Jujutsu Kaisen

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First, one must consider that it's a weekly published shounen manga with its stereotypical flaws and pitfalls, and readers should expect that they exists here as well.

Considering that, Jujutsu Kaisen is overall a very engaging story, with great characters, great consistent themes and a fun power system.

The characters are very engaging with good narratives and arcs. But most of all, I love how so many characters parallel, mirror and contrast each other, giving each other more depth and showcasing the circle of violence, isolation and negativity that the new gen has to break.

The themes are very consistent throughout with good conclusions and are very enjoyable, ... like connection and love vs isolation, or perseverence through dark times vs getting lost in the past.

Of course it has flaws. There are some pacing/sequencing issues, some set ups and plot points are dropped, some ass puls or a lack of foreshadowing for certain events exist, and the ending is very rushed. Because it's rushed the last 5 chaptes have a weird pacing and often seem more like cliffnotes which makes it lackluster, but it ties off the themes in a satisfying manner. (Many of those same issues can be found in other weekly published shounen manga. As I said: expected flaws).

But still, despite it's flaws overall it's a fun and enjoyable manga.

I'm pretty sick while writing this so please forgive this nonsensical review.

This might be a strong take to start off with but I feel like Gege Akutami owes to give half of the credit for JJK to Kubo Tite, Masashi Kishimoto, and Studio Mappa as it feels like its strong start was owed largely to them and it felt like he had no idea what he was doing after Shibuya.

Now, onto the actual review portions. I, like many others, was introduced to JJK through the anime adaptation and there was a lot to love at the start. Although many of the elements of the ... series were very reminiscent of series like Bleach, YuYu Hakusho, and Naruto, the execution of these tropes and characters were fresh and it felt like JJK had figured out the formula for modern Shonen. Unfortunately, this did not remain the standard, because the story eventually became bogged down by subplots that never were resolved, characters who never paid off to anything, and the pacing and questionable story decisions in the second half of the series were actively were a detriment to my enjoyment of the series.

Without spoiling things too much: there are a number of characters that die suddenly after either being present or hyped up for large portions of the story. A certain important character is hyped up, but immediately loses their first onscreen battle due to their opponent somehow having the perfect counter to their powers despite never alluding to that. However, the more infamous of these events in the story is chapter 236, where a fan favorite character seems to be winning a fight, but then proceeds to get absolutely hoed off screen just because it generates shock value. I would not even have been mad at the result, but there was no explanation for why it was done the way it was. Normally, the rule of storytelling is "show, don't tell", but for some reason the author loves to "don't show, and only tell 20 chapters later". He built up characters as being arrogant and confident on screen for hundreds of chapters, but then flashed back to them being very vulnerable off screen only after they die. This leads to the "fraud" syndrome that is running rampant in the fandom, and also feels a bit like character assassination after the fact.

Other issues included walls of text, powers not really making that much sense (even for a Shonen series), oh and also killing off half the cast in Shibuya. Although there are interesting characters afterwards, the fact that JJK has such a strong start actually worked against it in the long run since I felt no incentive to become attached to any of the characters afterwards and this was compounded by the lack of payoff for any of the characters in the end.

Apologies again for the rambling, but the tldr of it is that the first half of JJK is good, but the latter half felt like the weirdest mix of decisions that were only focused on shocking the viewer with obviously very little thought put into the story consequences. It makes me sad how frustrated I became with this series in the latter half of it, and although I feel that it was an objectively bad ending to the series, it almost feels like a mercy killing and I'm glad I don't have to blow up my friends phones about how frustrating JJK is anymore.

Hokuto no Ken II, Post-Varia Katekyo Hitman Reborn and Post-Arima Makibao make for a better read than Jujutsu post-Shibuya, creating the king of all "this manga should have ended ages ago," truly a feat to be remembered.

It's hard to believe the same author that did Mahito and Junpei spent 2 years having the characters explain their powers in (non-chronological order sometimes) in a slugfest of "actually I'm behind you now" "actually two weeks ago I made a pact that whenever someone is behind me, I get to be behind them now, so I'm behind you now." If Gege is asked their favorite character, they'll probably ... answer with a domain, as the characters completely were overshadowed by what powers they had and how they could use it.

A case study in what can go wrong with battle shonen about silly magical powers when the writer cares more about powers than characters and story.