JoJo's Bizarre Adventure started first in 1987. It also the only manga series currently going out of the three. Although Bleach does have connections to Burn the Witch. Then it was Yu Yu Hakusho in 1990, speaking of this master piece as well as Hunter x Hunter. The author of those works, Yoshihiro Togashi isn't doing well right now.
Let's hope he can pull through. Moving on Bleach started in 2001. I do wanna confirm a few select things to help prevent confusion. I'm not doing a full story comparison between Bleach and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. A little heads up in the near future, I do plan on reviewing a more recent JoJo game thanks to Game Pass. It doesn't mean I don't have a major reason to not compare the two.
In Yu Yu Hakusho's case, yes I will be directly comparing parts of the story. I may bring up non canon but ultimately not considering it for both comparisons. Otherwise I'm mostly focusing on canon stuff. Considering I don't have as much to go into, I felt I'm going to start comparing Bleach to JoJo first. Obviously Parts 1 and 2 of JoJo aren't a part of this comparison I'm about to make.
I also want to confirm yes Part 9 called JOJOLands is in the process of being written soon. Yes JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is among the longest manga series in the world. It's already longer than both Bleach and Yu Yu Hakusho combined. Honestly, I highly recommend either checking this manga series or the anime show out.
Did Bleach rip off JoJo's Bizarre Adventure?
Introduced early Part 3 of JoJo are spiritual beings connected to the characters named Stands. In a few ways excluding the Bounts from filler arcs of the anime show. Bleach has a few similar theme mechanics. Most JoJo characters we see using Stands are humans. Fullbringers & Quincies are essentially humans with spiritual powers.
There's a few major differences like most powers the quincies had came from their king, Yhwach. Fullbringers' powers came from something tragic. You know kinda like a lot of mutants in Marvel comics. Something unpleasant happens then suddenly they unlock a power from inside themselves. In JoJo's case, technically there's three ways to get Stands.
1. You are born with it
2. You got pierced by a particular unusual arrow
3. You stolen another person's body like the case of DIO
Soul reapers uses their spiritual partners named Zanpakutos in the form of weapons. I know what some of you are thinking, Bleach predates Soul Eater by a few years. The closest zanpakuto that acts virtually similar to a Stand in JoJo is Tenken. Which belongs to Captain Komamura. Most soul reapers aren't human with very few exceptions.
I also pointed Komamura out because he's a canine character. Believe it or not, Part 3 of JoJo had Iggy a small dog with it's own Stand. Don't worry the two characters are vastly different. Tenken is a giant golem when hurt by his enemies, also injuries Komamura in the process. Just like most Stand users in JoJo.
I also gotta mention in Part 2 of JoJo, the Pillar Men are very old living beings. One of them is also responsible for making masks that transforms anyone that wears em into vampires. Their leader, Kars transformed himself with the Red Stone of Aja with stuff used for those masks. He virtually became a nearly invincible character with shape shifting.
In Bleach, Yhwach had centuries under his belt including the entire process of regaining all his powers. Both Kars & Yhwach appeared similar to humans. In the end, both threw away their own people without a care in the world. I'm not going to do a full on in depth comparison of these powers. Obviously a lot of manga franchises uses a good number of them, it's very time consuming.
Stands do differ more notably in size. In most cases their height is slightly the same or a little taller than their user. Some Stands either had limited control while others the users have virtually none at all. Some can even remain activate after the user's death. One strong similarity JoJo Stand users and Zanpakutos is their wielders also uses their powers.
Other beings can see Zanpakutos too with plenty of proof. Only Stand users can see other Stands. Also there's more unusual powers among the Stands in comparison. Like some can manipulate particular concepts including some forms of reality manipulation. Such as time stopping or removing a few seconds with visions what would've happened.
I also need to point other stuff out. Some Stands & Zanpakutos are multiple spiritual beings to one person. This is more obvious in JoJo's case because a couple Stands are groups of them. Even a middle school kid had an Stand like this. How both communicates is vastly differently too. In JoJo's case, they can talk to each other like normal people
In Bleach's case it's more mental & spiritual take on communications. Thus, unless you were a part of them you can't talk to their Zanpakutos at all. Even some Stands on their own directly talks to people. Although most users can use their Stands to talk for them as well. I figured this is something people often forget about in these comparisons.
In other words, even for the record we state Bleach characters are higher tier from those JoJo's universe. It still doesn't change the fact, more ridiculous powers are actually present within JoJo. I even witness stuff I almost went speechless on among seeing it with my own eyes. What I'm trying to see is some Stands are capable of truly ridiculous things on scales beyond what you see in Bleach universe.
Virtually some Stands are insanely powerful as well as being broken. No literately like Father Pucci altered his Stand to be able to sped up time so fast, it actually caused an universal reset. This actually occurred twice very late into Part 6 of JoJo for reference purposes. The same section of the story had a man capable of bringing fictional characters to life as well as manipulating fate itself no lie.
Not to mention, DIO returns in Part 3 with Jonathan's body to get revenge on the Joestar family. Which is similar to Yhwach wanting revenge on the soul reapers. He personally killed Head Captain Yamamoto after sealing his bankai away. Now it's time to ask the question. Did Bleach rip off JoJo's Bizarre Adventure?
To be quite honest, yes there's some interesting similarities. But even those had plenty of differences as well. Like Ichigo was part Quincy because of his mother already being one. Which led with help, Ichigo killing Yhwach effectively getting rid of all his powers. This is strangely similar to DIO had four sons, one of them named Giorno.
Who ended up being more like his father's nemesis family rather than his old man. Potentially anyone could hurt an soul reaper. I know some fans misbeliefs state otherwise. Quincies and Fullbringers are humans with powers, there's proof both had harm even killed some soul reapers. Which also means they could break Zanpakutos too.
Which isn't the case in JoJo because only Stands can harm each other. Unless they can actually become part of their own Stands. To sum it up, for most Stands can only be harmed by other Stands. Diego in Part 7 can transform into a dinosaur allowed him to break that long standing rule to harm another Stand. The final verdict on this matter is Bleach surprisingly didn't rip off JoJo.
I'm sure some people would be more interested in this following comparison. Both anime shows had the same director, Noriyuki Abe. This will be a more direct story comparison. I even felt the similarities alone makes this rather interesting to discuss. I'm a huge fan of these three franchises. Of course, eventually I had to talk about this one.
Bleach isn't a rip off of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
Did Bleach rip off Yu Yu Hakusho?
Both have a high school student as the main character. Although how both ended up working for the afterlife is notably different. Later in the story, Yusuke was revealed to be an descendant of Raizen. One of the Three Kings also the strongest among the three as well. Earlier in another comparison, I stated Ichigo had Quincy connections because of his mom.
Thus, his Quincy powers came from Yhwach whose an old, powerful being. Basically both characters are unique hybrids with very high potential even for their respective universes. Ichigo also part hollow which also came from his mom. Obviously both use spiritual weapons. Yusuke uses his famous Spirit Gun while Ichigo uses his Zanpakutos named Zangetsus until Yhwach's death removed one of them.
Yusuke protects the human world from demons. Which is similar to Ichigo protecting the human world from all kind of threats mostly hollows. Both stories had a particular story arc with some strong similarities. By now you already knew this was coming. Chapter Black Arc & Fullbring Arc arc are incredibly similar stories.
Our heroes with their allies takes on humans with powers. Their leaders so happened to be the very person in the main character's jobs before them. By pure coincidence, both groups also had a gamer among them. Yes their goals were vastly different. Fullbringers planned to steal Ichigo's Fullbringer's powers for themselves.
Sensui planned to open a portal capable of letting A Class demons into the human world while he dies. Keep in mind, A Class demons are capable of destroying the human world with ease. In terms of how both characters gets their spiritual jobs, that's different enough no ripping off there. Yusuke & Ichigo are often viewed among the strongest characters.
I would say Ichigo isn't a rip off of Yusuke despite the similarities they share. There's more critical differences that proves Ichigo actually more of his own character. Ichigo eventually gets a hybrid form using all of his spiritual pressure together. Yusuke has to manually switch between his human & demon energies as shown in his fight against Yomi, another of the Three Kings in a tournament match.
Another major difference is Yusuke earned additional energy that's passed down. Which led to his master, Genkai's death. Don't worry she returns in the following story arc like nothing happened. Yes some deceased characters in Bleach helped somewhat in the final story arc. More true with a chapter following it's own time skip briefly bringing back another former Espada character who escaped Hell.
Also not to upset Yu Yu Hakusho fans, Yusuke doesn't get the girl in the end while Ichigo does. A good amount of their respective story arcs are vastly different enough. I knew eventually those two particular story arcs was going to be the hard one. In Chapter Black Arc, Yusuke is an enemy of Sensui and his group.
This wasn't the case in Fullbring Arc as most of them had their memories altered on purpose in order to trick Ichigo. After all, they wanted a power increase by stealing his Fullbringer's powers. By vastly different means, both our heroes gets back to fight the main antagonist of those story arcs. Yusuke was at death's door then his demon side came out also transforming his spiritual beast.
He still wasn't powerful enough to beat Sensui on his own. Then out of no where his ancestor Raizen took control over his body to kill Sensui. Which is actually similar to Ichigo himself being on death's door in the more famous Arrancar Arc. When an Espada named Ulquiorra blasted a Cero through Ichigo's chest.
He wasn't getting healed by Orihime's powers. Then his hollow took control facing Ulquiorra whose still in his strongest form dominating him badly. Which is exactly what Raizen did to Sensui in comparison. Ichigo was given a mix of spiritual pressure from the soul reapers to effectively become an soul reaper again.
As previously stated Ichigo had two spiritual beings connected to him while Yusuke has one spiritual beast. Which was part of his deal with his then boss Koenma. A major difference is Yusuke was a spiritual detective while Ichigo being an substitute soul reaper. Ultimately their jobs involved protecting the balance in all things mostly in the human world.
There were times, our heroes fought in other plains of existence. In canon, Hell isn't one of those with very clear differences in representing Hell within their respective universes. Ichigo never fought in tournaments either. Yes both had training periods but those are also vastly different as well. I would actually say most of Bleach isn't actually ripping off Yu Yu Hakusho.
Ichigo had one fight with Ginjo that isn't training while Yusuke had a few fights with Sensui. Another major difference is Sensui suffered from a couple multiple personalities. In his own mind, he with those personalities acted as their own group with a different percentage of power. Obviously the main personality is virtually the most powerful.
Just from powering up while in the human world, it threatened to destroy with ease. So he was forced to hold back, still dominating despite some surprise attacks from Yusuke. This is interesting because soul reaper lieutenants and captains had their spiritual pressures tone down for balance purposes. Especially in Kenpachi Zaraki's case with an eyepatch that also limits his power down.
The only notable exception was against Aizen in the human world. Yes this gets confirmed in a conversation. Aizen was strong enough to force them risking destroying the human world to let that go. During the later portions, King Enma takes control back from his son Koenma of the afterlife. Which happened due to missing that critical connection of Raizen on Yusuke.
Yhwach tricked Ichigo into killing his father, the Soul King. Which led to Yhwach becoming the new soul king in the process. This is clearly opposite what happened in Yu Yu Hakusho. Yes Koenma did over threw his father because he was willing to cause things to happen. Virtually having no regard of anyone harmed or killed.
In Koenma's case, he actually did it for a good reason. Thus, he started the Spirit Detective agency to make everything better. Even with Fullbring Arc being strikingly similar, I got to say it does just enough things differently to not be labeled as a rip off of Chapter Black Arc. Even with both being the next arc after their respective stories' most famous arcs.
In conclusion, there's plenty of differences that prevents Bleach being called a rip off of Yu Yu Hakusho. Especially the ones that's vastly different. The similar ones even have big, critical differences to prove Bleach isn't a rip off at all. I know this may come out as a huge surprise to some. Let's be honest, a crossover with these two is something I would watch in a heart beat.
Bleach isn't a rip off of Yu Yu Hakusho
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