Jujutsu Kaisen Director Addresses Its Season 2 Manga Homages

Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2’s newest episode introduced some scenes that were directly translated from Gege Akutami’s original manga version of the events, and the director behind the episode addressed why these manga panels were brought to life in this way! Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2 has been working its way through the Shibuya Incident arc with the latest episodes of the anime, and it’s been one major loss after another for Yuji Itadori. But things started to swing in the other direction as Aoi Todo made his grand return to the scene of the action as he’s now fighting side by side with Yuji. 

Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2 Episode 20 features Todo’s return to the anime as he started to jump into the fight against Mahito knowing that Yuji was in trouble of breaking his spirit completely. And as he jumped into the fight, fans were treated to some of the wildest animation in the season yet. But at the same time, there were a few glimpses and scenes that were complete recreations of the panels from Gege Akutami’s manga version of the fight. The director behind it, Tokono Yuji, explained that it was to express the manga’s intentions to their best extent. 

Why Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2 Directly Adapted the Manga

Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2 Episode 20 director Tokono Yuji opened up about the episode’s release with fans on X (formerly known as Twitter) and explained that in order to express the intent of the original manga to its fullest, the director decided to directly adapt some of these select panels, “I have also recreated a lot of manga drawings in order to express manga to the best possible extent. I made a Jujutsu Kaisen (episode) that I genuinely wanted to see. I like gags, action, and beautiful locations, and I’m good at them, so I thought this episode had all of it and it was a lot of fun.”

These full manga recreations were a hit with fans, and even had been snuck into some of the more explosive moments such as Todo’s Black Flash unleashing against Mahito. But as the anime continues through this fight, fans are hoping to see even bigger moments in the anime before Season 2 wraps up its adaptation of the Shibuya Incident arc later this year. 

What did you think of the way Jujutsu Kaisen brought the manga to life in Season 2’s latest episode? Let us know all of your thoughts about it in the comments! You can even reach out to me directly about all things animation and other cool stuff @Valdezology on Twitter!