JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable – 100x Appreciation Lecture (Part 2)

Kids these days, y’all know nothing about one of the longest-running and most highly regarded works of manga art, do ya? It’s been around since 1986!

I’m talking about JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure! But I’ll just be calling it JoJo from now on.
The fourth part of this series, Diamond Is Unbreakable, began airing this April, to high acclaim.
Are all the people around you telling you that it’s great, but you feel like starting watching it at this point is too big a hurdle?
Just for you, I, the wise and experienced MJA Ojisan will host this fantastic lecture series for all you JoJo rookies.
This course will be spread out over three installments, of which this is the second.

Click HERE to see what’s so great about JoJo.

Prof. MJA Ojisan:
UUURRRRYYY!!!!
Oy. We meet again. Professor MJA Ojisan here.
I’m going to continue telling you lads and lasses about what makes the JoJo franchise so great, so put down your newfangled gadgets and listen up.
Here goes:

What’s So Cool About JoJo? (contd.)

Point #3 – JoJo Quotes

There’s a lot of memorable lines in JoJo.

In Japanese, they are so popular that they can come up in everyday conversations. Listen tight and I’ll show you a few of them. Ah-hem…

Dio Brando: “UUURRRRYYY!!” (from Part 1 of the series)
Jonathan Joestar: “I reject my humanity! JoJo!! I’ll transcend humanity!” (also from Part 1)
Jonathan Joestar: “Diooooooooo!! Until… you cry… I won’t stop hitting you!” (Part 1)
Dio Brando: “Booze! I can’t stop drinking!” (Part 1)
Jonathan Joestar: “Beat, my heart! This burning heat!! OOOH! Pound out the beat of my blood!” (Part 1)
Dio Brando: “Weakling! Weakling!” (Part 1)
Jotaro Kujo: “Oh dear, well, that’s a relief.” (Part 3)
Rohan Kishibe: “But, I won’t do that!” (Part 4)

How’s that?
The basic idea is that all of these characteristic lines are emphatic, and most of them either don’t pronounce the whole world or stretch out the final vowel.
Not pronouncing the end of the end of a word gives a cut-off and very direct feel to the phrase.
Stretching out the final vowel adds emphasis. Both of these linguistic techniques are used to add emotion and tension into the script.
To give you an English example, it’s kind of like the difference between saying “happy” and “happyyyyyyyy!” Doesn’t it just sound more exciting? Something similar happens in the original Japanese.

Incidentally, you’ve all watched that American TV drama, Heroes, haven’t you? In season two, the Japanese character Hiro (portrayed by Masi Oka) goes like:
“MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDAAA!”
That there, is an homage to JoJo.
Since Hiro is supposed to be a manga and anime fan, the actor who portrayed him, Masi Oka, included a reference to JoJo.
That’s a little bit of trivia for you.

Point #4 – Onomatopoeia

Not only are JoJo’s turns of phrase unique, but the world of onomatopoeia in JoJo is also fascinating.
Japanese in particular utilizes a lot of onomatopoeia, and manga artists make full use of this to widen the expressive power of the medium.
I’ll show you a few of the famous JoJo onomatopoeias here, and while we’re at it, I want y’all to enjoy a bit of Japanese text.

A kissing sound is “zukyuuuhn.”
The sound of someone pulverizing a rock by punching through a frog (i.e., punch the frog, and the impact goes through the frog into the rock) is “memetaa.”
Other common onomatopoeia are “gogogogogo” and “dododo dodo dodo.”

What do you think? With these eccentric onomatopoeic expressions, JoJo creates a unique and exciting universe.
By the way, did y’all know that when JoJo was localized for English-speaking countries, they left the onomatopoeias untranslated? Betcha didn’t know that!
These unique onomatopoeia have been spread throughout the anime world and appear in other works as well, so knowing about all of this can help you appreciate other animes as well.

Well, that about wraps it up for today’s lecture.
Next time, I’ll teach you about the plots of the various JoJo series.
See y’all later.