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The ANN Aftershow - Is the Jujutsu Kaisen Shibuya Incident Arc...Good?


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Minos_Kurumada



Joined: 04 Nov 2015
Posts: 1112
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 12:07 am Reply with quote
I would never call the current JJK season bad, but it's not nowhere as good as JJK fans said it would be.

Season 1 was superior in every aspect.
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ThatMoonGuy



Joined: 13 Oct 2017
Posts: 364
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 4:06 am Reply with quote
Those comments won't age too well since the best material from Shibuya is about to come.
Then again, I can see an argument that Shibuya starts too slow and takes too long to get to the best parts.
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NeverConvex
Subscriber



Joined: 08 Jun 2013
Posts: 2381
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 4:50 am Reply with quote
So far it's kind've middling IMO; the preview arc and season 1 were both much better than present-day Shibuya, and the comparisons I remember people making to Chimera Ants feel undeserved. But, yeah, hoping it will step it up.
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Gem-Bug



Joined: 10 Nov 2018
Posts: 1257
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 6:18 am Reply with quote
ThatMoonGuy wrote:
Those comments won't age too well since the best material from Shibuya is about to come.


These are the type of comments that have created the type of comments you're talking about. Confused
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Matros



Joined: 22 Feb 2021
Posts: 285
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 9:12 am Reply with quote
Minos_Kurumada wrote:

Season 1 was superior in every aspect.


Well, that's a lie. Technical aspects like the compositing are objectively better in the second season.
Narratively the first season also felt aimless a lot of times with no clear goals in sight.
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Minos_Kurumada



Joined: 04 Nov 2015
Posts: 1112
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 11:22 am Reply with quote
ThatMoonGuy wrote:
Those comments won't age too well since the best material from Shibuya is about to come.
Then again, I can see an argument that Shibuya starts too slow and takes too long to get to the best parts.


I was promised Chimera Ant Arc level writing.

Up to now, I got Soul Society level, perfectly functional, but not what I was promised and I don't see how the writer can turn this in a perfect deconstruction of the shonen genera in 5 episodes.
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Gem-Bug



Joined: 10 Nov 2018
Posts: 1257
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 11:30 am Reply with quote
Promised by who? Not all fan-favorite shonen series arcs are going to be equivalent to each other. This kind of meta-power-scaling will only lead to disappointment.
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Minos_Kurumada



Joined: 04 Nov 2015
Posts: 1112
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 12:07 pm Reply with quote
Scenically, it was my fault.

JJK fans told me that this arc was going to crash the internet and that it was gonna be like the Chimera Ant war.

Then, as a fool, I started looking at the inconsistences in Season 1 as a setup for huge revelations in Season 2, I thought the central point was the dramatic irony of Geto being alive.

Thus, I convinced myself that the author was gonna take Dabi's Dance and turn it around, by making Geto and Gojo being besties and that everything in the series was actually Gojo's plan.

But, nothing of that was true, the inconsistences were just that, the dramatic irony didn't exist, since Geto was indeed dead, the smart explanations are just Star Trek gibberish, etc.

Now that I got to terms with that and admitted my guild I can enjoy the series for what it is: A cool looking battle series.
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b-dragon



Joined: 21 Apr 2021
Posts: 477
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 1:21 pm Reply with quote
I'm obviously withholding any sort of final opinion until the whole thing is done. So far though, it does feel overrated. Partly because the narrative substance feels fairly thin at the moment. And partly because we're spread out over so many characters that any emotional investment I have feels diluted.

Not to say its bad, mind you. It looks awesome, and there are a lot of solid moments. And the best could be yet to come! But I'm definitely hoping for better- if I end feeling like this, I'll be quite disappointed.
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One-Eye



Joined: 08 Mar 2011
Posts: 2263
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 1:38 pm Reply with quote
The Shibuya Arc definitely has its whoa moments, but even in the manga the story was a bit choppy. Part of it is the large number of characters and the shifting between them. I also think Lynzee made a fair argument that the positioning of the Pre-arc can kind of make the viewer feel disconnected from the main trio resulting in James' lack of emotional investment. Jujutsu Kaisen has been and continues to be for me a good but not great series and that's ok.
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db999



Joined: 23 Dec 2017
Posts: 307
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 3:10 pm Reply with quote
I think one of the reasons for the dissatisfaction with this arc isn't just because of the hype, but because of how the episodes are paced out. There are episodes and moments that have lived up to the hype, the fight with Mechamaru, Gojo vs the cursed Spirits, and the Yuji Choso fight from last week. However, unlike previous arcs like the Kyoto School arc, it's not hype episode after hype episode. After we get an episode like the ones I've previously mentioned, the storyline slows down again and we get episodes that while not bad, aren't absolutely fantastic because they're still setting things up, so it kind of leaves the arc so far feeling like it's starting and stopping a bunch. I think it's starting to break out of that because we've got 3 episodes in a row now, including today's episode, and we're getting another one that looks great next week so I'm thinking if they keep up the momentum, it'll feel better now that I think the setup has been gotten out of the way.
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ThatMoonGuy



Joined: 13 Oct 2017
Posts: 364
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 3:38 pm Reply with quote
Gem-Bug wrote:
These are the type of comments that have created the type of comments you're talking about. Confused

I understand that, but even if we look at the great arcs this is compared to, like Chimera Ants, they take a while to get going. The reception of this arc is very similar to the reception of the current manga arc. Week by week, you feel tired as there are many episodes that don't quite seem to go anywhere but when you see it all back-to-back, it becomes much clearer and some things that looked irrelevant look more important in retrospect.

For example, I remember comments talking about how the Mechamaru fight seemed irrelevant when he died, just for him to reappear a little later to inform characters. Similar things will also happen later.

To put it bluntly, what makes Shibuya great is how its later parts manage to conclude many things that were set up beforehand while also setting up many things that will appear next. But all of this can only be seen once the whole arc is done.[/spoiler]
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TheSleepyMonkey



Joined: 11 Jul 2022
Posts: 929
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 3:42 pm Reply with quote
I've been enjoying Shibuya a lot myself, but it doesn't help that the production circumstances for S2 have been awful. Several episode directors have talked about how awful their working conditions are and being dissatisfied with their own work, and animators also being pretty vocal about being given just days to make layouts.

It's sad, really. Shibuya could've ended up much better than it is rn when you consider just the names that have been involved so far.
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Minos_Kurumada



Joined: 04 Nov 2015
Posts: 1112
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 5:55 pm Reply with quote
ThatMoonGuy wrote:
For example, I remember comments talking about how the Mechamaru fight seemed irrelevant when he died, just for him to reappear a little later to inform characters. Similar things will also happen later.

I don't see how somebody can claim the Mechamaru fight was pointless.

1-It has a giant robot.
2-Closes the plotline of the traitor.
3-It tells you the badguys created a barrier for something.
4-It setups the practical application of minor domain.
5-It has a giant robot.

If anything its the most useful fight this season.
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2-2Distracted



Joined: 03 Feb 2021
Posts: 148
PostPosted: Thu Oct 26, 2023 6:06 pm Reply with quote
Laughing all I know is that Joey The Anime Man is about to be proven correct by his own BS metric when he wrote this show off as "Mid". That's not to say it won't be entertaining tho
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