SPOILERS WITHIN (FOR THE MANGA TOO)

Before watching the movie I saw a lot of discourse on how Suguru was animated. I decided to hold off judgement until I saw the movie for myself and I have to say, they made him look better than he did in the manga. No shade but man was going through it!

It makes sense though. Where we meet Suguru in the movie he’s at rock bottom and he’s at his most desperate. He is also full of hatred and probably anger at the perceived injustice of the world.

Call me Roald Dahl but I personally believe that when you’re in such a state internally it’s impossible to look good. It comes out somehow.

He’s always making ugly facial expressions because he’s feeling hateful thoughts!

So, for me, I think they captured Suguru perfectly!

(Also when man is going through emotional turmoil he doesn’t take care of himself, I mean Hidden Inventory anyone)

They got all the nuances of his character across so well, that it was even better than the manga for me. Perhaps, because in the manga Gege didn’t want to give everything away or he hadn’t figured out everything yet. But the movie has the advantage of knowing where the story is going and knowing what they can and can’t show, so they’re able to foreshadow to perfection.

It’s like they wanted me to cry. They kept showing flashbacks of Okinawa and snippets of their conversations and of Suguru before the fall. Why?!

I also feel like they added more flashbacks of Suguru’s and Satoru’s relationship. They were really driving the angst home.

The scene where Suguru appears at the school and Gojo confronts him and Suguru turns around and just looks at him for a second with a normal facial expression, for once, and then he goes back into his act, “Satoruuuu! Long-time no see!”

That scene! They captured the emotions so well in a short amount of time! Even without seeing Hidden Inventory you can tell there’s history there (in the manga too).

Then when Suguru leaves and Satoru watches him go.

*mentally flops on bed dramatically*

It was all well done!

They really captured that Suguru has gone crazy or has lost himself but at the same time the old him is still there somewhere.

I think that when a jaded person has their world view broken they roll with it, like “Yeah, just as I thought, the world sucks.” *ahem* MJ *ahem*. But when a righteous person or a person with a positive outlook on life has their world view broken, they break and it’s hard to put the pieces back together.

It’s like in Fruits Basket where everyone was worried that if Tohru ever broke then perhaps she would not come back from that. Who said that? I can’t remember but there was a specific person who mentioned this. Was it Rin?

Anyway, that’s Suguru. He believed he had his gifts to protect people, to help people. He, like Yuuta, was not from the jujutsu world. It was new to him too. So he only knew what they told him probably. So to then live life and find out that life is not how you expected it, that it’s worse. That it can be very dark. That the humans you’re saving can be the enemy (as in Hidden Inventory the people who hired Toji were human). It’s a hard pill to swallow.

Have you ever had that? Had so much hope only to have it dashed?

Also, Suguru saw the world in a black and white way to some degree and in the JJK world that did not help him in the long run. The JJK world is all grey.

They captured that in the movie. They captured his motivations and how warped they had become due to him losing hope and losing his sanity.

At the core he wants the JJK sorcerers to be free. He’s seen kids dying endlessly and he wants it to stop. He’s directed his anger in the wrong direction however I feel because the true villains we all know are the higher ups.

Instead of sending Zen’in adults to fight the high grade battles they send children! If the Zen’in are so good why can’t they take on more cases? Bastards.

Gojo even says it in the movie. He’s not going to let them stand in the way of the kids being kids because everyone deserves a childhood. Even Nanami says it in season one. He wants Yuuji to be a kid and tells him to leave the responsibility to him as he’s the adult.

They all lost their childhood and lost their friends who didn’t get to become adults. So they all treasure that.

But those M*F* higher ups!

Like I said in a blog post somewhere. I fully support Gojo wiping them out. I will release him from the box myself so that can happen.

*calming breath*

Anyway, back to Suguru. When he kills the investor and there’s blood, he doesn’t allow the blood to touch him because to him the human is filthy. However, when he tosses Maki around like a ragdoll and she’s bleeding, he steps in the blood. He doesn’t avoid it. He allows it touch him.

So as much as he professed to hate Maki on sight, did he? Why didn’t he kill her? He could have very easily done so.

In fact, Gojo sends Inumaki and Panda to Suguru knowing Suguru is about to body these children but trusting that he would never kill them because like I said they value childhood. I don’t think he could live with taking the life of children.

(It’s probably why what happened to Nanako and Mimiko caused him to snap.)

Imagine that, after all that time man still trusts him and he was right to trust him.

This movie highlighted, again, the tragedy of Suguru. However, the movie also highlighted how powerful he is.

I don’t know what it is but for fight scenes sometimes I need to see them in motion for them to make sense to me. That’s how I am with Jujutsu Kaisen. Which is why I can’t wait to see Choso fight in the anime because it didn’t make sense to me seeing it static.

So, in the movie (and the manga) Suguru bodies these children! He wipes the fall with them! His curses genuinely give the sorcerers a hard time in Tokyo and Kyoto. He’s doing those two things simultaneously.

However, throughout the movie we hear him lament that if he was like Gojo or Yuuta he wouldn’t have to struggle to have his vision come to light. He feels powerless and that makes him desperate which leads to him dying.

The thing is though, he’s not powerless. He’s very powerful, sure he can’t wipe out humanity but that’s just a numbers thing. Even Gojo would not be able to do it in one day. The world is big. Geto chose a goal that was too big!

Anyway, he’s a special grade and I’m sure he was one before he committed the massacre. He always had that power within him but he lost hope and he was disillusioned. He failed to save someone and he watched his comrades fall like flies.

It kind of makes me think. If he was that powerful when depressed, on the brink, self-esteem at the floor… how powerful would he be if he was in a good place? If he was happy, well rested and had gotten therapy or quit for a bit like Nanami?

Can you imagine!

I again want to slap the higher ups.

(Yes, they are the root of all evil! I bet we can trace this back to Sukuna! Maybe higher ups turned him to darkness… it could happen! Kenjaku got away with so much in the Kamo clan and no one questioned it… why? Because he blended in!)

If you imagined me saying all that with a crazy look in my eyes and my conspiracy hat on… thanks. That’s what I was going for.

Back to his physical prowess, how can someone survive being crushed through a hole in the earth! He just pops up out of there, *Mushu voice* like a daisy!

It takes the anomaly of Rika to kill him. He should be honoured that the only people who could kill him are the weirdos Gojo and Yuuta with their limitless power. Only them!

If I was Suguru’s friend I’d slap him. How do you not see yourself!

The ultimate tragedy is that when he was drowning he never told Gojo. He only opens up when he’s dying saying that he’s never truly smiled or been happy from the bottom of his heart.

Then Gojo makes him laugh sincerely.

*throws table*

I love Suguru but also I don’t.

If I had known beforehand this is where the story would go I would not have read it. A mutual said it was sad but I thought they meant general anime sadness which I can deal with but no… it’s deeply sad.

At least for me it is.

Suguru is a broken person internally when we see him and they captured that perfectly in the movie.

Suguru is a character I relate with, minus the resorting to murder, so the story never fails to get to me no matter how many times I read it or view it.

I went to watch the movie alone and so I tried not to get emotional. It happened anyway so I just sat there sniffing silently lol.

But seriously where do people find their anime friends? I was the only one alone!

It was a good experience though. Even with all the angst there were still funny moments (selfie moment) and as I said in Part 1 the fights were epic! They were so good. If someone wants to cut the Geto vs Panda and Gojo vs Miguel and send it to me, I’ll consider that an early birthday present.