Hirohiko Araki ( 荒木飛呂彦) is a Japanese manga artist. He left school before graduation from Miyagi University of Education.
He enjoys the baseball manga Kyojin No Hoshii (Star of the Giants); the video games Mario Kart and Bomberman; and likes Prince and other African-American singers, as well as jazz, rock, and rap.
Of course shit hits the fan in New Jersey. It's always New Jersey. We're going to have to see if Johnny can manage to beat Valentine without turning his horse left.
Much of this volume is transition. It's kind of utilitarian in getting Johnny and Gyro on board the train while also introducing Love Train. But it's by no means bad. In particular the conductor's situation was a nice fakeout. His perilous situation took a minute for me to wrap my head around, but was actually ingenious.
Also, I think Hot Pants might have unceremoniously died? Which is kind of wack given how important she's been. I hope this isn't the end for her, because she's really fallen off as a character at the end here.
Love Train is a fantastic ability. It looks amazing in full color and the name is fantastic. It's cool to finally have a main villain who controls space, rather than time. Symbolically, it works really well. Yes, I'm about to get on my soapbox again.
Love Train's ability is one twofold. It centers the world around its user and exports all pain away from the user to be inflicted on someone else. So you have a president who centers the world around himself and makes random innocent people pay the price for any damage he has caused. It's pretty easy to see the symbolism. There is one instance where his power literally puts the bullet in the head of a child in a war-torn country. The president, and by the extension the United States, thrives by exporting brutality. We are deliberately divorced from the brutality that is necessary to create what we think of as "normal life". Slave labor, sweatshops, blood diamonds, factory farming of livestock, imperialism. The things we enjoy have been paid for with blood. But by monopolizing that brutality and exporting it away from where we can see it, the United States can maintain the facade of civility.
I'm really not reaching here. This probably only feels like subtext if you're from an imperialist country. The president states that the reality of the world is that one man must rule another. Then he activates an ability that kills innocent people so he can continue his pursuit of power. It's only subtle if you've been conditioned to ignore this kind of thing.
Shifting gears, I'm not sure I buy into Johnny's crisis of confidence. It came a little to quickly and Gyro's wounds were way too light. But I did like the parallels between Johnny's brother and Gyro. He sees a fraternal figure in peril and he's immediately taken back to being that scared kid again. Plus the source of his power up is really wholesome. The spin is powered up its users become aware of the divine beauty of nature. And he's powered up further by having his horse run as joyfully as possible and becoming attuned to that joy. The spin, as a powerset, is based on a connection to and appreciation of nature.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
love train is acutally insane what the fuck. how did funny get EVEN STRONGER. no only can he pop out multiple of himselves and OTHERS BUT HE CAN NOW REDIRECT ANY PAIN AND SHIT TO ANYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD. THE FUCK??? bro but gyro is putting his PUSSY into this battle like oh my god. and everything with the golden ratio and just.... johnny i believe in you. get that spin king. BELEIVE IN IT
Series: Steel Ball Run #20 Rating: 4 stars - It was really good
Johnny and Gyro are racing to board the train to stop the President when they realize that the landscape is following them. A new stand ability is in play and it is being caused by the corpse who is inhabiting Lucy. Hot Pants briefly tries to put up a fight against the president but sadly she is no match against him. Her end was very body horror-esque with all the bugs crawling through her hand. A gap in space has also formed near Lucy/the Corpse which has powered up the president even more and he is using it to attack Johnny and Gyro, who are trying to use the Golden Rotation and their horses against the president.
This was a very interesting battle so far. Johnny and Gyro are struggling against the president and Johnny even declares he is at his limit when their first attack fails. I like the fact we are seeing these two struggle against this really unique and difficult stand. The president is ruthless, cunning, and frankly really smart with his ability so it makes sense that he will be a hard opponent. I also like that we are seeing Johnny and Gyro being honest with each other about how they are mentally with this journey. Johnny is tired of fighting the president and just wants to finish the horse race and gain some movement in his legs again. I really like seeing how far their relationship has progressed since they were first paired together and hated each other.
Now we have to see how Johnny utilizing the golden triangle with his horse goes against the president and D4C.
TW: body horror; death, blood, gore
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Llevamos varios volúmenes centrados en la acción, a.k.a. "pelea final contra el malo", sin mucha trama fuera de las peleas, interacciones entre personajes o flashbacks, así que se me está haciendo un poco pesada la recta final.
La muerte de Diego ya me pareció gratuita, aunque al menos me impactó, pero la de Hot Pants creo que no está a la altura de la importancia del personaje.
Lucy lleva tiempo sin hacer nada.
Los dos protagonistas también llevan tanto tiempo sin hacer nada importante que he perdido un poco la conexión con ellos. Gyro tiene una herida que le ha subido al corazón y parece que se está muriendo en un panel y en el siguiente ya está curado?
El nivel de creatividad es increíble, realmente disfruto muchísimo como los personajes deben ingeniarse para lograr sus objetivos, de esta manera, Gyro, Johnny y Funny deben ir tratando de descubrir nuevas formas para aprovechar su habilidad al máximo. Me ha dado mucha adrenalina esos volúmenes queriendo saber qué va ocurrir, porque después de Funny, ¿qué pasará con Lucy? ¿O con el objetivo de Gyro? ¿O con lo deseado por Hot Pants? Definitivamente ha muchas cosas por desarrollar, y ya estamos en la recta final.
Araki's ability to write thrilling scenarios knows no bounds. A sign about bears in the area becomes threatening for reasons unrelated to bears!
It seems like, as we come closer and closer to the end of the story, and the tension continues ramping up, I'm more or less at a loss for words. I have very little to say other than that this battle is intense...!
Funny Valentine was a formidable foe before and now Love Train has engaged! Hot Pants was killed and Lucy Steel is dying. Johnny and Gyro have one hope (use of the golden rotation on horseback) but its effects are unknown. I know the fight reaches the ocean but I don't recall much else of the conflict proper. I look forward to seeing this conflict resolve.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
This series has been great, but it slows down a lot between 20-3, because there is a lot of discussion of the president's stand that can be a little hard to get through, but I really do appreciate Araki's commitment to this crazy premise.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Pretty good 7th part of Jojo’s bizarre Adventures and far from the best! This series lacks awesome intense fights and the story of this series was dull😭😁❤️❤️
Jesus Christ’s corpse has the power to repel any harm that comes its way.. a formidable foe when combined with someone who can travel between dimensions 👀