JoJo's Bizarre Adventure S03E27 Review: It Came From Outer Space

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable, Episode 27: I Am An Alien

This review covers the "I Am An Alien" arc, which takes place throughout episode 27's entirety, as well as the first half of episode 28, "Highway Star, Pt. 1". And this is how you do a weird, wacky-situation-of-the-week story right, after the pretty disappointing Janken Boy stuff.

See, this story arc features one of the most bizarre characters in an already bizarre story, Nu Mikitakazo Nshi, a self-proclaimed alien that looks like he's an elf from Lord of the Rings who found a customized version of Josuke's school uniform adorned with random carton UFO badges. And whether Mikitaka is an actual alien or just a scatterbrained/schizophrenic Stand user is genuinely never confirmed and left as an open mystery with both sides of the story being pretty plausible explanations.

The story starts off with Yoshihiro shooting the arrow at Mikitaka... but it was actually deflected by Mikitaka's skin, and later on Josuke and Okuyasu encounter Mikitaka when he's lying down in a random Terry Funk crop circle (oh, Okuyasu) in the middle of Morioh town. Josuke and Okuyasu walk into the crop circle to find Mikitaka lying down in the middle, who then stand up and proclaim that he's an alien. Josuke and Okuyasu totally approve of what they think is a pretty elaborate prankster, who claims he's an alien.

Of course, Mikitaka continues to do weird things, like eating a tissue (who he mistakes as an offering of food), and pulling out a pair of ice-cream in ziplock bags from his bag when Josuke and Okuyasu bemoans the fact that the ice cream store they were going to is closed. It's genuinely unsettling (especially the ice cream part), and Josuke and Okuyasu naturally surmise that this dude is a goddamn Stand user.

Increasingly frustrated at how "Nu Mikitakazo Nshi" keeps insisting that he's an alien, with a ship parked in space that'll take three days to arrive, how he's looking for a place to stay after his planet is destroyed, and how he left all of his space-ray weapons in his ship, Okuyasu just gets pissed off that the dude is either mocking them, or just spouting bullshit. Okuyasu gets angry and leaves, while Josuke watches as Mikitaka apparently has some sort of allergic reaction towards sirens, sprouting blisters and going crazy. Mikitaka then reveals his ability (marked, hilariously, as "Stand???" by the eyecatch of this episode) of transformation, turning into sneakers that allow Josuke to bounce around.

Confounding matters even more and seemingly leaning more towards 'alien', Mikitaka claims he can't see Crazy Diamond when Josuke manifests it in front of him. And, you know what? Considering what we know in Part 7 about the origin of Stands (albeit Part 7 runs on different rules) and the fact that this setting did have whatever the hell the Pillar Men are... I'm genuinely not surprised that Mikitaka is indeed an alien.

Josuke, of course, ends up making use of Mikitaka to... think up of a plan to cheat Rohan of some money? Apparently, in a pretty realistic turn of events, Josuke's mom found out about the lottery money and froze the bank account until he's older.

Josuke tells Mikitaka to transform into dice, and then challenges Rohan to a dice game (the anime cuts out a pretty lengthy "Araki did his research" scene of Rohan talking about the history of the dice game cee-lo). Josuke apparently hid the transformed Mikitaka inside Rohan's house beforehand, knowing Rohan would get suspicious, while Rohan (dressed in a pretty... interesting outfit) notes that he's going to have some fun taking money from Josuke. Because Rohan doesn't like Josuke, despite all their mutual friends. Considering Josuke punched him in the face... yeah, not a surprise there.

The actual dice game is simple, if clearly meant to be comedic, and I absolutely love just how dice-Mikitaka has absolutely no concept of 'make it look good' and just gives Rohan the worst combination and Josuke triple-sixes. We get Rohan stabbing his own pinky finger just as a punishment for not catching on to the methods of how Josuke is cheating, and bets even higher amounts of money. Kobayashi "the Lock" Tamami show up out of nowhere, apparently contacted by Rohan, to act as the arbiter and judge of the game (he was apparently hospitalized for a month).  And we get the hilarious visual of Mikitaka, as dice, vomiting a bit out of the little numbers, because Rohan shook him up too much.

And then the whole deal ends up being interrupted by fire engine sirens that causes rashes to break out on Mikitaka... and apparently Rohan's fucking HOUSE is on fire because he left a magnifying glass that he used on an earlier scene out in the open. Josuke runs out after fixing Rohan's finger, while Rohan is just oh-so-angry... poor Rohan. I mean, he's a dick, but he doesn't deserve his house burned down... but at the same time, it's kind of his own fault for taking things so seriously.

(On the same vein, why the heck didn't Josuke return later to fix the house? Dick.)

The final scene throws in Mikitaka's "mother", who tells Josuke that they're a family that just moved into town from Tokyo, and Mikitaka often plays pranks on people telling he's an alien... while Mikitaka himself claims that he's 'brainwashed' the lady into thinking that she's his mom. Both

I felt like we probably spent a wee bit too much time on the dice game, honestly, but it's still  pretty entertaining. We get brief shots of the Kawajiri family, first up with Kira barely suppressing his desire to kill people while forced to maintain cover, and his attempt to actually kill Shinobu ends up being mis-interpreted as an attempt to help her take off her dress (and makes Shinobu feel even more excited). The final scene of the "I Am An Alien" storyline focuses on the child of the Kawajiri family, Hayato, who actually feels suspicious at how cheerful his mother's gotten (dude, be happy for your mom), and apparently the creepy little kid put a hidden camera in his parent's bedroom, knowing exactly when the last time "mom got naked in front of dad". Like, I know Kira's a dangerous serial killer and all, but what the fuck, little boy?

Anyway, a fun little distraction. Next episode we go into actual threatening stands.

The JoJo Playlist: 

• Mikitaka's Stand (or "Stand???", as parsed by the manga and anime) is called 'Earth, Wind and Fire', one of the most iconic bands of all time, and one that blends multiple musical styles. Among their most iconic songs are: September, Let's Groove, Boogie Wonderland, After The Love Has Gone.
• This episode features the third Diamond is Unbreakable opening, Great Days,  which is a whole lot more upbeat compared to the previous two DiU openings.