Jujutsu Kaisen S01E16-17 Review

More Jujutsu Kaisen! This series is proving a bit slower for me to review than I anticipated, but oh well!

Episode 16:

• I really do like this next batch of episodes. A lot of these other characters have been hanging out in the background promising that they'll do something exciting in the episodes leading up to the Friendship Competition, and what a payoff!
• I still really like the sequence with Yuji and Todo, and how Todo is making this fight into a training sequence for his new best friend. Extremely like the hammy, over-the-top dialogue that Todo has about having an 'eye for art' in combat, and how easily Yuji gets swept up in his vibe. 
• And it's interesting that Todo goes from his blissful, almost orgasmic (heh) monologue to a yell at how flawed Yuji's Divergent Fist is. 
• Basically, turns out that Divergent Fist is a flaw, not a feature -- the cursed energy can't keep up with Yuji's superhuman speed, and Yuji needs to apply cursed enery at the moment of impact. 
• Todo gives a whole speech about how there are theories about how cursed energy is tied to emotions, which in turn spreads out from the stomach, but Todo forces Yuji to think of himself as a single entity, mind body and soul. 
• It's a lot of hammy silliness and profoundness all mixed into one, and Todo's voice-acting really does sell it!
• And, of course, what sells it even more is Yuji getting the same 'alternate universe' best friends fantasy as he gets dragged into Todo's pace. Hilarious!
  
• That's just the prologue, but I do really appreciate Todo. The rest of the episode sets up Nobara vs. Momo, but mostly focuses on Panda vs. Mechamaru. 
• There is a reference to 'Pepper-kun', which is this real-life robot from Japan.
• After some taunting of Momo, which builds up the next episode, Panda gets shot from behind by Mechamaru -- and it does initially seem like we're just taking out one of the more joke-y characters on the Tokyo side. But then Panda gets up, fights Mechamaru, and identifies both of them as 'cursed objects'.
  
• And just as it seems like there's an explanation for both of their natures, Mechamaru -- or rather, his pilot Muta Kokichi -- gets super-duper pissed off. Kokichi is shown as being rather sinister looking, a bandaged-up cripple in some kind of sci-fi harness and fluid pool. Creepy!
• We learn a bit later on that Kokichi isn't even crippled normally, but his condition and his missing limbs is due to a 'heavenly restriction'. Holy shit! We've heard of heavenly restrictions with Maki not having cursed energy in her body, but there's a vast difference, isn't there?
• And there's a very fun, almost Sentai/Rider-esque hamminess as Mechamaru goes through a bunch of moves in English. Sword Option. Boost On. Ultra Spin. Ultra Cannon.
• I appreciate them putting in a robot (or a puppet robot) in this anime that's otherwise about sorcerers or melee fighters. It really does help to make these characters stand out even though they do technically fit in the setting with some explanation. 
• Also, the visuals of the Ultra Cannon look impressive as all hell!
  
• And then we get Panda's backstory, where he's the masterpiece Cursed Object creation of Yaga Masamichi, which, again, is somewhat foreshadowed by his usage of semi-sentient dolls before. Panda is fully sentient, and is noted as a 'sudden mutated cursed corpse'. 
• Ergo, 'panda... panda ja nai!' Panda is not a panda, a running line spoken throughout this episode. 
• Panda seems to be obliterated by Mechamaru's Ultimate Cannon, and it's kind of clear that Mechamaru is both venting his frustrations at Panda... but also not seeing Panda as a real person, making this battle actualyl feel a bit more dangeous compared to the o
  ther non-Yuji battles in this arena.
• Oh, so that's why Panda was pounding his chest in the opening! I completely forgot about Gorilla Mode, and that's a badass design. The gorilla arms look threatening, as is the altered body silhouette, but the best part has to be his monstrous, beast-like face. 
• Panda also has three cores -- the balanced 'Panda', the strong 'Gorilla' or his older brother, and an older sister we won't see in this fight because Mechamaru took out that older sister core. A nice way to foreshadow a future 'power up', so to speak.
• And the fight between Panda's Gorilla Mode and Ultimate Mechamaru is fun to see, with, again, this anime's signature fluid motions and a lot of usage of destroyed surroundings.
• I do like that both combatants actually have a relative upper hand -- Panda's wounded with two cores taken to near-death and Gorilla Mode's basically his last-ditch weapon... but the shockwaves caused by his Drumming Beat clearly is destroying Mechamaru's puppet body, disabling many of his weapons. 
• We get a cool sequence finishing it off on top of the roof of the building, with Mechamaru zipping around Panda to seemingly do a sniper shot, only for Panda to reveal that he's created a false energy spot, then grab Mechamaru's hand and palm-thrust him into submission. Pretty smooth animation here!
• And then we get a pretty nice little 'friendship moment' at the end, where Mechamaru lay defeated and Panda just slowly talks to him, saying that he is different from humans, finds them different, but he's never been jealous about them and appreciates whatever differences they have. And then Panda drops the golden moral of this fight -- Mechamaru having a terrible life doesn't give him the right to be a jackass to everyone else. 
• And this leads to a nice little shot of Kokichi realizing that his greatest wish is to get out of the damn bandages, wires and pool to walk alongside his classmates. 

Episode 17:

• We wrap up three fights here, all featuring ladies! Maki vs. Kasumi, Nobara vs. Momo, and finally the epic Maki vs. Mai.
• I do really like that, just like Mechamaru in the previous episode, we do get a fair bit of backstory and explanation about Mai's personality... and we delve not just into why Mai has such a chip on her shoulder, also into the alluded backstory between Maki, Mai, as well as their elitist sorcerer family. 
• We start off with Maki fighting Kasumi in the river, with Kasumi being pushed back to a river. She eventually sets up her Simple Domain -- explaining it quickly in probably one of the more infodump-heavy power explanations we'll have in this fight. 
• Maki then... just fucking breaks her weapon in half, confusing Kasumi because Maki surrenders the reach of a spear.
• And then we get the gloriously animated sequence as Maki launches half of the spear and a kunai, forcing Kasumi to block, block... and take a step back, deactivating her ability as Maki charges in. And there's all the water splashing animation! The animation really does make the speed look explosive and powerful without making it hard to follow, which is highly appreciated. 
  
• And then Maki takes Kasumi's sword and just kinda... man, Kasumi's face just looks entirely defeated and bullied, huh?
• We cut away to the teachers, with the debut of Mei-Mei and her questionable braided-ponytail-over-face hairstyle. She and Gojo have a bit of a discussion about promoting Maki and how the Zen'in family is being difficult about it. 
• Mei-Mei, interestingly, is the source of surveillance for the teachers with her crows, and there's a nice bit of acknowledgement as Gojo knows that the crows observing Yuji are intentionally shaky, but he's not confronting Mei-Mei about it. And whie Mei-Mei is clearly helping out the Kyoto branch with disturbing the monitoring, I do like the politics and that she's not entirely loyal to Gakuganji. 
  
• We then go to Nobara's fight against Momo, which is an interesting lead into the Maki/Mai Zen'in clan drama. Momo is a huge Mai fangirl, and gets pissed off the more and more Nobara mocks Momo. I do like this way of giving a bit more insight to the emotionally-charged Maki/Mai confrontation later on, while also giving Nobara some much-overdue characterization. 
• And that characterization is what I appreciate the most about this conflict. Momo gives a lot of stuff about Mai and why she should be 'pitied' after the sheer amount of expectations that she has to deal with, but Nobara's answer falls in line a bit with Panda's "just because you had a shit past doesn't mean you can be an asshole" speech from the previous episode. 
  
• But more importantly, Nobara just doesn't give a shit. There's also the loyalty aspect to Maki and Yuji, but Nobara gets pissed off at all this nonsense about expectations, all this nonsense about 'men and women', and how Maki shouldn't be made to feel bad 'just because she's fortunate', and that fortunate people shouldn't bend over backwards to apologize to the less-fortunate ones -- something that Nobara's bullied friend went through. 
• In a sense, it also applies to Yuji being 'talented' enough to at least have some control over the Sukuna fingers, though we don't dwell on this point. 
• It's also a really nice counterargument against the female characters of slightly older Shonen manga, too, with Nobara not giving a damn about Momo's talk about the expectations of women having to be 'cute' as well as strong, because Nobara isn't just 'a woman', she's Kugisaki Nobara. That's a great reaffirmation of her identity beyond mroe than just labels, and I always love that. 
  
• Momo herself is just flying around with her broom and launching wind, and the action scene manages to be a bit fun because of that while Nobara continues to light up her nails and launch them seemingly randomly at Momo. Appreciate the glowing effects around her nails, and ultimately when Nobara gets to 'curse' the broom, as well as the dizzying effects when Nobara activates Hairpin. 
  
• I also do like that Momo's being fairly distracted with the idea of the super-powerful Toge appearing, musing that the paranoia about Toge is making her antsy regardless of whether he's actually nearby or not. 
• And then we get the over-the-top reveal that Nobara brings along a non-lethal weapon... a squeaky hammer! She bashes Momo in the head with it, and is about to attack again before she gets one-shotted by Mai with a rubber bullet. 
• And it is kind of a rather 'aw, man' moment as Nobara's about to clinch a full victory over a named character, but I felt like it's a nice way to end the battle nonetheless since Nobara had her big character moment and a clear victory, but it's also realistic that these characters would pile on and take cheap shots whenever necessary. 
• But the fight ends up becoming between Mai and Maki in the trees. I do find it interesting that while Maki has been a gigantic bully to Nobara and the other characters, when faced with Mai, it's Mai who goads her on and causes her to flip.
• Of course, we've got Mai slicing up bullets with a sword. Always badass to see. 
• And then, we of course get the flashbacks. How they are unable to use cursed techniques, but Maki was never afraid of the creepy curses they saw as children and just ran towards the future, always dragging her along...
  
• That is a fucking creepy curse, though, even if it's technically harmless.
• Until, of course, when they reached young adulthood, at which point Maki left the clan and fighting verbally with the drunkard Zen'in clan head (their dad, I think?). And being more or less dismissive when the clan leader talks about putting both her and Mai through the gruelling training.
• Of course, there's the whispered line about Mai muttering that Maki is a liar, but if we take what she and Momo said at face value and that Mai didn't really want all of this curse-hunting life then you can see why there's resentment on top of abandonment issues. "Let's fall down this hole together!"
  
• I must confess that I wasn't paying attention to the number of shots being fired because of the dizzying action, but Mai explicitly using a revolver to fool Mai into thinking that she's only got six shots is a great little trick!
• Turns out that Mai is able to use 'Construction', an innate technique that she developed secretly and allowing her to create a seventh bullet. 
• And, again, I mention more about the flashback and the character moment, but it's a pretty amazingly-animated and fast-paced scene that goes on here, culminating in Maki's superhuman reflexes allowing her to grab and catch the constructed bullet mid-flight with her bare hands. 
• And Mai is basically defeated, but I've always found this conflict to be a rather melancholic one. It has a great, explosive climax with a lot of exposition about the jujutsu world and the Zen'in siblings... but other than Maki showing that, yes, she can stand up and potentially reach her goal as the leader of the Zen'in clan, she hasn't really fixed anything between herself and Mai. I really found this very intriguing compared to other 'relatives from a noble family facing each other in a tournament' like the Hyugas from Naruto where one of the siblings are clearly in the wrong.