THE JOJO'S BIZARRE ADVENTURE
STORY EXPLANATION FAQ

LATEST UPDATE: June 29, 2005
Current goings-on in the world of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure:
Both the new movie and the English manga release of JoJo are really big news. I hope that Viz does a good job with the manga. Unfortunately I may have to sort of excuse myself from talking about it, since I'm biased due to the fact that I work at Viz. (Heh... well, I guess I can't really hide it any longer.) I'll try my best to ensure that the Viz English release is as authentic as possible.
Version 1.0: April 28, 2000

By Jason Thompson & others; thanks to the people on Ohla's JoJo Forum

* About this FAQ
* What is "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure"?
* A few thoughts on the popularity of the series
* About the Video Games
* Why the name "JoJo"?
* What is "Lucky Land"?
* Series Plot Summaries
* What is a Stand?
* Series 3 Characters & Stands
* Spoiler Warning
* Minor Series 3 Characters
* Miscellaneous Questions:
* About Hirohiko Araki
* Araki's Other Manga
  • * Winchester Mystery House manga (2003)
  • * Steel Ball Run (2003-2004) * What is the JoJo anime and will it ever be released in the U.S.?
    * Where can I get the JoJo manga?
    * What's the status with the manga's U.S. release?
    * Art Books & Other Products
    * Other JoJo Websites

    ABOUT THIS FAQ
    This FAQ was inspired by the release of Capcom's "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" video games, which have brought the JoJo series to a wider audience in America. In 1998 I heard about the then-new PlayStation & Dreamcast video game, which reminded me about the anime I'd seen a few years ago, which caused me to borrow the manga from my then-coworker Toshifumi Yoshida. I quickly got hooked on the gory violence, the horror movie references (which I dwell on to excess in this FAQ), and eventually even the screwed-up art style. And now, with an anime and video game series on the way, you -- YES, YOU -- can face the awesome absurdity that is JOJO'S BIZARRE ADVENTURE!

    This FAQ, focused on Series 3 of the manga, was written to fill the need for one. There used to be an older JoJo FAQ maintained by someone whose e-mail address was "axolotl", but it hasn't been on the Internet for years. I am hardly a definitive authority on the series, as I can't read Japanese aside from katakana, but I've written down what I know about the series (focusing on the part covered in the PlayStation/Dreamcast video game). I've inevitably concentrated on the aspects I like the most. To be honest, I'm a little JoJoed out after writing all this, so I may end up asking someone else to update the FAQ. If you're only familiar with it through the game or the anime, you can use this FAQ to find out more about the series and its characters. If all this explanation is too much, just skip to the Characters/Stands listing.

    One warning -- this website only really covers JoJo Series 3 (vols. 13-28 of an 80-volume series!). It doesn't cover the Playstation 2 video game, which is based on JoJo Series 5. I devoted more attention to the Series 3 video game because it was translated into English, and I'm also more familiar with Series 3 than Series 5.

    WHAT IS JOJO'S BIZARRE ADVENTURE?
    "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" is a popular action manga by Hirohiko Araki which has run from 1987 to the present (with occasional breaks) in Japan's bestselling boys' comics magazine, "Shonen Jump" (home of "Ruroni Kenshin", "Dragon Ball", and many other titles). (Note that I'm talking about the Japanese "Weekly Shonen Jump", not the monthly English-language version.) Over 80 volumes of the series, each over 184 pages long, have been produced. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what genre it belongs to, as it has gradually changed with time; it started out as a Gothic horror story, changed to a martial arts story, and then became a sort of Japanese equivalent of a superhero comic, which it has stayed. However, there are a few common themes that connect all the different incarnations of the series:

    (1) It's extremely violent
    (2) It's full of weird and grotesque imagery
    (3) It's loaded with references to Western rock music; almost all the important characters' names refer to rock bands, musicians or albums.

    The storyline of "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" is divided into several parts which have different protagonists and take place in different places and times, but the focus is always on the Joestar/Kujo family. The series began in the 1880s, but the most popular part so far is the 3rd Series, set in the 1980s. It's this part which is the basis for the current video game and anime series. Beginning with Series 3, the main characters are all gifted with "Stands," a sort of superpowered psychic alter egos which take strange and sometimes frightening forms.

    A FEW THOUGHTS ON THE POPULARITY OF THE SERIES
    "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" (JoJo no Kimyo na Boken) is a successful series with a "cult" sensibility. There are less fans of "JoJo" than there are of, say, "Dragon Ball", but they're pretty diehard. It's more or less a fighting manga, but if "Dragon Ball" is for 12-year-olds, "JoJo" is better for the late teens; it's much weirder, more violent, more gross and absurd. However, it's still got the cliffhanging, drawn-out, "keep the readers interested" sensibility of a formulaic (but well-crafted) "Shonen Jump" comic. It's got the "friendship, perseverance and victory" of "Dragon Ball," but it's also full of sudden, shocking gore and tragedy; dramatic set-ups which dead-end into jokes; and things which are just there to be strange.

    To American readers of the series, there's also the semi-intentional hilarity of all the American pop culture and music references. The series, particularly in the beginning, is sort of a homage to Western sensibilities, and katakana and Romanji (English text) are used frequently. In Series 1, set in 1880s Britain, there's a dialogue between the good and bad guys about "Pluck & Luck" (move over, Horatio Alger!). Series 2 is set in '30s New York, and has a pulp adventure feel, with a young Joseph Joestar reading "Superman" comics! The Americanisms extend beyond music to action and horror movies. Hirohiko Araki (born in 1960; his only other successful series was "Baoh": in 1984) seems to be a child of the '80s, when Japanese fascination with America was at its peak. If the manga has since become less concerned with America (lately it's turned to Japan and Italy), this only reflects the same trend in Japan in the '90s.

    Araki's baroque, fascinatingly ugly art style is also a strong point. In the early volumes of the series, the art is pretty bad, but he's clearly learning as he goes along, and by Series 2 the beginnings of his current style are recognizable: contorted "dynamic" poses, warped perspective, and concentrations of details, symbols and patterns (on heiroglyphs, earrings, clothes...) Like Akira Toriyama, he's another artist who started with a "cartoony" style and became more realistic. At times the detail looks like it's being used to distract from deficiencies in drawing. Since he is liked by his fans for having a distinct, detailed, but not necessarily realistic art style, and for his inventive superheroes (i.e. Stand Users), it's possible to think of Araki as a sort of Japanese equivalent of Todd McFarlane and the other '90s Image artists (their peaks of popularity were even at the same time!). His decadent art style and habit of drawing his heroes as macho pretty-boys (more and more so as the series goes on) has also led to the question "Is this manga totally gay or what?", which apparently no interviewer has been rude enough to ask Araki yet. (Carl Gustav Horn, who's currently working as one of Dark Horse Comics' main manga people, referred to JoJo as "a glam version of "Fist of the North Star.") Anyway, like any popular series, it's probably got its share of yaoi dojinshi. Maybe it's "service for the female readers"; or maybe it's yet another way in which Araki has been influenced by those ambiguous American superheroes.

    This Americanism, however, is not a mark in JoJo's favor when it comes to being translated into English. Most manga and anime fans -- myself included -- are attracted to the material _because_ it's different and Japanese, and, often, because it's cute. Despite the occasional sexy girl (drawn more buxom than _roricon_), there's nothing cute in JoJo. The art style is more suggestive of Tetsuo Hara (of '80s "Fist of the North Star" fame) and Burne Hogarth ("Tarzan", the "Dynamic Figure Drawing" series of books) than the typical wide-eyed manga. And "dark-themed, violent, quirkily-drawn superhero comics" are a dime a dozen in American comics at the turn of the century. But "JoJo" is more than just a twisted mirror; it's great, unwholesome entertainment, and a true manga in the sense of its epic, rambling plot.

    ABOUT THE VIDEO GAMES

    *** PLAYSTATION & DREAMCAST ***
    In 1999, I was pleased to hear that Capcom was making a "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" game (arcade, PlayStation and Dreamcast), and even more surprised to find out that it was being released in the U.S. Frankly, the game comes as a surprise from a licensing and marketing perspective, since although the comic is still running, the storyline the game is based on ("Series 3") ran from 1989 to 1992! Maybe it took awhile to set up the rights.

    Anyway, the game is fun, if not perfect. The original arcade version (known in the U.S. as "JoJo's Venture") was at least consistent, even if it only had a small number of characters, but at some point the decision was made to focus on the PlayStation 1-player version, the "Super Story Mode", which replicates all of the different encounters from Series 3 of the manga. While this is awesome for a completist, some of the mini-games and segments of the Super Story Mode are much better-put-together than others; and also, many of the new characters (such as Pet Shop/Horus, Rubber Soul/Yellow Temperance, etc.) are extremely unbalanced and feel like they were quickly dashed together. As a result, its usefulness as a 2-player fighting game suffers (as long as you just don't touch some of the worse characters except as joke, it's all right). Despite all this, the Super Story Mode is a lot of fun, making the PlayStation version more fun than the Dreamcast version, which doesn't have it.

    For a while, I thought Capcom wasn't going to release the game in the U.S., since it wasn't very popular in the arcade and the Super Story Mode makes it even more cryptic to JoJo newbies. But I have an unsubstantiated personal theory about why the game was made in the first place... Hirohiko Araki and his editors couldn't have helped noticing that Capcom's Marvel fighting games had greatly popularized Marvel superheroes in Japan. WHAT IF the JoJo video game was partially intended to publicize JoJo in America in a similar fashion? To be totally blunt... I'm pretty sure that Capcom U.S.A. was _forced_ to translate the game by Capcom Japan (these things happen sometimes in American-Japanese companies). But what the heck. I'm just happy it was released it all.

    The American version of the video game has a few predictable problems... although it's very true to the original, all things considered. First, all the red blood and gore of the Japanese game has been 'whited out', although it's still obviously violent. Secondly, many of the music references have been obscured, which is semi-unfortunate, though some sound better than others (would Mariah Carey really sue because of a video-game character named "Mariah"? Why did that get changed while "Pet Shop" stayed intact?) Thirdly, the bowdlerized swearing ranges from entertaining ("You'll join him soon in the fiery depths of hell!") to awful (Jotaro to Dio: "You scoundrel!"). Lastly, some of the PlayStation English dialogue and localization is completely ludicrous and embarrassing (there's a typo in the opening animation, to begin with), since old Cal-Animage San Diego hand Dan Okada (hi Dan), who worked on the more-than-adequate translations for the arcade version, wasn't involved. Judging from errors like sometimes translating laughter as "Fu Fu Fu", the Japanese equivalent, I'd guess that the game was translated by non-native English speakers and not proofed. But still, Capcom U.S.A. ultimately did a faithful, near-literal port and didn't hide its Japanese origins at all, instead aiming it at the "collectors, anime fans and maniacs" market. Everyone buy ten copies.

    There is also a second Dreamcast version, available only in Japan: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure for Matching Service. This is not really a new game, just the online-play version of the regular Dreamcast fighting game, with a few new options and all playable characters available from the beginning. (Capcom has made "For Matching Service" versions of several of their fighting games.) If there are any really new secrets in this version, aside from technical options like starting the fight with your super combo meter full, etc., I'm unaware of it.

    *** PLAYSTATION 2 ***
    In late 2002, Capcom released a totally new JoJo game based on JoJo Series 5 for the Japanese PlayStation 2. (http://ps2.ign.com/articles/356/356053p1.html) Unlike the previous games, it's a 3D action-adventure game, with cel-shaded graphics. The game basically takes the form of a series of "boss battles" between different characters from JoJo Series 5. The plotline exactly follows Series 5 (the GioGio story), with manga-style, cel-shaded intermissions.

    Initially, Capcom USA announced that the game would be released in America (despite the poor American sales of the PlayStation and Dreamcast games), and an English/U.S. cover and logo was even made for it. But the game was never released, for unknown reasons and despite promo spreads in several video game magazines (including the American SHONEN JUMP). According to some rumors, Capcom wanted to change the music references in the game to avoid lawsuits, but Araki insisted that they not be changed, leading to an impasse. (Capcom may also have been unhappy with the fact that the original music-reference names were used in the previously mentioned SHONEN JUMP article, which have eliminated any chance of "plausible deniability" on Capcom's part if Prince, for instance, decided to sue them.) For information about JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 5, check out Li's JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Site.


    WHY THE NAME "JOJO"?
    The nickname "JoJo" refers to several characters in the Joestar family. It derives from the first syllable in their first and last names -- i.e., "Jotaro Kujo", "Jonathan Joestar" or "Joseph Joestar". Usually whoever is the main character at the time gets the title. (In the English translation of the Capcom game, the young Joseph character is called "JoJo", but there's no particular reason for this. In Series 2, when Joseph was young, he was referred to as "JoJo." In Series 3, Jotaro is usually referred to as "JoJo", while Joseph is politely called "Joestar-sama" or "Mr. Joestar".) As for the nickname itself, it is a music reference, to the Beatles song "Get Back" ("JoJo was a man who thought he was a loner..."). Seriously.

    WHAT IS "LUCKY LAND"?
    "Lucky Land Communications" is the name of Hirohiko Araki's company which owns the copyright to JoJo. That's why it shows up in some signs in the backgrounds of the video game (and all over the JoJo manga).

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    SERIES PLOT SUMMARIES
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    The "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" video game is only part of a long and complicated story, although it's the most famous and popular part. All the different Parts or "Series" of the story have a distinct style and atmosphere.

    LEADING UP TO THE BIG EVENT...
    The tragic history of the Joestar family, Dio, and the first appearance of Stands!

    SERIES 1
    Time: 1880s -- Place: Britain -- Manga Vols. 1-5
    The story begins in Victorian times as young Jonathan Joestar (JoJo), whose mother has died, comes to live with his father on his estate in the British countryside. However, his father has let a wolf into the fold: Dio Brando, Jonathan's new stepbrother, whom his father adopted to repay a debt to Dio's father (who recently died). Unfortunately, Dio is rotten to the core, and schemes to get Jonathan out of the picture so that he can inherit the Joestar fortune. Polite, honest JoJo endures Dio's tormenting, and eventually discovers that Dio had plotted to murder his own father. Exposed, Dio uses the power of an ancient Aztec mask (a mysterious family heirloom and the first supernatural thing to show up in the series) which, when worn and dipped in blood, causes the wearer to become a vampire. Dio kills Jonathan's father and goes on a killing rampage until JoJo drives most of a statue through his heart. End of volume 2. In volume 3, Jonathan (previously just a strong guy who played a lot of rugby) learns martial arts from a mysterious stranger in a top hat, Antonio Zeppeli. Soon thereafter he is using _hamon_ ("wave energy") to walk on water, generate heat from his fists, and track down Dio, who has survived and is gathering an army of half-human zombies including Jack the Ripper. Finally, JoJo defeats Dio and marries his childhood sweetheart, but their honeymoon voyage is interrupted by Dio's severed head, which tries to take over JoJo's body, ultimately sending the ship, Dio and JoJo to a watery grave. JoJo's wife and child survive. (The first series is very violent with very bad artwork. However, the premise is great, it's got David Cronenberg references in it, and it's got the least comic relief of all the series. If Araki is influenced by American comics, could Series 1 be influenced by Marv Wolfman's TOMB OF DRACULA comics from the '70s, which introduced the world to characters such as Blade?)

    SERIES 2
    Time: 1930s -- Place: America and Europe -- Manga Vols. 5-12
    New York!!! Jazz music! Tommy guns! Fast forward to 1938, when Jonathan's grandson, Joseph Joestar, is an easy-going tough guy visiting the streets of New York. (Contrary to my own previous misunderstanding, Joseph is British, not American, although we never see him at home in Britain for the whole of Part 2.) Joseph ( "JoJo") knows what befell his grandfather, and when vampires (resurrected by the Nazis a la "Raiders of the Lost Ark") start showing up, he hunts them down across America, Mexico, and Europe. This time, though, they're not just vampires; they're the "Ultimate Life Forms", four humanoid blood-sucking things who _created_ the vampires, and are much stronger than them. Though it sounds like this would be similar to Series 1, it's much more fighting-oriented, and the main bad guys, rather than being treacherous evil bastards like Dio is, are more like some "Fist of the North Star" big-guy opponents who want to prove that they're stronger than JoJo by beating him up fair and square in battle arenas with spiked floors or a Roman amphitheater where they have a chariot race with vampire horses. JoJo continually pulls off impossible stunts, such as blocking bullets or stabbing a vampire's eyes out with his toes. Eventually, after saving the world in a battle that involves a volcano, a Nazi cyborg and a B-52 bomber, Joseph marries Susie Q. and retires from adventuring. (The second series has the same "travel across the world, go to exotic locations, meet interesting people and kill them" premise as Series 3. The art is much better-developed than Series 1, and it's got some incredibly bizarre moments, but it's more of an outright martial arts manga than any of the other Series.)

    SERIES 3
    Time: 1980s -- Place: Egypt and all across Asia -- Manga Vols. 12-28
    Joseph Joestar, now 67 years old, goes to Tokyo to meet his daughter Holly and his half-Japanese grandson Jotaro Kujo ("JoJo"), a violence-prone high school rebel in the classic '70s Japanese "bancho" (gang boss) style. (Notice how the heroes become progressively less goody-two-shoes with each series?) Jotaro believes he's possessed by an evil spirit, but actually, he is one of the few people on Earth who have "Stands" -- psychic, superpowered astral bodies corresponding to Tarot Cards, which may have been around for centuries, or may be spontaneously appearing everywhere. But across the world in Cairo, Dio has also returned to life as a Stand User (and he's still a vampire, too), and now threatens the world as well as the JoJo family bloodline in particular. Together with a few Stand User friends, Joseph and Jotaro travel to Cairo, intending to kill Dio. Unfortunately, their trip which they planned would take a few days by plane, turns out to take several weeks by plane, helicopter, submarine, train, car and boat, as they are repeatedly bushwhacked and ambushed by increasingly freakish, evil and horrific Stand Users sent by Dio to kill them. Finally, after 13 volume of travelling and fighting, they reach Cairo only to be virtually helpless against Dio's awesome and mysterious power... THE WORLD. (This is the part that the original video game and anime are based on, the part that everyone remembers. Volumes 12-17 or so have a fairly different atmosphere than the later volumes up to 28; as the journey progresses, things get a little sillier and more blatantly superheroic, the fights go on longer, and the art becomes sleeker. It's part horror, part superheroes, and part travelogue -- as the heroes travel to each new country, Hirohiko Araki drops tourist's-eye bits of local flavor, local food, and so on. Since world travel is one of Araki's hobbies, it's quite possible that the heroes' route across Asia is based on his personal experience.)

    ...AND THE AFTERMATH
    I haven't read all of Part 4, or any of Part 5, so please don't take these descriptions as gospel. At this point the grand super-plot of Series 1-3 is basically over, and you could almost say that Series 4, 5 and 6 are "set in the world of JoJo" rather than being literal continuations.

    SERIES 4
    Time: 1990s -- Place: Morioh Town (a fictional city in Japan) -- Manga Vols. 29-47 (approximately)
    But wait! There's more! This series focuses on Josuke Higashikata (Stand: Crazy Diamond), the illegitimate son of Joseph Joestar, with Jotaro Kujo and Joseph Joestar along in a supporting role. Apparently feeling that Stands needed more explanation, Araki retroactively introduces the "Bow & Arrow", an ancient artifact (and yes, it is a bow & arrow) which causes latent Stand ability to develop in people. Unfortunately, the Bow & Arrow falls into the hands of a serial killer, who uses it to turn assorted other crazy people into Stand Users who then run around maniacally butchering others or just causing trouble. (They're not really working together like they were in Series 3.) Most of the Stand Users are teenagers, too, so the effect is sort of like "Stand User High School". Josuke's classmates also become Stand Users, and the powers they go up against get stranger and stranger... "Heaven's Door", which allows you to open up a person's face like a book and change their memories; "Echoes", which attacks with materialized sound effects; "Pearl Jam", which causes your food to apparently dismantle your body from inside... This Series is most notable for (1) Taking place in Japan and (2) Taking place in an imaginary place, without any trips to real locations. (The plot is mystery-oriented, not travel-oriented, as the characters try to locate the true murderer without being exterminated, but mostly they just wander around and encounter weird people.) Also, it really pumps up the rock references; there's even a villain jamming on a guitar, which might cross the line into total ridiculousness. For its sheer inventiveness, and its artwork, it occupies a high rank among many fans, even though it's probable that "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" was supposed to end with Series 3 and was just continued due to its popularity.

    SERIES 5
    Time: Early 21st Century -- Place: Italy -- Manga Vols. 47-62 (approximately)
    The main surprise of this series is that its main character is not one of the Joestars or Kujos -- it's Giorno Giovanna, aka "GioGio" (Stand: Gold Experience), the son of Dio, who is working his way up through the ranks of Italian gangsters. Despite his father, however, Giorno is basically a nice guy, and doesn't really have to answer to his father's evil past (of course, due to Dio's strange method of living 100 years, he's got Jonathan Joestar's blood in his veins too, so he is partially a member of the Joestar family. Dio + JoJo = GioGio). This series is more crime-oriented than horror-oriented (possibly following the late-'90s trend of cool criminals in American movies, gangster music and pop culture), and is basically a battle of "good Stand Users vs. bad Stand Users" between extremely weird-looking and overdressed Italian mafia hitmen. It's a big break with the past as there are hardly any continuing characters from any of the earlier Series. At this point some characters begin to be named after fashion models (as opposed to rock stars). This is a very popular series with female fans; as someone once said, the sullen, lounging-around gangsta heroes of Part 5 are "like a boy band."

    SERIES 6: "Stone Ocean"
    Time: Early 21st Century -- Place: A Florida prison -- Manga Vols. 63-80
    Set in and around the maximum-security Green Dolphin Street prison in Florida, surrounded by palm trees, swamps, and (as the bug-eyed warden warns the inmates) man-eating alligators, this storyline stars Jolyne Kujo/Cujoh (Stand: Stone Free), the daughter of Jotaro Kujo! After being falsely accused of a hit-and-run automobile accident, she is sentenced to 15 years in jail, a plot which _may_ be orchestrated by some dark conspiracy, some unknown enemy. Series 6 is a weird prison story in which Jolyne discovers her own powers and other Stand Users while trying to escape the pen. Her dad Jotaro Kujo returns for a cameo in the first few volumes, and Dio, the ultra-villain of the JoJo series, also shows up in several flashbacks, with a fragment of his corpse playing a major plot point. This series appears to be an attempt for Araki to relaunch the series for new readers (the graphic novels are numbered starting with "Vol. 1" with "JoJo Vol. 63", and so forth, in small letters) by re-explaining the Stands and introducing a slinky, appealing female protagonist. (However, the "women in prison" aspect gradually fades out in place of a more conventional male-dominated Araki cast, as strangely-dressed men become Jolyne's primary allies.) And for the most part, it takes place within a literally confined environment -- Araki had previously done some short manga stories set in jail, so maybe that's where his current interests lie. Note also that Jolyne is the first American (specifically Japanese-American) JoJo protagonist. Series 6 features (IMHO) somewhat sloppy but interesting artwork and some of the goriest, most unrealistic fights in the entire manga (in Series 4 and 5 the protagonists had healing powers, allowing them to get really injured and come back okay, but in Series 6 the main characters are practically scalped, dismembered, chopped up into bloody bits, and then get back into the action without much explanation). The sheer level of weirdness is also pretty mind-boggling, with all kinds of bizarre phenomena -- rains of frogs, time distortion, and some extremely odd, conceptual Stands. And the ending is probably one of the strangest things ever to happen in the series.

    WHAT IS A "STAND"?
    Stands are psychic superpowers made visible. They're like alter egos or astral bodies; a spirit that dwells within certain people or animals and can leave the body and perform actions outside it. Some of them are anthropomorphic, and all of them look very strange. Only a Stand can hurt another Stand, although the Stand Users themselves can be hurt like regular people. If a Stand is killed, the Stand User dies, and vice versa. In addition, only Stand Users can _see_ Stands. In other words, if Jotaro uses Star Platinum to punch a hole in the wall, normal onlookers would just see Jotaro standing there while the the wall shatters and explodes, and might think that Jotaro had the power of telekinesis -- which, in essence, he does.

    When Stands first appear in JOJO, they're an ominous force which only a few people in the world know about. Like poltergeists or telekinesis, they generally manifest during a person's teenage years. They don't quite share the same mind as their human wielders (in Series 4 there is a stand that talks to its "master"), but they may represent a sort of alter ego of the Stand users. Their origin isn't explained in Series 3, but in Series 4 it's explained that there is an ancient artifact called the Bow & Arrow which causes Stand Power to manifest in certain people who are struck by the arrows. (The Arrow can also make existing Stands stronger, turning them into the mutated "Requiem" form (as in "Silver Chariot Requiem"), which is a big plot point in Series 5.) Some people have the potential and the willpower; others die. The power also transmits genetically. Lastly (?), in Series 6, one character has the power to steal and transfer other people's Stands in the form of CDs which emerge from their head, which may be too literal an expression of the music references. (IMHO, the Bow & Arrow is not a perfectly satisfactory explanation -- I prefer the idea that Stand Users have awesome powers just because that's the way they are, rather than being people who acquired superpowers by random chance.) The first several antagonist Stands in Series 3 are mostly references to American horror movies, and they are all bloodthirsty evil spirits. Later on, the Stands become more like standard superpowers. In fact, a lot of the appeal of Stands to Japanese audiences seems to be the appeal of superheroes; the main characters may not have capes and tights, but they sure dress funky, and they can do completely implausible things. (And, in a sense, Stands are "secret identities.") And, for Araki's benefit, there doesn't need to be any explanation of how they got bitten by a radioactive spider or inherited a mutation; they've just got Stands.

    There's one particularly strange story about the origin of Stands. According to a JOJO fan at Antarctic Press who knew some Japanese JOJO fans, Stands may be inspired by a mid-'80s sequence in a Marvel NEW MUTANTS comic, where Professor X has an astral battle with an evil psychic talent in a bar in Cairo. To the onlookers, it seems merely that they stare at one another, and the evil talent (a Cairo crimelord) drops to the table dead, while Professor X walks away. But, later in the same storyline, they actually have one or two scenes of assorted characters' astral bodies (in the form of glowing versions of themselves, more or less) fighting one another! Cairo and invisible spirits... is NEW MUTANTS one of the influences behind JOJO? Is JOJO an attempt to do a sort of X-MEN-like superpowers story?

    In any case, the idea of heroes who get their powers from a helper, or spirit, is a popular one in Japanese comics. Stands may have inspired the spirit partners in manga and anime such as SHAMAN KING and SHAMANIC PRINCESS. Most of the later Stands also have a robot-like appearance, suggesting that, even in the spirit world, it's hard to get away from the influence of mecha.

    * The first type of Stands are named after the Major Arcana of the Tarot Cards, giving them a weird occult atmosphere. The Minor Arcana -- Cups, Rods, Swords and Pentacles, with numbers and face cards like regular playing cards -- aren't referred to. I'm not sure why the very first Tarot Stands are also accompanied with colors (i.e., why not just "The Star" instead of "Star Platinum?"), but one possibility is to make it easier for Japanese readers to understand the English names. Tarot terms are esoteric and difficult to pronounce, but everyone learning a foreign language learns colors early on. (This is the same reason why DRAGON BALL Z characters are named after foods and vegetables.)

    * The second type of Stands are named after the ancient Egyptian gods. Presumably Araki ran out of Tarot Cards mid-series and needed new antagonists to keep going. It's said at one point in the series that they're based on the "Egyptian Tarot Cards" or the "Pillar Gods of Egypt", which isn't quite as bogus as it sounds: according to some people, the Tarot is originally based on Egyptian sources. Probably Araki modelled these cards after the many 'variant' Tarot decks, such as Aleister Crowley's Thoth tarot deck, or another deck with Egyptian-style artwork. This also marks the first appearance of the pure-superpower Stands which don't have visual representations, like Mariah's Stand.

    * The third type of Stands are outright music references. Tenor Sax and Cream are the only examples in the 3rd series. (Judging from evidence in the JoJo video game, it's possible that they're initially supposed to be some sort of "Tarot Cards from Another Dimension", but this explanation only lasts for Series 3.) In the 4th, 5th and 6th Series of JOJO, all the Stands are named after bands, albums or songs (Achtung Baby, Crazy Diamond, Gold Experience, R.A.T.T., Killer Queen, etc.). This marks the shift in the series from "occult and foreboding" to "simply crazy and unpredictable", although most of the Stands continue to be extremely violent.

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    SERIES 3 CHARACTERS & STANDS
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    *** SPOILER WARNING ***
    The following describes all the important characters in JoJo Series 3. Although I've tried to keep some secrets, some of the character descriptions reveal their powers or the bad ends they come to. These _will_ give away some surprises in the story. However, if you've already played the video game but haven't read the manga, they'll hopefully help flesh out the characters and story. The following descriptions probably have the most spoilers (sometimes including how the character dies), in case you want to avoid them: Name Unknown (Tower of Gray), Forever (Strength), Rubber Soul (Temperance Yellow), Hol Horse (The Emperor), Nena (The Empress), ZZ (Wheel of Fortune), Dan Steely (The Lovers), Arabia Fats (The Sun), Mannish Boy (Death 13), Cameo (Judgment), Daniel J. D'Arby (Osiris) and Kenny G (Tenor Sax).

    Jotaro Kujo
    STAND: Star Platinum/The Star
    REFERENCE: Aside from being one of the JoJos (see above), it's been suggested that the name "Kujo" is a reference to Stephen King's mad dog "Cujo". As for "The Star"... perhaps it's because he's the _star_ of the series? Or maybe it's a rock _star_ thing? And could "Platinum" refer to a record that's sold 1 million copies?
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 12 (Tokyo, Japan)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Still hasn't died yet as of Vol. 60.
    The hero. "He used to be such a good boy... and now I don't know what's happened to him!" his mother laments right at the beginning of Series 3, just before we see him: a 17-year-old teen delinquent with a ripped uniform covered in chains. When Jotaro first appears, he's voluntarily gotten arrested because he believes his Stand is an evil spirit possessing him. (To demonstrate, he steals a gun from a prison guard, and tries to shoot himself in the head -- a phantom hand emerges from his arm and catches the bullet.) After he is released from jail by his grandfather Joseph and Joseph's friend Avdol, and learns what his Stand is, Jotaro gets used to Star Platinum -- a fierce, muscular, vaguely Aztec-looking spirit with "the precision of a machine" and the ability to destroy virtually anything with a "Fist of the North Star"-like sledgehammer barrage of fists. Jotaro has a perpetual cooler-than-thou, slightly disinterested attitude, although he loves his mother and respects his grandfather. In the manga, he's constantly chased by adoring girls, whom he ignores or tries to drive away. He is the main target of Dio, who realize that Jotaro is his greatest threat.
    IN THE ANIME: Major character (of course).
    IN THE GAME: Playable.

    Joseph Joestar
    STAND: Hermit Purple/The Hermit
    REFERENCE: He's just one of the JoJos (see above).
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 5, New York City (when young; first appears as an old man in Vol. 12)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Appears throughout Series 4 (up through the early Vol. 40s), but hasn't been since in the series since. Joseph is Jotaro's grandfather and Holly's father. Joseph started out in the 1930s as a wise-cracking, trash-talking, good-natured young punk, who had tremendous fighting ability due to his innate mastery of _hamon_, the "vibratory energy" which disciplined martial artists can use to perform great feats. In Series 2, he travelled around the world fighting a group of super-strong vampire-like creatures. (This is the character called "Young Joseph" or "JoJo" in the video game. The bowgun, bola, cola bottle and _hamon_-amplifying red gem are all improvised weapons he uses in Series 2 of the manga. The guy who appears when he does his "flurry of manga panels" super move is Caesar Zeppeli, one of his friends from that period who died fighting the bad guys.) After saving the world (at the cost of his hand, which he replaced with a cybernetic metal prosthesis), he married Susie Q. and had a child, Holly. Fast forward to Series 3, 50 years later: Joseph Joestar is 67 years old and still a powerful fighter. He's less of an impulsive goof-off and more of a paternal, Hemingway-esque adventurer. At this point he develops a Stand, Hermit Purple, which takes the form of a tangle of thorn vines which grow from his hand at will. Hermit Purple gives him a form of clairvoyance; the vines can enter mechanical devices such as cameras or televisions and cause them to project an image of whatever he's looking for, even if it's on the other side of the planet. Using this power, Joseph creates a photograph of Dio and knows that he must go to Cairo with his grandson and allies to stop his ancestral enemy. (This is the character called "Joseph Joestar" in the video game. The woman who appears when he does his "flurry of manga panels" super move is Lisa Lisa, a mysterious woman from Series 2 who's dear to his heart.)
    IN THE ANIME: Major character.
    IN THE GAME: Playable as 2 different characters, both his young and old versions. (Frankly, "Young Joseph" should be even _more_ awesome to equal all the cool stuff he does in Series 2, but all in all, he's still not bad.)

    Muhammad Avdol
    STAND: Magician's Red/The Magician
    REFERENCE: Paula Abdul
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 13 (Tokyo, Japan)
    LAST APPEARANCE: circa Vol. 26
    A fortune-teller from Myanmar (Burma) who is a friend of Joseph Joestar's and one of the first people to understand Stands, due to his occult background. His Stand, Magician's Red, is a djinn-like bird-headed being which can breathe flames. (Essentially, he's a pyrokinetic.) The fiery ankhs in the video game are straight out of the manga. Avdol, who has something of the Punjab stereotype about him, is a brave and loyal friend and advisor, a man of war and peace, and unfortunately self-sacrificing. In Vol. 15, he appears to be killed by Hol Horse and J. Gail, but he wasn't destined to stay dead for long -- apparently because grieving Shonen Jump readers demanded his return.
    IN THE ANIME: Major character.
    IN THE GAME: Playable.

    Kakyoin Noriaki
    STAND: Heirophant Green/The Heirophant
    REFERENCE: Possibly refers to a Japanese musical group, but if so, it's practically unknown in America.
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 13 (Tokyo, Japan)
    LAST APPEARANCE: circa Vol. 27
    One of Jotaro's high school classmates, Kakyoin is a brooding artist. He first shows up as a villain, controlled by Dio by means of an evil implant; he uses his Stand to possess the school nurse, causing her to assault Jotaro in the school hospital. After Jotaro defeats him, he is freed from Dio's brainwashing and agrees to join the group. Kakyoin's Stand, Heirophant Green, is very weird; a glistening bio-organic entity which can stretch and contort its body into a mass of ribbony tentacles. (Is it a plant? An armored marionette? A raw, exposed mass of veins and internal organs?) It can also (1) Join its palms together to emit the "Emerald Splash," a projectile attack that really shoots emeralds, and (2) Possess people by crawling into their mouthes (this doesn't happen often). At one point, Kakyoin says that when he was a child, he was aware of his Stand as an "imaginary friend" that only he could see. He generally appears to be cynical, intelligent and a little standoffish, although by the end, he repeatedly demonstrates his heroism. When fighting N'doul/Geb in Vol. 20, his eyes are seriously wounded, putting him out of commission for awhile; he returns wearing dark glasses with his injuries healed. Note that in its very first appearance in the manga, Kakyoin's stand was originally called "Heirophant Emerald". If you look in the Japanese volume 13, the first time when Kakyoin explains his stand, the katakana reads "Heirophant Emerald." The manga has been through a zillion printings, but apparently they never felt the need to change this inconsistency.
    IN THE ANIME: Major character.
    IN THE GAME: Playable as two different characters (although "Kakyoin" and "Kakyoin w/Sunglasses" are virtually identical).

    Name Unknown
    STAND: Tower of Gray/The Tower
    REFERENCE: None (???)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 13 (En route from Japan to Hong Kong)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14
    An inconspicuous old man whose Stand is a flying beetle with huge mandibles, from which it extends a long, grisly stinger with which it tears out the tongues of its victims. (Maybe "The Tower" refers to the Tower of Babel, where people lost the power of speech?) It attacks the heroes while they're on a passenger plane from Tokyo to Hong Kong, and rampages through the other passengers (who can't see or harm it), killing the pilots and writing the word "Massacre" with bloody tongues on the wall. It's too fast and agile for the heroes to hit, but eventually Kakyoin is able to defeat it by spreading his Stand out and attacking from several directions simultaneously. This is the good guys' first encounter with a non-anthropomorphic Stand. Before dying, the Stand User rants about how the great Dio will destroy them. (In the video game, he's referred to as "Gray Fly," although if so, that's one of the most unlikely names in the series, and doesn't appear to be a music reference either.)
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to a pretty weak opponent whom you can fight with any of the good guys (only in the PlayStation version). Unfortunately, he's not playable.

    Jean Pierre Polnareff
    STAND: Silver Chariot/The Chariot
    REFERENCE: Michel Polnareff, a French musician (http://www.polnaweb.com)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14 (Hong Kong)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Still hasn't died yet, although in Part 5 he has some trouble.
    Polnareff is a French Stand User who became a fighter to avenge the death of his sister, Sherry (possibly meant to be the French word "cheri"?), who was murdered by J. Gail (q.v.). Along the way, he met Dio under the guise of a fortune-teller, and was brainwashed into becoming his servant. After being defeated by Avdol, however, he becomes one of the main good guys (and one of the most popular characters in the series, in Japan). Personality-wise, Polnareff means well, but isn't very smart and is sometimes bad-tempered. He's the "earnest, incompetent clutz" of the group, always getting caught in awful situations due to his brashness, although he's a brave fighter and is sometimes able to pull off surprising victories. If you like your heroes cocky, sentimental, and thick-skulled, he's your guy. His Stand, Silver Chariot, has a Medieval appearance but is actually a robotic creature capable of performing bewildering tricks. It's fast enough to parry bullets, it can form mirrors, and it can split into dozens of duplicates. Also, it's prone to destroy opponents in an onslaught of rapier thrusts, leaving them covered in bloody puncture wounds. SNK's "King of Fighters" character Benimaru looks like he's based on Polnareff.
    IN THE ANIME: Major character.
    IN THE GAME: Playable. When possessed by Chaka (q.v.), he becomes "Black Polnareff".

    Captain Tennille
    STAND: Dark Blue Moon/The Moon
    REFERENCE: The Captain and Tennille
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14 (South China Sea)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14
    Captain Tennille's Stand is an amphibious-looking sea monster, similar to the "Creature from the Black Lagoon", but with a masklike face covered with eyes. The Stand User infiltrates a boat which the heroes are sailing from Hong Kong to Singapore and poses as the captain. Dark Blue Moon is strong enough to rip a shark in half, and has various other water-related powers: (1) Causing barnacles to grow on its opponents, preventing them from moving; (2) Creating a whirlpool in the ocean; and (3) Shedding its scales into the water, where they act like razors. While fighting Captain Tennille, the heroes befriend a young runaway girl who is posing as a boy sailor. During the fight, Dark Blue Moon smashes the boat's propellor, sinking it and leaving the heroes in lifeboats at the mercy of the next ship which happens to be passing by... which is unfortunate...
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to an interactive movie sequence.

    Forever
    STAND: Strength
    REFERENCE: Forever (This character isn't human, and doesn't speak, so its name might just be provided by Araki.)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14 (South China Sea)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14
    A gorilla whose Stand takes the form of a huge freight ship, slowly drifting through the ocean; the ape first appears in a cage in the otherwise seemingly empty ship, but it soon becomes evident that it's the master, not a prisoner. The entire ship and everything on it is mobile and murderous; hoses, gaffe hooks, fans, doors and broken glass can all come alive and attack anyone who's on board, and if that fails, the steel deck or walls simply melt like butter, allowing the gorilla to pass through but crushing anyone else. The gorilla itself is intelligent, sadistic (all JoJo's villains are sadistic) and lecherous. In appearance, the ship is a direct reference to the early '80s horror movie "Death Ship", which is also about a possessed killer freighter. (Unfortunately, "Death Ship" sucks. One of the few interesting things about the movie is that the makers of the JoJo anime appear to have used it for reference, since many of the anime shots of the ship's interiors and machinery, which aren't in the manga, are similar to the movie.)
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to a somewhat weak action sequence.

    Devo/D'bo
    STAND: Ebony Devil/The Devil
    REFERENCE: The musical group Devo.
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 15 (Singapore)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 15
    A sado-masochistic Native American assassin, "Devo the Cursed", who always lets his victims hurt him before he kills them; that way his Stand, which feeds on his own pain and hatred, grows stronger. His Stand initially appears as a very weird-looking insect-like idol, but this is only a decoy; his _true_ power is the ability to possess and remote-control a little puppet which has nails for teeth and carries an assortment of razor blades, spears and other weapons. (It looks similar to the homicidal Zuni Fetish Doll in the movie "Trilogy of Terror".) The idol-like "decoy Stand" is taken directly from the "Devil" card in the rare Sardinian Tarot deck.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable.

    Rubber Soul/Robber Soul
    STAND: Yellow Temperance/Temperance
    REFERENCE: The Beatles album "Rubber Soul".
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 15 (Singapore)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 15
    Temperance Yellow is sort of like "The Blob"; a disgusting ooze which can mimic shapes, dissolves and eats human or animal flesh, and is nearly invulnerable. The Stand User first appears in disguise as Kakyoin, having coated himself in a Kakyoin-like ooze, but acting completely evil. After much provocation Jotaro punches "Kakyoin" in the face, after which his lower jaw rips off and his entire face explodes, revealing the actual Stand User beneath. After a brief fight, Jotaro is splashed with a piece of Temperance which starts to feed on his hand. Jotaro tries to burn it off with a cigarette lighter, but (also like the '80s remake of "The Blob") the ooze just jumps to another part of his hand. Eventually Jotaro figures out the blob's one weakness. The Stand User himself may be British, Australian or American, judging from his use of English phrases in the video game ("Loathsome!" "Tarot Card Yellow Temperance!" "Do you understand?").
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable, although they turned him into a Kakyoin clone. One of the worst characters; not nearly as cool as he is in the manga. The taunt where he sticks his tongue out and rolls a cherry around in his mouth is in the manga.

    Hol Horse
    STAND: The Emperor
    REFERENCE: The musical group Full Force (an obscure '80s band)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 15 (Calcutta, India)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 24
    Cool-handed, swaggering, cigarette-smoking cowboy-type mercenary. Hol Horse's power, The Emperor, is a phantom handgun which fires bullets which go wherever he wants them to. Hol differs from most of the other 'bad guys' in the story in that he is not devoted to the cause of pure evil, but is instead a complete pragmatic coward concerned only with self-preservation. When the going gets bad, he runs, therefore surviving to face the good guys on several occasions. He also has a policy of always working in a team if possible, chiefly so that there is someone else to draw fire. When the heroes first encounter him in Calcutta, he is working with the assassin J. Gail, and together the two of them seemingly manage to kill Avdol. (Actually, Avdol is just knocked out, and rejoins the group later.) However, the heroes escape and Hol takes his time chasing them, assuming that J. Gail will finish off Kakyoin and Polnareff by himself. When J. Gail dies instead, Hol has to get out of dodge. He tails the main characters on their journey through Asia, and in Afghanistan he is attacked along with them by Enya Gail, who blames him for letting her son die. Much later in the series, Hol goes to Cairo and tries to back out of his agreement with Dio. When this doesn't work, he tries to kill Dio with a point-blank shot to the back of the head, only to be terrified into submission when Dio vanishes and reappears behind him. Finding Boingo in the street, he forces the kid to help him kill the good guys with his precognitive powers. His plan, however, backfires badly.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Playable in two different versions: as he first appears (with The Hanged Man as his partner) and as he appears later, with Boingo as his partner.

    J. Geil
    STAND: The Hanged Man
    REFERENCE: J. Geil's Band
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 15 (Calcutta, India)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 16
    An ugly, freakish-looking assassin, the son of Enya Gail (q.v.). J. Gail killed Polnareff's sister; when the manga begins, Polnareff is searching for him, but knows him only as "the man with two right hands", an inherited deformity which J. Gail shares with his mother. His Stand, The Hanged Man, is a twisted, mummy-like, partly mechanical thing which only can be seen in mirrors; in fact, it exists _inside_ mirrors and other reflective surfaces, moving between them in the blink of an eye, and killing its victims by attacking their reflections. (SPOILER AHEAD) It can even travel through the mirrors in a person's cornea. However, even though it moves at light speed, it's apparently slow enough for our heroes to hit it in transit if they know which reflective surfaces it's jumping between.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: J. Gail shows up when Hol Horse does some of his special moves, but he's not really playable. He also has a lengthy story scene in the PlayStation version.

    Nena
    STAND: The Empress
    REFERENCE: Nena (http://www.nena.de) (best known for the song "99 Luftballoons")
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 16 (Calcutta, India)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 16
    Inscrutable, beautiful East Indian woman who first shows up as a companion/paramour of Hol Horse (Emperor & Empress...). The heroes think she's just an innocent, and allow her to accompany them. Big mistake. Nena's Stand is truly revolting; the ability to infect others with a tumor which grows rapidly into a fanged, talking face. (This is a horror idea at least as old as Edward Whitehead's story "Lukundoo", although the reference is probably to the movie "The Manitou".) Joseph Joestar is infected when a drop of Nena's blood splashes on his arm; he goes by himself to a surgeon to have it removed, but the face grabs the scalpel with its teeth and slashes the surgeon to death, then screams something like "I killed him! I, Joseph Joestar!", causing Joseph to be pursued by the police through the slums of India. The face then starts spreading and ferociously eating everything that comes near it, growing into a little file-toothed dwarf with arms and a waist emerging from Joseph's bicep. As soon as it's big enough, it promptly slugs Joseph in the face (_this_ cancer knows _kung fu_!) and tries to beat him to death. Joseph, however, is able to outwit it by using his "Hermit Purple" clairvoyance to locate a bucket of tar; the sticky, fast-drying tar slows down the Empress enough for Joseph to tear the hideous creature apart, at which point Nena explodes, revealing that she was not the pretty girl that everyone had thought she was...
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up, although strangely, she's not as a Stand User, she's just an ordinary person who is in love with Hol Horse.
    IN THE GAME: Converted into an interactive movie sequence (in which only her Stand appears). Nena herself shows up in one of Hol Horse's starting poses (she's the girl riding the elephant).

    ZZ
    STAND: Wheel of Fortune
    REFERENCE: ZZ Top (I'm not sure if his name is mentioned in the manga or if it was just invented afterward by Araki.)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 16 (Delhi, India)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 17
    More horror movies... This sequence starts off as a scene-for-scene take-off of Steven Spielberg's 1976 TV movie "Duel" and turns into a sequence from "Christine" or "The Car". The Wheel of Fortune takes the form of a dusty car which passes the good guys' car along the road to Afghanistan. While they are driving on a curve, a muscular hand hanging out the driver's side window (all that is visible of the driver) gestures for the heroes to pass; they do so, and as soon as they cross into the oncoming traffic lane, they see a huge truck heading straight for them. Jotaro's Star Platinum is able to absorb most of the impact of the crash, but the mystery car drives out of sight. Stopping at a small village, the heroes are then shocked to see the mystery car parked and unattended. Figuring that the driver must be one of the sinister-looking patrons at a nearby cafˇ, they start to rough them up, only to see the car driving away with the same muscular arm hanging out the window. The car then tricks them into taking a bad road out into the mountains, where it circles around on them and tries to push them into a ravine. They are able to knock the mystery car into the ravine instead; but a second later, a hateful voice on their car radio starts promising to kill them, and the mystery car bursts out of the ground, transformed into a spiked, hell-on-wheels metal monster. After subduing it, they see that the driver/Stand User is a man they'd noticed in the village, who looks ridiculous because he has big muscular arms on a puny body. (This is one of several JoJo sequences which starts out seriously and then sort of self-destructs into comic relief at the ending.)
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to an interactive movie sequence. Apparently they considered making it into a real fighting-game opponent at one point, since you can view Wheel of Fortune's "fight location" as part of the bonus material in the PlayStation version.

    Enya Geil/N-Yah
    STAND: Justice
    REFERENCE: Enya
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14 (Cairo, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 17 (also shows up later on in many flashbacks)
    Enya is an aged, shrunken prophetess who first appears as an advisor to Dio. (In Part 4 it's retroactively explained that it was she who used the magical bow & arrow to grant Stand powers to some of Dio's followers.) Her most distinguishing physical feature is that she has two right hands, a birth defect she shares with her beloved and equally evil son, J. Gail (q.v.). When J. Gail dies, she sympathetically feels his death wounds and vows to avenge him. She meets up with the good guys and Hol Horse (whom she blames for her son's death) in a city in Afghanistan, where she uses her Stand, Justice, to turn the inhabitants of the cities to zombies. Justice appears as a gigantic skeletal head wearing an emperor's crown, with great clutching hands, composed of a mist which seeps throughout the entire city. The zombie victims of the mist develop boils and sores and long, piercing tongues, and assault the heroes, trying to stab them with their tongues, which then create a wound through which the mist can enter and control their bodies. A few of the protagonists are partially infected, but Jotaro saves them with Star Platinum.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up, although her appearance is somewhat different.
    IN THE GAME: Converted into an opponent in a pseudo-fighting game (PlayStation version only) during which you play Jotaro. It's a pretty cool battle, even though you can't use all of Jotaro's moves. (Unfortunately, her connection to her son isn't explained.)

    Dan Steely/S'Terry Dan
    STAND: The Lovers
    REFERENCE: The musical group Steely Dan ('70s-80s band which just released a new album in early 2000) (http://www.steelydan.com)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 17 (Karachi, Afghanistan)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 18
    An overconfident, vain man who picks a fight with the good guys in broad daylight; when Jotaro hits him, _Joseph_ goes reeling in a spray of blood. Dan Steely explains that Joseph has been marked with his Stand, The Lovers, and will suffer any pain or damage that he, Dan, takes, many times amplified. Dan Steely then forces Jotaro to follow him around town and run various humiliating errands, while Joseph, Kakyoin and Polnareff try to figure out how to save Joseph. Eventually Joseph uses his clairvoyance to get an image of the Stand as a microscopic parasite within his body (through a TV screen), and Kakyoin and Polnareff shrink down their Stands, "Fantastic Voyage"-style, to enter Joseph's brain and kill The Lovers. After a long battle with the self-replicating, crustacean-like Stand, Kakyoin and Polnareff are able to drive it away. Meanwhile, Dan Steely, who has been slapping Jotaro around, notices that Jotaro is writing something down on a notepad whenever he's struck. Dan asks what it is. "I'm keeping track of all the beatings I owe you," Jotaro responds. When Kakyoin and Polnareff announce that Joseph is safe, Dan Steely tries to infect a different person, but before he can, Joseph uses Star Platinum to pummel him to death.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to a shooter sequence which is probably the best-designed and most original mini-game.

    Arabia Fats
    STAND: The Sun
    REFERENCE: Unknown (This character doesn't have any dialogue, so his name might just be provided by Araki.)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 18 (Abu Dhabi, Arabia)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 18
    A great ball of fire in the sky which floats overhead when Jotaro and Co. are in the Arabian Desert, causing the temperature to rise so high that they must retreat to a shelter beneath some rocks. While they are pinned down, awaiting death, they figure out that the Stand User is hiding some distance away in a little van with mirrored sides (the mirrors make it appear to be part of the landscape). Jotaro throws a rock through the van and knocks the driver out, causing the second sun to vanish; they walk over and find a fat man lying unconscious. The Stand User is not developed as a character. This is possibly the least interesting of all the Series 3 Stands.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted into a weird mini-game.

    Mannish Boy
    STAND: Death 13/Death
    REFERENCE: The Mannish Boys, a '60s rock band that David Bowie worked with (I don't think this character ever has a name in the manga, so his name might just be provided by Araki.)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 18 (The Empty Quarter of Arabia)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 19
    While preparing to take a helicopter for the next leg of their journey, Jotaro and Co. are asked to take care of a mysterious baby. Unfortunately, the baby is actually a Stand User, who, when no one is looking, likes to smoke cigarettes and stab things to death with its safety pin. Death 13, which looks like a combination of a clown and the Grim Reaper, has the powers of Freddy Krueger in "Nightmare on Elm Street" -- it can kill or torture you in your dreams -- but with the added advantage that its victims, if they wake up alive, don't remember anything about the dream. During a nap, however, Kakyoin survives a dream and manages to realize what's going on (through a very good idea which I won't spoil); the next time he's drawn into the dreamworld, he's figured out a way to fight. (This is a very cool part of the manga, although that the baby is used for lots of diaper-changing and toilet jokes...
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to a weak opponent whom you can fight with any of the good guys. Unfortunately, he's not playable.

    Cameo/Kameo
    STAND: Judgment
    REFERENCE: Cameo (Obscure '70s-80s funk band) (I don't think this character has any dialogue, so his name might just be provided by Araki.)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 19 (By the Red Sea)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 19
    Judgment is a genie-like (but mechanical-looking) Stand which dwells in a lamp and grants wishes; unfortunately they are all "Monkey's Paw" wishes which end up coming true in the worst possible way. Polnareff first wishes for his sister to come back from the dead -- she comes back as a flesh-eating zombie -- and then wishes the Avdol would come back from the dead -- causing an evil duplicate of Avdol to appear. However, whether by wish or coincidence, the _real_ Avdol also chooses this moment to reappear and saves Polnareff from the attacking phantasms (which are apparently just illusions made of clay). In the manga, Judgment's signature phrase is "HAIL 2 U!!!" in Romanji (English) when it appears before Polnareff. The Stand User, who is remote-controlling his Stand from a distance while hiding, hardly shows up at all and is not developed as a character. (Like Death 13, the Judgment sequence starts semi-seriously but ends with some cheesy jokes.)
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted into an opponent in a pseudo-fighting game (PlayStation version only) during which you play Avdol. It's a pretty cool battle, even though you can't use all of Avdol's moves.

    Midler
    STAND: High Priestess
    REFERENCE: Bette Midler (http://www.bettewriter.com)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 19 (Jiddah)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 20
    The High Priestess is a possessing spirit that has the ability to manifest itself out of metal, silicon, and other inorganic substances. It attacks the heroes when they're in a submarine, transforming into various objects which then suddenly malfunction on them, or sprout hair and teeth and try to eat them. It even gets inside Polnareff's lungs and has to be forced out before he suffocates -- and just when they think they've escaped, they remember that dirt and sand is partly made out of silicon... The Stand User, Midler, actually never appears in the manga; she's controlling her Stand by long range so her face is never shown (although you can see her body at one point). In the video game she was redesigned as a sort of priestess-belly dancer by Hirohiko Araki by request of Capcom, who presumably wanted a marketable sexy-girl character (and hey -- it worked!).
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable. When Midler fights Joseph, he has a special starting pose (where he's holding a mug, and it turns into the High Priestess) which is taken from the manga; that's how the High Priestess first appears.

    Iggi
    STAND: The Fool
    REFERENCE: Iggy Pop (who had a song titled "I Wanna Be Your Dog"...)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 20 (Abu Simbel)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 26
    A selfish, very intelligent, somewhat gross bull terrier whom Avdol found in New York City and had sent to Egypt to help the good guys. Iggi is the star of the first two volumes of the anime series. He can only be made to obey orders by bribing him with coffee-flavored chewing gum, and he's also fond of jumping on peoples' faces, tearing out their hair, and farting in their face. His Stand is the power to control sand and shape it into various objects, including a giant dog-like beast. When the team is first attacked by N'dul, he runs away and tries to save his own skin, but later on he becomes devoted to his companions. He doesn't get much screen time from Vol. 21 to Vol. 23.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Playable. When Iggi first shows up in the manga in Vol. 20, he's a very grotesque, ugly-looking, realistic dog (this design is also used in the anime). When he becomes a major character again in Vol. 24 to fight Pet Shop, he has been redesigned and looks much more cute and anthropomorphic, and it's this version which is shown in the video game. However, in some story scenes, and when he's "de-aged" by Alessi, he looks like his old ugly self. Other notes: his move where he causes a duplicate of Dio to appear out of sand is a trick he uses in the manga to fool Vanilla Ice.

    N'doul
    STAND: Geb (first of the Egyptian Stands)
    REFERENCE: Youssou N'dour (Unsure about this one)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 20 (Abu Simbel)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 20
    N'doul is the main bad guy of the first 2 volumes of the anime series. A blind man who worships Dio as a savior, he attacks the heroes from long range with his Stand, which is made of water and can cut through things with intense water pressure. He cannot see, but he has excellent hearing, and can hear the vibrations of people walking through kilometers of sand. The Stand mostly hides underground, but it attacks without warning at great speed, and manages to injure nearly everyone. At one point his Stand tears off someone's head and sucks it into a canteen; at another point it turns into a watery claw and slashes Kakyoin's eyes, nearly blinding him and putting him out of commission for several volumes. Geb was an Egyptian god of the earth.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to a side-scrolling action scene which you can play with any of the 'good' characters.

    Oingo & Boingo/Oing & Voing
    STANDS: Khnum & Thoth
    REFERENCE: The Californian musical group Oingo Boingo
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 20 (Aswan, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 21 (Oingo); Vol. 24 (Boingo)
    Oingo and Boingo are two Egyptian brothers, who work together at first, although their powers aren't really related. Oingo, the older brother, has the power of Khnum, the Egyptian god of clay (among other things), which allows him to mold his face like clay and mimic people. Little Boingo, a precognitive, has the power of Thoth, the Egyptian god of knowledge. He is the possessor of a strange comic book titled "Oingo Boingo Brothers Adventure", which predicts the future as new drawings slowly appear. (It's been suggested that this is a self-parody of the JoJo manga; also, the comic-within-a-comic is drawn in a grotesque style that resembles "Oingo Boingo" album art.) Many of their predictions end with people dying in horrible accidents, so they are not popular with the other locals. They try to kill Jotaro together by giving him an orange with a bomb in it, after Boingo sees a prediction of Jotaro being caught in an explosion. Later, after Oingo is incapacitated, Boingo ends up alone in Cairo, where Hol Horse threatens him and forces him to help him try to kill the heroes again. (The great thing about Boingo's power is that almost all his predictions sound completely ridiculous, but they always come true... more or less.)
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: The two brothers' first appearance together is converted into an interactive movie scene. Boingo also appears onscreen with Hol Horse and gives him new moves, but isn't really playable (unless you're playing in "Alessi Mode"...). The "Boingo Book" in the PlayStation version is, of course, Boingo's magical comic book.

    Chaka Khan
    STAND: Anubis
    REFERENCE: Chaka Khan (http://www.chakakhan.com)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 21 (Kom Ombo, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 21
    Chaka is not a human antagonist; it's an intelligent Stand residing in a sword, left there by a now-dead swordsmith hundreds of years ago, which now has the ability to possess people and turn them into bloodthirsty, maniacal fighters. Being a weapon of death, it thinks only about killing. (It's probably coincidental, but this is the same plot as the movie "Ninja 3: Domination"; although the sword is supposed to be Egyptian, it sure looks Japanese.) The sword first possesses an ordinary, wimpy laborer ("Chaka" in the video game); he challenges Polnareff to a duel and is killed. Polnareff takes the sword with him to examine it, but then the sword possesses a barber ("Khan" in the video game) and attacks him again, more successfully. After putting two and two together, Polnareff and Jotaro break the sword in half, but it manages to possess Polnareff ("Black Polnareff" in the video game), and uses both itself and Silver Chariot in a final attempt to kill Jotaro. Jackal-headed Anubis is the Egyptian god of funerary rites and mummification. Ancient Egyptians didn't fear Anubis, but in JoJo, like in a lot of modern fiction, he's sort of an evil god of death.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable as _three_ separate characters with similar moves: the original Chaka, Anubis-possessed Polnareff (who should be even stronger than he is), and the barber.

    Mariah/Mahrahiah
    STAND: Bast
    REFERENCE: Mariah Carey (http://www.sonymusic.com/artists/MariahCarey)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 21 (Luxor, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 22
    A cold-hearted bombshell in a mini-skirt (she's always laughing evilly) who possesses the power of Bast (the Egyptian cat goddess), which, apparently, is magnetism. After being shocked by an electrical outlet, Joseph Joestar contracts her progressive "curse"; he becomes more and more highly magnetized, first causing little metal objects like bottle caps and pins to stick to him, then finally causing large objects to fly towards him, pelting and crushing him to death. When Joseph realizes what is happening, he pursues Mariah around town with several pounds of iron dragging behind him, nearly being killed by an escalator, several cars, and various everyday objects and pieces of scrap metal. Avdol is also caught in her power.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable.

    Alessi
    STAND: Sethan/Set
    REFERENCE: Alessi (Unsure about this one)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 22 (Luxor, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 22
    A completely goofy, nebbishy assassin. Alessi has the power to de-age people with his shadow; anyone stepping in his shadow, Sethan, gradually grows younger and younger until they are a helpless baby, at which point this grinning boogeyman attempts to kill them. (One victim in the manga even gets turned into a fetus.) Alessi is such a cheap cowardly bastard that, even when his victims are infants, he uses a submachine gun and an axe to attack them. In the manga, he de-ages Polnareff and spends several chapters chasing him around town. I'm not sure why his Stand is named "Sethan" instead of "Set" or "Seth", which are the more common names for the Egyptian god of chaos, evil and child molestation (seriously! Well, there's at least one Egyptian myth where Seth is a child molester)... it's probably just a Japanese spelling which seems weird to native English speakers. There's a scene in the manga where he hacks a door open with an axe and sticks his face through, like Jack Nicholson/Jack Torrance in "The Shining." (But as usual, I may be making up associations where they don't exist...)
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable. His "turning people into children" ability works differently for different characters; some people turn into baby versions of themselves, but others (Mariah, Dio, Shadow Dio, Hol Horse, Rubber Soul, and all the Chaka Khan variants) turn into minor wimpy characters who show up during that character's tenure in the manga.

    Daniel J. D'Arby
    STAND: Osiris
    REFERENCE: Darby Crash, singer for the band The Germs (?)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 23 (Giza, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 23
    When the heroes arrive in Giza, they set out looking for the exact location of the mosque which is Dio's lair. Sitting in the shade of a bar, a dapper English-speaking gambler offers to tell them where it is if they'll make a wager with him. Polnareff is the first to attempt to gamble, and loses, at which point the gambler's Stand emerges from him and captures Polnareff's soul in the shape of a poker chip. The Stand User gambler, D'Arby, has been collecting souls for years; he is an expert at all games of chance, as well as a cheater, and if he dies, the hundreds of souls he owns will die as well. After Polnareff, Joseph challenges D'Arby, but also loses (at least in the manga and anime... it may be possible to beat him in the video game). Jotaro then challenges D'Arby to a poker game... Osiris is the Egyptian god of the underworld, which might explain why the Osiris Stand has the power to take souls.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Converted into a series of mini-games that give you a chance to actually succeed where the manga characters failed. Also, he appears in the Mode Select screen, and in the screen you see when you die in Arcade Mode (that's his Stand that squashes you into a poker chip).

    Pet Shop
    STAND: Horus
    REFERENCE: The Pet Shop Boys
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 24 (Cairo, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 24
    Pet Shop is Dio's superpowered hawk, first seen killing someone and then plucking the eyeballs from two huge dog carcasses. He guards Dio's mosque, attacking strangers who come too close. He fights Iggi, using Horus -- an elemental ice Stand -- to freeze Iggi to various surfaces while shooting deadly ice spears through the air. Pet Shop can also regenerate, and use condensation to create giant ice boulders which tumble from the sky. The Stand appears in one or two panels of the manga, and in one of Pet Shop's win poses in the video game, as a sort of icicle-draped Pterodactyl skeleton; however, for the most part, the Stand doesn't have a visible "body", and Pet Shop is just a hawk surrounded by a nimbus of freezing, swirling, liquid-looking ice. Horus is the falcon-headed Egyptian god of royalty and the air.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Playable (but not a very good character).

    Terrence Trent D'Arby
    STAND: Atum
    REFERENCE: Terrence Trent D'Arby (A British pop singer from the late '80s and early '90s) and the singer Darby Crash (?)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 24 (Cairo, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 25
    The little brother of Daniel J. D'Arby, Terrence is a gamer rather than a gambler; he prefers video games. He ambushes the main characters as they are on the doorstep of Dio's mosque, sucking them into his private world. His Stand, Atum, has the ability to create an extradimensional space in which Terrence dwells, where he entertains his guests and keeps his collection of puppets -- each of them containing the tortured soul of someone who has lost to him. Although the "playing video games for their souls" thing seems like a silly attempt to duplicate the success of the Daniel J. D'Arby sequence, this is actually a pretty tense, interesting sequence with a good twist. Kakyoin challenges D'Arby to a racing game, but loses, and is imprisoned inside an ugly puppet; Jotaro then challenges D'Arby to a baseball simulation game... This is the second-longest fight in Part 3, after Dio. Atum was one of several Egyptian creator gods, who was said to have made the world. (So maybe that's how D'Arby makes an extradimensional world to play games in..?)
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted to a really hard interactive movie sequence. (Wouldn't it have been fun in a ludicrous way, though, if it really _was_ a racing and baseball video game within a video game?)

    Kenny G/Ken-Nee-Gee
    STAND: Tenor Sax
    REFERENCE: Kenny G (http://www.kennyg.com). One of the more painfully obvious references... I think if he were named "Pink Floyd", his Stand could be more appropriately called "The Wall".
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 26 (Cairo, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 26
    While walking in Dio's mosque, Joseph, Avdol and Iggi find that they have somehow entered a maze of stairs and passages which is too big to fit inside the building. As it turns out, the maze itself is a Stand, and they must figure out some way of finding the Stand User or be trapped forever in the endless corridors. The Stand User, who is remote-controlling his Stand from a distance while hiding, hardly shows up at all and is not developed as a character. This is also the quickest fight with a Stand User in all of Series 3!
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Converted into a mini-game.

    Iced/Vanilla Ice
    STAND: Cream
    REFERENCE: The singer Vanilla Ice. The "Cream" reference is not just a really bad English pun -- it's also a reference to Eric Clapton's band of the same name. Of course, it, uh, "works" on both levels. Some people have noticed that the Tarot Card for his Stand, as drawn by Araki, resembles the Stand for the "Ace of Cups" in the Minor Arcana of the Tarot. Maybe this was originally intended to be his power, before they came up with the "Cream" pun.
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 26 (Cairo, Egypt)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 26
    Dio's final and most faithful servant, who does, in Dio's words, "Every little thing I ask of him." To prove his loyalty, Dio asks Vanilla Ice to cut off his own head; Ice does so, killing himself. Dio reattaches Ice's head, giving him some of his own blood in the process, which turns Ice into an immortal vampire. (This is the only time Dio turns anyone into a vampire in Series 3, except for Nukesaku, although he does it all the time in Series 1.) Vanilla Ice's Stand, Cream, is a hulking monster which can swallow itself like Ouroboros, and Ice along with it, turning itself inside out and becoming a sort of floating Sphere of Annihilation which destroys anything that it touches. While in this form, Ice is invulnerable, and indeed he's one of the toughest and most evil bad guys in the series. (Due to his name, he also gets more laughs than any other character in the anime.)
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Playable. One of the strongest (in fact, most unbalanced) characters, appropriately.

    Dio Brando
    STAND: The World
    REFERENCE: Ronnie James Dio (the heavy metal musician who's been around since the early '80s). The fact that his name means "God" in Italian is also a nice touch for a nearly omnipotent villain.
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 1 (first appears in full light in Series 3 circa Vol. 26; from Vol. 13 to Vol. 26 he's only seen with his face in shadow, hence "Shadow Dio" in the video game)
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 28
    NOTE: THERE ARE SPOILERS ABOUT DIO'S POWERS IN THIS WRITEUP! (But nothing you don't know already if you've played the video game or seen the anime.) A megalomaniacal villain whose origins stretch to the 1880s, when he was the adopted brother of Jonathan Joestar, who tried to steal Jonathan's birthright, and finally transformed himself into a vampire. (See the description of Series 1.) His treacherous, sadistic nature may be partially explained by his abusive upbringing at the hands of an alcoholic father, but it's probably best not to spend too much time psychoanalyzing a blood-sucking, superpowered undead corpse. At the end of Series 1, Dio's body was destroyed, but his severed head managed to kill Jonathan Joestar and together they sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. The anime and video game begin 100 years later, in Series 3, when Dio has returned from the bottom of the sea and developed a Stand, giving him new abilities on top of his vampire powers. (At the bottom of the sea, Dio's severed head reattached itself to Jonathan Joestar's lifeless body, which is why Dio and the members of the JoJo family share the same star birthmark.) For most of Series 3, Dio is offscreen and in shadow, and the question of exactly _what_ "The World" does is a mystery. (In Series 1, Dio's powers were more bio-organic and slimy, and indeed at the beginning of Series 3 he still has the touch -- the "evil implants" which brainwash Polnareff and Kakyoin are generated from Dio's hair when he does the move called "Charisma" in the video game.) Eventually it's discovered that "The World" is a sort of brother power to "Star Platinum", which has great strength and can also stop time (although not for as great a duration), making Dio seem to be teleporting or moving at impossible speed. Dio's ambition is to rule the world, and his first step is to drink the blood of Joseph Joestar, which will help him to fully fuse with Jonathan Joestar's body. Once he does this, his powers will gradually increase, until he is able to stop time for as long as he likes.
    IN THE ANIME: Major character.
    IN THE GAME: Playable as two characters: "Shadow Dio" (the beginning-of-Series 3 Dio whose Stand is still unknown) and regular Dio, with his Stand at full power. (What... no playable "Dio with Yellow Jacket"?)

    MINOR SERIES 3 CHARACTERS

    Holly Kujo
    STAND: Unknown (presumably a variation of Hermit Purple)
    REFERENCE: She's just one of the JoJos (see above).
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 12
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 28
    Joseph's daughter and Jotaro's mother (she married a Japanese rock star, but Jotaro's father is now dead or out of the picture). She's completely good-hearted and concerned about her son, and she has some amusing scenes with her father. Like the rest of her family, and Dio, she has a star birthmark on the back of her neck. When Dio comes to life, it causes her innate Stand ability to develop, but unfortunately, her Stand is harmful; a phantom plant growth of thorny vines which grows out of her body, slowly squeezing out her life force. The explanation is that Holly does not have the fierce fighting spirit which would allow her to control her Stand, so instead, it's gradually killing her. She spends almost the entire saga of Series 3 on life support in Japan, as the heroes try to kill Dio, which will end his "curse" and save Holly.
    IN THE ANIME: Shows up.
    IN THE GAME: Shows up in some of the early story scenes.

    Runaway Girl
    STAND: None
    REFERENCE: None (She's never given a name, as far as I can tell)
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 14
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 17
    A girl initially disguised as a boy sailor, who joins up with the team while they are fighting Dark Blue Moon in the South China Sea. She has a crush on Jotaro (she mutters "JoJo" in her sleep), which irritates him greatly, although he saves her from an awful fate on a few occasions. In the manga, she is involved in the fights with Strength and Yellow Temperance, leaves the team for a little while, and then briefly tags along with them again while hitchhiking across India in the Wheel of Fortune sequence.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: She's the girl wearing overalls who shows up in the "Strength" mini-game.

    Nukesaku
    STAND: None
    REFERENCE: None
    FIRST APPEARANCE: Vol. 27
    LAST APPEARANCE: Vol. 27
    Small, treacherous, cringing vampire servant of Dio in Cairo. Basically a comic relief character. He has a "special power" which was probably granted to him by Dio's flesh-crafting ability.
    IN THE ANIME: Not present.
    IN THE GAME: Shows up in some of the story scenes; you can also play him if you pick Dio in "Alessi Mode".

    WHAT ARE VAMPIRES LIKE IN JOJO?
    The vampires are the main antagonists in Series 1 and 2 of JoJo. They were originally created by an accursed mask (the blue mask which is briefly visible when you're "Stand Crashed" in the video game) which the Aztecs used in sacrificial rituals. Vampires can also create more vampires by draining their victims' blood. They're unbelievably strong and they can regenerate from any damage except sunlight (which destroys them almost immediately) or "hamon", a form of _chi_-energy (which either burns them or causes them to explode, depending on the intensity). They have fangs, but they mostly drink blood through their fingers. In Series 1 and 2 they have various weird powers, mostly related to shapeshifting and body-altering, and most of them, except Dio and the four "Men in the Pillar" from Series 2, look grotesque and disfigured. In Series 3, only Dio, Vanilla Ice, and Nukesaku (and possibly Death 13's Stand User) are vampires.

    ABOUT HIROHIKO ARAKI
    Born in 1960. He debuted in 1981 and drew several short series (including "Baoh", 1984) before starting JoJo in 1987. Since then, he's occasionally written other short stories in between his JoJo duties. I don't have much information on him, but aside from the obvious American movies (crime, mystery, horror, Westerns...) and music, Araki is a fan of travel and professional F-1 racecar driving. Photos in the art book "JoJo6521", which includes an interview in Japanese, show him leaning around a house with deep shadows and assorted animal skulls hanging from the walls. (All part of the image...) He's been to at least one American anime convention -- Anime Expo in the mid-late '90s -- where he drew super-deformed pictures of Jotaro in peoples' sketchbooks. More biographical info is available at http://www.ce.cmu.edu/~soo/JOJO/jojoauthor.html.

    There's one other anecdote about Araki, which will probably seem more significant than it is, since it's the only anecdote I know. According to American artist Colleen Doran ("A Distant Soil"), when she was invited to Japan in the late '90s for the Tezuka Symposium (where Japanese and American artists meet), Araki was at some panel discussion. Apparently he was one of several manga creators who accused American comic book artists of being lazy or unprofessioal due to their relatively low page-per-month output. Doran countered that she drew every page by herself, without assistants, to which Araki answered something like "You don't understand the beauty of the Japanese system". I have great respect for American small-press comic artists, being one myself, so I'm not on Araki's side in this apocryphal story, but I can understand how he and other major-magazine Japanese artists who produce 80-100 pages a month would have such an attitude. Thanks to August Ragone and Colleen Doran for telling me about this event.

    I have also heard from two sources that Araki (at least as of the year 2000) actually doesn't like present-day America very much, despite the many references to American movies, music and pop culture in JoJo, especially the first 3 Series (although he definitely loves Europe and Italy). I can't say how true this is or why, although if it is, allow me to venture a possibly opinionated (and definitely oversimplified) guess as to why. In the '80s, both Japan and America were mutually fascinated with one another, both in a positive and negative way. Thus you have manga like "Mad Bull", or Akimi Yoshida's "Banana Fish", or Tetsuo Hara and Buronson's "Fist of the North Star" (which Hara says is American-influenced), or Part 2 of JOJO. But after the Japanese "bubble economy" burst in the mid-'90s, neither country has been quite as interested in the other. Hara said in an interview with "Animerica" that he was more into American stuff in the '80s than he is now, and perhaps that's how it is with Araki; perhaps, too, if you like something _too_ much, you can become pretty critical of it when the honeymoon wears off. (And this is still inspecific -- does he not like the experience of actually visiting America compared to seeing it in movies? America's foreign policy? America's apparent disinterest in having JOJO translated?)

    Lastly, a Japanese friend of mine told me that he wrote a fan letter to Hirohiko Araki around the time when BAOH was first being published, and Araki wrote back to him and gave him an autograph. This friend went on to ponder that maybe, after BAOH, Araki had consciously changed his style (to a more FIST OF THE NORTH STAR-like style) and hired more assistants to make his manga more popular. However, there is apparently no actual personal connection between Tetsuo Hara (FIST) and Hirohiko Araki. (The styles of the FIST and JOJO animation look especially similar because they have the same character designer, Junichi Hayama.)

    But this is all guesswork -- I haven't heard any interviews with Araki where he talks about his opinion of America, or, indeed, any interviews between Araki and an English-language publication. So who knows? Just another wild accusation! Flame me at my e-mail address listed (sort of) at the bottom of this page.

    HIROHIKO ARAKI'S OTHER MANGA
    These are Hirohiko Araki's other manga series before and during JoJo. Not listed here because I haven't seen them: a short educational story from the mid-'90s on the life of eccentric Russian scientist Nikolai Tesla, and possibly another early short story.

    *** MASHONEN B.T. *** (early '80s)
    Also known as "Cool Shock B.T.", although it translates directly as "Magic Boy B.T.", this was Araki's first ongoing story. (Araki's even earlier one-shots are collected in GORGEOUS IRENE.) B.T. is a sharp-wittted young boy who knows various magic tricks (sleight of hand, not supernatural magic), and uses his know-how to solve mysteries. (Think of it as being in the spirit of "Kindaichi Shonen no Jikenbo", or "Detective Boy Conan," or "Encyclopedia Brown.") He ends up facing criminals, bullies, Nazis, and various stupid adults, with the help of his less talented friend, who is the actual narrator of some the stories (the stories often start out with the friend sitting at his desk and talking to the reader, introducing the plot). The manga includes small "how to" sections diagramming how various magic tricks are done. Except for some subtle stylistic clues, the art is almost unrecognizable as the Araki of today; there are similarities, but it's just much cartoonier and simpler.

    *** BAOH *** (approximately 1986/1989 in America)
    "Baoh" was Hirohiko Araki's main work before JOJO. It was translated in 1989 by Viz Comics (www.viz.com), so it's the only Araki work which is available in English. There are two graphic novels total, although the first one is sometimes out of print -- the original 8-issue comic series, however, should still be available. Baoh was America's first introduction to Araki, but it was a very low-selling title. If it'd been a hit, who knows?... Maybe JoJo would have been translated into English... in fact, "The Strange Adventure of JoJo" is the subject of a short preview article in Viz-In Vol. 1 #17 (Viz Comics' promotional newsletter).

    Baoh is an action-horror story with a fairly standard plot -- a teenager is experimented upon by an evil organization, becomes a super-powerful killing machine, and ends up fighting the bad guys who gave him his powers. It's got some of the absurdness and extreme gore of JoJo, but the art is extremely primitive. Nonetheless, some of the dialogue is hilarious, and suggests how entertaining JoJo could be in translation ("In training, I'm afraid, Martin got a little... _playful_ with me. Only a touch or two, but as you can see, my face is a _bit_ of a _mess_. Still, he is an _affectionate_ fellow...") ("To _this_ little baby, your head is nothing but a _balloon_ filled with _blood_!") The head-exploding psychic powers suggest David Cronenberg movies like "Scanners" and "The Dead Zone", and "Martin", the giant mandrill, is possibly a reference to the George Romero movie of the same name. Baoh was adapted into an anime OAV which was translated by AnimEigo (www.animeigo.com). The OAV, however, is a pretty flat adaptation which is missing some of the manga's best scenes.

    *** GORGEOUS IRENE *** (1987)
    GORGEOUS IRENE is a one-volume collection of miscellaneous early Araki stories. The title story (two long episodes, about 100 pages) is apparently Araki's take on Go Nagai's CUTIE HONEY formula: Gorgeous Irene is a beautiful sweet young girl who transforms into a "mature", busty superheroine when she or her guy friends are menaced by ugly, sadistic, transvestite-like women villains. There's lots of scenes like Irene parrying chainsaws and making sexy poses while her breasts grow and she shouts "Gorgeous!" It's most notable for showing Araki's artistic development between BAOH and JOJO; the art style is similar to JoJo Series 1. The male lead of the second story also looks like Jonathan Joestar.

    This book also contains three even earlier stories: a long "Mashonen B.T." story; a science fiction story about two guys and a robot trying to defuse a bomb in a spaceship; and a Western story about a poker game with buildings named "Eastwood" and two gunmen named Don Peckinpah and Mike Happa! (A combination of Mike Hammer and Frank Zappa?...) The latter two are some of Araki's first ever stories. It's interesting to see what elements they have in common with Araki's current style: the similar-looking hand-drawn skies and landscapes; the foreshortened perspective in the action scenes; the sometimes cartoony faces; and the fascination with puzzle-like, locked-room, mystery-story situations. Recommended for Araki completists.

    *** UNDER JAILBREAK, UNDER EXECUTION *** (1999)
    A nicely-produced, special-format collection of various non-JoJo manga drawn by Araki in the 1990s. The first, title story is about a criminal who undergoes extremely nasty punishments while trying to escape from a trapped jail cell. The second story is about a murderer and his cat (which is, inexplicably, wearing a little suit for most of the story) trapped on a sinking yacht surrounded by sharks. The third is a ghost story of vengeance from beyond the grave, narrated to the character Kishibe Rohan from JoJo Part 4. The fourth and longest story is the one or two installments of "Deadman Q", a manga about a ghostly guy in a derby hat (he looks vaguely like one of the droogs from "A Clockwork Orange") who wreaks supernatural justice on criminals. "Deadman Q", which ran for a short time in the magazine MANGA ALLMAN, may have been intended to be an ongoing story, but it ends abruptly; perhaps Araki later used some of its ideas (such as the ongoing obsession with ghosts and spirit creatures) in JoJo Part 6 with its "ghost rooms" and bodiless Stands. The art is good, and the stories are all cruel tales of punishment and physical injury.

    *** WINCHESTER MYSTERY HOUSE STORY (TITLE UNKNOWN) *** (2003)
    In mid-2003, after the end of JoJo Part 6, Araki did a brief story for ULTRA JUMP magazine set in America, in San Jose's Winchester Mystery House. I haven't seen anything but a single ad for this series and I'm not sure of the details, but since the poster was advertised as an "okama pin-up", it may have involved gay or cross-dressing characters.

    *** STEEL BALL RUN *** (2003-2004)
    A pseudo-continuation of JoJo set in the American Wild West in the 1800s, the plot involves Stand Users and other weird stuff (of course!) on a cross-country horse race. There's several Native American characters. The name is a reference to the 1970s road-race movie THE CANNONBALL RUN, and also to the fact that the main character -- apparently a relative of Dio, although I haven't read it translated so I don't know how it fits into the timeline -- uses steel balls as his weapon. STEEL BALL RUN is essentially JOJO PART 7, and I'll put up more information about it as soon as possible. It ran for several volumes in SHONEN JUMP magazine.

    WHAT IS THE JOJO ANIME AND WILL IT EVER BE RELEASED IN THE U.S.?
    In 1993, at the height of its popularity, JOJO was made into a 6-volume anime OAV series, part of Shueisha's "Jump Video" line (i.e., anime based on manga running in "Shonen Jump"). The videos have very high production values, particularly in the music and sound department, with a faux Italian-rock-horror soundtrack by Marco d'Ambrosio and sound mixing by Skywalker Sound. The character designer is Junichi Hayama, who also worked on "G.I. Joe", among other things. The production house is Studio A.P.P.P.

    However, the videos were intended for an audience already familiar with "JoJo", so they do not bother to explain the plot and characters, and instead start abruptly in Vol. 20 of the manga. It begins with the first appearance of Iggi and ends with the final battle with Dio (the last part of the video game). They're dramatic, and they've got a satisfying ending, but audiences who are unfamiliar with the series will probably be confused. The videos correspond to these parts of the manga and skip several characters:

    OAV Vol. 1 -- Iggi ("The Fool") & N'dul ("Geb") (beginning and cliffhanger ending) -- Manga Vol. 20
    OAV Vol. 2 -- Iggi ("The Fool") & N'dul ("Geb") (conclusion) -- Manga Vol. 20
    OAV Vol. 3 -- Daniel J. D'arby ("Osiris") -- circa Manga Vol. 24
    OAV Vol. 4 -- Vanilla Ice ("Cream") & Dio -- circa Manga Vol. 26
    OAV Vol. 5 -- Dio (the fight begins) -- Manga Vol. 27
    OAV Vol. 6 -- Dio (the fight continues) -- Manga Vol. 28

    Each OAV volume is about 35 minutes long. They're available in raw Japanese, and they were also fansubbed at least twice -- once by Mayonaka Anime and once by Dark Ops. Mayonaka Anime's sub is the better of the two, but they aren't distributing it any more (don't bother asking them, they don't have it). Copies may be available for trade from one of several distributors at http://www.anipike.com/fansub.html. However, I recommend everyone to support the commercial release of this series when it's released in America.

    From 2000 to 2001, A.P.P.P. made several new episodes of the anime, partly for the purpose of selling the series in America. The new series is 7 episodes, covering the parts from the beginning of Series 3 up to the first 6 OAV episodes, and they help explain the plot, including the origin of Stands and some of the background story about Dio. The new series has the same studio, character designer, director and music/sound as the first 6 volumes. The new OAVs are a condensed version of the story, with only the most important characters. They include:

    New OAV Vol. 1 --Begins with Jotaro ("Star Platinum") in jail and introduces Joseph ("Hermit Purple") and Avdol ("Magician Red"), as well as some background about Dio. -- Manga Vol. 12-13
    New OAV Vol. 2 -- Introduces Kakyoin ("Hierophant Green") and Dio's mind-control powers; ends with the heroes leaving Japan -- Manga Vol. 13
    New OAV Vol. 3 -- Polnareff ("Silver Chariot") and "Strength" -- Manga Vol. 14
    New OAV Vol. 4 -- Hol Horse ("The Emperor") and J. Gail ("The Hanged Man") -- Manga Vol. 15
    New OAV Vol. 5 -- Hol Horse and J. Gail (the fight continues) -- Manga Vol. 16
    New OAV Vol. 6 -- Enya ("Justice") -- Manga Vol. 17, with a scene from Vol. 22
    New OAV Vol. 7 -- Enya (the fight continues) -- Manga Vol. 17

    There are several story differences between the new OAVs (as well as the old OAVs) and the manga. Most significantly, Enya, Dio's tarot-card-reading confidant/servitor, first appears as a young woman who superficially resembles the manga's Mariah. In general, the new OAVs appear to have a somewhat smaller animation budget than the old ones, particularly suffering from some not-always-great computer effects as a result of being shot digitally (mostly in Vol. 1). Some digital camera effects were used, such as camera movements which, unless corrected, have a higher "frame rate" than normal film. The result is overly smooth, unnatural-looking camera movements. Another possible flaw of these OAVs is that the story simply moves too slowly -- they could have crammed another Stand User or two in there -- although this may be a matter of opinion. They look fine for the most part, and have another great soundtrack from Marco d'Ambrosio and Skywalker Sound.

    The new OAVs have had a complicated release history, and have been extremely delayed from original estimates. Originally the JoJo anime was supposed to be released in America by Studio A.P.P.P. themselves, under the company name "Super Techno Arts" (S.T.A. as in "Stand" -- get it?), with some cooperation from the action figure company ArtFX/Kotobukiya. Then, Studio A.P.P.P. decided to instead license the anime (apparently for a very high price) to Digital Manga, under their sub-company Synch Point. Unfortunately, in late 2001 Digital Manga ran into serious problems as a company, being cut off from their Japanese "money connection," the company called Broccoli, who decided to launch their own stores, Anime Gamers, in the U.S. instead. As a result of this, Super Techno Arts/Studio A.P.P.P. had to go back to their original plan and release the JoJo anime in the U.S. themselves.

    Unfortunately, after releasing the first seven episodes on three DVDs (3-2-2), Super Techno Arts has apparently put the series on indefinite hiatus. I think the problem is with their distribution and business plan, rather than the quality of the videos themselves. Hopefully at some point Super Techno Arts (or another licensor) will be able to finish releasing the series.

    For more information about the Japanese release, visit the Official New JoJo OVAs Site (in Japanese) or the Super Techno Arts webpage (in English).

    Super Techno Arts also released a 30-minute "The Making of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure" promotional video, subtitled in English. It is available from some online retailers (try http://www.banzaianime.com). Unfortunately, I have bought this video and I must say it is pretty lame. It has no information about the plot of JoJo, no background history about the anime or the manga (such as, say, how it originated, or who Hirohiko Araki is), and would be totally confusing to anyone who didn't know about the series. The "interview with Hirohiko Araki" is a three-minute subtitled clip of omake (bonus) material from the 1993 JoJo OAVs. There are a lot of trailers of footage you've already seen, a few very short interviews with various Studio A.P.P.P. staff (such as, admittedly, the character designer, the producer, and the old and new directors), and about thirty seconds of the camera panning over the backs of a bunch of animators in the Studio A.P.P.P. offices.

    What's next for the JoJo anime? Well, as I said, I don't know when or if the final six episodes will be released in English. However... apparently A.P.P.P. is working on something even cooler... an anime movie (I don't know how long it'll be) based on Part 1 of JoJo, the Jonathan vs. Dio storyline! I'm really looking forward to this, although I don't know when it's coming out, or what chances it has of getting a U.S. release.
    For a 1999 interview with Hayama Junichi, the character designer of the videos, go here: http://www.ex.org/3.5/04-feature_hayama1.html. There was also a 1999 interview with Studio Techno Arts at the Anime News Network, but the site appears to have some problems and the interview may have been deleted. Hayama Junichi and Marco d'Ambrosio were also interviewed in Animerica magazine around 2003-2004. (Sorry I don't remember the exact issue...)

    WHERE CAN I GET THE JOJO MANGA?
    The original Japanese JoJo manga, all 80+ volumes of it, can be found at most large Japanese bookstores. Try a Kinokuniya or Mandarake bookstore if you live in a sufficiently large and diverse city. Or look for an online store that sells manga (start here), such as The Place, Anime Nation, Nikaku, Planet Anime or Sasuga Books (http://www.sasugabooks.com). If they don't have it, they may be able to special-order it. The books are part of Shueisha's "Jump Comics" line, and if all else fails, ask for it by its Japanese name, "JoJo no Kimyo na Boken". If you're just starting out, I recommend picking up Vol. 12 of 13, the beginning of Series 3 (Series 3 begins with the last 20 pages of Vol. 12, so you don't miss much by starting with Vol. 13). Summaries of the first few volumes of the JoJo manga are available on the Internet at http://www.onlinetoday.com/~neko/jojo/.

    Since the series is also available in Italy, France, Spain and Taiwan, if you read one of these languages (but not Japanese) you might want to check it out in translation. I don't know how extensive the Spanish French editions are, but huge portions of the series have been translated into Italian and Taiwanese. However, I have never been able to find any of these translated editions in America.

    THE JOJO MANGA IN ENGLISH
    As I announced at the beginning of the FAQ, JoJo is being released in English by Viz (Shueisha and SHONEN JUMP's official U.S. licensor) in August 2005. I should also admit that I work at Viz, so from this point on, it's hard for me to talk about the manga objectively. Yes, now I have to switch from being a fan to being a suit. *sigh* Adding to the unpleasantness is the possibility that someone from my job will take offense at this FAQ and beat me senseless. But I'm going to be as honest as possible,so if you have any questions or complaints about the Viz release of the manga, send me an e-mail. (My e-mail info is on the bottom of this webpage.)

    To be honest, I'm relieved that Viz decided to release it, because I was starting to worry that it was too late. Even I admit that the early volumes of the manga is kind of old and "'80s-looking." Furthermore, three obvious marketing "windows" for releasing it in English passed -- once in the late '80s after "Baoh" was published in America, once in 1999-2000 when the Capcom game came out, and in 2003 when the anime was finally released in English. One of the big problems is that it's a such a long series, and most American manga publishers are extremely reluctant to commit to the beginning of a series which may go on for years and may or may not be successful (manga publishers are often required to buy the rights to an entire series at once). The JoJo manga is so long (80 volumes!) that it would take over _13 YEARS_ for it to be released in English even if it came out at the same rate it was published in Japan... over _25_ years if it was published in typical 32-48 page American monthly comic installments... or, slightly more realistically, about 6-7 years if it was published at a rate of one graphic novel every two months!

    Viz's initial release will start with the Jotaro storyline (the last chapter of volume 12 onward). This is a little disappointing, but not too surprising, since all the anime and video games focus on the Jotaro storyline. Hopefully Viz will release the earlier volumes of the manga eventually, as a kind of "prequel." Hirohiko Araki *did* create an 8-page prologue, summarizing JoJo volumes 1-5, which will be added to the beginning of the Viz JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Vol. 1. Since it's written and laid-out by Araki himself, the prologue is a nice touch. However, it consists mostly of recycled (rather than redrawn) artwork from volumes 1-5.

    There's another bad side to Viz's release, which isn't totally Viz's fault: it seems very likely that many of the character names will be changed in the English version of JoJo. Why isn't this Viz's fault? Well, the aggravating truth is that a recent American court decision establishes a precedent that celebrities can sue people for attaching their names to fictional characters in comics. The case in question is a lawsuit by hockey player Tony Twist against SPAWN creator Todd McFarlane, for using his name for the mobster "Antonio Twistelli" in the SPAWN series. (For more info, do a google search, or go here.) After a long court battle and appeal, in 2004, Todd MacFarlane finally lost the lawsuit and was forced to pay Tony Twist millions of dollars. (And he didn't even use the exact same name... he changed it to "Antonio Twistelli"..!) After losing the case, Todd McFarlane declared bankruptcy. So until some comics publisher is willing to risk another court case, this establishes a legal precedent that, say, Vanilla Ice could sue Hirohiko Araki for millions of dollars. If it can happen to SPAWN, it can happen to JOJO. Yes, I know the American legal system is totally screwed up. I know *I* wouldn't mind if some manga artist decided to create a character named "Jason Thompson" who was a villainous sleazeball... sigh.

    So, to summarize, I'm not sure what will happen to the JoJo character names when the series comes out in English. I hope that they are changed as little as possible. But if Viz (like most manga companies) wants to take the easy route and avoid any risk of lawsuits, there's a good chance that they will change many of them... partly because of some brain-dead jury in some court case between Todd MacFarlane and some lame hockey player.

    ART BOOKS & OTHER PRODUCTS
    JoJo doesn't have literally tons of merchandise available for it like some Shonen Jump manga (Dragon Ball...). However, there are several products out there, of which this is a small random sample... please e-mail me if you know of other stuff I've left out.

    * Baoh Anime (one-shot, 1989) (q.v.)
    * Baoh Soundtrack CD (1989)
    * JoJo Anime (6 volumes, beginning in 1993) (q.v.)
    * JoJo Soundtrack CD (1993)
    * Super Famicom RPG Video Game (1993). This game, which I've never seen, is apparently a simple pseudo-RPG adventure following the plot of Series 3. The ROM is available on the Internet. There may also be a second Super Famicom game.
    * A JoJo novel in the "Jump Books" series (1993). This is a fiction book for teens set in the JoJo universe; I don't know if it has an original plot or is an adaptation of Series 3.
    * A set of at least three "CD Cassette Books" (i.e., drama CDs), published in 1992 and 1993. They don't have the same voice actors as the anime series.
    * "JoJo6521" (1999) (ISBN4-08-782407-1, C0079 P2000E). As you can probably tell, 1993 was the height of fame for the JoJo series, and this impressive color and b&w art book contains maps, character information and a dictionary of terms from Series 1 through the middle of Series 4. It also has information on tie-in products (which I've referenced here), and an interview with Hirohiko Araki.
    * Collector's Figurines of the major Series 3 Stands: Silver Chariot, Star Platinum, the Hanged Man, etc.
    * Other action figures: soft plastic figures of the Series 3 heroes, and a new set of large hard-plastic collectible action figures, also of the Series 3 heroes.
    * "JoJo's Bizarre Adventure", the video game from Capcom, available for both PlayStation and Dreamcast (1999). Capcom also published a hard-to-find "The Making of the JoJo Video Game" book containing most of the design sketches.
    * "JoJo A Go Go" (2000), a new boxed set of art books. It is divided into several books, one of which is a complete listing of all the Stands from Series 3-5, ranked according to various attributes. ("The Complete Handbook of the Marvel Universe", anyone?)
    * "Static and Dynamic Action Figures", from ArtFX; different boxed figures containing characters and their Stands (Jotaro, Dio, Polnareff, Kakyoin, Avdol, and a double pack of Joseph and Hol Horse). Plus, each has a small non-poseable figure with them: Jotaro comes with Iggy, Dio comes with Petshop, Polnareff comes with "The Lovers", and I don't remember what Kakyoin and Avdol come with. There are also variant colors of some of the earlier figures. The "Dynamic" Stands are slightly poseable and the "Static" human characters are not at all poseable.
    * A second series of ArtFX JoJo figures, this time from Series 5: Giorno Giovanni with Gold Experience, Bruno Bucciarati with Sticky Fingers, and Diavolo with King Crimson. These figures have higher production values than the previous set and the "Dynamic" Stands are extremely poseable (although the "Static" human characters are still not poseable at all). They also come with small non-poseable figures.
    * A new JoJo novel in the "Jump Books" series. This one is about GioGio and the characters from Part 6. (2001)

    MISCELLANEOUS JOJO REFERENCES
    * CLAMP (the female manga artists team) are acknowledged fans of JoJo and have drawn Jotaro Kujo and Star Platinum in the background of at least one picture.
    * As was pointed out by Muhammed Abdul on Ohla's JoJo Forum, the late-'80s arcade game "Ninja Gaiden" has JoJo-like "stone mask" carvings in the backgrounds of some of the later levels.
    * Several Shonen Jump manga have had JoJo-like elements. Both Kazuki Takahashi ("Yu-Gi-Oh!") and Hiroyuki Takei ("Shaman King") have acknowledged the influence of Hirohiko Araki. The main character of "Yu-Gi-Oh!", which is about an "ancient Egyptian puzzle game", wears clothes similar to Jotaro Kujo, and the manga also has a slightly JoJo-like use of color. (In fact, the entire idea of playing games with people's souls is similar to the "Darby the Gambler" episode of JoJo.) Another notable manga is "Shaman King", in which shamans can summon ancient spirits (mostly ghosts, but also various nature spirits, etc.) which then dwell in their bodies. Frederik Schodt, the author of "Manga! Manga!" and "Dreamland Japan", also saw the influence of JoJo's "ultraviolence" on manga like "Hell Teacher Nubei."
    * One of Atlus' RPGs in the "Revelations" series, the PlayStation game "Revelations: Persona", has potentially JoJo-based elements: in the words of one of the posters on Ohla's JoJo Forum, it combines "mod fashion sense and characters with spiritual alter egos."
    * There are possible influences of the horror manga artist Kazuo Umezu in JoJo. Vols. 3 and 4 of Umezu's manga "Left Hand of God, Right Hand of the Devil", which ran from 1986-1989, involve evil spirits which hover above peoples' backs and which only a few people can see. Also, in the "Spider Woman" segment of the same manga, there is a person with a wound on their tongue in the shape of a spider... similar to a scene in JoJo Vol. 13. And, in the "Papa's Sketchbook" segment of the manga, there is a gory drawing similar to a drawing in Boingo's Book in Vol. 20.

    OTHER JOJO WEBSITES
    A few more sites are listed at http://www.anipike.com/series4.html, but these are the ones I've found most useful. (Most of the sites listed at anipike are just reviews of the anime, and I haven't listed those, or sites that are just reviews of the video games.)

    ** ENGLISH SITES **
    Due to using free web space providers, many of the webpages out there with JoJo scans and translations have a high turnover. Therefore, some of these sites may no longer be active. E-mail me if any of these links don't work. Some no-longer-in-existence sites you may have heard of include Psycho Shonen (English), Dio's World at idrive.com (English), Cottonball's Freedrive scans (English), Hentai's Scanned Manga Translations at 4mg.com (English), the JoJo Part 3 scanslations at jojo.highervoltage.net (English) and Get Back JoJo (Japanese).
    Super Techno Arts -- The American branch of Studio A.P.P.P., producers of the JoJo anime and the company releasing the series in English.
    Ignition-One.com -- Excellent scanslations site which, since late 2002-early 2003, has been translating JoJo from volume 1.
    Li's JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Site -- Excellent webpage devoted to Season Five of the series. If you want to know about the characters and Stands of the PS2 game from Capcom, this is the place to go!
    Synch Point -- The homepage of the financially troubled company that was previously supposed to release JoJo in English. This company is the anime arm of Digital Manga, Omocha Box and ComicTones.com.
    Ohla's JoJo Page -- A good page, but the real highlight is Ohla's JoJo Forum, an English JOJO discussion board. [NOTE: As of 3/4/2003, this forum was not working. I haven't put it in the dead-sites list because it was a good forum and I hope it comes back up.]
    JoJo's Bizarre Adventure -- The first page with English-language summaries of the manga. As of March 2001 when I last checked, the summaries cover all of Part 1, about half of Part 2, and about half of Part 3.
    Magus Darkstar JoJo Manga Translations -- Translated by Akafu and posted on the web by Magus Darkstar, these are translations (without images), not summaries.
    Takahan's JoJo Page -- Information about every part of the series, plus four-panel gag manga!
    Noriaki Kakyoin's JoJo Shrine -- Moved from Geocities to its own domain name in mid-2005, with a "grand opening" on August 1, 2005.
    PRISMS Ultimate Manga Guide -- Information about Hirohiko Araki's works and art style. I've tried not to copy it too much.
    JoJo Theater -- Joke translations of some of the parts of the manga where Hol Horse shows up, including the infamous "Dio and Hol Horse" scene.
    Gaijin Dan's JoJo Fanfiction -- A story on a fanfiction website.
    Noriaki Kakyouin's JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Shrine -- A very cool site with information about the different series and "Standology" (Stands in general).
    Supa Rob's JoJo site -- Includes some JoJo icons.
    Aeclectic Tarot -- This is not a JoJo-related site, so it probably shouldn't be listed here, but if you're interested in the Tarot, it has scans of selected cards from dozens of Tarot decks.
    Viz -- Shueisha's official English licensor, the company that's going to be releasing the JoJo manga.

    ** ITALIAN SITES **
    Hirohiko Araki's World -- This incredible and frequently updated website by the one called Vinegar Doppio includes short series descriptions, listings and images of all the Stands, cosplay photos, fan fiction, and more. It's mostly in Italian, but many of the important parts are translated into English.
    Skuadrone Araki -- English/Italian fan club with message board and chat room.
    JoJo X Series -- This site contains tons of color and b&w images, particularly from the 6th series. Very cool, includes a chatroom, and it's part of a JoJo webring!
    JoJo Message Board -- This message board is maintained by both Hirohiko Araki's World and JoJo X Series.
    The JoJo Fan Club Mailing List -- Italian-language mailing list
    Skuadrone Araki -- Italian-language mailing list
    M.A.D. -- The personal website of Simona Stanzani, the translator of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure into Italian. The site is bilingual.

    ** FRENCH SITE **
    JoJo Bizarre Adventure -- This is the only significant French JoJo website I know about. There's probably more somewhere, but in any case, this looks like a good one.

    ** JAPANESE SITES **
    Shonen Jump JoJo Site -- The official site for the current JoJo series (Part 6). It's got a few pictures of Jolyne Kujo and a cool but very brief "virtual tour" of the prison with a map.
    JoJoNet -- A huge Japanese list of probably hundreds of JOJO sites. I haven't been to more than a fraction of them.
    Official New JoJo OVAs Site -- OVAs or OAVs, whatever you call them, this is the official Japanese site for the new tapes, with assorted interesting information, trailers and images. The site apparently only works with Internet Explorer.
    Kotobukiya JoJo Action Figures Page -- Images of the new 2000-2001 JoJo action figures. (They don't have a lot of poseability, but they do look good.)
    JoJo Goods -- A list (in Japanese, without images) of JoJo books, prizes and merchandise.
    Capcom's JoJo Part 5 Game Site -- Images and promotion for the PS2 JoJo Part 5 game.
    Capcom's JoJo Part 3 Game Site -- This seems to be Capcom's main JoJo Part 3 site, although there's other stuff scattered around their site as well. It includes an untranslated interview with Hirohiko Araki and the game developers.

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    Thanks for getting this far -- I hope you enjoyed the FAQ!
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    E-MAIL: My address is (MY FIRST NAME)@SONIC.NET. (No capitals or parentheses.) By the way, my name is Jason Thompson.