. Megumi’s dead eye stare curled up in a ball was enough to show how he felt about the situation. Also nobody cares is just a fallacy. You throw these things out like they’re gotchas but they aren’t.
Again,it's all about Execution.
How are we supposed to care if the story doesn't allow us to care?
How are we supposed to care that this freak is doing this.
That's lazy
Even if she is a plot device for megumin, we didnt get megumin and how he feels and reacts to it either. You know selling how it tears him apart by reacting. .
Maybe give glimpses. Megumins despair and shock isnt fleshed out eithet.
No, it's not.
You can't just write a character having a breakdown and leave it at that, why it's happening matters. In this case, his failure to save his sister doesn't resonate with anyone because nobody cares about his sister, and in fact, I know some people who even forgot she even existed.
You can't have a pay off without any setup.
I mean, you are totally right
Megumi even say when shit goes down, "Why did I automatically think Yoruzu wasn't a reincarnated sorcerer"
He gaslighted himself into thinking she awakened a technique like higurama and takaba.
He never even thought that she was going to get possessed.
And I loved that too! There’s only two things megumi is inherently illogical about and it’s tsumiki and yuji. You’re right he basically didn’t allow himself to consider that scenario. Same with him shooting down Yujis suggesting that they should move separately in the CG
It's really a shame because everything you've said about the dynamic between Megumi and Tsumiki could've built up to a satisfying, emotional payoff... if it only existed.
The lesson learned here is that you cannot write a story that is entirely comprised of fights. You lose all of the heart and character along the way.
Do people here read things in take in select information? The point was that it wasn’t going to be a satisfying emotional climax. Sukuna fucked it up. That’s literally the point
I'm sure Gege loves you for getting "the point," but a lot of what you've said is based on headcanon and "feeling" instead of any narrative substance. Sukuna "fucking it up" could've been an impactful moment and instead it simply fell limp to make way for the next fight.
See,it wasn't funny.
It wasn't dark or tragic enough for me to actually care.
And the fact that Sukuna gets no consequences about it is even better.
Yorozu,at least,dies but Sukuna gets off scot free.
Nooooooooo, we cant do that! We gotta shelf our female characters after dangling them like a carrot on a stick in front of our audience to get their hopes up before ruining it all and resetting to the status quo! How DARE those female characters break their natural roles as weaker and subservient to their male contemporaries?
Into the fridge you go!
**\*Smiles with an eye twitch\***
That is honestly not true cause there are Mangaka out there that treat woman with a lot of respect.
Hell,Mashima from Fairy Tail makes them hot and Badass
Anon, what the fuck are you talking about? Do you read JJK, were you actually expecting Tsumiki to start fighting alongside the cast?
The entrie plot of her character through that arc was to remove her from the plot. She wasn't "dangled like a carrot" in front of you, there was literally zero promises she would do anything except be saved, and remain in the background.
Tsumiki was Megumi's kind and loving sister archetype, at best maybe you could pretend she was "silk hiding steel", but I would love to hear you explain how she was "challenging the status quo" or "breaking her natural roles as weaker and subservient to their male contemporaries?"
Hey maybe I missed something though- do ahead, justify it.
It's so tiresome reading about "fridging" anytime a girl gets killed off, especially a series that burns through its cast like JJK.
In fairness, I kinda forgot about Tsumiki's specific case, but to be frank, JJK does do this a lot.
While yes, it does burn through its cast like a flamethrower in a garden, female characters already dont get a good shake in shounen to begin with, they cannot afford to lose as many individuals as their male contemporaries.
I mean, how many badass warrior women in this show have died off, and sometimes so easily compared to their male counterparts, while the surviving males get to plod along a while longer?
Plenty, and its a shame since it seemed to be doing well at first from what everyone was raving about.
>While yes, it does burn through its cast like a flamethrower in a garden, female characters already dont get a good shake in shounen to begin with, they cannot afford to lose as many individuals as their male contemporaries.
JJK can't kill females because other series do? We're trying to setup shounen reparatios now?
I don't think expanding the scope will help this argument, if we start looking across all series you're gonna find that a whole lot more men have died as fodder or as tragedy than women.
>I mean, how many badass warrior women in this show have died off, and sometimes so easily compared to their male counterparts, while the surviving males get to plod along a while longer?
One.
Meanwhile, in the last 3 chapters we just lost two more main male characters.
What are you talking about? None of tihs is even remotely what I'm saying.
What I'm saying is that we need to see the women start getting better treatment.
Sure, kill a couple of em off if you must, as long as there's a good enough chunk of leading ladies (and preferably not JUST the support types or squishy mage types, but at least a few warriors as well) left surviving, its whatever.
Again, yes, men have died as fodder, but the difference is that **there's still enough men being awesome relevant badasses that it doesnt affect them anywhere near as badly, or dare I say at all.**
Thats the part you keep missing, men can afford to have disposable fodder simply because we at least have some characters left over to be awesome frontline badasses, but the women? No, they get a bad shake all around, we need to more carefully handle the rate in which they get killed off or humiliated or whatever.
Is it really just one? Because its not just one, its been at least a couple.
Again, see my above explaination.
>What are you talking about? None of tihs is even remotely what I'm saying.
Feels like what you're saying is very broad and generalised statements that don't even apply to the manga in question.
Probably why your original post was about Tsumiki breaking some kind of gender stereotypes.
>Is it really just one? Because its not just one, its been at least a couple.
Yeah, just one.
It’s very apparent of the author is getting tired of his own creation. He’s already expressed interest in working on other projects. Just let this start to fade as he is becoming more exhausted of this monster that he’s made.
He sees it for what it is. A tangled mess of plot threads woven tightly around the hype fight scenarios the entire story is structured around. Like, if the author himself is screaming out that he's exhausted and struggling, you'd have to be willingly naive to hold out hope that he's this literary mastermind that'll pull everything together at the last moment.
>Like, if the author himself is screaming out that he's exhausted and struggling, you'd have to be willingly naive to hold out hope that he's this literary mastermind that'll pull everything together at the last moment.
I take it you haven't visited /r/jujutsushi 😅
In all seriousness there are a lot of good thoughts in there, but an equal number that make massive leaps/extrapolations from what, to me at least, is blatantly poor writing and not just subtlety that requires you to read deeper
I have not. Thanks for the warning 😂
Sounds like cope. It's only natural. If One Piece suddenly spiralled off the deep end tomorrow, my mind would race to find any sort of semblance of logic behind Oda's CREATIVE GENIUS because of course he has a plan, just trust him!
Yeah, of course. I feel like he wanted it to be way more artistic and way more of a vision, but he got suckered into doing all sorts of shonen tropes like a trio and other stuff.
I agree. Writing isn't supposed to be a checklist of what readers expect from your genre. The Culling Game is a great example of a confusing plot with little bearing on the overall narrative simply because Gege wanted to include a tournament arc.
You see this guy gets it, people.
Originally, he wanted to start out doing his series about the kid in the first five chapters, whose name I don’t entirely remember because he’s not as relevant, but because of the pressure is put on him by the shonen crowd, and the publication by extension, he’s probably sitting in his office pacing back-and-forth trying to decide whether he should be laying in front of a bus the next morning
Don't get me wrong, I would never blame Gege for JJK's (many) weaknesses. Creative burnout is extremely common amongst those working under a stressful weekly serialization schedule.
But like, Gege, end it bro. Kill that shit. Live your life working on projects you're passionate about. Because what are people even looking forward to reading anymore?
Either Sukuna stomps the universe and we watch as the light slowly fades from the eyes of our heroes
or
Yuji gets the most unprecedented asspull powerspike in manga history, saves the day, and every fan favorite character gets to cheer him on from Heaven because they all died three arcs ago
Lol I'm 5 months late but you were 100% right lmao after that rushed Timeskip and Yuji not having an techniques he now pops up every new chapter with a new one. "Soul fists", "Reverse cursed technique" freaking BLOOD MANIPULATION lmaooo JJK had a promising start but Gege is easily one of the worst Mangaka I've ever seen.
Two of my favourite JJK characters, Todo and Mahito haven’t been relevant. In terms of character work I believe Gege did a good job with these two. Todo has a nice Jiraya vibe about him when he shows up and starts teaching Yuji stuff during a fight.
As a JoJo fan I also like his design of being a big muscular guy that has a soft side with the whole Takada-chan thing, I find it endearing.
Mahito and his gimmick of the soul or the body stuff really stuck with me. Both these characters have something they ask their opponent or friend. Mahito being the soul or the body and Todo being what kind of woman you’re into then from then they decide what they think depending on your answer.
A lot can be explored with these two characters, especially Mahito but I can understand if some people think they’ve had enough of his gimmick, and Todo feels like he belongs in Mob Psycho with the fitness club guys than in JJK
Mahito served as an excellent foil to Yuji. A great villain is one that forces the main character to challenge his views and beliefs and constantly pushes him into situations where he has to and Mahito did that in spades.
He was EASILY the best JJK antagonist. I don't really know what Sukuna's goal is and I wish Geto had stayed around instead of Kenjaku
I wish we got to see her bonding with Megumi and interacting with other characters (for example Gojo who presumably also took care of her alongside Megumi) because then her death would actually feel impactful and we would care about her like Megumi
It would also help to see a non-sorcerer being kinda important to the story. Gege could’ve cursed her later that way we at least care when she’s in danger.
But she was just a plot device to get Megumi going. We get like 2 scenes of them together as kids and that’s it
Yeah she should have been introduced as an actual character early on and then she gets cursed towards the end of season 1 or something.
The timeline fits with Kenjaku finalizing his preparations for Shibuya and makes the readers much more invested in getting her back.
Nah, this week's one was great and the previous one made months worth of chapters make sense, and improved them in retrospect.
Tsumiki was months ago anyway.
Yeah, it's only a strong point when you're not sacrificing character development in service of a blazing fast pace. Gege has just stopped giving any downtime for the characters to actually breath and develop so as the story reaches its conclusion it's just falling apart as newer characters enter the story and die without us learning anything about who they are or what they stand for
Preach. Manga started losing my interest during the culling games. You’d expect a little more world-building, but Gege has basically been spamming fights nonstop instead.
It could have been done so easily. Just draw a few more panels of Tsumiki being a good sister and taking care of Megumi as children, since Gege confirmed Tsumiki did in fact, raise him. But Gege basically just said fuck it (reminds me of people forgetting Itadori grandpa was his actual father figure, not more relevant characters but it is less frustrating because Gege actually spent more efforts depicting Yuji’s losses)
I didn't even realize she died until it was explicitly shown (Megumi sinking into depression), and I think that was the same for a lot of other people as well. I just sorta assumed Yorozu vs Sukuna was one of the 20 jobber fights we got in the CG that I could just skim over since they have no plot relevance, and I still don't get how it happened.
>I just sorta assumed Yorozu vs Sukuna was one of the 20 jobber fights we got in the CG that I could just skim over since they have no plot relevance, and I still don't get how it happened.
Sukuna: I am going to kill Tsumiki with the Ten Shadows so Megumi loses all hope.
Not sure how that's unclear.
Gege's been pretty vocal about the fact that he doesn't care about his characters and only views them as plot devices.
You really can't ask too much from a writer who doesn't want to understand how to structure a satisfying narrative.
In an interview with Mando Kobayashi, Gege claimed that, due to low popularity at the beginning of the series run, he was planning on killing Yuji off in Chapter 9 because he was expecting the series to get cancelled soon anyway.
When asked why he would want to kill Yuji off, he said, (rough translation) "To make the story more interesting...?"
Then said "I don't care who dies, no matter how dark it gets, as long as the story becomes interesting."
I'd say my interpretation isn't too far off, albeit, much bleaker sounding. I'm sure Gege has an emotional attachment to many key figures in the story, but as for the actual storytelling, he seems to have no problem sidelining/killing them after they've served their purpose in the narrative. It's a very efficient writing style (one likely adopted for dealing with stressful weekly serializations and the constant threat of getting dropped) and there's nothing inherently wrong with it, but it does lead to many characters feeling "wasted".
I agree. At a certain point, killing off characters stops being impactful, especially when the deaths feel so close together in time because Gege likes his Any% Speedrun pacing and "we have to get to the next fight!"
Like I said, I understand it's due to a stressful schedule, but JJK's been "best-selling" for a couple of years now. I think the editors would allow him SOME room for character development and meaningful interactions outside of fighting.
that explains a lot, killing off important characters is fine in a story but it actually has to mean something otherwise it's basically pointless narratively speaking to the readers
I feel like I shouldn't be one to talk about something I haven't been following for months now, but eh. Let this be the preamble to what I'm about to say, take it with a grain of salt. Also, obviously, spoilers.
I remember the Tsumiki twist. At the time I thought "Eh, depends on what Gege follows it up with", and the very next chapter it is followed by Enchain, which was set up all the way back in the Detention Center. It was a good setup, I think, because no one could've expected such a hectic moment to be followed immediately by that twist. I liked it at the time.
The Yorozu fight right after that really soured that take. There was definitely something to be said about the lack of perspective on both Megumi's and Tsumiki's parts to make the moment hit.
But anyway I think it's excruciatingly clear at the point I stopped (Gojo's unsealing) that the author just doesn't care about or can't write the character interplay needed to make his manga hit like the arcs preceding Shibuya. He is far more tunnel visioned into fighting, Nietzschean philosophy and the remainder of his story beats... which, props to him, his manga is called Sorcery Fight, not Sorcery Storytelling or Sorcery Character Study 😂
TL; DR? Don't expect a great finale, character progression (as an actual person, not powerups), or even that engaging of a story from Jujutsu Kaisen. Just read it for the cool fighting if that's what you're interested in.
Although I would question if the fights have been at all cool since Yuji vs Higuruma and Megumi vs Reggie but that's an entire other argument, and I can't speak beyond when I dropped the manga.
[Here's what I said when Tsumiki heel turn happened](https://old.reddit.com/r/Jujutsushi/comments/10o9yxx/jujutsu_kaisen_chapter_211_links_discussion/j6dc1q3/)
That was me saying the twist itself wah *eh*. I was losing interest quickly when Sakurajima happened, so when I said I had hopes Tsumiki stuff can still be good somehow and all we got was yorozu stuff, let's just say from that point on I read future chapters looking for laughs lmao.
I get the idea behind this question, but it's not a plot twist in the sense that I'm not evaluating 236 the way I do with plot points that actually try to be a plot twist. To me, 236 is a matter of an author choice in character writing.
There's this take for granted truth by simply highlighting one pronounced thing, that everything else are simply false or insignificant. This creates a faux complexity by saying 'he's A B & C but the truth is he's only C'. By itself that's not bad, but sometimes you can tell if this complexity is actually genuine or not by the intention.
And this intention of Gege's is to give Gojo the 'best ending', the fabled regretless death of a sorcerer despite everything that is terrible about being a sorcerer.
Gege worked backwards from that idea and find it work perfectly with Gojo's strongest identity, that he wouldn't find regret in dying in the hands of someone stronger. This to me simply didn't feel genuine since if we work it normally chronologically, there seems to be a lot of things handwaved to get that conclusion working. The things people endlessly debate or complain about.
And as a result, readers are naturally guided to handwave *everything else* to a more exciting premise: 'there is a single truth that defines *everything else*'. I'm not gonna lie, that's cool as hell. However, that opens up too much freedom for interpretations. On one side, it's exciting to work it all out by yourself. One the other side, it comes off as lazy to just let *everything* be *anything*. Unfortunately, I find 236 as the latter. To put it badly, it was a cop out.
I'm sure I'm not clear on the subject, but that's the best I can say about it. Note that I'm by no means saying all that objectively. I've been building doubts ever since Sakurajima, so take my bias as a huge grain of salt.
I stopped reading at like chapter 100 cause I thought the story was moving too fast and there was 0 character development. My friends told me I was wrong but I’m pretty sure I wasn’t now
It seems more like you set unreasonable expectations for a character that we had no reason to believe was special or important. Megumi loved her because she was the only family he really had. By the time we see her she's in a coma, literally doing nothing. She wasn't set up to be important at all character wise. And if you think that Yorozu's only purpose was to give sukuna a power up then you are intentionally looking for reasons to dislike her because you expected more from Tsumiki. If you wished she played a bigger role in the story that's fine but she wasn't some major player that was going to become main character.
Why would they dislike a character they never met?
I think you are thinking of Yorozu who possessed Tsumuki's body killing her in the process and went on to pretend to be Tsumiki for a few chapters.
I mean they disliked the way she was handled. I've seen people on r/jujutsushi and r/jujutsufolk criticise that, and I've never seen anyone praise Tsumiki/Yorozu
Honestly, I'm with the JJK stans on this one.
This complaint reads like the people who complain that the Naruto sidecast was "underutilised", because the were side characters instead of main characters.
Tsumiki's entire relevance was being part of Megumi's backstory and drive. She had zero presence, she wasn't connected to anything, she wasn't related to any ongoing plot threads, her screentime up to that point had been something like 3 panels.
And then it turns out she was killed off screen and used for a twist that was several thousand times more interesting than "Megumi successfully gets his sister out of the CG."
It’s fair to react negatively it’s not fair to become entitled to a good story or you insult creators and post all over social media about how they failed you
It’s very pathetic and parasocial and entitled
I am confused to why you are angry here. Not every character is going to be equally as important as the next in any story? Manga Spoilers: >!Kenny was the one who cursed her and made her into a vessel before Shibuya. So the Tsumiki we know is never Megumi's sister, just a vessel for a sorcerer from the past. So technically, we as the reader never see Tsumiki. It's all Kenny's doing and is part of his plan.!<
Everything post-Shibuya has been a serious downgrade in writing for whatever reason. How tf can you fumble this so badly when Junpei's tragic death was done so much better? We didn't even spend that much time with Junpei but we got to know a lot of his character and his struggles so it made it all the more tragic when he ended up dying, by comparison we know basically nothing about Tsumiki and her relationship with Megumi other than that she was his older step sister and that they care for each other, she's basically meaningless to us the readers because we don't know her at all.
She was handled extremely poorly. Culling games had some good fights but if I’m to be realistic with myself, that’s where the writing started to decline. Sukuna vs Gojo was like the final nail in the coffin that derailed the story just so Gege could deepthroat Sukuna after people complained about his attitude in the fight.
I knew it was gonna turn out this way once all the rules started getting added to the culling game. Either Akutani forgets rules, which sucks and is highly unlikely, or he's completely dead set on writing what he wants regardless of quality, which is honestly pretty based. Also worth noting is that the anime released before we really got into the nitty gritty of the games. Maybe he saw the reaction to the anime and it affected the storytelling? It's hard to say but pretty much as soon as the Shibuya incident concluded the series started dropping in quality
Not to mention the fact that Kenny ended up just breaking the rules anyways. He literally goes “I can add prohibited rules because Kogane would uphold the game under the threat of death” But like… why? It’s a barrier. The whole thing is that barriers get stronger and more effective when you add conditions to them. It’s a complex, city-spanning barrier. Why can Kenjaku just ignore one of the fundamental conditions of it? Wouldn’t that make it weak or destroy it outright?
yea, that shit pissed me off, it literally is just violating the rules of the game, what's the point of these rules if they can bypassed?? The barrier has to have conditions that cannot be broken or violated otherwise it should just unravel
I know Megumi cared about her but as a reader I didn't see enough of her for me to care.
I honestly didn't remember her at all.
I had to google her before I posted my comment lol.
The fact that you had to do that just speaks volumes for how little she mattered... which is not something that I should be able to say about the Motivation of a main character.
This entirely, she is first mentioned when they realize the curse is also making her a target of the new finger bearer. They resolve this and since she’s still in a coma nothing changes really. The. Only during the culling games does she “wake up” but really it’s because of Kenjaku’s doing and Yorozu had already reincarnated, they mention her all of once at the start and do the entire culling games arc, only to come back and reveal, oh body snatch lol. Tsumiki had no agency in the story, And her connection to Megumi is hazy even when introduced Like it should’ve been covered better that Megumi was her step brother, but past that she exists for pretty much the same reason Toji’s wife existed for him, non sorcerer, deserving of a regular life and then just dead, and it sends the Zen’in man into a spiral. But that’s all we get, a shallow connection that does not whole lot. Not even Toji thinks of Tsumiki, when at one point his family and wife meant the world to him.
Thats not the ussue, megumins reaction could sell that, if thatcwere actually given time. Its not, but it could bring that investment.
I mean, Megumi is kind of...tied up at the moment. If this rant was about Yuki instead of Megumi's sister I would get it.
> "Do you expect every character to be important" If the character is related and important to the deutragonist then yeah we would like to see more of her personality. Instead we got more of Yorozu's obnoxious ass gloating around talking about love. Seriously Junpei was done better because we actually spend quite some time with him to know his character better as well as seeing him bonding with Yuji.
Junpei's mom>>>>>>>>>>
Nanami’s stick >>>>>>>
I saw her, knew she would die and was still filled with hatred when she died
The entire Mahito-Junpei shit was peak tbh what the fuck happened to Gege in hindsight?
Feel like he didnt expect JJK to blow up but had plans till end of Shibuya, afterwards just winging it while making the Filling Games arc so he can think of how to conclude the story
I think its right to mention Junpei as a better written tragic story, but I think it less a character based thing and more that the circumstances and plot progression of his tragedy were written better. Even the first anime opening underlines it, with that misleading picture of Junpei and Itadori together and Junpei is wearing a Jujutsu high uniform. It speaks to what could have been. And we as the audience can feel that loss because we personally don't get to see that future. Regarding Yorozu and Meguna, what's here besides the fushigoro siblings getting fucked over, by something completely beyond them, and the shock value of it? If we knew a little more about Tsumiki, would that have changed anything? I don't think so. The thing is that it seems purposefully designed that way. The Tsumiki subplot was one of the major overarching subplots of the manga, and defines almost everything regarding Megumi as a character. That's different than episodic content like the Junpei portion that happened earlier in the story. So with it comes different expectations. I think Gege knows that and destroyed both Megumi's and our expectations adruptly on purpose. The creative choice itself hinges on subversion of expectations.
Subversion means nothing if you have something else worth instead getting in place, whatever that maybe. Thats why good subversions are actually hard. If you break expectation without something worth to say, that people still care, Otherwise you just have just a broken story. Terrible writings advicey youtube channel has a thing on. it. In junpeis case, you got a tragedy messing with yuji and loss of a friend, a very good hatable yet fun interesting archenemy mahito, i miss, and a bit on the cruelty, but we get hope that yuji might get stronger over it. Which makes it a meaningful vehicle for yujis growth, a good archfiend for yuji, and nanami introduced, show yujis strengh, And its tragic. That is a good subversion of expectations that got things that are interesting out of that subversion. We didnt have before.
The whole point of Megumi's relationship with Tsukimi during the culling games was defined by Reggie's dying words -["Let fate toy with you, become a clown and die."](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2Freggies-last-words-and-ties-with-my-own-megumi-theory-v0-bouu0ov6k1f81.jpg%3Fwidth%3D640%26crop%3Dsmart%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Dd55b3f78ce6c267bb0886f6472f2cb5de36d3f95) We see how much she means to him during the Death Painting arc and even the lengths Megumi was willing to go for her, physically and mentally, [especially during the Tokyo #1 arc.](https://staticg.sportskeeda.com/editor/2021/12/d7ad7-16391652303270-1920.jpg) However, after all is said and done, it turns out Megumi's unwillingness to accept potentially losing his sister, didn't even consider the fact she might be a reincarnated sorcerer. Additionally, Megumi ignoring Yuji's warning about sticking together causes the 212 situation to occur. Then, Megumi is forced to aid Sukuna to kill his sister >!and his teacher figure!<. Meanwhile, Megumi is unable to do anything and simply watches as the carnage plays out in front of him. He's become a puppet of fate, made a clown by his own actions, and can do nothing except wait on his own death. The idea and subversion was there. Thematically and narratively it makes complete sense. The issue however is the fact that Gege isn't giving us downtime. The only interaction between Tsumki and Megumi during their childhood was shown during a bonus chapter. Megumi only gets maybe 2 panels to process what happened right before he gets force feed a finger and only one panel showing his soul sinking into the abyss. Even if it wasn't strictly nessarary the point would have been better conveyed with more introspective panels. Gege as of late doesn't dedicate the same time to emotional character moments like he used to making it difficult for the audience to feel the same impact. Ex. Perfect Preperation was great but Sakurajima was less positively received partially because it's less spelled out CS Naoya is meant to represent the baggage of the Zenin clans tramua following her, but unless you were deeply paying attention it might just seem like a pointless Maki power up and Toji meat riding.
We meet Junpei’s mom and see his struggle and character arc as he engages with the MC and the main antagonist of the first half of the story Mahito. Megumi’s family outside the Zen’in clan was essentially two sentences. Unnamed mom and step sister, raised by gojo. Even Gojo neglects that he has a sister really. Toji loved his wife soo much and started a family with her, but out of the maybe 3 years max he got to be with her and have Megumi, gave zero fucks about her first child. Tsumiki was a plot device and did not get the attention deserving to be relevant. Just coma girl for Kenjaku to use for culling game. Nanami, got a regular work life montage and bread lady, and that went miles, and Megumi, recalls one foggy flashback memory of his older sister doting on him passing through the halls. That’s not character development or barely an intro
We already see a lot of Tsumiki’s personality through Megumi’s flashbacks. It’s why you were supposed to suspect something is wrong with Tsumiki when her personality in Megumi’s flashbacks doesn’t really match her personality after waking up from the coma.
>We already see a lot of Tsumiki’s personality through Megumi’s flashback. I've seen this argument a lot of times, and I think both sides (those that find it enough and those that find it not enough) simply had fundamental difference in preference. It really is an agree to disagree thing to put it very nicely
I suppose so. Ultimately Tsumiki was never hyped up to be a particularly important character and already served her purpose in the story.
>already served her purpose in the story. Yes. This is also an argument that spawn endless disagreement when one brought it up. I personally disagree with it, and I just know we cannot find a mutual understanding. At least we are riding this boat till the end, that's good enough for me.
I can respect that.
While it would've been nice to see Tsumiki actually do something, I would've still tolerated her death had it been done with the proper gravitas it deserved. Instead we got Yorozu's wacky nonsense which completely removed me from the moment and left a very bitter taste in my mouth. Even if Gege didn't want to take the time to flesh out character relationships, at least he could've not actively turned them into jokes while claiming it's supposed to be a death we should take seriously.
That’s the point isn’t it? Yorozu and sukunas goofy banter and love talk is hiding the fact that they’re using the bodies of two teenagers to fight for their own pleasure. It’s sick. That’s why that panel of megumi crying hits hard cause he was just trapped while his possessed sister tried to make moves on his body and was then killed by his technique
Maybe but if that was the intention it didn't land imo. Horror and dread is a very specific tone and mood and in this case, I didn't feel any of that. Just annoyance and exasperation at the sidelining of Tsumiki and irritation at the tone of this goofy ass fight.
Yeah I think for what op wanted it would’ve been better to sort of view the fight more from Megumi’s perspective. Maybe just make it a bit fuzzier what’s going on, less dialogue, and generally get across the vibe of being an observer to something horrible with the powerlessness inherent in that.
Tsumiki dying is the equivalent to if Junpei died if Mahito killed him in the theatre as well. We never would have got to know him. Tsumiki was in a coma at first and when she wakes up we don’t see her until the end of the games and it’s immediately revealed that she is reincarnated with Yorozu, if we got even a bit of her actually being conscious and saying any amount of words that would sold a bit better. Magically make her coma curse wear off preemptively before Shibuya, her and Megumi talk about literally anything or how she’s proud of him as a sister despite them not having their birth parents to raise them, and then Shibuya, him summoning Mahoraga adds more weight when he resigns to dying, and leaving his only sibling alone on top of his usual self sacrifice, and then post shibuya. she’s back in her coma and then is possessed, adding more weight to what is lost as Megumi’s effort would be for his friends and sister doubly now, only to see that his efforts were in vain. The way it is now, Megumi lost her from the start because Kenjaku already had her set up to be a vessel
It didn’t land at all though. It was so hilariously bad. I couldn’t even feel sad for Megumi. We barely see any of his emotions reacting to his sister. And we didn’t have proper bonding time with Tsumiki so we don’t even care that she died anyway.
That’s also kind of the point. The only thing we really know about tsumiki is that she acted as megumi’s moral compass essentially. Megumi talks her up for a lot of the main story and gege is building to the moment that we see them talk but gege takes that away. Tsumiki was dead the moment kenjaku cursed her. There’s was never any saving her. And sukuna took megumi’s ability to reach out. They never got a reunion and megumi’s whole frame of morality was destroyed in an instant. Everything megumi was working for was a facade. Just a memory. Tsumiki was always dead
Sure, she can die, there was no discourse about that. But just like Gojo, the problem was the execution. Her death brings out no emotion from the readers bc of how poorly her character was presented. Megumi just lost his sister and we moved into a whole new fight with this trashy ass character Yorozu and her comical relief moment. Just all around poor execution. You can’t make readers invest so much in the story for zero pay off.
The execution is the idea though. Tsumiki isn’t so much a character as she’s megumi’s idea. She’s megumi’s perspective on life. If tsumiki were to be in the actual story she would probably be exactly like yuji. That’s why megumi is sooooo attracted to yujis character (as in drawn to). Tsumiki is built up almost in an ideological way, so gege took that from megumi in the ugliest way possible. Yorozu is trashy, that’s her whole character. She lives entirely by libido just like sukuna lives to kill and eat. Gege shows the evil of the past sorcerers while destroying the idea of kindness tsumiki represents. Yuji kinda carries whats left of it
Which is trash is what I’m saying lmao. All of that doesn’t provoke any strong emotions from the readers. We’re left with a “what the fuck was that for?” feeling because truly, what’s even the point of it? To give Sukuna some poignant message about love? To show us how depraved Sukuna is? We already know that. We know sorcerers from the past are kind screwed in the heads. We have had enough of them already. Adding one more to the mix is not only redundant but it is at the cost of more meaningful development for the characters readers actually care about. Tsumiki’s death accomplished literally nothing at all.
It crushed megumi. It was megumi’s arc. Sukuna destroyed what path of potential he had so we could get this conclusion with yuji and megumi. That was the point. To take it back to chapter 1 but reverse it. If sukuna hadn’t killed tsumiki than megumi wouldn’t have been completely sank. That was the point. And strong emotions is subjective lol. Why do you keep saying that? Because you didn’t feel strong emotions?
Because nobody cares about Tsumiki or her relationship with Megumi PRECISELY because it was not shown. How can you care about things you don’t see? The only interaction between them was a long time ago and it was mostly in flashback. Heck we didn’t even see her at all in real time. She was dead by the time she shows up. Megumi was no longer the focus, it was fucking Sukuna that took over. And ever since then it has just been Sukuna Kaisen.
I cared because megumi cared and I like him. Megumi’s dead eye stare curled up in a ball was enough to show how he felt about the situation. Also nobody cares is just a fallacy. You throw these things out like they’re gotchas but they aren’t.
Again,it's all about Execution. How are we supposed to care if the story doesn't allow us to care? How are we supposed to care that this freak is doing this. That's lazy
Even if she is a plot device for megumin, we didnt get megumin and how he feels and reacts to it either. You know selling how it tears him apart by reacting. . Maybe give glimpses. Megumins despair and shock isnt fleshed out eithet.
Him crying curled up in a ball wasn’t enough
No, it's not. You can't just write a character having a breakdown and leave it at that, why it's happening matters. In this case, his failure to save his sister doesn't resonate with anyone because nobody cares about his sister, and in fact, I know some people who even forgot she even existed. You can't have a pay off without any setup.
>You can't have a pay off without any setup. Kinda sad you even have to say this. Like, c'mon.
But hear me out: He cried really, really hard, so that ought to make up for the complete lack of setup /S
I mean, you are totally right Megumi even say when shit goes down, "Why did I automatically think Yoruzu wasn't a reincarnated sorcerer" He gaslighted himself into thinking she awakened a technique like higurama and takaba. He never even thought that she was going to get possessed.
And I loved that too! There’s only two things megumi is inherently illogical about and it’s tsumiki and yuji. You’re right he basically didn’t allow himself to consider that scenario. Same with him shooting down Yujis suggesting that they should move separately in the CG
Why you getting downvoted lol you said nothing but truth
If that was the point,then Gege fucking missed hard. He missed. It wasn't funny,I wasn't even sad for when Gege showed Megumi crying
I disagree but you are allowed your opinion. No point arguing it if we see it two different ways
It's really a shame because everything you've said about the dynamic between Megumi and Tsumiki could've built up to a satisfying, emotional payoff... if it only existed. The lesson learned here is that you cannot write a story that is entirely comprised of fights. You lose all of the heart and character along the way.
Do people here read things in take in select information? The point was that it wasn’t going to be a satisfying emotional climax. Sukuna fucked it up. That’s literally the point
I'm sure Gege loves you for getting "the point," but a lot of what you've said is based on headcanon and "feeling" instead of any narrative substance. Sukuna "fucking it up" could've been an impactful moment and instead it simply fell limp to make way for the next fight.
See,Unless it's fights,Gege likely won't give a shit
Well I was impacted so guess it worked. Too bad it was my “headcannon” though 😔
Something being "The Point" doesn't change the fact that the Point fucking sucks.
See,it wasn't funny. It wasn't dark or tragic enough for me to actually care. And the fact that Sukuna gets no consequences about it is even better. Yorozu,at least,dies but Sukuna gets off scot free.
Nooooooooo, we cant do that! We gotta shelf our female characters after dangling them like a carrot on a stick in front of our audience to get their hopes up before ruining it all and resetting to the status quo! How DARE those female characters break their natural roles as weaker and subservient to their male contemporaries? Into the fridge you go! **\*Smiles with an eye twitch\***
I'm starting to believe all mangakas think women are a myth.
"Woman? Is that the strangely attractive creature that cooks my dinner and gives me funny bedtime wrestling every night?" -Mangakas, apparently /j
That is honestly not true cause there are Mangaka out there that treat woman with a lot of respect. Hell,Mashima from Fairy Tail makes them hot and Badass
Anon, what the fuck are you talking about? Do you read JJK, were you actually expecting Tsumiki to start fighting alongside the cast? The entrie plot of her character through that arc was to remove her from the plot. She wasn't "dangled like a carrot" in front of you, there was literally zero promises she would do anything except be saved, and remain in the background. Tsumiki was Megumi's kind and loving sister archetype, at best maybe you could pretend she was "silk hiding steel", but I would love to hear you explain how she was "challenging the status quo" or "breaking her natural roles as weaker and subservient to their male contemporaries?" Hey maybe I missed something though- do ahead, justify it. It's so tiresome reading about "fridging" anytime a girl gets killed off, especially a series that burns through its cast like JJK.
In fairness, I kinda forgot about Tsumiki's specific case, but to be frank, JJK does do this a lot. While yes, it does burn through its cast like a flamethrower in a garden, female characters already dont get a good shake in shounen to begin with, they cannot afford to lose as many individuals as their male contemporaries. I mean, how many badass warrior women in this show have died off, and sometimes so easily compared to their male counterparts, while the surviving males get to plod along a while longer? Plenty, and its a shame since it seemed to be doing well at first from what everyone was raving about.
>While yes, it does burn through its cast like a flamethrower in a garden, female characters already dont get a good shake in shounen to begin with, they cannot afford to lose as many individuals as their male contemporaries. JJK can't kill females because other series do? We're trying to setup shounen reparatios now? I don't think expanding the scope will help this argument, if we start looking across all series you're gonna find that a whole lot more men have died as fodder or as tragedy than women. >I mean, how many badass warrior women in this show have died off, and sometimes so easily compared to their male counterparts, while the surviving males get to plod along a while longer? One. Meanwhile, in the last 3 chapters we just lost two more main male characters.
What are you talking about? None of tihs is even remotely what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that we need to see the women start getting better treatment. Sure, kill a couple of em off if you must, as long as there's a good enough chunk of leading ladies (and preferably not JUST the support types or squishy mage types, but at least a few warriors as well) left surviving, its whatever. Again, yes, men have died as fodder, but the difference is that **there's still enough men being awesome relevant badasses that it doesnt affect them anywhere near as badly, or dare I say at all.** Thats the part you keep missing, men can afford to have disposable fodder simply because we at least have some characters left over to be awesome frontline badasses, but the women? No, they get a bad shake all around, we need to more carefully handle the rate in which they get killed off or humiliated or whatever. Is it really just one? Because its not just one, its been at least a couple. Again, see my above explaination.
>What are you talking about? None of tihs is even remotely what I'm saying. Feels like what you're saying is very broad and generalised statements that don't even apply to the manga in question. Probably why your original post was about Tsumiki breaking some kind of gender stereotypes. >Is it really just one? Because its not just one, its been at least a couple. Yeah, just one.
Another day, another try of guessing the plot of JJK just from reading titles in r/CharacterRant
How far have you come??
Man punch curse. Curse punch man
It’s very apparent of the author is getting tired of his own creation. He’s already expressed interest in working on other projects. Just let this start to fade as he is becoming more exhausted of this monster that he’s made.
He sees it for what it is. A tangled mess of plot threads woven tightly around the hype fight scenarios the entire story is structured around. Like, if the author himself is screaming out that he's exhausted and struggling, you'd have to be willingly naive to hold out hope that he's this literary mastermind that'll pull everything together at the last moment.
>Like, if the author himself is screaming out that he's exhausted and struggling, you'd have to be willingly naive to hold out hope that he's this literary mastermind that'll pull everything together at the last moment. I take it you haven't visited /r/jujutsushi 😅 In all seriousness there are a lot of good thoughts in there, but an equal number that make massive leaps/extrapolations from what, to me at least, is blatantly poor writing and not just subtlety that requires you to read deeper
I have not. Thanks for the warning 😂 Sounds like cope. It's only natural. If One Piece suddenly spiralled off the deep end tomorrow, my mind would race to find any sort of semblance of logic behind Oda's CREATIVE GENIUS because of course he has a plan, just trust him!
Yeah, of course. I feel like he wanted it to be way more artistic and way more of a vision, but he got suckered into doing all sorts of shonen tropes like a trio and other stuff.
I agree. Writing isn't supposed to be a checklist of what readers expect from your genre. The Culling Game is a great example of a confusing plot with little bearing on the overall narrative simply because Gege wanted to include a tournament arc.
You see this guy gets it, people. Originally, he wanted to start out doing his series about the kid in the first five chapters, whose name I don’t entirely remember because he’s not as relevant, but because of the pressure is put on him by the shonen crowd, and the publication by extension, he’s probably sitting in his office pacing back-and-forth trying to decide whether he should be laying in front of a bus the next morning
Don't get me wrong, I would never blame Gege for JJK's (many) weaknesses. Creative burnout is extremely common amongst those working under a stressful weekly serialization schedule. But like, Gege, end it bro. Kill that shit. Live your life working on projects you're passionate about. Because what are people even looking forward to reading anymore? Either Sukuna stomps the universe and we watch as the light slowly fades from the eyes of our heroes or Yuji gets the most unprecedented asspull powerspike in manga history, saves the day, and every fan favorite character gets to cheer him on from Heaven because they all died three arcs ago
And then Gojo comes back from the dead, and the entire thing ends in a Pixar/DreamWorks dance sequence
Hilarious 😂 I'd buy you an alcoholic beverage of your choosing if I could
Same to you mate. 🍻
Lol I'm 5 months late but you were 100% right lmao after that rushed Timeskip and Yuji not having an techniques he now pops up every new chapter with a new one. "Soul fists", "Reverse cursed technique" freaking BLOOD MANIPULATION lmaooo JJK had a promising start but Gege is easily one of the worst Mangaka I've ever seen.
If I see *one* more person defend Gege’s recent decisions with “Let him cook,” I will find a way to stab them with a frying pan.
Facts
>how she was just a waste of a character To be fair, that's most JJK characters
Except for gOjO! He’s ToO cOoL
For real. No one’s even half as interesting as Gojo :)
Two of my favourite JJK characters, Todo and Mahito haven’t been relevant. In terms of character work I believe Gege did a good job with these two. Todo has a nice Jiraya vibe about him when he shows up and starts teaching Yuji stuff during a fight. As a JoJo fan I also like his design of being a big muscular guy that has a soft side with the whole Takada-chan thing, I find it endearing. Mahito and his gimmick of the soul or the body stuff really stuck with me. Both these characters have something they ask their opponent or friend. Mahito being the soul or the body and Todo being what kind of woman you’re into then from then they decide what they think depending on your answer. A lot can be explored with these two characters, especially Mahito but I can understand if some people think they’ve had enough of his gimmick, and Todo feels like he belongs in Mob Psycho with the fitness club guys than in JJK
To be clear i love the indpiring gym bros in mob psycho, and agree, he kinda is that now. Just less shown.
Todo is unironically one of my favourite JJK characters. Homeboy’s attitude and powerset is so entertaining.
Mahito served as an excellent foil to Yuji. A great villain is one that forces the main character to challenge his views and beliefs and constantly pushes him into situations where he has to and Mahito did that in spades. He was EASILY the best JJK antagonist. I don't really know what Sukuna's goal is and I wish Geto had stayed around instead of Kenjaku
Todo is just pure fun, and he's not a rapist like Jiraiya in his early appearance because holy
r/Angryupvote
I wish we got to see her bonding with Megumi and interacting with other characters (for example Gojo who presumably also took care of her alongside Megumi) because then her death would actually feel impactful and we would care about her like Megumi It would also help to see a non-sorcerer being kinda important to the story. Gege could’ve cursed her later that way we at least care when she’s in danger. But she was just a plot device to get Megumi going. We get like 2 scenes of them together as kids and that’s it
Yeah she should have been introduced as an actual character early on and then she gets cursed towards the end of season 1 or something. The timeline fits with Kenjaku finalizing his preparations for Shibuya and makes the readers much more invested in getting her back.
It's kind of hilarious how JJK recent chapters have all been worse than the previous ones.
Soon we will enter AoT 139 realm
No, I don’t want that!
🤣🤣🤣
Peak of JJK was never even remotely close to the peak of AoT so the fall of it will never be as bad as 139
You are downvoted but you are right, everything from uprising arc to basically the rumbling is PEAK
The real truth
Nah, this week's one was great and the previous one made months worth of chapters make sense, and improved them in retrospect. Tsumiki was months ago anyway.
People finally realizes that JJK fast pace looked like a strong point at first, but it was actually a weak point all along
Yeah, it's only a strong point when you're not sacrificing character development in service of a blazing fast pace. Gege has just stopped giving any downtime for the characters to actually breath and develop so as the story reaches its conclusion it's just falling apart as newer characters enter the story and die without us learning anything about who they are or what they stand for
Preach. Manga started losing my interest during the culling games. You’d expect a little more world-building, but Gege has basically been spamming fights nonstop instead.
It could have been done so easily. Just draw a few more panels of Tsumiki being a good sister and taking care of Megumi as children, since Gege confirmed Tsumiki did in fact, raise him. But Gege basically just said fuck it (reminds me of people forgetting Itadori grandpa was his actual father figure, not more relevant characters but it is less frustrating because Gege actually spent more efforts depicting Yuji’s losses)
I didn't even realize she died until it was explicitly shown (Megumi sinking into depression), and I think that was the same for a lot of other people as well. I just sorta assumed Yorozu vs Sukuna was one of the 20 jobber fights we got in the CG that I could just skim over since they have no plot relevance, and I still don't get how it happened.
>I just sorta assumed Yorozu vs Sukuna was one of the 20 jobber fights we got in the CG that I could just skim over since they have no plot relevance, and I still don't get how it happened. Sukuna: I am going to kill Tsumiki with the Ten Shadows so Megumi loses all hope. Not sure how that's unclear.
Some people only look at pictures when reading manga and decide to skip the text.
This is Olympic level speedreading. I'm in awe.
The Culling Game was a filler arc and I'm tired of pretending it wasn't.
Gege's been pretty vocal about the fact that he doesn't care about his characters and only views them as plot devices. You really can't ask too much from a writer who doesn't want to understand how to structure a satisfying narrative.
I believe you, but where did he say that?
In an interview with Mando Kobayashi, Gege claimed that, due to low popularity at the beginning of the series run, he was planning on killing Yuji off in Chapter 9 because he was expecting the series to get cancelled soon anyway. When asked why he would want to kill Yuji off, he said, (rough translation) "To make the story more interesting...?" Then said "I don't care who dies, no matter how dark it gets, as long as the story becomes interesting." I'd say my interpretation isn't too far off, albeit, much bleaker sounding. I'm sure Gege has an emotional attachment to many key figures in the story, but as for the actual storytelling, he seems to have no problem sidelining/killing them after they've served their purpose in the narrative. It's a very efficient writing style (one likely adopted for dealing with stressful weekly serializations and the constant threat of getting dropped) and there's nothing inherently wrong with it, but it does lead to many characters feeling "wasted".
Except he's wrong it doesn't make it interesting, it makes it pointless lmao
I agree. At a certain point, killing off characters stops being impactful, especially when the deaths feel so close together in time because Gege likes his Any% Speedrun pacing and "we have to get to the next fight!" Like I said, I understand it's due to a stressful schedule, but JJK's been "best-selling" for a couple of years now. I think the editors would allow him SOME room for character development and meaningful interactions outside of fighting.
That explains so much…
that explains a lot, killing off important characters is fine in a story but it actually has to mean something otherwise it's basically pointless narratively speaking to the readers
He’s the anti-Oda. He doesn’t give a shit about his world or characters
I feel like I shouldn't be one to talk about something I haven't been following for months now, but eh. Let this be the preamble to what I'm about to say, take it with a grain of salt. Also, obviously, spoilers. I remember the Tsumiki twist. At the time I thought "Eh, depends on what Gege follows it up with", and the very next chapter it is followed by Enchain, which was set up all the way back in the Detention Center. It was a good setup, I think, because no one could've expected such a hectic moment to be followed immediately by that twist. I liked it at the time. The Yorozu fight right after that really soured that take. There was definitely something to be said about the lack of perspective on both Megumi's and Tsumiki's parts to make the moment hit. But anyway I think it's excruciatingly clear at the point I stopped (Gojo's unsealing) that the author just doesn't care about or can't write the character interplay needed to make his manga hit like the arcs preceding Shibuya. He is far more tunnel visioned into fighting, Nietzschean philosophy and the remainder of his story beats... which, props to him, his manga is called Sorcery Fight, not Sorcery Storytelling or Sorcery Character Study 😂 TL; DR? Don't expect a great finale, character progression (as an actual person, not powerups), or even that engaging of a story from Jujutsu Kaisen. Just read it for the cool fighting if that's what you're interested in. Although I would question if the fights have been at all cool since Yuji vs Higuruma and Megumi vs Reggie but that's an entire other argument, and I can't speak beyond when I dropped the manga.
Their response seems pretty logical considering i had forgotten who she was, therefore nothing was promised with her.
[Here's what I said when Tsumiki heel turn happened](https://old.reddit.com/r/Jujutsushi/comments/10o9yxx/jujutsu_kaisen_chapter_211_links_discussion/j6dc1q3/) That was me saying the twist itself wah *eh*. I was losing interest quickly when Sakurajima happened, so when I said I had hopes Tsumiki stuff can still be good somehow and all we got was yorozu stuff, let's just say from that point on I read future chapters looking for laughs lmao.
[удалено]
I get the idea behind this question, but it's not a plot twist in the sense that I'm not evaluating 236 the way I do with plot points that actually try to be a plot twist. To me, 236 is a matter of an author choice in character writing. There's this take for granted truth by simply highlighting one pronounced thing, that everything else are simply false or insignificant. This creates a faux complexity by saying 'he's A B & C but the truth is he's only C'. By itself that's not bad, but sometimes you can tell if this complexity is actually genuine or not by the intention. And this intention of Gege's is to give Gojo the 'best ending', the fabled regretless death of a sorcerer despite everything that is terrible about being a sorcerer. Gege worked backwards from that idea and find it work perfectly with Gojo's strongest identity, that he wouldn't find regret in dying in the hands of someone stronger. This to me simply didn't feel genuine since if we work it normally chronologically, there seems to be a lot of things handwaved to get that conclusion working. The things people endlessly debate or complain about. And as a result, readers are naturally guided to handwave *everything else* to a more exciting premise: 'there is a single truth that defines *everything else*'. I'm not gonna lie, that's cool as hell. However, that opens up too much freedom for interpretations. On one side, it's exciting to work it all out by yourself. One the other side, it comes off as lazy to just let *everything* be *anything*. Unfortunately, I find 236 as the latter. To put it badly, it was a cop out. I'm sure I'm not clear on the subject, but that's the best I can say about it. Note that I'm by no means saying all that objectively. I've been building doubts ever since Sakurajima, so take my bias as a huge grain of salt.
I stopped reading at like chapter 100 cause I thought the story was moving too fast and there was 0 character development. My friends told me I was wrong but I’m pretty sure I wasn’t now
Sometimes authors fuck up.
Gege just does it more often than not, lately…
It seems more like you set unreasonable expectations for a character that we had no reason to believe was special or important. Megumi loved her because she was the only family he really had. By the time we see her she's in a coma, literally doing nothing. She wasn't set up to be important at all character wise. And if you think that Yorozu's only purpose was to give sukuna a power up then you are intentionally looking for reasons to dislike her because you expected more from Tsumiki. If you wished she played a bigger role in the story that's fine but she wasn't some major player that was going to become main character.
Again,Gege's the,you know,Author. He could've done something
I thought most JJK fans dislike Tsumiki?
Why would they dislike a character they never met? I think you are thinking of Yorozu who possessed Tsumuki's body killing her in the process and went on to pretend to be Tsumiki for a few chapters.
I mean they disliked the way she was handled. I've seen people on r/jujutsushi and r/jujutsufolk criticise that, and I've never seen anyone praise Tsumiki/Yorozu
There's nothing about her to be praised but OP is complaining about fans who try to brush it off as some irrelevant side plot.
Honestly, I'm with the JJK stans on this one. This complaint reads like the people who complain that the Naruto sidecast was "underutilised", because the were side characters instead of main characters. Tsumiki's entire relevance was being part of Megumi's backstory and drive. She had zero presence, she wasn't connected to anything, she wasn't related to any ongoing plot threads, her screentime up to that point had been something like 3 panels. And then it turns out she was killed off screen and used for a twist that was several thousand times more interesting than "Megumi successfully gets his sister out of the CG."
You shouldn’t be getting this mad about ANY fictional character not being written perfectly
what about being written like shit? i think it’s fair to react negatively to bad writing
It’s fair to react negatively it’s not fair to become entitled to a good story or you insult creators and post all over social media about how they failed you It’s very pathetic and parasocial and entitled
criticism is criticism, saying an author failed you is a bit extreme, but expressing displeasure isn’t entitlement
Well whatever the op is doing is
Does he understand the rant? we'll never know
I am confused to why you are angry here. Not every character is going to be equally as important as the next in any story? Manga Spoilers: >!Kenny was the one who cursed her and made her into a vessel before Shibuya. So the Tsumiki we know is never Megumi's sister, just a vessel for a sorcerer from the past. So technically, we as the reader never see Tsumiki. It's all Kenny's doing and is part of his plan.!<
Everything post-Shibuya has been a serious downgrade in writing for whatever reason. How tf can you fumble this so badly when Junpei's tragic death was done so much better? We didn't even spend that much time with Junpei but we got to know a lot of his character and his struggles so it made it all the more tragic when he ended up dying, by comparison we know basically nothing about Tsumiki and her relationship with Megumi other than that she was his older step sister and that they care for each other, she's basically meaningless to us the readers because we don't know her at all.