English Dub Review: Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable “Shining D (Diamond) is Unbreakable, Part 2”

Don’t stop Josuke now! He’s having such a good time!

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Kira maintains his civilian identity by checking in with his boss about his lateness, blows up a random guy who is just a bit too concerned about his female neighbor, then continues his hunt for Josuke and Hayato. As the two hole up in a nearby house, Josuke finally accepts that Okuyasu has died, but vows vengeance on Kira. But before they can get any proper rest, explosive bubbles start floating in from the wall, seemingly able to track Josuke’s movements. Remembering Heart Attack being able to track them by heat, Josuke deduces that this is a different form of homing attack. Seconds before the explosion, Josuke breaks a vase and sends part of the broken glass towards Kira, who is hiding just outside the house. The explosion still mortally wounds Josuke, but he’s still able to use Shining Diamond to bring back the glass and injure Kira as well.

Josuke also notices that Kira has been on the phone since he got there, meaning he’s been talking to someone. He then uses the lighter in his pocket to begin lighting up the edges of Hayato’s jacket, revealing Yoshihiro hiding within as the one giving Kira directions on where to send the bubbles. Once he grabs the cell phone, Josuke disguises his voice to send the biggest bubble yet right into Yoshihiro, finally killing the ghost once and for all. After losing his only remaining ally and getting yet another glass shard to the back, Kira is at wit’s end but is hell-bent on retaining his peaceful life.

Josuke limps out into the open to directly face Kira, landing several blows with Shining Diamond…only to find almost every punch has been blocked by Stray Cat’s air bubbles. Kira uses this opportunity to send another bubble bomb at the weakened Josuke, but to everyone’s surprise, it’s absorbed by the newly revived Okuyasu, who also nabs Stray Cat from Deadly Queen. Kira has run out of options and begins panicking, just in time for Koichi, Rohan, and Jotaro to arrive on the scene.

OUR TAKE

Diamond is Unbreakable reaches its climax as the battle against Kira reaches the height of suspense. While the last episode focused more on who had the best poker face, this one acted as a game of tactics. Kira fought with his bubbles to track down Josuke and Hayato’s location while those two had to figure out how they were being tracked while also finding ways to land damage of their own. The use of Yoshihiro was definitely a surprise since he had basically disappeared from clear view once Kira started using Bites the Dust, and so had no one knowing where he would pop up next. And yet Kira doesn’t shed a single tear for the loss of his father and only true ally, showing how remorseless and selfish he really is.

And since this fight is all but over, now is probably a good a time as any to compare it to the last few final battles throughout the adapted anime fights thus far. Jonathan’s fight with Dio in Part 1 was pretty short and simple, so there’s not much to mention here, while Joseph’s battle with Perfect Life Form Kars in Part 2 focused more on the sheer ridiculousness of the escalation, contrasted to the small scale city streets of this battle against Kira.

So, the main example to best compare it to would be the final fight between Jotaro and DIO from Part 3. I will say I enjoyed that fight more in terms of spectacle and tension, with moments like Jotaro having to stop his heart to remain undetected, the emotional blow of Kakyoin’s death, and the constant time stops. The fight between Josuke and Kira, meanwhile, has less in terms grand overpowered abilities (since Bites the Dust has been undone), and requires more quick thinking, with both sides slowly chipping away at both the health and mental clarity, even relying on allies the other side couldn’t have expected.

It also goes a long way to highlight the difference between DIO and Kira as villains. Where DIO was a maniac with world-conquering who had control over powerful individuals in addition to his vampire powers, Kira is just a regular dude who is both beholden to the laws of society and in pursuit of being seen as a normal man in order to keep up his murderous hobbies. But what goes around comes around, and I don’t just mean shards of bloodied glass, as Diamond is Unbreakable concludes next week.