that sad feeling when a Jojo part is over, no more Jojo fridays :(

But man, what a great ending, good job DavidPro.

Can we get a Vento Aureo announcement now?

May as well, nothing is going to change my mind at this point.

Anime of the Year

Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable

Anime of the Season: Flip Flappers / Shuumatsu no Izetta

Studio of the Season: David Productions (Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable)

Opening of the Season: “Great Days” by Karen Aoki and Daisuke Hasegawa from Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dfy6Y98XRR4 [Version 1]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBiVN5T7dv8 [Version 2]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJ6QhxgqBUQ [Bites the Dust Version]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9xBzpZBT_4 [SFX Version]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oItlCGLgbqQ [Units Version by JO-STARS UNITED (every Jojo Opening themes singer, from TOMMY to Karen and Daisuke)]

Ending of the Season: "FLIP FLAP FLIP FLAP" by TO-MAS feat.Chima from Flip Flappers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGKjPD_BNAE

Best Character: Kira Yoshikage from Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable

And thanks for all the gayness this season (Haven't even finished some other yurirific shows yet, I'll get on that later), 10/10.

I just got done watching the finale to Diamond Is Unbreakable and its my Anime of the year and Kira is also my favorite Anime character of the year. Part 4 was just simply wonderful from start to end with a nice change of pace for the series by giving it a slice of life vibes with an incredible that is now my new favorite Jojo character.

A short Jojo retrospective and my feelings/impressions/rambling about Diamond is Unbreakable.

TL; DR I encourage anyone to give a try to the series, you won’t regret it.

I started watching Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure around June or July of this year, thanks to a certain OP of certain anime thread, and needless to say I fell in love with it, from its lovable and fun characters, how over the top and bizarre everything was, the amazing soundtrack, I loved all of it.

Phantom Blood and Battle Tendency were excellent and while Stardust Crusaders was a bit slow at times in terms of pacing, it still was Jojo at its finest.

Which brings us to Diamond is Unbreakable (DiU)

DiU as a whole goes for a different setting and structure than the previous parts. It takes more of a Slice of Life route, DiU is not about some grand adventure in India, or going find fabulous pillar men; is just about our protagonists dealing with Stand users (people with special powers basically), making new friends and establishing key and recurring characters, some intense and touching moment, etc.

Speaking of characters, they are all great ranging from weird, fabulous or just plain awesome; another aspect that I love about Jojo as a whole is that some characters from previous parts show up again, while still letting the new characters have most of the spotlight, it gives a sense of familiarity and continuity for those that follow the series while still discovering great new characters. One of my highlights was Koichi, which had a good development arc and growth alongside his stand powers across the series. Another one was Rohan, badass mangaka and just a joy to watch in action.

In terms of action, the introduction of Stands in Stardust Crusaders was a great way to make fights more creative, which is also put to full use in DiU, now with crazier and more creative and unique stands, it also brings back the feel of tension and strategy to every fight from the first two parts, making them even better. Highway Star and any fight against Kira being some of the best ones for me. The greatness of the fights are accentuated thanks to Jojo’s style and great use of color palette, basically Jojo isn’t big on animation, fights are very dialogue heavy and much slower than in your usual shounen, which in no way that is a bad thing, because Jojo really shines in those still moments, the over the top expressions of the characters, the onomatopoeias, the color changing palettes to match certain emotions in characters where is needed in a way to make some scenes have more impact, the great use of sound effects that makes every action have that extra feel of BOOM to it, all of this makes for some very immersive and satisfying fights.

Another highlight of DiU and Jojo as a whole is the music, either its BGM or the Opening themes. From the cheery themes like Morioh Cho Radio to the more intense tracks like Irreversible Sadness is all great and right to the mood of each scene.

Instead of the usual one opening per arc, DiU brings 3, each of them being Jojo at its finest, expertly crafted credits with a great use of the visuals for foreshadowing, winks, nods and the mood of the part that is representing. I’m just going to give a general impression of each opening and their arcs, because explaining what makes each of these openings so special may as well could take individuals posts for each of them and is quite easy to understand why once you have experienced the series for yourself. The first one, Crazy Noisy Bizarre Town, really puts a 90s feels on it (since that is the period of time that DiU takes place) and the more SoL nature of DiU.

With the second OP, chase, things take a different turn, at this point in the story, it focuses on the main villain that has been built up and foreshadowed since the start, Kira Yoshikage and the entire mood becomes a lot more dark and tense, with some of the greatest moments coming from Kira’s arcs, Kira Yoshikage wants a quiet life and Sheer Heart Attack.

And now the final OP, Great Days, the song has a more triumphant feel to it, a sense that our heroes are finally going to defeat Kira. This last part focuses on developing more of Kira’s character and our protagonists while building up the moment of the final battle and of course the battle itself.

Since I have mentioned him so often may as well go a bit more in depth about him, Kira is my biggest highlight from the show, Jojo villains are awesome, but Kira is on another level, fitting both as a villain with his very intimidating and imposing nature and quite an interesting character, not only from his OCD (which is quite funny at times) but for his development, little nuances and conflicts that appears in the later episodes, wanting to live a quiet life, and not wanting to hide from people that may want to chase him for his crimes, etc. making him feel like an actual person and relatable at times, quickly becoming one of my favorite villains of all time. His Stand, Killer Queen is also amazing, being able to explode anything it touches and leaving no trace of his victims to not get caught.

And of course, I have to give an applause to the studio behind the Jojo adaptations, David Productions, since the first part, every adaptation made by this studio has been excellent, following the events of the manga as closely as possible, replicating Araki’s artstyle and even adding new scenes that are there to improve on the already excellent work of the manga, as a whole it just shows how much passion, love and respect goes into the crafting of the anime, from its opening and ending credits and the content of the show itself.

Diamond is Unbreakable was overall fantastic for me, the great pacing, colorful visuals, memorable fights, some of my favorite stand abilities, Kira and the rest of the cast, soundtrack and everything else that I mentioned made this one of my favorite anime of all time, even surpassing Battle Tendency as my favorite Jojo part for me.

And as a whole, the Jojo series has quickly taken a special place in my heart, the anime adaptations making me have so much fun and being able to keep me at the edge of my seat, I even started reading the manga, as of now finished reading Part 1 through 5, all I can say now is, that I cannot wait for the Vento Aureo adaptation and the rest of the parts as well, while I continue to read the manga too.

Gonna need until the end of the year to finish everything up.
I think I have my AOTY and AOTS is definitely Izetta.

But no time to waste on this year or season. Next season is gonna be pretty amazing as well.

Alright, now that Jojo has ended, I can finally put my list together. I'm gonna do something different and put together my list of the full year before I post my yearly rankings. We'll see if I get annoyed with the formatting and just do it the usual way. Hopefully I'm not contradicting my previous lists...*sweats*

Yearly rankings comings up next! (maybe)

*Bolded. Oh Boom you beautiful being.

Tho, tbh, he is even underwhelming at that, because that piece of underdeveloped shit is not even getting the end he deserves, unlike villians like Kira and the like. Can an ambulance run over him?

Jojo Part 4 ending was amazing as expected. I like what David Productions did with the extra scenes for the more minor characters and the OP being sung by all of the previous singers. A little disappointed that we didn't get a Part 5 tease though as I was looking forward to having some news on the that Part. Hopefully they announce it for next year soon, I need my fix!

Also, happy holdiays everyone!

Boom's 2016 Rankings

Best Guy: Koro-Sensei (Assassination Classroom)

Comments: Koro-sensei was the heart of Assassination Classroom, and was the main reason for me ranking it as high as I have. He starts off as a very simplistic character with seemingly one-dimensional motivations, only to get more and more fleshed out as the story goes on, culminating in one of the best backstory arcs I've seen in this genre. I was really impressed at how it was done; he suffered a lot, but at the same time, he definitely wasn't a blameless person in his first life, keeping it from seeming like suffering for its own sake (which is honestly overdone in these type of manga/anime). Hard to believe I'm talking up something that just appears to be a clone of the Wal-Mart logo, but he definitely deserves this spot.

Best Girl: Erina Nakiri (Food Wars)

Comments: Admittedly I'm basing this somewhat off her later developments in the manga, but looking back at her actions this season and knowing her background, I definitely find her more symathetic than anyone else. Even ignoring that though, seeing her jump from Ice Queen to Derpy Teenage personas is absolutey adorable, and shows that she's much more awkward than her initial impression belies.

Best Villain: Yoshikage Kira (Jojo)

Comments: Kira is not only my favorite villain this season, but is probably one of my favorite villains in any medium. Rather than seeking world domination, his primary goal is to live peacefully outside the public eye (while maintaining some creepy hobbies; which is what gives the arc its conflict). He's a coward, and is willing to do anything to live his life, which only makes his character even more terrifying. The only anime villain I can think that really compares to this type of motivation is a short-lived villain in One Piece (Captain Kuro), but the character is handled much better here, without a doubt.

Best Bout: All Might vs. Noumu (My Hero Academia)

Best OP: Rough Diamonds - Screen Mode (Food Wars)

Best ED: Refrain Boy - All Off (Mob Psycho 100)

Best Studio: BONES

Biggest Dissapointment: Kiznaiver

Comments: I think I ended up giving this a 6 or a 7...so it's not the worst anime out there, but I had such high expectations going into this that seeing this turn out to be so..mediocre...was incredibly dissapointing. The anime had a great few first episodes, but failed to really takes its premise anywhere, making most of the characters feel either pointless or driven by forced motivation, only for it all to fizzle out with an incredibly asanine resolution (seriously...the adults were spending all this money to make kids become friends? Just...why?)

AOTY Ranking:

5.) My Hero Academia

4.) 3-Gatsu no Lion

3.) Jojo's Bizarre Adventure - Diamond is Unbreakable

2.) Food Wars: Shokugeki no Souma S2

1.) Assassination Classroom S2

Comments: This was hard to put together, especially the top 3, and there were a lot that I couldn't fit into the top 5 (Mob Psycho 100 and Erased were left out for example). Overall, Jojo was probably the highest on average, and though I loved the anime overall, I had a few issues with underutilized characters and violations of the Chekhovian Gun Trope (the invisible baby, Josuke's savior, and Okuyasu's Dad plotlines in particular didn't satisfy me, and though these issues may have existed in the manga...they're still issues with the story as a whole, minor as they may be). Assassination Classroom won for essentially two single episodes, which absolutely blew me away on multiple levels, and for portraying one of the most well-written and realistic death scenes i've ever seen in this medium (certainly this year, without question). On a pure emotional level, nothing I watched this year came close to Assassination Classroom Season 2, and in the end, this was enough to push it above the rest of my list this year.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, it's been a fun year, and I'm grateful to Versy and Shad for all the work they put into this thread. I had my eye on this thread even back in my lurking days, and so I'm grateful to have this here, given the focus of this forum. I hope to spend more time here next year, so here's hoping our OP overlord keeps things fun for everyone.

Merry Christmas anime thread friends, and Happy New Year!

I thought you'd like that XDDD Such a lively villain~

I could have listed Kira twice, but it seemed redundant, given no other villain came even remotely close anyway.