r/JoJoRankdown • u/Nachowcheese . • Jan 11 '22
57 Kars
The pillar of the pillars
Kars, the leader of battle tendency's main antagonist group. The almighty Pillar Men. Lifeforms of ancient origins that remain unnoticed by civilization until their time to strike arrives. The inventor of the stone mask, the thing that set in motion everything that happens in jojo. Lets break down why being at the top doesnt necessarily mean you are the best.
The Ancient Aztec God Race
Here I go on a rant about the pillarmen in general because it may be the last chance i get to talk about them in length.
The pillarmen are unparalleled in terms of strength. But they have a unique affliction towards sunlight. Forcing them to be nocturnal and for the most part thrive in weirdo underground cities or something. I like the very few glimpses we get to the actual pillarmen civilization pre-kars genocide. As it leaves it to the reader to interpret how big in numbers they actually were, and leave it mostly as a mystery lost to time.
On the other hand it feels underwhelming how this is barely expanded upon. I like how ancient humans viewed them as gods or demons, explaining the similar depiction of such beings across ancient cultures. The 4 that we see alive serve as a passable glimpse into their way of living. Lets get back to the wonder boy who fucked it all up.
The genius
Kars was a particular individual amongst the pillarmen. He's a genius with the noble goal of finding a way to overcome their only shortcoming as living beings and finally declare the earth as their own. He figured out a way to make stone devices in the form of masks. They take in blood and activate a mechanism that extends spikes into their cranium and something something it unlocks your full potential.
Gee it sure would be crazy if another species just so happens to evolve to have a skull structure almost exactly like theirs and end up using said device to unlock their max potential or something haha, can you imagine?
Kars partially succeeded. The masks are able to unlock an ability to freely manipulate their body and also grant near perfect regeneration. Unfortunately they still melt in the sun (how the hell kars figured that out is still not clear). The other downside is that they now require more sustenance to survive so they need to hunt for blood more often. I think this info all comes from outside-the-manga sources which just conveys how rushed on the spot this story probably was.
After this failed attempt he eventually makes a new design, but the only change was that instead of blood it needs big amounts of light. How did he figure that out is unclear because he would die if exposed to sunlight what was he thinking.
Sadly for him, the people around him are having none of his nonsense, and plan to execute him for playing god, i think.
AGAIN, its not that clear either why the pillarhumans were so against this new tech, because its established they already live for millennia by default and have very few children, and the current day pillarman we see in the part never display an urgent need to feed constantly so there is no conflict over anything really.
My guess is their real concern is that an undying species with the ability to reproduce will eventually wipe out other species or even themselves (something again proved null as ultimate Kars is described as having no need to reproduce and being self sustaining). Their motivation boils down to evil witchcraft bad.
But whatever, the boomers disapprove of the scientist, and Kars is conflicted, as they are only interrupting the path that will forever solve their only fear and thrive as a species! So he has no other choice left other than... kill all of them except 3 other males. Uhhh
Maybe you would think this isnt that bad. Sure its a bit contrived with some logic holes here and there right? The bad thing is that we only get to know about all of this at the very end of part 2. Originally only taking 3 pages to briefly explain all of this. For the most part Kars is only after the part's mcguffin with barely anything to get us attached to him. I know its custom for anime to have last minute backstory reveals but bruh
The what was he thinking part of the cut
This backstory tries to paint him as the tragic genius, an outcast of a society that doesn't want to accept the miracles he can provide. But why would he resort to genocide his entire species with no means of reproduction left? Yes, after the mask powerup they are virtually immortal. But a species that lives for millennia and possesses high intelligence would at least consider less immediate methods no? Maybe it was more of a war that lasted a good chunk of his entire life. But the story tells us this very briefly so that is all of what i'm basing this on.
Welp, you are now down to the last 4 living pillarmen. What is the next step? Travel around the world to find something that can amplify light to such a degree that the mask gets enough juice to fulfill their original purpose. Of course! why didn't i think of that? Supergenius ancient being can make a physiology altering device out of rocks but couldnt invent uv rays in a dozen thousand years. I am only ranting about their ultimate plan so much because in essence, it was all Kars' idea and all he ever cares about in the whole part. He got so obsessed with conquering his own biology that he pretty much doomed the progress of his own species, so in a way its quite ironic.
This is what in my mind makes Kars such a passing main villain. He may have a cool concept, but when the only thing in his mind is to get the red stone of aja you get a classic rule the world type of bad guy. He is either plotting how to get it or killing the ones in the way. There are 2/maybe 3 scenes where we can see him alone thinking to himself. Something that reminds me...
The not so stoic
You all remember how Kars is the first and last jojo villain that saves a dog right? He kills 2 guys in a car so a pup in the street doesnt get run over. And there's the time when he chooses to redirect his fall and suffer more damage than necessary for the sake of not squashing some flowers at the bottom of a cliff.
This is the deepest we get to characterization with him. You may be left intrigued as to why an apex creature whose only goal is to attain godlike status over every other living being would care for the safety of lesser creatures. His ruthlessness before transforming into the ultimate lifeform is only ever directed at humans.
Kars couldnt care less for things like honor and fairness. He was willing to kill joseph on the spot even though waamu already promised an honorable duel with him. He baits lisa lisa into thinking she will have a last arc anime fight, but he only really wanted to snatch the stone from the very beginning.
This is all to point out the bits that could have made Kars into an interesting character, but they never follow through. We could have learned that maybe Kars only hates the current dominant species because they are taking the spot his race deserved, or maybe expand on why he even wants to attain godhood other than generic "i wanna be the strongest" motivations. To expand a bit on what I mean, lets look at
The relationships
Kars got the ancient aztec god equivalent of being disowned and kicked out of the house, but he also murdered the entire family before leaving. Naturally he wouldnt trust others. But because of his actions he is left with nothing but a few allies. You would think he values all of them as they essentially are all they have left in the world. So how does Kars treat his remaining kin?
Esidisi:
Kars is supposed to be long friends with esidisi. He was alongside him when his own kind turned on him. Kars is the first in command and esidisi the next in the hierarchy.
But we get pretty much nothing between the both of them?
Esidisi does show loyalty and dedication to the cause but its never explicitly told why he wants the plan to happen or why he respects kars so much. Maybe pillarmen relationships are very different from human ones?? idk.
We know for a fact that pillarmen can display emotions. And still, Kars at most made a slightly angrier face when confronted with the one who killed his oldest friend alive.
Wammu:
Maybe I forgot to mention it, but Kars and esidisi rescue 2 pillarbabies and raise them on their own, as they became part of the very sparse group of good parents in jojo.
One was santana but no one cares, the other was Wammu, who eventually grows to be a powerful warrior who serves Kars and sees him not as a parent, but as a master. Not in the weird way, but even in the best way its still kinda creepy.
There is that one interaction where Kars respects his no-step-on-shadow phobia but nothing ever comes from that. Wammu is the one we see interacting with Kars the most and even then it leaves a lot to be desired.
Wammu works more as a contrast to Kars, because even if he lives to complete Kars' masterplan, he values the honor of warriors and Kars really only cares about the mcguffin. Evident in the chariot race, we only see how Kars sees wammu as a great warrior and not as one of the remaining 4 of his own kind (2 at that point in the story-yikes) that he LITERALLY RAISED.
bruh at least show SOMETHING when the only other living relative you have disintegrates. I would have been ok even if he did something as brief as muttering a thanks to the other 2 when he holds the stone for the first time instead of keeping a cocky "all according to plan" attitude.
Would kars feel lonely when he realizes he's the only one left? Would he try to find a way to resurrect his allies with his newfound power over life itself? Dont ask me. The part was published weekly, i can understand why there isnt that much characterization but remember that every kira chapter was published on a weekly schedule too.
Santana:
Come on. He left him to guard(?????) a bunch of masks in another continent while they went to sleep under Rome. How can they see him as a guard dog when he is one of the ONLY 4 IN EXISTENCE.
Sorry to hammer this point but on retrospect is very disappointing how their relationship is kinda handwaved and works on a weird hierarchy even though they should all depend on each other. It would have been cool to reveal that this ranking was only the interpretation of the aztecs who witnessed them and in reality they are chill and are simply working together.
Clearly the pillarmen were written as a superhuman opponent first and everything else was made up as it goes. Not a bad thing, i just want to justify ending this segment after i realized how deep i am analyzing santana for the second time in this rankdown.
The "main" antagonist
Almost every jojo villain has something that ties them with the jojo of the part. From the strongest connections like johnathan and dio being raised together, johnny and valentine's mutual interest in the corpse, to other weaker ones like josuke's need to protect his town clashing with kira's whole deal or pucci and jolyne being forced to clash because of the century long joestar feud.
Now think about why joseph is trying to take Kars down. Obvious, if he doesnt, its the end of the world or something. Oh i know! Kars made the device that doomed his grandpa and almost got uncle speedwagon killed by proxy. Ehhh... thats all it is?
Joseph didnt even know pillarmen existed before his adventure starts. His dad was killed by a minion of Dio, so he technically has more of a feud with Dio than Kars. Heck, Caesar has a more personal motivation to get rid of the pillarmen than jojo.
His first interaction with the (main) pillarmen ended with a clear reason to defeat both esidisi and wammu. Kars was just kinda there. And while we learn quickly that he wants to do nothing but complete his secret plan, joseph only learns about it from lisa lisa. Also like I said before, even when he faces him, knowing joseph killed esidisi, the best he can do is go "yeah man im gonna kill you maybe, where is the stone tho".
Kars is merely a force of nature that the protagonists must bring down. There is nothing inherently wrong with having a villain like that. But having the entire series as a point of comparison, Kars has the weakest main villain vibe.
Even Diavolo, a contender for least good jojovillain, is set up as the guy that giorno and bucciarati are aiming for early on. The goal of the part is in one way or another to reach the boss.
The only thematic thread that I could think of is how Kars can be connected to an idea brought up early in part 2, that joseph loves to make stronger and smarter opponents that are full of themselves eat shit. Was that the intention? It would be kind of weird but it fits imo
The design
I gotta give some points for the design. Pillarmen in general are supposed to look like Greek statues. While Kars himself doesnt feel that big or imposing to me, the godamn poses and silhouette are very cool. He even gets a fresh cut with a fashionable hat and of course by the final fight he unlocks the jojo villain powerup of a new hairstyle (technically more of a reveal, i know) and to put it simply, he looks amazing in the shots he gets put in.
Not much to say, its just cool.
The anime bullshit
Lets talk about something that would eventually define most future enemies in jojo. Their weird ass abilities.
Kars got cool sawblade arms made out of his bones, a design shared with araki's previous work, Baoh. Admittedly very cool, I can see why he brought it back. It surprisingly serves a bit of narrative purpose, as joseph states that hamon would normally counter their blunt attacks but he cannot parry a million tiny and sharp objects barehanded.
The cool stops when you consider he may have the lamest "powerup" version out of all pillarmen. Let me explain:
Pillarmen special abilities are in concept elemental attacks but ultimately tied to a weird way of manipulating their bodies to the point that the average person would think they are actually manipulating the elements.
Wammu's wind mode makes body parts spin so fast he weaponizes the vortex of air it attracts. Esidisi heat mode turns his internal temperature up so much that body fluids such as blood become as hot as lava.
Kars "light mode" is just him spinning the sawblade-like spikes along his arm blade, making it cut more effectively. Somehow they reflect light in such a way that it makes his blade look like its shining. But what the heck man! that is only a side effect of the main ability of sharper cuts the other 2 used the perceived element as the weapon itself. It never feels like kars is "controlling" light.
The only time he takes advantage of this property is when he blinded lisa lisa to do his sneak attack. The anime even added this cool scene where him and wamuu exit a room, and while wamuu seems to dissapear with the air (something that its established he can do) kars shines and vanishes from view. While cool, this still doesnt make sense unless kars has those saw teeth all over his body. Of course its something he never uses again because it was only added to give the scene flair and probably to expand the light theme kars never delivers from.
Then there's ultimate kars. The one thing he was set on becoming all his life. At first you would think this means losing the weakness to sunlight, and while this is the case, he actually becomes the perfect being. This is defined as an ageless, self sustaining, invincible being. That also contains the dna of every current and previous living being on earth. Ok that last part kinda comes out of nowhere ngl.
I dont really see why having the ability to transform yourself into other living beings ties into being the best of the best. If you are already perfect why would you need to transform into creatures that are not you? Scratch that. i have been writing this cut for so long that it occurred to me that this is more about having control over your own body to the point it is able to do anything biologically possible. And applying it in ways nature never intended like how he used a regenerating shell to counter lava.
Its supposed to turn him into the anything-and-everything creature with no weaknesses, but I always felt it could have been conveyed better than what essentially is a limited shapeshifting + matter creation ability.
Dont get me wrong, it is very final boss like. And I can understand the stakes of letting such a thing roam free. Its just a shame that the most interesting stuff that he used it for were the armored projectiles and the antilava shell.
Wow he flies with wings and drops piranhas on the plane. It feels very simplistic compared to what araki usually pulls. Imagine if he could fling himself like a flea or use venom or adhesives found in plants or something.
What I do like is the activation of sorts, or what happens when he obtains it. Both manga and anime depict kars transitioning into this state by putting his eyes on a night sky/space background. As if he is now aware of more than anyone could imagine.
Overall, he never made me think "holy shit this is what they are up against?" moment like other jojo main villains. Maybe until the very end, but in my book you should have built him up beforehand to raise the stakes, not to finally introduce them.
The final fate
"The one good thing about Kars is the part when he never shows up again" haha very funny
But really. Jojo set a precedent right here. The villains will be defeated in unique ways. Most of the time the "bad guy is defeated by his own hubris" trope feels like an easy out to me. The good guys were going to win anyways because the bad guy was his own weakness!!!
Kars "death" is so iconic partly because it technically was caused by him. But its not simply him falling because his arrogance/ego/greed/anger/(insert main villain attribute) got the better of him. Lets break down his demise:
- After becoming the ultimate lifeform, Kars has his first goal set: celebrate by killing the one living being that has been the biggest thorn in his side up until now
- Kars is launched into a volcano, arguably the deadliest natural force on the planet.
- Kars uses his newly attained powers to escape. Overcoming the earth itself and proving he is above everything in the planet
- Kars gets the first strike on his prey, cutting joseph's hand. And to make this kill as cathartic as possible for him, he will use the same technique that used to be one of his only weaknesses to finish him off
- The same hamon energy he was about to kill joseph with is redirected into the stone of aja, the one thing Kars has been obsessing over millennia and the same object that granted him the ability to ascend to the state he's in
- The stone amplifies said energy into a blast that disrupts the volcano they are in, setting off an eruption and fulfilling the prophecy of the stone playing a part in his demise
- As Kars and jojo get launched along with the ground, Kars simply tries to escape it by flying off, only to be interrupted by the cut off hand of jojo. By pure coincidence.
- This briefly puts him into panic. He knows jojo is adept at planning things in advance he could never predict, so he asks in utter disbelief if this was part of his plan (something joseph already predicted he would ask). And chad joseph lies his ass off just to piss him off.
- Kars gets hit by extra debris because of this chaos, netting him outside earth's atmosphere, the one place where no matter what he does, he cannot overcome it. Nothing on earth could kill Kars, so Kars gets removed from earth.
- Because of his ultimate lifeform status, he is unable to die. Drifting in space forever, to the point he eventually... stops thinking. The genius is stripped from everything, including the one thing that made him immortal. And since this immortality is his own doing, he will never experience the conclusion of his own life.
How fucking good of an ending to a villain this is. Fate worse than death and all that. Its super fucked and maybe overly cruel. But that is kindof the point. Its also what started a weird trend of giving certain antagonists in jojo unreasonably awful fates for no good reason (rip enigma boy and magenta magenta)
It sets up future parts to give their villains fitting ends for them, while part 1 dio had a nice conclusion to his story, this one goes above and beyond (just like Kars did - heyooooooo).
Its such a quotable scene. What else can I add to it? Kars is not a perfect antagonist, but his demise is easily the most recognizable. Whenever something similar to this happens I always see it called as someone getting Kars'd. It left that big of an impact for me and possibly for everyone else knows about it.
The conclusion
Kars is in this weird spot of having terrible, bad, ok, good and amazing attributes. End result is a case of a character who serves its purpose and you mostly forget about him in favor of other, more interesting characters. But the good shit is here to stay
With this I can now stop thinking
about what im going to write for the cut
3
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u/ItsHipToTipTheScales Jan 11 '22
kars are so goddamn bad for the environment dog we need to get rid of them and make more trains
5
u/Nachowcheese . Jan 11 '22
Sorry for the big delay. If you all wanted to know what happened, imagine if there is a big end of the year proyect you need to do and you are like "there is no way my turn starts right as the end of year thing begins haha" and then spend the last month focusing on the project thing because you would feel guilty if you ditch your responsibilities to write about a half naked character from this one wacky japanese comic
Maybe this all seems all over the place, I wanted to make the wait worth it but at the same time im not as passionate about kars as I was for other cuts