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REVIEW: ‘Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Vento Aureo’ Episode 8: “Sex Pistols Appears, Part 2”

Disclaimer: This review contains spoilers for this episode and previous episodes of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure.

We start off “Sex Pistols Appears, Part 2” with a clear next move as  we follow up the story of “Sex Pistols Appears, Part 1” with Mista  jumping on the side of a truck to chase and fully kill Sale, who he shot  through the leg in the previous episode. The last episode sent Giorno  and Mista to kill/capture someone at the docks who knew about Polpo’s  fortune and about Bucciarati and his gang coming to get the money. They  tried to set up a trap for the mysterious enemy, but it went wrong. Now,  Giorno is left at the dock while Mista has hitched a ride on a truck to  engage the enemy.

Image from Crunchyroll

“Sex Pistols Appears, Part 2” has several good things going for it,  which has brought more interest to the series. One thing it has done is  solidified the answer to the question of whether or not they were going  to continue to do introductions before a character’s first battle, and,  so far, they seem to have created a pattern that most likely will  continue. Another good part of this episode is the fact that Mista has  shown himself to be a better character than Abbacchio, which instantly  makes this episode more interesting to watch since Mista is such an odd  character that needs explanation. Before “Six Bullets Appears, Part 2,”  they have shown things about Mista to generate interest in him, such as  his tetraphobia and showing off his stand Sex Pistols, all before  revealing his back story. This generated more appeal in a possible  backstory which we receive, and unlike how Abbacchio’s backstory which  had such a gap in explaining the current Abbacchio, Mista’s backstory is  simple and sufficient enough to explain him as a character and how he  acts now.

Abbacchio and Mista’s fight scenes had many differences between them.  Abbacchio’s opponent was a mystery who did not reveal himself and his  stand’s power was unclear. In this episode, Mista’s enemy appears rather  quickly and shows off his stand immediately. Kraft Work, known as Arts  & Crafts in the translation, is able to affix things by touching  them. He affixes the driver of the truck’s hands to the steering wheel  and the pedal as well as glueing one of Mista’s hands to the bar on the  side of the truck. The enemy stand user shows an extreme amount of uses  for his abilities that are believably true, like he is able to throw  rocks into the air and affix them, using the rocks like a ladder to  climb to Mista.

Surely Mista’s awesome Sex Pistol stand can help him, and it can,  except that even though he shoots the man in the forehead, the bullet  itself pauses before it fully enters his brain as part of his stand’s  power. One of the main items that made this episode really amazing was  the straightforward hardness of this fight. How do you fight someone who  can do so much with their stand, to the point where they are  practically invincible? The sheer amount of uses for Kraft Work reminds  many viewers that despite how many stands we have seen in the past, the  wide variety and creativity put into how to use them to their full  potential can still wow viewers.

Image from Crunchyroll

“Sex Pistols Appears, Part 2” shows the quality of the stands in this  series will be just as good as every other season and also have the  variety of stand battles we enjoy, at least that is what we hope. This  battle between Sex Pistols and Kraft Work can be seen as a versatile  stand versus a very simple stand. Kraft Work is able to be used to  attack, defend, and ambush, as well as keep his user alive even from  near death, while Sex Pistols is a simple and straightforward stand like  his user. The matchup was exciting since it almost seemed too unfair to  Mista, but then again that is how life works. The fact that Mista’s  stand is like him and really symbolizes his way of life makes him easy  to understand and more likable.

Something that must be praised in this episode is that this fight is  basically a fight on a car and, at a point, a car chase, and what movie  with gangsters would be complete without the most stereotypical gangster  scene, a car chase? Not any normal car chase either— it’s a car chase  against an enemy able to climb in the air and the car is a semitrailer!  Something fun about the whole thing was Giorno’s minor appearance in the  episode, but that helped us focus on the fight more than usual since  Giorno wasn’t getting anywhere quickly. It was funny to watch Giorno not  be the highlight of the episode even when he was still in parts of it.  The ending of the episode makes me wonder what will happen now that  Mista is back at the docks with the body of his enemy, and Giorno is  trying to go up the road to find Mista, who is already back at their  meeting place, essentially switching places from the start of this  episode.





Images: Crunchyroll

Featured Image: Jojo Animation

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