JoJo’s Part 5 Episode 19

White Album

Alright, it’s time to conclude the fight between Giorno, Mista, and Ghiaccio once and for all. And, remember how last week I mentioned that maybe driving the car off the bridge and into the canal wasn’t the best idea when fighting against someone with an ice-type stand?

Well, guess who was right? It was me, not Giorno. Stay in school, Giorno, you’ve got a lot to learn.

The classic mistake that Giorno made when he decided to drive the car into the canal is that he assumed that the insulating properties of the water would protect Mista and himself from Ghiaccio’s freezing attacks. While it’s true that water is great for this, they would have to be completely surrounded by a lot of water.

So, much like how fish are able to survive below the surface of a pond after it freezes over, Giorno and Mista would have been able to escape from Ghiaccio’s attacks if they were to dive below the surface. But, as you may have realized, that’s not a good strategy either because he’ll just cut off their access to the surface.

Essentially, by going into the water, and then being forced to stay towards the surface, Giorno has put Mista and himself in the worst possible position. The surface of water freezes quickly, and this only serves to enhance the power of their opponent.

Tag-Team Fight

But, all hope isn’t lost. Through the power of teamwork Giorno and Mista are able to fight back against their overpowering opponent. First, Giorno turns the hood of the car into grass which Mista fashions into a snowboard as it freezes. However, he doesn’t get too far as Ghiaccio simply unfreezes the grass, making the board fall apart.

Next Mista shoots the grass as Giorno turns it back into car parts. This catches Ghiacco by surprise and Mista is able to lodge a screw into his forehead in the exact same way he beat Sale earlier on in the series. As multiple bullets hit the screw, it gets pushed farther and farther into Ghiaccio’s head.

But, even this isn’t enough to kill Ghiaccio, which doesn’t really make much sense to me. Further, Ghiaccio should have been able to defend against the screw from the car in the exact same way he defended against Mista’s bullets directly, but I’ll just pretend that plot hole doesn’t exist.

So, if Ghiaccio can defend himself against all incoming attacks by freezing the air around his body into a hardened shell, just how are our heroes supposed to defeat him?

Surprisingly, Mista is the one who’s able to figure out Ghiaccio’s weakness. I took him for someone who wasn’t exactly the brightest, but it seems he has his moments. If Ghiaccio freezes the air around him, then how does he breathe? This is the question Mista discovered the answer to.

There’s a small opening in Ghiaccio’s White Album suit at the back of his neck, and this is the only vulnerable part of his body. However, as we learn, just because Mista knows where Ghiaccio’s weak point is, doesn’t mean he’ll be able to defeat him easily, even with his Sex Pistols.

Once he knows Mista is targeting his weak point, Ghiaccio can still temporarily block it and survive on what little air is trapped within his suit.

Mista’s Last Stand

So, if Ghiaccio can protect his weak spot once he knows it’s under attack, then how can he be defeated by Mista? The simple answer is that you have to lull him into a false sense of security and distract him at the same time while also setting up a trap.

Easier said than done, so let’s take a look at how Mista is able to accomplish this feat with relatively little help from Giorno.

• The first step is to lay the trap. Mista does this by sharpening a metal pole into a spike at neck height by shooting it. From Ghiaccio’s perspective, this was simply Mista missing his mark, and so the trap is laid without him even realizing it.
• Step two involves distracting Ghiaccio. This is achieved by Mista firing his rounds directly at his opponent so he’s focused on defending himself from the front and not the back, where his weak point it.
• Next, Mista has to force Ghiaccio to let his guard down even further. He does this by allowing Ghiaccio to deflect his bullets back at him. Now that Mista is injured, Ghiaccio won’t see him as much of a threat anymore.
• The final step involves putting steps one through three into action all at the same time now that they’re set up. Mista continuously fires his gun at Ghiaccio, pushing the hitman back into the sharpened pole. Because he’s focused on stopping the shots coming from his front he isn’t protecting his back, and since Mista is wounded he isn’t expecting to lose.

But, while Mista was eventually able to defeat Ghiaccio in this fashion, it wasn’t without serious consequences. His body is full of bullet holes, and he’s barely alive. Luckily, he has the world’s best medic, Giorno Giovanna, on his side.

Giorno Giovanna

Before I end for today I’d like to discuss Giorno for a bit. In this episode Giorno didn’t really play as big of a role as I was hoping for at first. We saw him and Mista do a couple of tag-team attacks towards the beginning of the fight, but the latter portion was all Mista.

But, it would be incorrect for me to say that Giorno’s presence didn’t have a major effect on the outcome of this battle. Obviously, as the team medic, Giorno is able to save Mista’s life after the fight is complete, but even during Mista’s solo portion of the fight against Ghiaccio, Giorno played a significant role.

That role was to be Mista’s rock. Through a flashback we saw that Mista decided to join Buccellati’s team because he realized he was someone he could rely on. He saw that Buccellati had a personal investment in all his subordinates, and they looked up to him as their leader.

However, Buccellati isn’t around for this fight, and so Mista feels like he has nobody he can really rely on. Sure, Giorno is there, but he’s just the newbie, so what can he really do?

Well, Giorno showed him just what he can do. Giorno was able to get through to Mista and make him think calmly and rationally when he was in a situation that was pushing him to do the opposite. This is the sign of a true leader, and for the first time Mista recognizes that Giorno may not just be another team member.

Buccellati already recognizes Giorno’s potential to lead, but the two have kept this a secret from the rest of the team until this point. Remember, it’s Giorno who wants to take down the boss, and Buccellati is actually his follower who wants to help him reach this goal.

Conclusion

If I’m being honest with you, JoJo’s has been getting a bit stale for me over the past couple of weeks. I’m going to continue with my reviews of it every Friday, but I just don’t feel like it’s really living up to my expectations.

Sure, the fights have more strategy in them than most other shounen battle series, but they’re still usually one on one. Where I think a series like this could really shine is in team fights where we really get to see characters combining their abilities in unique ways, and we only got a short glimpse of that this time around.

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My review of the next episode is available here.