is the fourth main story arc of the Japanese manga series JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki. It was serialized in Shueisha's Weekly Shōnen Jump for a little more than years, from May 4, 1992, to December 4, 1995, with the 174 chapters collected into eighteen volumes. In its original publication, it was titled . It was preceded by Stardust Crusaders and followed by Golden Wind.
This part introduces the Stand Arrow, which causes anyone pierced by it to develop a Stand if they are mentally strong enough. The Arrow was retroactively revealed to be the source of Dio's stand as well as the Joestar family's stands. The arc was adapted into an anime television series by David Production, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable, that began in April 2016. A live-action film adaptation by Toho and Warner Bros. titled JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable Chapter I was released on August 4, 2017. Viz Media released the manga in English in a nine-volume edition from 2019 to 2021.
Plot In 1999, Jotaro Kujo arrives to the town of in the after learning that his grandfather Joseph Joestar has an illegitimate son while compiling a list of beneficiaries. He bumps into a freshman named Koichi Hirose before the two encounter the youth Jotaro is looking for: A highschool student named Josuke Higashikata, whose Stand Crazy Diamond allows him to manipulate matter in ways that include repairing and healing. Fighting Josuke after inadvertently insulting his pompadour, Jotaro explains the nature of Stands and that one is being used by a death row inmate named Anjuro "Angelo" Katagiri, who escaped to Morioh. Josuke unknowingly makes an enemy of Angelo, who murders his grandfather before Josuke uses his power to fuse Angelo into a rock. However, Angelo uses his final moments of consciousness to reveal someone hit him with an Arrow that gave him his Stand, Jotaro learning that an actual artifact was possessed by Dio's forces. Josuke and Koichi eventually come across the culprit, Keicho Nijimura, who inflicts Koichi with the Arrow while his younger brother Okuyasu holds Josuke off. Josuke defeats Okuyasu and heals Koichi with Crazy Diamond, with Koichi developing a Stand called Echoes. After Keicho is defeated with his reason of creating Stand users to create someone able to mercy kill his father, a mutated subordinate of Dio's, Keicho is killed by Stand Red Hot Chili Pepper, which takes the Bow and Arrow. Okuyasu then joins Josuke's group to avenge his brother, encountering several other Stand users Keicho created before they eventually find and defeat Akira Otoishi, Red Hot Chili Pepper's user, as Joseph arrives in Morioh. The Bow and Arrow are taken into Jotaro's custody and all seems to be over for the moment.
Soon afterward, after Josuke tries spending time with Joseph as they find a baby with an invisibility stand, the group encounters other Stand users such as eccentric manga artist Rohan Kishibe, middle schooler Shigekiyo "Shigechi" Yangu, and a beautician named Aya Tsuji. Koichi and Rohan later meet the ghosts of Reimi Sugimoto and her dog Arnold after stumbling into the mysterious Ghost Alley, learning of a serial killer who has been lurking in Morioh for years. The murderer is a handsome office worker named Yoshikage Kira, who seeks to satisfy his murderous hand fetish obsession while living a peaceful, quiet life by using the destructive ability of his Stand, Killer Queen, to erase any evidence of his crimes. But his prompted murder of Shigechi ends up exposing him during a brief battle with Jotaro and Koichi that left him injured as Josuke and Okuyasu arrive. Kira escapes and forces Aya to use her Stand to swap identities with a man Kosaku Kawajiri, killing them both while assuming Kosaku's life. Kira's father Yoshihiro, a ghost who uses his Stand to live on in a photo, uses a Bow and Arrow he received years ago from Enya Geil to create an army of Stand users to protect his son, including a dying cat that reincarnated as a Stand-plant hybrid named Stray Cat which Kira took as a pet.
Kosaku's son Hayato Kawajiri begins to suspect his father's imposter and confronts Kira, only to get murdered with Kira panicking before receiving a new ability after pierced by Yoshihiro's Arrow a second time that allows him to revive Hayato. The following morning, Hayato learns Kira inflicted him with Killer Queen's new ability Bites the Dust, which destroys whoever Hayato reveals Kira's identity to while rewinding time back an hour with the victim's fate fixed. After Rohan died in one loop and Josuke's group the next, Hayato realizes he needs to force Kira into canceling Bites the Dust before the others are killed with their deaths made permanent. Hayato exploits the knowledge he gained from the time loop to wake Josuke up early and arrange for him to overhear Kira blowing his cover. Kira is forced to use Killer Queen to defend himself, which cancels Bites the Dust just in time to save Josuke and his allies.
Josuke engages Kira in a pitched battle, Okuyasu seemingly killed as Josuke and Hayato take refuge in a house when Kira combines his Stand's powers with Stray Cat to create invisible projectile bombs. Kira plants Yoshihiro's photo into Hayato's pocket to track Josuke, only to be tricked into destroying his father before Okuyasu appears in the nick of time to swipe Stray Cat and further disadvantage Kira. As Jotaro, Koichi, and Rohan arrive with emergency workers responding to the explosions, Kira attempts to activate Bites the Dust on a nearby paramedic in a last ditch attempt to avert his defeat. But he is stopped by Jotaro with assistance from Koichi, knocked into the path of an arriving ambulance that accidentally crushes his skull. Kira's ghost ends up in Ghost Alley and is confronted by Reimi, who gets him dragged off into an unknown fate by spectral hands. Her mission accomplished, Reimi gives the group her final farewells and moves on to the afterlife. The next day, Josuke bids farewell to Jotaro and Joseph, who leave Morioh as the summer of 1999 draws to a close.
Characters
Josuke Higashikata is the illegitimate son of Joseph Joestar. He is a freshman who lives in the town of Morioh with his mother and grandfather. His Stand is Crazy Diamond, which can not only punch rapidly, but also restore objects to their original state or rearrange their structure, allowing him to heal injuries, erase written documents, or revert complex structures to their raw components. However, Crazy Diamond has no effect when used on Josuke himself. Despite normally being kind and friendly, Josuke becomes especially enraged if anyone insults his pompadour hairstyle, which he adopted after a delinquent with the hairstyle saved him and his mother during a blizzard. This is demonstrated for the first time after he punches an upperclassman and incorrectly heals his face for insulting his hair. Koichi Hirose is Josuke's and Okuyasu's best friend and is also a freshman in high school, but appears as a short boy. His Stand is Echoes, which has three distinct "ACTs". ACT1 can create messages and attach them to a person by touching them, which results in the message repeatedly played in the victim's head (e.g. attaching the phrase "Believe in me" causes the message to be audibly spoken in Koichi's mother's head), ACT2 has a similar ability but instead can attach onomatopoeia onto objects, causing the effect of the onomatopoeia to activate when touched (e.g. attaching "sizzle" to a stair railing causes it to burn the person when touched), while ACT3 loses the former abilities (but can still recall previous ACTs) and sacrifices its long range, it gains the ability "3-Freeze", which dramatically increases the weight of a target and thereby making it unable to move. Koichi gains access to each ACT as he grows throughout the story, ultimately gaining ACT3 in the first battle with Kira. Okuyasu Nijimura is one of the two Nijimura brothers who became friends with Josuke Higashikata and Koichi Hirose after encountering a Stand user who murdered his brother. His Stand is The Hand, which can erase whatever it swipes with its right hand and can even be used to erase space, drawing objects closer to Okuyasu. Though the ability is incredibly versatile and powerful, Okuyasu's subpar intelligence prevents him from using it to its fullest potential. Jotaro Kujo is an aspiring marine biologist who travels to Morioh to find his grandfather's illegitimate son, Josuke Higashikata, who is technically Jotaro's uncle despite Jotaro being older than him, as well as investigate the crimes of a Stand user. His Stand is Star Platinum, which compensates for its short range with incredible strength, speed, and precision, as well as the ability Star Platinum: The World, which lets Jotaro temporarily stop the flow of time. Joseph Joestar is Josuke's father and Jotaro's grandfather. His Stand is Hermit Purple, which manifests in the form of multipurpose thorny purple vines that allow him to divine information through electrical equipment or be utilized as ropes. Now in his late 70's, Joseph is incredibly feeble and senile. Rohan Kishibe is a famous manga artist who recently moved to Morioh. His Stand, Heaven's Door, allows him to temporarily turn a person into a book, with all of their memories written down akin to a novel. Rohan can read the memories, learn their weaknesses and secrets, as well as write down commands that they must follow (usually writing that enemies cannot attack him). The power typically activates when the target sees Rohan's drawn artwork, but can also activate if Rohan draws something in the air with his finger. Rohan also stars in his own spin-off one-shot series by Araki called Thus Spoke Kishibe Rohan. Keicho Nijimura is Okuyasu's elder brother who caused the outbreak of Stand users in Morioh to create one whose Stand can end the suffering of their father after he was mutated by Dio Brando into a monstrous being with rapid regeneration. Keicho was later killed by Akira Otoishi when saving his brother from an attack by the guitarist's stand. Keicho's Stand, Bad Company, is an army of toy soldiers. Anjuro Katagiri, also known as "Angelo", is a depraved serial killer with an IQ of 160. Originally on death row for various acts of murder and sexual assault, including staging a post-mortem ransom for a young boy, Angelo is made a Stand User by Keicho and uses his water-based Stand Aqua Necklace to escape captivity and resume his killing spree in Morioh before ultimately confronting Josuke, murdering the youth's grandfather before being fused by Crazy Diamond's powers into a stone that becomes Morioh's tourist attraction Angelo Rock. Yukako Yamagishi is a high school student who develops an obsessive crush on Koichi. She kidnaps him and tries to form him into a "better man" by taking drastic measures to improve his grades. Koichi defends himself with the help of Echoes ACT2 and Yukako instead decides to admire Koichi from afar. However she soon sinks into depression and learns of a beauty salon named Cinderella from Joseph Joestar, which she uses to help rekindle her relationship with Koichi. Afterwards, she and Koichi become a couple. Her Stand is Love Deluxe, which is bound to her hair, allowing her to grow her hair to long lengths and freely manipulate it. Aya Tsuji is the owner of the Cinderella Salon, a beauty clinic in Morioh. She changes people's appearance and fate using her stand, Cinderella. She is killed by Yoshikage Kira after being forced to use her Stand to change his face so he can avoid capture. Akira Otoishi is an aspiring rock star guitarist. His Stand is Red Hot Chili Pepper, which draws its powers from electricity and can travel through various electrical outlets. He acquired his Stand after being shot with the Arrow by Keicho Nijimura.