JoJo’s Bizarre Adventures is back with Part 7, Steel Ball Run. This is fantastic first episode, not only is it a wonderful 45 minutes, but the introduction to a wide-range of really fun characters. Diego, Pocoloco, Sandman, Gyro, & Johnny all of them with their own unique quirks & reasons for racing in the Steel Ball Run.

Personally as someone who spent a lot of time doing cross-country. I felt really attached to Sandman immediately. What an awesome character who just relies on his own body to take him across the US, I’m looking forward to learning more about him!

I also really love how Gyro seems to be the only person with any kind of powers. It adds a mystery to every other character. Do they already have powers? Will they gain powers during the Steel Ball Run?

Diego studies the movement of an opponents’ horse to get ahead. Pocoloco is just lucky. Johnny is a former professional jockey, and Sandman just runs.

The Steel Ball Run being a cross-country race is such a rad premise! I really enjoy a movie called “The Cannonball Run”. It’s a comedy with a bunch of famous actors & figures from the 80s racing across the US. Steel Ball Run is that movie, but JoJo-ified and I’m excited to see how much more JoJo this show will get.

Now I have read a bit of Part 7 about two-ish years ago. My memory is a bit hazy, but I most certainly remember where I stopped, which is an insanely out of nowhere twist that happens pretty early on so I’m excited to see that moment animated!

I did have a worry going into Part 7, which is how they will animate all those damn horses. Animating hundreds of 2D horses is incredibly labor-intensive. So I was expecting they would rely on 3D, but fans likes myself don’t think of David Production as a 3D studio like a Studio Orange. I was hesitant, but they nailed it.

It looks like they’re using so many techniques to keep the horses looking great in every scene. Most scenes, I don’t even notice whether they’re using 3D or 2D horses. They’ve done an outstanding job with modeling, texturing, & animating of the horses. Even in scenes where, they using a 3D character, the horses are still looking so close to 2D.

I worried that the 3D would distract from the 2D backgrounds & characters, but David Production did a fantastic job. I could not be happier with the results.

Based on the horses animations, it appears they may be reusing animations. I hope this is true. The animators deserve a break & probably focus on more means the animators won’t be unique animations with the horses.

At the time of writing this, Anitrendz interviewed the director, Yasuhiro Kimura. The director confirms the difficulties of animating horses & the different techniques they had to use to make it look good.

I ended up inventing a totally new running style for STEEL BALL RUN. It’s not realistic, and it’s a little deformed, but I think it still looks like a horse, and people will think it’s cool.

Yasuhiro Kimura

Overall, Episode 1 is absolutely incredible! It feels good to have JoJo back, hopefully, the release schedule will be weekly rather than whatever they hell they did with Stone Ocean.

Funny enough, at the time of writing, I don’t know when they’ll release episode 2 & neither does the director according to the Anitrendz interview. So who knows how long we’ll wait, but after seeing Episode 1. Take your time making the best & please Netflix do not batch release. PLEASE!!

Of course, I cannot forget how much of a banger the main theme is. I am constantly listening to it every day.