Jujutsu Kaisen, the shōnen manga and anime, has been very popular and well-received these days, and I would say that this story has been well-written in plot and character with interesting personalities and mysteries along the way.
I’ve personally watched the first season three times since the beginning of the year and recently caught up to the manga. I didn’t really see the appeal in it in my first watch because I watched it very casually that I did not pay attention enough to understand the whole concept of cursed energy and spirits. A few months after that, I watched an explanation video hoping to finally understand it. In the video below by Anime Balls Deep on YouTube, they briefly mentioned the subject of death as a prevalent topic throughout the story which convinced me to watch it a second time, this time, actively seeking out this theme.
In that second watch, I began to take notice of the range of themes including regret, rejection of outdated traditional values, and as mentioned earlier, death. A theme closely tied to the theme of death and the whole ‘saving lives’ agenda that really stood out to me though, was the ‘value of life’, because of all the varying perceptions of different characters.
DISCLAIMER: Everything I write here will be based on the anime and not the manga. I might have inaccurate information and/or interpretation. Or I might even miss some important details.
And once again, SPOILER ALERT!!
First of all, when I say ‘the value of life’, a few questions can address it:
- “What is the value of a human life?”
- “On what basis does someone’s life hold value?”
- “How is one’s life valuable to another’s life?”
The value of life is also closely associated with whose lives are worth saving. In other words, a life that is valuable would be worth saving and/or protecting. But then again, what is deemed valuable?
An example of this question would be Tadashi from the juvenile detention center. In Episode 4, Yuji, Megumi, and Nobara were assigned a mission to rescue survivors in the detention center. Upon coming across Tadashi who appears to have been killed, Yuji insists on at least bringing his body back to his mother. However, Megumi intended on leaving his body behind as he was deemed a bad person due to the crimes he has committed.
Later, in Episode 6, Megumi visits Tadashi’s mother to deliver the news of her son’s death and his name tag. She cries that she is the only person sad over his death, implying that a criminal’s life holds no value to most people.
This provides a perspective on to what extent is a life worth saving? More importantly, is a life valuable because it holds meaning to someone, even if they are bad people?
Similarly, in Episode 24, Yuji and Nobara fought and killed Eso and Kechizu who were half-human half-cursed spirit, making them unable to tell if they were cursed spirits or users and only realized when their bodies did not disappear after death. What concerned Yuji was the fact that Eso and Kechizu showed emotions as they called each other brothers and cried for one another when they were hurt by the sorcerers.
Thus, even though they were the antagonists in that situation, Yuji questioned if that justified killing them. Do their lives hold the same value as regular humans because they too can express emotions and show care for one another?
Taking a look at it from the cases and perspectives of the characters:
Itadori Yuji
—‘every life I worth saving no matter what’ and the value of his life as Sukuna’s vessel
In Episode 1, Yuji’s grandpa dies and his last words ring out in Yuji’s conscience throughout the series which ultimately drive a good amount of his decisions.
“You’re strong enough to save others. As far as you go, if you can, try to save them. It’s okay to be confused. Don’t worry about it if you don’t get any gratitude. Anyway, try to save more people. You’re going to die in front of a crowd of people. Don’t be like me.” – Yuji’s grandpa, Episode 1
It led him to strive to save people’s lives like when he saved his club seniors in the first episode when they unwrapped Sukuna’s finger. Yuji calls it a curse on himself to fulfill his Grandpa’s last request.
“There is a troublesome curse on me too.”
Episode 1
He says the above quote as he fights the cursed spirit after Sukuna’s finger in his school. He is eventually driven to a corner where he eats Sukuna’s finger in order to gain the power to protect Megumi. Thus, those last words serve as a turning point and as a motive. In a way, the end of his Grandpa’s life marked a new beginning for Yuji where he joins Jujutsu High as a first year.
In Episode 2, Yuji is brought to Principal Yaga Masamichi for an interview to join Jujutsu High where he is asked why he wants to study in Jujutsu High. After a few unsatisfactory answers from Yuji as judged by Yaga, Yuji explains the accepted reason,
“Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been good at sports and fighting. But I never felt like I was the only one who could do that. I’m the only one who can consume Sukuna.”
Episode 2
The way I interpret it would be that Yuji now holds a new value to his own life. He thought that being physically strong didn’t mean much because there were other people like that, but proving himself strong enough to become Sukuna’s vessel and eventually eradicate the remaining fingers reinforced his decision to ‘save others’. It gave him a newfound purpose beyond just living up to his Grandpa’s dying words; he now has the opportunity to change the world for the better against Sukuna.
However, still exists the constant debate on whether to kill Yuji immediately or allow him to eat all of Sukuna’s fingers. It is a question of the “Is Yuji’s life as Sukuna’s vessel more valuable or harmful to others?”. It challenges Yuji’s new purpose in his life and the reason he is still kept alive.
Yuji as Sukuna’s vessel is valuable:
“But it’s also true that he has saved lives. This time, he cooperated with Todo to repel the Special Grade Cursed Spirit.” – Principal Yaga, Episode 21
Yuji proved to be a powerful asset, being able to host Sukuna while still being in control of his own body. Along the series, he also hones his new abilities that proves to be useful against cursed spirits as Yaga noted during his conversation with the Kyoto branch’s Principal Gakuganji.
Yuji as Sukuna’s vessel is more harmful:
“Because you ate me, my scattered soul is awakened. Do you want to save as many people as possible? … Those people died because of you.” – Ryōmen Sukuna, Episode 24
When Yuji ate the finger in the first place, it activated the rest of the fingers attracting surrounding cursed spirits to eat them and grow into special-grade curses endangering human lives. The curse in the juvenile detention center was an example as well as the curse under Yasohachi bridge that only started killing in June when Yuji ate the first finger. There also exists the risk of Sukuna taking control over Yuji’s body. Even Megumi and Yuji seem to acknowledge that danger in the back of their minds as early as Episode 4 when Yuji insists on saving the juvenile detention center victim’s life,
Should Megumi not have spared Yuji’s life? // Should Yuji have not ate the finger to save Megumi?
“You’ve always wanted to save civilians and point them to the right death. But what if the person you saved takes someone else’s life later?”
Megumi to Yuji
“Then why did you save me?”
Yuji to Megumi
In the last episode (24), this ongoing concern is brought up again and they decide not to address it to each other.
“Don’t tell Itadori about the fingers resonating… In the first place, he swallowed the finger to save me. But he won’t be happy with that explanation. So don’t tell him.” – Megumi to Nobara
“Hey, don’t tell Fushiguro about this.” – Yuji to Sukuna
Gakunganji has repeatedly expressed that he wants Yuji dead to even ask the Kyoto students to kill him during the Goodwill event, “Kill Itadori Yuji. That is not human.” Since Yuji ate Sukuna’s finger, a special-grade curse, it made him considered to be a cursed spirit which by default would mean he had to be exorcised. Similarly in the following quote said by Megumi in Episode 1, “You’re not human anymore. According to the sorcery law, Itadori Yuji, as a Cursed spirit, you will be exorcised”, it seems that eating the finger does not make him viewed as human anymore so does he immediately lose the value of his life as a human and is only viewed as the menace Sukuna’s vessel?
Moving on, in Episode 11, Junpei asks Yuji what he will do if faced with a cursed user and he responds,
“Even so, I don’t want to kill anyone… If I kill once, the option of killing will appear in my life. The value of life becomes ambiguous. I won’t understand the value of someone important to me.”
Itadori Yuji, Episode 11
Yuji has shown throughout the series that he wants to save everyone’s lives and has no intention to kill anyone. In Episode 21, during the baseball game, Kamo asks Yuji why he wanted to be a Jujutsu sorcerer to which he responds, “I’m afraid of loneliness, and I want to help many people. When I die, I hope many people will come and pay their last respects.”
What he probably meant by this was that saving and protecting others brings value into your own life especially in the eyes of the people you save; they’ll want to help you and stay with you until your death. I believe that this is the reason behind what his Grandpa said in Episode 1 about saving others and dying in front of a crowd since only Yuji stayed with his Grandpa on his deathbed which could also be why he tells Yuji to not end up like himself.
Overall, Yuji believes that every human life has value and taking away lives would defeat the purpose of protecting them. He hopes to be a person of value by striving to save anyone he can with his strength.
Fushiguro Megumi
–‘Good people deserve to be saved’
In Episode 2, Megumi expresses to Gojo that he does not want Yuji to be executed even though the sorcery law states that he should be. When Megumi thinks about why he insisted on saving Yuji’s life, he recalls his sister Tsumiki’s kind and understanding nature. We first hear her words in Episode 5,
“If I have the ability to curse someone, I would rather think about those who are dear to me” – Fushiguro Tsumiki
During his fight with Sukuna in the juvenile detention center, Megumi reflects on how unfair it was that someone as kind as Tsumiki would be cursed where he says, “Jujustu sorcerers act as one of the gears in karma”. Megumi chooses to fight curses and save people as a form of karma towards the unfair circumstances good people have been put upon. In Episode 5 and 23, Tsumiki’s words showed up in his conscience, “Being unable to forgive people is not a bad thing. That’s part of your gentleness,” that basically explains how he condemns the bad and seeks justice for the good. We see this occur with both Yuji and Tsumiki.
“Even if it’s dangerous, I didn’t want to see a good person like you die.”
Megumi to Yuji before he dies when switching back with Sukuna
He wanted to save Yuji because he may view it as unfair that Yuji was dragged into the mess of dealing with cursed spirits that were after Sukuna’s finger in Episode 1 just because he wanted to save his seniors which displays Yuji as a kind person.
“I’m not good at dealing with kind people. They forgive those bad guys to make themselves seem virtuous. It makes me sick.”
Episode 23
Megumi does not view himself as a hero of any kind, I think that he doesn’t want to admit at times that he does want to help good people but lacks a concrete reason other than he simply wants to seek justice for kind people like Tsumiki and Yuji. He thinks that kind people are at times stupidly kind to the point where it backfires on themselves:
- Exhibit A: Yuji getting involved with the fight to save his seniors and ate Sukuna’s finger to save everyone including Megumi
- Exhibit B: Tsumiki gets cursed when going to Yasohachi bridge just because she tagged along to check up on the safety of everyone else
In Episode 18, Megumi felt the need to defeat Kamo Noritoshi on the basis of his own conscience because Kamo intended to kill Yuji. He views his own conscience as as selfish as he only chooses to save people who he deems valuable. This would be why he did not intend on showing sympathy for Tadashi from the juvenile detention center.
“I only believe in my own conscience. Helping others according to my own conscience. If someone denies me of that, all that’s left is to curse that person.”
Episode 18
As for the value of his own life, in Episode 19 as he fights Hanami’s cursed technique growing in his stomach, he says, “Unlike everyone else, I choose who I will protect… I’m not allowed to fall before anyone else does.” Concluding Megumi’s character, he holds value in his own life as a protector of the good and only holds value in the lives of good people who always somehow get the short end of the stick, and vows to seek karma for them as he thinks they deserve.
Yoshino Junpei
–‘Bad people’s lives are no longer worth saving’
Junpei shows a more passive (at first) and negative outlook on the value of life.
“Even if I had a button that would kill people I dislike, I probably wouldn’t press it. However, if there’s a button to kill someone that didn’t like me, I’ll press it without hesitation” – Yoshino Junpei, Episode 9
He believes that his bullies deserved to perish especially for how they’ve treated him to the point where he asks Mahito if he could do what Mahito did to them in the cinema. Therefore, he is not against the idea of actually outright killing bad people (in contrast to Yuji) as he even tried to do so to his classmate in the school auditorium.
I’ve honestly had to read this quote over and over again to get it:
“‘The antonym of like is indifference.’ Did the person who came up with this go to hell? Getting along with others with bad intentions is better than leaving them alone? That’s impossible.” – Junpei, Episode 10
But I think what Junpei means is that indifference is not a bad thing. Typically, the antonym of ‘like’ is ‘dislike’ or ‘hate’, but the saying that Junpei brought up equates the antonym as ‘indifference’ which in some way, puts ‘indifference’ on the same plane as ‘hate’.
“Indifference is the virtue that mankind deserves.”
Yoshino Junpei, Episode 10
Thus, I think that Junpei doesn’t want to exactly ‘hate’ anyone and prefers indifference… unless someone else has intentions of hurting him. He was generally indifferent to most people; he was severely bullied but never actively took action against it, instead choosing indifference… until he was led to believe by Mahito that his mother was killed by another bully from his school (Episode 12). This led him to change his perception of bad people, that they do in fact deserve to die and that humans have no hearts,
“What’s the point of randomly saving people? Don’t mistake the value of life… Those who deserve to die shouldn’t be spared.”
Junpei to Yuji as they fight in his school, Episode 12
In conclusion, Junpei seems to only value the lives of people who care about him and who he cares for such as his mom; and if someone is bad, then it’s not wrong for them to be killed.
Mahito
–‘Humans are full of hate, there is no value to their lives’
I won’t go into detail about what he said about souls and bodies, but I’ll focus more on his feelings towards human lives.
In Episode 10, in response to Junpei going on about indifference,
“Life has no value or weight… Life is just a cycle. You and I are the same, meaningless and worthless. Because of this, you can do whatever you want… Eat when you’re hungry, kill when you hate.”
He claims that humans have no heart and there is only the soul which is defined by Oxford Languages as the “immaterial part of a human being”, and at least in this context, that is all there is to it. This ‘soul’ doesn’t hold any emotions or heart, it merely represents someone’s life itself, while the body is the vessel that the soul attaches itself to. Being born out of hate humans have for one another, Mahito understands how humans aren’t good, thus he holds little to no value in human lives as reflected too in his cursed technique of mercilessly transfiguring humans.
Nanami Kento
–‘Live a life that holds value to others’
Nanami has questioned the value of his own life and role in this world, and he reflected on this in Episode 13 while he was trapped in Mahito’s domain expansion, “I’m a person who does not have a concept of what is worth doing, and what is worth living for.”
Nanami expressed in Episode 9 that he hated both jobs as a Jujutsu sorcerer and a salaryman. However, he chose to return as a Jujutsu sorcerer because he could at least help others, whereas his work as a salaryman paid well but he questioned the importance of his role in the world/other people’s lives.
“My job is to let the rich entrust their money to me and make them richer… no one will be sad even if I’m gone.”
Episode 13
The gist is that even if Nanami hadn’t done his job in growing their money, it doesn’t exactly change the fact they’re still rich anyway. The difference or impact isn’t much, thus his work seems to not have much worth. He realizes that the only reason he worked that job was for the money for the sake of living a life where all his problems are solved with money as evident in the following quote, “I think about money all the time. Curse or other human beings, I can stay away from them if I have money”. It can be similar to ‘money buying happiness’. However, if he does manage to accomplish that goal, what value does his own life have for other people?
I think it’s an interesting idea because money is perceived as something so valuable but the pursuit for money itself tends to make people question the true value in their lives. Do we live solely for the purpose of earning money?
Nanami later receives gratitude from the girl at the bakery when he quickly exorcises the curse on her shoulder. Through this simple act, he realizes the value of a Jujutsu sorcerer and decides to return, and claims he does not regret the path he has chosen (Episode 13).
Kugisaki Nobara
–‘Your own life is the most valuable’
“I live for myself.”
Episode 3
In Episode 24, after killing Eso and Kechizu, Nobara and Yuji discuss the incident where Yuji was once again conflicted with his actions while Nobara didn’t seem to fazed over killing them,
“Frankly speaking, I don’t feel anything… Not to quote Fushiguro but there are only so many people we can save… People who are not involved in my life should not affect how I do things.” – Kugisaki Nobara
She defends herself by saying, “We’re not capable of trapping opponents of that level for long.” If they had tried to check if Eso and Kechizu were actually cursed spirits or humans, their lives could’ve been at risk. Thus, Nobara will kill if she must especially if it is for her own good. However, she isn’t necessarily against saving lives either but will only save lives that she can afford to save such as in Episode 3. She did try saving the kid when he was being held hostage by a cursed spirit, although she did question whether his life was worth saving at first since her objective was only to exorcise the curse. Therefore, people who have no connection to her seem to hold little value to herm thus it doesn’t mean much to her whether they are “saved” or not.
If I were to make a spectrum of “negative to positive” (or something along those lines), for these six characters’ perceptions on the value of life, it would look like:
It’s open to interpretation.
In conclusion, this was my personal take on Season 1 of Jujutsu Kaisen. I honestly did not intend for it to be this long nor am I even sure to what extent it made sense. The next time I write a post, I might have to cut down on the content. I just felt like pointing out these consistencies in each character because it is quite insightful. I love how these themes are recurring, concrete, well-written, and every aspect of the story seems to intertwine with one another. Looking forward to the rest of the series.
Bagelsapien 