Gege Akutami’s Jujutsu Kaisen ended in 2024 in quite a remarkable fashion, as it delivered what could be considered one of the most ambitious battle raid arcs in modern shonen. Jujutsu Kaisen’s end saw all the major sorcerers in the story launch a massive attack on Ryomen Sukuna, which was kick-started by the duel of Gojo Satoru and the King of Curses. This battle was incredibly fierce, and Yuji Itadori, the protagonist of the series, was at the center of it all.
Jujutsu Kaisen’s clash of the strongest is remembered to this day, as is the raid that was then led by the protagonist, Yuji Itadori. However, fans recognize the fact that this story still had a lot to offer and, in some ways, couldn’t live up to the expectations. In fact, even the author of the story, Gege Akutami, recognizes this and has previously spoken about arcs that he wanted to draw, and parts of the stories that he would have drawn differently if given another chance.
Gege Akutami Wanted To Draw A Rescue Gojo Arc After Shibuya
A Special Arc Dedicated To Gojo Satoru
Jujutsu Kaisen enjoyed quite a stunning run in Weekly Shonen Jump, and its anime only raised its popularity even further. One of the most exciting parts of the story unfolded during the Shibuya Incident arc, and to this day, most fans consider it to be the peak of the entire series. Following Shibuya came the Culling Game Arc, and this is where Gege Akutami has quite a few regrets regarding both the characters involved in the plot, as well as the premise of the arc itself. For Gege Akutami, a Rescue Gojo arc was apparently of the highest priority at the time. If there’s one arc that he wanted to draw, it was a Rescue Gojo arc, but time constraints and many other factors saw to it that he was never able to give Gojo a proper rescue arc.
Instead, Gege came up with the Culling Game, which was an amalgamation of many different ideas, and the rescue of Gojo was thrown in there as well. Gojo was saved from the Prison Realm by the sorcerers in a rather unique way. The back of the Prison Realm was already with the sorcerers, and all they needed to do was to find Angel and utilise her cursed technique to free the strongest once again.
In Gege’s original idea, a rescue Gojo arc was supposed to take place after the Shibuya Incident, and that would truly have been incredibly exciting to see. Rescue arcs are one of the pillars of shonen series, and over the years, fans have seen some of the very best action resulting from them. Take One Piece’s Marineford arc, for example. Even though Luffy’s rescue of Ace failed, it ended up delivering what can be considered the best arc in all of anime and manga, and Gege truly laments not being able to draw a similar rescue arc for Gojo Satoru.
Gege Ended Up Doing Culling Game Arc Instead
As stated previously, Gege instead went with the Culling game arc, which was interesting in its own way. Kenjaku, the mastermind behind the Culling game, had already made vows with many ancient sorcerers, who were then reincarnated into various vessels. His goal was to accumulate enough cursed energy in one particular point to trigger the merger.
Kenjaku’s plan was certainly exciting, but the plot itself led to a story arc that most fans do not cherish. Culling Game is quite easily the weakest arc of Jujutsu Kaisen, despite some of the strongest characters being present in it. The ancient sorcerers are largely uninteresting for the most part, and the system that Gege established, based on the collection of points and addition and removal of rules, makes it rather complicated for no reason. In fact, the author of the series, Gege Akutami, himself has many regrets about the Culling Game arc.
Gege Akutami Has Many Regrets About The Culling Game Arc
To most fans of the Jujutsu Kaisen manga, the Culling Game is quite easily the weakest arc of the series, and it is this particular point of the story at which interest started dwindling among the fan base. It wasn’t until the return of Gojo Satoru and the beginning of the Shinjuku Shodown arc that fan interest started to rise once again, because the arcs started getting fun once more. However, the Culling Game itself was weak, with many issues that Gege himself regrets.
Simple Tournament Style Arc
When Gege wanted to write the Culling Game, he first wanted to do a Tournament-style arc, which is quite common in battle shonen. Think Naruto’s Chunin exam arc, or Hunter x Hunter’s Hunter exam arc. Gege wanted to do something similar, but ended up going with a more complex version of a tournament arc in the form of Culling Game.
Later down the line, Gege spoke of his regrets about Culling Game and wondered whether he should have stuck to an original tournament-style arc where one-on-ones would have been prevalent, and more focus would have been given to various characters all across the story. It would certainly have been more fun to see Gege’s take on a tournament arc, and it could have elevated Culling Game to a whole new level.
I now regret not making the Culling Game into a tournament-style battle. When introducing new characters, I wanted to create excitement by telling side stories for each character in advance, like “When will they appear? What will happen if they fight?” and “Oh, this character appears at this timing?” If the Culling Game had adopted a tournament-style format, I think the story would have been much clearer, and characters like Tsumiki and Kurusu could have been more prominently featured. Additionally, it might have allowed for the incorporation of the Gojo Retrieval arc as well. — Gege Akutami
Tsumiki’s Character Handling
Another big regret of Gege Akutami when it comes to the Culling Game arc is the handling of many major characters. One absolutely massive character in the Culling game is Tsumiki, Megumi’s step-sister. Because Tsumiki was branded with Kenjaku’s mark as well, she was to become a vessel of an ancient sorcerer, and fans know that she needed saving in the Culling Game. Saving Tsumiki was the whole reason Megumi was as determined to enter the Culling game as he was; however, in the end, it was all for naught, as Megumi was not able to save her, and his own character arc was destroyed in the process as well. According to Gege Akutami himself, he failed Tsumiki as a writer because she ended up hardly receiving any characterization.
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Along with Tsumiki, Gege quite clearly also regrets not giving Hana Kurusu the time she deserved. She was largely a plot device in the story to bring back Gojo Satoru, and beyond that, her technique was actually utilized by other sorcerers more than her at important times. The character itself was quite hollow, and that is something Gege regrets as well.
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Had Gege adopted a tournament-style format in the Culling Game, these characters could have been fleshed out way better, and they would have received the characterization that they deserve. Unfortunately, that never happened, and the major flaws with the Culling Game arc then continued to flow into the final arc as well. Still, fans love Jujutsu Kaisen for what it gave them over its short but incredibly successful run, and that can never change.
- Release Date
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October 3, 2020
- Network
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TBS, MBS, CBC, Tulip Television, BSN, tys, NBC, HBC, RKK, i-Television, SBS, IBC, BSS, MRO, OBS, TUF, RSK, TUY, tbc, RKB, SBC, KUTV, RBC, UTY, RCC, MRT, atv, MBC
- Directors
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Ryohei Takeshita, Masataka Akai, Chie Nishizawa, Daisuke Tsukushi, Tomomi Kamiya, Kakushi Ifuku, Ken Takahashi
- Writers
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Hiroshi Seko
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Yuichi Nakamura
Satoru Gojo
