JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 5: Golden Wind

Ebonyslayer Sep 11, 2017

9.5

Story- This story arc of Jojo begins in Italy where Giorno Giovanna, the son of Dio Brando, begins his path towards becoming a gang boss. He meets Bucciarati a little bit in the story and from there they begin to make plans to take down the boss of the organization. With the pure goal of reforming the mafia from the inside out, and from there Jotaro let's him live his life. Giorno ultimately joins a squad of Passione, a Stand-using mafia, led by Bruno Bucciarati, who leads Giorno, Leone Abbacchio, Guido Mista, Narancia Ghirga, and Pannacotta Fugo on a mission to Capri to retrieve his former superior's riches, being attacked by rival mafioso along the way, and then are tasked by Passione's boss to escort his daughter Trish Una throughout Italy and protect her from others in the gang who wish to use her to find out his identity. Characters- There was one theme that I felt that was recurring with the main characters and that was resilience. All of the main characters came from crappy circumstances but they don't let it turn them into shitty people. Take Giorno for example, he was born of Dio, one of the most evil, dastardly people who had ever lived, and look how different his character is compared to him. He chooses to follow what he believes to be right, even if the world doesn't agree with him. Even in the face of death they don't allow themselves to become sleeping slaves of fate. Although they can't change their fate, the circumstances they were born and find themselves in, but they don't run away from them either. They face it with preparedness. Diavolo however stands against all of that. While all of the other characters dealt with their hand of fate, Diavolo got very, very, very, lucky. And he takes this as a sign that he's meant to be better than everybody else. He essentially believes fate choose him to rule. We all know how he treats good fortune, bad fortune on the other hand he does not. Unlike the main characters he tries to bury it. While he obsesses with control, his entire life is dominated by things he cannot control. His goal and reasons born of circumstance he attributes to fate, with all his threats are products of the past, which are impossible to destroy, meaning he's really a sleeping slave of fate. There's also the fact that he believes himself to be invincible. So long as he's careful he'll believe that he'll never fail. He's denies his death so much that he fears it incessantly. The final fight has Giorno expalining how reality is the only thing that lasts in this world and decisions based on reality will last forever. Even though Bruno, Abbachio and Narancia are dead, their wills will never disappear. The people that can accept fate and not let it define them, those that meet their fate with preparedness and yet still take action they feel is right, their decisions are the ones that are true and can never be destroyed. Giorno wonders if Diavolo's actions come from reality and if they'll last or are nonsensical ambitions that are doomed to failed. Giorno in the final fight says "I wonder if you can be annihalated forever boss?" meaning Diavolo spent his entire reign avoiding fate and reality. Instead of acknowledging what he couldn't control, he tried to bury it. So in the end he expected fate to always protect him and keep him safe. But Giorno is saying that Bruno and the others would never really die because they acknowleged their own misfortunes and eventual deaths, leaving their wills and their memories to carry on in the minds of the survivors. Diavolo's attempts to save himself from ruination ironically makes it so that no one will ever remember him. He is never immortal, he would never be immortal with this line of thinking. So in the end Golden Experience Requiem ironically gives Diavolo the immortality he's always wanted but one where he'll never reach reality. Nothing he does will ever last or make an impact, including his own deaths or the infinity of them. So it only serves to make him more miserable and sinks into his own crazed paranoia, spending his own last page moments screaming at a little girl to get away from him. So in the end I felt a huge existential message behind all of this, making me all the more happier that I learned all this from NZAnimeManga, so all the credit and thanks goes out to this awesome youtuber. A discussion of reality and fate, the fate found in their blood, which is something very cool to Jojo. Happy to know that Diavolo is a really well written character that all ties in very well with Giorno. And it really makes the stand Golden Experience Requiem not a deus ex machina, but a perfect ending to a perfectly flawed villain.            

TheIceQueen Aug 6, 2016

7.8

A lot of(mostly English speaking considering it's the most beloved part in Japan, France, Italy and many others) Jojo fans consider Vento Aureo to be the most forgettable of the jojo parts. This arc experienced the same treatment Diamond is unbreakable got with shitty original scans. I have reread it with the new scans, and I have mixed opinions.  Story: So let's start right off with the story. The plot of vento aureo has its weak and strong points. It has a quite different feel to it than the earlier parts, seeming more like a mafia-action movie. The story revolves around the son of Dio, born with Jonathan's body, so he's biologically a Joestar, Giorno Giovana. The beginning of the arc is seen through Koichi's perspective, as he is sent by Jotaro to investigate the son of Dio. He is not seen as any sort of threat so they just leave him alone after this. Giorno kills a member of a gang out of self defense and is nearly assassinated by another member Bruno Buccelati. During their battle Gio comes to the conclusion that Buccelati is a good person because of how he was concerned about a kid that was doing drugs sold to him by Buccelati's own gang, passion. After this Gio joins passion and Buccelati's team so they can kill the boss to stop dealing drugs to children and harming innocent people. Later on they are tasked with protecting the boss's daughter and returning her to him, which they see as an opportunity to get close to the boss and kill him. While on this mission many traitors to the gang try to stop them. Well this plot is cool, there were certainly a few holes and the ending was semi underwhelming and very confusing(I've not read the end with better scans yet so keep in mind I'm going off of the shitty ones). I liked the new use of more gun like stands in this part really giving it that, ahem, Gang Star, feel. This part seemed a lot more focused on action than any other part, and well, the action is great. Honest to god a lot of the best fights of the series are right here. But with the glaring holes and questionable ending, the story is not  perfect. -plot: 7/10 pretty good, but lacking in some areas. Art: Quite A few of people had a problem with the art for the more... feminine characters, and just more glamorous style. The characters of this part look very different from the earlier designs, with the muscles being drawn differently and flamboyant outfits(seriously Fugo, those aren't clothes). I think the best way to describe the characters is.. bishies. Well, being completely honest, I have a thing for pretty boys so it didn't bother me, but I can see why people didn't like it. being Even so, the art is some of the most stylized there is and everything just fits the setting and story so well. There's also some incredibly graphic imagery. despite being different, it's not bad, it's very good, as always with Araki. The action is always really impressive and the anatomy is still great.  -art: 9.5/10 Characters: For the characters, I liked that the heroes weren't really heroes and more antiheroes. They were doing the right thing but still gangsters and were more violent than any earlier arc's heroes, not being afraid to kill their opponents and beat up people that may be their enemies. This was a refreshing change. But the thing is some of the characters were.. not the best. The main character Giorno allot of people consider a bit dry. He's like a mix of Jonathan and Dio, with a bit of jotaro. He is noble like Jonathan, a bit sneaky, charismatic and is not afraid to kill like Dio, while being stoic like Jotaro. He was compassionate, but I don't remember him having a very defined personality, he didn't laugh or even smile that often and was very direct. The only thing about him I kinda didn't like was that he really only did anything because "I wanna be gang star" like, I wouldn't say he was uninteresting at all, but I'd like to have seen a bit more of what he was thinking. Also he's the most overpowered character I've ever seen... like ever. But he was really more of a side character to Buccelati, who was pretty awesome. He had a bit of a strange introduction, face licking and all, but he really was interesting. Unlike Gio, I knew clearly who he was and why he did what he did. The next character is Guido Mista, and well, I really liked him. He was pretty funny and a bit of dick. His battles were normally pretty interesting because he almost always ended up shooting himself... yeah I don't know how he survived this long either. Narancia Gihra is okay. I didn't personally like him very much originally, but he kinda grew on me. he has a defined character, he feels inferior to the other team members and is rather easy to piss off. He's got a pretty great backstory too. Oh and that, that, dude looks like a lady! Get it, his stand's name is Aerosmith and he looks like a girl.. no? okay. Leone Abbachio is an okay character, he's the regretful more tragic type character, and is is rather serious, a no nonsense kind of guy. I just wish he was in the story a bit more. Panacotta Fugo is wasted potential. He could have been a cool character, he is a genius and can switch from normal to crazy in a second. But he only got one fight and was completely edited out of the story cause he was too op.(I put more detail into my thoughts on his character on his actual character page) Trish Una, is the boss's daughter. She is mostly just kinda there, it's only till near the end she gets any development. But her development is pretty great, I like her. As for the minor villains, there were some freaking awesome ones, like Prosciutto and Risotto. The villains are far and away some of the most disturbing shown in shounen jump. Diavolo is possibly the weakest link. Which is a major problem seeing as he is the main villain. at first his need to hide his face, always shrouded in mystery was cool, but later on it seemed very cowardly. him wanting to kill anyone who knew his identity and panicking every time he is threatened makes this obvious. His some very confusing abilities as well and how ridiculously outclassed he was in the final battle was just disappointing. Wait, I almost forgot about the best boy Vinegar Doppio, he's the boss's alter ego and he's perfect. All I'm gonna say. -characters: 7/10 pretty solid, but with a few hiccups. Overall: This part isn't bad, it was lacking in some areas but it was still good, the ending was not great, and Gio is the most overpowered character I've ever seen. But it still has its moments and some cool characters. For me personally, this is probably the arc I enjoyed reading the most, however, it still has issues.