JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Stone Ocean [Season 6], Episode 19: Birth of the Green
This episode begins with a short prologue showing what happened to the poor, memory-less Kujo Jotaro. Jotaro has regained his Star Platinum Stand Disc after Jolyne's efforts earlier in the part, and we get to see a bunch of nameless Speedwagon Foundation doctors work to figure out the catatonic Jotaro. He's able to regain some functionality, but basically remains a vegetable (heh, get it?) that sits on the bed and can only understand simple words. The doctors theorize that he has no 'will to live', since he's lost his memories, but he still has Star Platinum manifesting and strike out at anyone who tries to touch Jotaro's head.
It's a short moment and I think it doesn't really hold a candle to Jolyne's earlier team-up with Jotaro, but I do like that Jolyne finally realizes that her father's distance from her had been an effort to protect her and her mother from powerful phenomenon like Stands and Stand users.
There's also a short moment where Anasui basically guilt-trips F.F. to get Jolyne to trip and fall into his arms so that they can share a 'romantic' moment, and... to be honest, I've never really cared for these aspects of Anasui's bizarre idea of flirtations. It's nowhere as funny as I think it's intended to be, and especially not when our heroes are there about to fight against other Stand users. Jolyne's "trip" ends up causing her to see the ugly, deformed man who's playing with Dio's bone, and she uses Stone Free to catch up.
I do really like how the 'little man', as the fandom calls him, initially seems to be set up as another Stand user, perhaps the user of Survivor (since at this point we've seen Westwood, Kenzo and D&G) because he has a somewhat unique model... and then his skin just peels off, and his body contorts horrifically as Anasui notes how he's growing taller and taller. It's one of the more gloriously grotesque bits in JoJo and it is drawn even cooler with colours as we see that this man who plays with Dio's bone ends up morphing and transforming into a plant -- a small tree is growing out of his mouth with his teeth haphazardly embedded into it, and we get to physically see his eye whirling around and transforming into the center of a flower bud. It's gloriously disgusting body horror!
It was at this point that our heroes realize that all the dead prisoners on the maximum security ward have been transformed into plants, with trees that grow straight up from their bodies. It looks positively horrifying! JoJo's never been a stranger to body horror, but I do have a special revulsion (which is a compliment in this case) for the sight of the short prisoner getting his face transformed into a tree.
We get a pretty tense moment as Anasui yells at Jolyne, realizing that Jolyne, too, is sprouting leaves and branches... and there were some bits where it seems like the growths has disappeared. It doesn't take long for our heroes to realize that the rate of plants growing from Jolyne's body is proportional to how much sunlight strikes her skin, though, which is... still horrifying, but there's something quite 'natural' in the unnaturalness of sunlight affecting the rate of plantification.
Anasui does some very close inspection, including nibbling on the flower, and later on uses Diver Down to attempt to beat the plants out of Jolyne, and... it's not really possible for Diver Down to do much when the plants aren't really growing out of Jolyne, but Jolyne herself being physically transformed into a plant. The trio also quickly figures out that it's not actually an enemy Stand, but the sheer eldritch qualities of Dio's bone itself, which Jolyne's string made contact with when she grapples onto the short prisoner.
We also get a bit of a handwave about Survivor's user. It really does feel like after the Westwood fight, Survivor kind of ceased to be relevant since Jolyne, F.F. and Kenzo all basically fight without having the berserking effect of Survivor going on. They just find Guccio, a frightened, meek prisoner, and Anasui kind of talks to him, giving this whole speech about how everyone has the same number of ribs. He then lets Guccio off once he's sure that he's not going to turn into a plant.
This ends up becoming a trap for D&G, because the moment D&G touches Guccio, Guccio's ribs turn inside-out like a goddamn Pillar Man, piercing and crushing D&G's arms and causing poor D&G to cry in pain. Guccio shambles off, cursing his luck before presumably dying, while D&G is placed out of commission. This, I feel, is a much cooler 'first look' into Diver Down's ability and Anasui's far more brutal personality, compared to his interference in the Dragon's Dream fight. But I digress.
Basically, all the solitary prison enemies are dealt with except for D&G's Stand, Yo-Yo Ma, who is this bizarre green guy with a fat belly and overalls that, uh... just immediately eats the cocoon with the baby in it. Stone Free, Foo Fighters and Diver Down unleashes a barrage of attacks on it, until Anasui freaks out about Yo-Yo Ma's smell. Yo-Yo Ma just becomes a very helpful sycophant, making chairs, offering a foot massage, and even telling them about his master. The group decide to split up, with Jolyne and Anasui taking Yo-Yo Ma with them while F.F. remains to hunt down the Stand user.
As Jolyne, Anasui and Yo-Yo Ma go off on a boat and Yo-Yo Ma gives a detailed explanation as to how to pilot the boat, we cut away to see F.F. with her lower face and neck melting, begging her allies to keep an eye out on Yo-Yo Ma because it's only pretending to be placid and calm. And... it is kind of dumb that they just bring Yo-Yo Ma with them, but admittedly the anime's voice acting does such a great job at portraying it as being harmless and being kinda meek that I can see why in their panic, they would bring Yo-Yo Ma along with them.
Random Notes:
- I love that Jolyne compares the weird plant baby to "carrots that look like snoopy" and "raddish that look like breasts"
- Of course the creepy tree-tongued prisoner makes a
RERORERORERORERORERORERORERORERORERORERORERORERO noise. Kakyoin would be proud. - In a reversal of the Sports Maxx arc, the anime arranges the Green Baby/Yo-Yo Ma arc chronologically instead of starting in medias res from the boat escape. It flows much better like this, in my opinion!
- An anime addition is that Yo-Yo Ma specifically offers Jolyne the manga Pink Dark Boy, the manga written by Rohan Kishibe in Part IV, instead of a generic volume.
- Man, the staff at the Speedwagon Foundation really do look... weird, don't they?
- Jotaro's muscle tissue is apparently going down after losing his memories! Oh no! His JoJo physique! (Or it could just be the art style).
- Wait, is Star Platinum defending Jotaro's hat instead of his head? Is that the joke?
- I also really do like that the Speedwagon Foundation people are all completely aware of the existence of Stands, even if the random gnome doctor is presumably not a Stand user.
- Guccio is, of course, based on the fashion brand Gucci. If you can't tell that he's Survivor's user, his very questionable outfit has "SURVIVOR" plastered all over it in English.
- D and G (sometimes people parse his name as D&G or D an' G) is based on the fashion brand Dolce & Gabanna.
- Yo-Yo Ma is based on an American-Chinese cellist of the same name.
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