Right after that, Jotaro did something in front of his mother and the prison guards that no one there would forget anytime soon. With the brutal ease of someone who did not even consider it remarkable, he intercepted a bullet with his own spiritual manifestation, as if ordinary logic simply did not apply to his body. The moment was so sudden, so absurd, that a good part of the audience froze for an entire second before the comments exploded. Some saw it as a deliberate tribute to classic action cinema; others could only stare at the screen, eyes wide, trying to process the fact that the protagonist had barely been introduced and was already bending reality in front of them.
Holly, however, barely registered the shock around her. What cut through her was something else entirely.
The instant she saw that ghostly shadow flickering behind her son, an instinctive realization stirred inside her. This was not completely unfamiliar. There was something in that presence that reminded her of her father, Joseph Joestar, the man who also possessed a power far too strange to fit into any ordinary explanation.
And so he came from New York to Ishtar.
The meeting between the two generations happened through the bars, tense and stripped of any warmth. Joseph stopped in front of the cell with narrowed eyes, his face carrying a gravity that felt rare on him, as though he already knew that one wrong word would only make his grandson shut himself off further.
"Come out and come with me."
Jotaro lifted his eyes, expressionless, as if he were listening to something beneath his interest.
"I didn't call for you. Get lost. You may have come a long way, but there's nothing you can do for me, old man."
And then, in the very next second, he raised his hand and showed the little finger from Joseph's prosthetic left arm, already removed without anyone noticing when he had done it.
Even Joseph was startled.
Outside the screen, those who had followed Battle Tendency could not help feeling a strange, almost comical discomfort. This was the same man who had once stood against beings beyond human logic, the same Joseph who had defeated ancient monsters and survived through the sheer insolent audacity with which he treated the impossible. Seeing him now with part of his prosthetic casually dismantled by his own grandson made the passage of time feel real. He still had strength. He still had presence. But that unruly youth was gone, and the story was not trying to hide it.
Once it became clear that words alone would not be enough, Joseph abandoned the idea of persuading Jotaro through conversation. If the boy insisted on calling it a curse or an evil spirit, then he would have to be shown - plainly and directly - what it actually was.
Joseph snapped his fingers.
"All right. Your turn."
That was when Avdol made his first true entrance, carrying himself with the solemn calm of a man who seemed to have stepped into the story long before he was formally introduced. There was something about him that commanded respect without effort, a firm, ritual-like steadiness, as though he carried within himself the certainty of someone who understood forces the rest of the world did not yet even have names for.
And when his power manifested, the atmosphere changed completely.
Fire took shape.
Magician's Red appeared shrouded in flames, like some ancient entity - fierce, majestic, and radiating threat. At the same time the series delivered its first clear demonstration of this new combat system, Joseph finally put the concept into words: the projection of life energy into image, will, and power.
A Stand.
It was not just an ability. It felt like an extension of the soul itself.
Jotaro, pinned down by the burning pressure tightening around his throat, felt the anger inside him grow until his body could no longer contain it. For a few seconds, he still tried to suppress it.
Then he gave up.
"I don't care what happens anymore… I really don't!"
The roar came together with the eruption of power.
The entity behind him finally revealed itself in full - massive, overwhelming, carrying the presence of a titan born to crush anything that dared move one step too far. Its appearance was both violent and beautiful. The bars of the cell twisted as if they were nothing more than cheap wire, and the strike that followed toward Magician's Red carried such crushing force it seemed capable of piercing space itself.
But Avdol did not stop because he was weaker.
He stopped because he had already accomplished what he came to do.
The fight ended before it could truly begin.
"There's no need for you to stay locked up in a cell trying to understand this power anymore. Come, Jotaro. There are things you need to hear."
As the scene shifted, the series added another elegant layer of information. A freeze-frame of Magician's Red appeared on screen, wreathed in fire and posed almost ceremonially, accompanied by a hexagonal parameter chart. That visual choice immediately won over part of the audience. This was not the first time a work had used something like that, but here it felt especially fitting. A Stand was not merely something to be seen; it was something that could be measured, compared, interpreted.
The comments reacted instantly. Some viewers liked the stat panel at once. Others fixated on the numbers, comparing categories with near-competitive seriousness. There were also those who openly lamented that the story seemed to be moving away from Hamon for good. For them, there was a faint sadness in seeing the system that had supported the earlier parts being quietly pushed aside. Others pushed back immediately, arguing that this new concept was far more stylish, far bolder, far more memorable.
The discussion swelled at the natural pace of a fandom that had just realized it was not merely watching a continuation, but a complete shift in the rules of the world.
By the time Magician's Red's image faded, Jotaro, Holly, Joseph, and Avdol were already seated in a café.
The contrast between that ordinary setting and the weight of what was being discussed made everything feel even stranger. Outside, the city carried on, alive and indifferent. Inside, a family was talking about inherited curses, manifested spirits, and an enemy who should have remained buried a century ago.
Relieved to see her son out of prison, Holly clung to his arm with almost childlike affection, as though the simple act of touching him was enough to convince her everything would somehow be all right.
"Thank goodness… you're finally out."
Jotaro did not even look at her.
"You're such a pain, woman."
Joseph frowned at once.
"Hey. How can you call your own mother that?"
The scolding made the audience laugh, and the longtime fans immediately returned to joking about embarrassing fragments of Joseph's youth. But this time the humor did not last long. As the conversation deepened, the mood began turning heavy again, as though the air inside that café were slowly being compressed by something invisible.
Then Joseph decided to show them.
A violet energy coiled around his right hand like glowing vines. Hermit Purple emerged with that strange, almost organic appearance, utterly different from the aggressive grandeur of Magician's Red or the crushing power of Jotaro's Stand. In a single motion, Joseph used it to destroy a camera, forcing an image into existence through the impact.
Part of the audience reacted with immediate confusion. Compared with what had just been shown, Hermit Purple felt less impressive, less destructive, almost too modest for a former protagonist. Plenty of viewers started frowning before they had even seen its stat chart, already preparing to complain that the story had reduced Joseph to a support role.
But the plot moved too quickly to let that dissatisfaction settle.
In the developed photograph, there was a man.
Or rather, there was the threatening silhouette of someone who seemed to deny even the right to be fully seen.
Half his face was swallowed by shadow. But the body - beautiful in a way that was almost offensive - had a cold, sculpted perfection to it, as though it had been carved from marble and then filled with cursed blood. And there, around the neck, visible between the skin and the nape, was a stitched scar.
Lower still, at the back, there was a star-shaped birthmark.
The same one Jotaro had.
The same one Holly had.
The same one Joseph had.
When Joseph spoke, the pain in his voice tore straight through the distance between past and present.
"DIO… my spirit photography always leads me back to him. And the body below that bastard's head… is my grandfather's body. Jonathan Joestar."
The words landed like a stone in the chest of everyone who had been following the story since Phantom Blood. All at once, what had once felt distant began to ache again. Jonathan had given his life trying to stop that monster. He had died believing that, at the cost of his own existence, he had finally brought the tragedy to an end.
And yet, a century later, the horror was still alive.
Worse than alive.
It was wearing the legacy of the very family it had destroyed.
Then, for the first time in a true sense, the series plunged into DIO's space.
It was a dark room drenched in luxury and silence, each detail seemingly chosen to exalt both decadence and power. The lighting barely allowed the audience to see his face clearly, but that only strengthened the effect. DIO moved slowly, as if the room itself bent to the rhythm of his steps.
"This body… is like a blood-bound link. It connects Jonathan to his descendants."
His voice was calm, low, almost intimate, which only made it more unsettling.
"After taking Jonathan's body, I awakened a new power as well… a Stand."
There was a brief pause, and then the intent beneath everything emerged without decoration.
"But every advantage comes at a price. This Stand affects his descendants. That is why I must exterminate them."
The light continued to conceal part of his face, but what the camera revealed of his body was already enough to ignite the audience's reaction. DIO planted one leg on the step, stretched the other behind him, rested one hand on his thigh near his hip, and let the other drift to the back of his neck, slowly brushing the star-shaped mark there.
The pose was extravagant. Theatrical. Indecently self-assured.
Too beautiful. Too provocative. So drenched in style that, for an instant, it almost felt like it was mocking the viewer.
And it worked.
The older fans recognized it immediately. That was DIO to the core. That theatrical vanity, that perversity transformed into elegance, that almost sensual pleasure in occupying space as though the entire world were a stage built purely to frame him - it was impossible to mistake. Some viewers even began commenting that while Part 1's DIO had felt above all like a cruel, impulsive psychopath, this version had gained another layer entirely. The threat was no longer only in the brutality. There was now a cold, calculated pressure to him, a dark magnetism that called to mind villains capable of crushing others without ever needing to raise their voices.
Meanwhile, the audience starting the franchise from this point was stunned for different reasons. Many still did not fully understand the events from a hundred years earlier, the roots of that conflict, or the true weight of the Joestar name. But even without understanding everything, they understood the important part.
This man was dangerous.
Absurdly charismatic.
Impossible to ignore.
Even so, the story did not abandon its new viewers. Without breaking its rhythm, it organically recapped the essential events of Phantom Blood through Joseph's words and DIO's own lines, allowing newcomers to follow the conflict without feeling as if they had permanently missed the train. It was an intelligent, almost invisible choice - one that preserved continuity for veterans without leaving first-time viewers behind.
When the scene changed again, the series also displayed Hermit Purple's parameters: low destructive power, modest speed, short range, but excellent durability. The reaction was immediate and loud. Many thought it was unfair. Others were genuinely shocked. Some complained with the near-personal sense of betrayal of fans who simply could not accept that a legendary former protagonist had received a Stand that seemed so unimpressive at first glance.
But that, too, said something important about this new phase of the story.
The role of protagonist had changed hands.
And the series had no intention of pretending time had stood still.
The next day, even after hearing from his grandfather the unbelievable story that stretched back across an entire century, Jotaro still had no final answer. Joseph and Avdol were still discussing what had to be done, how DIO should be confronted, which path to take first.
And while the adults were thinking, the very center of that storm remained trapped in a routine so ordinary it was almost ridiculous.
With his schoolbag over one shoulder, Jotaro headed to school.
He had barely gone a few steps before a crowd of girls swarmed around him as though they had spent the whole morning waiting for that exact moment.
"Ah, JOJO!"
"It's been so long since we saw you!"
"You're still so cool…"
The adoration was immediate, shameless, and almost competitive. Some of them were already beginning to fight for his attention without the slightest embarrassment, throwing little barbs at one another as they tried to get closer. For the audience watching from outside the screen, the scene provoked that inevitable mixture of laughter and envy. It was not new. The characters Alex played always seemed to carry this maddening magnetism, this irritating talent for attracting female attention as though it were a law of nature.
Then Jotaro stopped, turned sharply, and exploded:
"Shut up! Don't you people ever get tired of being annoying?!"
The shout came so suddenly that it startled the audience and froze the girls around him for an instant. Any reasonable viewer would have expected the obvious outcome: tears, offense, retreat, resentment. After all, if someone with that size, that presence, and that voice barked at you from only a few steps away, trembling would be the most natural response.
But what came next destroyed common sense completely.
"Ahhh! He talked to me!"
"He was talking to me!"
"JOJO, look at me!"
Their devotion did not weaken in the slightest. If anything, it only intensified. And in that moment, even the calmest men watching were left speechless. The comment section was overtaken by a flood of question marks, as though no one could come up with a better reaction than that.
Because in the end, the conclusion was humiliatingly simple.
With a face like that, a presence like that, and an aura no one else could replicate, even rudeness looked like charm.