JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable

Episode 24

With Sheer Heart Attack halted by the power of Koichi's new Echoes form, Kira is having a tough time going about his day. Sheer Heart Attack is linked to Killer Queen's left hand and by extension, Kira's left hand. Clearly the suave murderer can't live his peaceful life with his hand constantly glued to the pavement, so it's time for him to return to the scene of the crime in an attempt to silence Koichi once and for all.

The ensuing beating that Kira delivers is one of the best scenes I've seen in Diamond is Unbreakable yet. It's brutal as he smashes Koichi's face in the ground repeatedly. It's also incredibly bloody, but since it's not technically gore, it goes uncensored and ends up being far more visceral and evocative than any scene where people's guts are flying all over the place under black shadows. Koichi does his best to survive the onslaught, and though he's clearly defeated in this matchup, he does manage to win one thing over Mr. Not-Bowie: he nabs his wallet and confirms his identity as Yoshikage Kira.

Since peace and anonymity are core to Kira's identity, this is a major blow. It turns out that he's not as good at covering his tracks as he once thought, and Koichi knows just how to push his buttons. Of course, this taunting doesn't last long before Kira decides to just end the conversation by summoning Killer Queen and blowing a hole clean through him. Koichi's down, and now it's a bloody Jotaro's turn to hold down the fort until Josuke can arrive.

I'm honestly disappointed that Koichi wasn't just killed off here. Last week, I was worried about a potential toothlessness to this season with Crazy Diamond's healing powers, and I was sure that I was about to eat my words. I lamented Jotaro's inevitable survival and was floored by the idea that Koichi would be the one to bite the dust in his place. It would have been the most perfect, unexpected character death, especially with Echoes, Act 3 only having just surfaced.

For a good half of this episode, I thought Koichi was genuinely dead, and the entire time my blood was on fire. I respected Kira as a villain and I respected the balls of the story to kill one of the more vulnerable and likable characters, while also giving him some great final moments. But alas, Josuke does arrive and he does bring both Jotaro and Koichi back to tiptop shape.

Feeling burdened by Echoes's ability to stop Sheer Heart Attack, Kira follows up with the obvious solution: just cut off his damn hand so that he can't be slowed down by it. He makes his escape and heads to Aya Tsuji's beauty parlor where he makes her give him a new face and identity before killing her. So there's our big dramatic character death, I guess.

Saltiness over Koichi's beating heart aside, these last moments are pretty intense. The group is trying to chase him, but with the knowledge that he now looks like a completely different person and intends to continue living his life of peace, regardless of his new identity, they stumble into a crowd of regular everyday people. Kira could be any one of them, so there's a weird poetic tinge to this defeat. This episode has me torn because it has some of the most incredibly exciting and intense scenes in the season so far, but I do feel a bit of emptiness with the bait and switches over character deaths. This episode was almost an A+ to me.

Rating: A-

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Sam Leach writes and records about One Piece for The One Piece Podcast and you can find him on Twitter @LuckyChainsaw