Jotaro Kujo is not Boring

 

-Spoilers for JJBA Parts 3, 4, and 6-

I love Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. 

What is Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure; you may ask? Well, it’s a manga and anime series created by Hirihiko Araki. It follows the crazy generational story of the Joestar family, a family with a long lineage and legacy whose names can all be shortened to “Jojo”, in some way. The Joestars fight the never-ending battle against a variety of colorful evildoers.

Each installment of the Jojo story follows a different member of the Joestar family; from the noble and pure-hearted Jonathan Joestar of Phantom Blood, to the mysterious 

Josuke “Gappy” Higashikata from Jojolion.

Of all the Jojos that have shared the role of protagonist, my favorite Jojo is the silent and stoic Jotaro Kujo; the third protagonist of Jojo Part 3: Stardust Crusaders.

Now, I’m not the only person who loves Jotaro. In fact, he’s probably the most recognizable character of the series, and a large portion of the fanbase loves him a lot.

However, there are also several people, who dislike Jotaro Kujo for a number of reasons. People often say that Jotaro lacks depth, that he is a weak character, or to put it simply…

That Jotaro Kujo is boring.

Now, I may be a Jotaro simp, but I think it’s perfectly fine to dislike him, or not find him interesting. We all have different tastes in favorite characters.

However, I’d like to take a moment to talk about how I view Jotaro Kujo because I want to show people why I love him so much, why I find him very interesting, and why I think Jotaro Kujo is not boring.

-Stardust Crusaders-

When we first meet the 17 year old Jotaro Kujo, in Part 3: Stardust Crusaders, he is introduced to us as a typical Japanese delinquent. He acts tough, talks back to his mother, he even got himself landed in jail for getting into a fight!

For a lot of people, that’s their only view of Jotaro during Stardust Crusaders; that he’s simply this tough-guy, macho man, and nothing else.

If you look closely at Jotaro, and pay attention to his actions, however, you’ll realize that there’s more to him than he shows on the surface. 

Jotaro’s bio in the Stardust Crusaders manga states that he thinks people can tell how he’s feeling just by looking at him, thus he finds it unnecessary to deliberately show his emotions. This results in misunderstanding, due to people perceiving him as cold and uncaring. This one bit of information already tells us that Jotaro has feelings and does care for people, he just doesn’t show it in obvious ways.

Baby Joot

His mother, Holly, even insists in the beginning of Stardust Crusaders, that Jotaro Kujo has a good heart. While this could just be Holly’s biased perception of her own child, I’m inclined to believe she’s right.

It’s easy to look at him talking back to his mother, and think that he doesn’t care about her, yet he notices when she’s looking a little pale, and asks her if she’s alright.

He notices something’s off when she doesn’t come to give him a goodbye kiss before going to school.

When Holly falls unconscious, after awakening her Stand (a supernatural power some people have in the Jojo universe), the first thing Jotaro does is ask his grandfather, Joseph what they’re going to do to help her. He then proceeds to travel all the way to Egypt, to kill the all-powerful DIO, in order to save her.

You can’t tell me that this boy travelled all the way across the globe, to rescue his mother from her own superpower, and that he doesn’t care about her.

It’s not just his mother he cares for, as well. Jotaro risked his life to save Kakyoin, a person who was his enemy not too long ago.

He allowed himself to be humiliated and battered for the sake of keeping his grandfather alive.

He became a bridge just so his grandfather wouldn't die

He even refused to leave his jail cell, after awakening his own Stand, because he didn’t want it to hurt the people around him.

If this isn’t too bold a claim, Jotaro is a huge tsundere (he could also be a kuudere, I guess?). He acts cold and tough, but he does genuinely care for the people around him. He may not say it outright, but it shows in his actions.

Jotaro fights for what’s right. When met with injustice, he’s quick to put a stop to it. He’s extremely strong, and incredibly intelligent. 

He may appear cold on the outside, but when the people close to him get hurt, when Avdol and Kakyoin die, when Joseph is killed right in front of him, he clenches his fists in anger, and does everything he can to fight for them because they matter to him.

He has his rare moments where he laughs and smiles with the team,

he embraces Polnareff and his grandfather when they all must part ways (the manga even shows him with tears in his eyes),

and he keeps the photograph they all took together in Egypt (He is shown with the photo again, years later, in Part 5).

Before I move onto the next section, I’d like to talk about a little fan speculation, as to why Jotaro became a delinquent.

During Stardust Crusaders, we never once see Jotaro’s father, Sadao Kujo, physically appear. We never even see any photos of him (the only photos we see are of Holly and Jotaro),

and the only pieces of information we have about him is that he is a jazz musician, and that he’s currently away on tour. When Holly falls ill, Sadao doesn’t even come home to check on her.

This has led fans to theorize that Sadao was absent from Jotaro’s life, and that Jotaro acted out and became a delinquent because of this.

This is all just speculation, but I do think it’s possible, and ties into a later part of Jotaro’s life.

-Diamond is Unbreakable-

After Stardust Crusaders, Jotaro goes from being the protagonist, to filling more of a mentor role. In Part 4: Diamond is Unbreakable, Jotaro is now an adult with a career. Aside from working for the Speedwagon Foundation (where he tracks down enemy Stand users), Jotaro works as a marine biologist in his adulthood.

I like this fact about him because it further drives the idea that Jotaro is more than just a walking tower of muscle. He’s intelligent and has interests. His SDC manga bio did also state that his favorite movie was “Never Cry Wolf”, a movie about a biologist studying wolves in the arctic, so it makes sense that Jotaro has an interest in biology.

A look at his interests isn’t the only thing we see from Jotaro in DiU. We also see how much he’s grown as a person, since SDC. He’s notably calmer, more mature, and he doesn't lose his temper, as much.

When Josuke’s mother bombards him with affection, due to mistaking him for Josuke’s father, Joseph (long story), He reacts calmly and with patience. The old Jotaro would’ve yelled at her to go away. 

We also get to see how his relationship with his grandfather has changed over the years. When Joseph appears in DiU, Jotaro is shown to have more respect for the man, and a closer relationship. He no longer curses at Joseph as much, and the two can be seen spending time together in the town of Morioh.

Jotaro also forms new relationships with people of Morioh, specifically Josuke and Koichi. He takes on a sort of mentor role for these boys, using his knowledge and intellect to help them take down enemy Stand users, and puts his life on the line for both of them.

He is shown helping Josuke master new techniques with his Stand when they go to hunt a Stand-using rat (also long story),

and he’s complimented Koichi multiple times on his performance in battle.

He also has a hole in his chest (Somehow, he doesn't die)

During the final battle against Yoshikage Kira, when he slows down time before the final blow, he takes a moment to admit how important Koichi is to him, and reflects on the people of Morioh before he delivers the final blow to DiU’s main villain.

In Diu, we certainly see Jotaro develop as a character, and become more open to those around him. However, we also see that there's still a level of distance between him and the people he cares about.

The next part we're going to talk about puts a focus on that distance Jotaro has with his loved ones.

-Stone Ocean-

Now, as of the time this is written, Stone Ocean’s anime hasn’t come out, and I do not have access to the Stone Ocean manga. I can only go off of what I’ve researched, so this section may contain some inaccuracies, or miss some information, and might not have as many pictures.

Also, note for the Manga photos: Manga is read from right to left.

Part 6: Stone Ocean is an interesting part for Jotaro’s character development. Mainly because the protagonist of this part is none other than Jolyne Kujo, Jotaro’s daughter.

Unfortunately for her, she and Jotaro don’t have the best relationship. It’s revealed in the manga that Jotaro divorced his wife, and has been mainly absent from Jolyne’s life. This caused Jolyne to become a delinquent (which she, later, admits was an attempt to gain his attention)

However, we learn, later on, that the reason why Jotaro did this was to keep Jolyne and his wife from being harmed by enemy stand users.

Going back to the speculation from earlier, it’s interesting to see how much Jolyne and Jotaro’s relationship parallels the one fans speculate he had with Sadao. Jotaro and Jolyne both, supposedly, started acting out due to the lack of father figures in their lives. In this context, it's tragic to see Jotaro become the absent father Sadao is theorized to be.

Despite this, it’s clear that he still cares for his daughter, and wants to protect her, even with the rift that’s grown between them. He comes to Green Dolphin Street Prison to break her out, knowing full well he’s walking into a trap. During this time Jolyne gets mad at Jotaro for coming to see her after years of absence, and confronts him on his stoic demeanor. 

Meeting Jolyne in the prison

Oof, step up, Joot

Then, when they are attacked by two stand users, Jotaro sacrifices himself to save Jolyne.

His final words, before being knocked unconscious, and having his memories stolen, were:

This is the first time Jotaro explicitly tells someone he cares about them. Sure, he’s said how important Koichi is to him, but that’s only ever been at times when Koichi couldn’t hear him.

It’s amazing to see how far Jotaro has developed, in this moment. Back in SDC, he never seemed like the kind of person who would openly express affection for others, but here, he sees how Jolyne is upset by his lack of affection towards her, and makes an effort to let her know he does care about her.

This shocks Jolyne to the point where she decides to stay in the prison to regain Jotaro’s stolen memories.

While Jotaro was unconscious and being monitored by the Speedwagon Foundation, the doctors found out that certain important memories still lingered in his mind; among them, memories of Jolyne.

When Jotaro regains his consciousness and memories, he fights alongside Jolyne, in the final battle against Stone Ocean’s main villain, Enrico Pucci.

Jotaro was using his time-stop ability to aid the heroes in reaching Pucci. During a key moment of the battle, Jotaro stopped time, in order to land a blow on Pucci. 

However, Pucci had taken advantage of Jotaro’s love for Jolyne, and thrown knives into the air before the time-stop; knives that would land directly on Jolyne once time had resumed.

Jotaro abandons his chance to attack Pucci, in order to pull Jolene out of harm's way. However, this choice leads to his demise, as Pucci kills Jotaro, moments later.

(Thankfully, when the universe is reset, after the end of the battle, it is implied that an alternate version of Jotaro exists; as mentioned by his daughter, who is named “Irene”, in this new universe)

-Conclusion-

What makes Jotaro Kujo so appealing to me (aside from his Greek god-like stature and menacing aura) is the surprising amount of depth you find once you look deeper into his character. His change and growth as he becomes more outwardly caring for the people around him is really interesting to witness.

He’s a lot more than just a bland tough guy, who throws one-liners around, and punches his enemies in the face. He’s a man with feelings and emotions, but has trouble showing those emotions to others. He has people he cares about and does what he can to protect them, even if he has to push them away. He’s this incredibly muscular and intimidating individual who has an interest in marine biology of all things. 

Are there flaws in his writing? Of course, no character is written perfectly.

Am I biased because I simp for this man to the ends of the Earth? Probably.

Still... I hope I was able to convince someone that Jotaro Kujo is an interesting character.