#sukuna analysis

sukuna skeletal structure

i really enjoyed making this ☺️ i might do different angles later but this is it for right now cuz man my hand is cramping from all those little lines 😫

(maybe i'll draw a normal skeleton next time and call it gojo or one of the other characters. not like we'd be able to tell them apart by much at skeletal level 😆)

also a second ribcage protecting his other organs is definitely why he is hard to kill 😉 (not really tho 😆)

you might be thinking, “bitch you just pulled that out of nowhere,” and, well… maybe, i won’t deny that possibility. but aside from my own suspicions while watching the anime and reading the manga (which are probably personal) i keep going back to one specific page where Sukuna says:

“I’ve never needed anyone to satisfy me.”

if we break down that sentence and consider that having sex (in this case, with concubines) would mean relying on someone else to bring him pleasure (even if he was the one in control, prioritizing himself during the act, whatever), that alone clashes with the way he explicitly presents himself. honestly, i personally assume that Sukuna would even see this whole “need for sex”—both emotionally and physically—involving another person (or several people, for that matter, in the sense that he’d keep multiple women around just to satisfy his carnal necessities, not because any of them genuinely sparked desire/longing in him or made him actually want to engage with them sexually—aside from a simple sexual impulse) as pathetic, perhaps way too human? especially when he could very well just satisfy himself if he wanted to, maybe with self gratification (if you know what i mean). and that humanity of some sort is something he seems to constantly distance himself from as much as possible—those kinds of “petty” urges, one could say. in short, i believe Sukuna doesn’t see himself as a being with needs, but rather with desires he lives to indulge at his own will.

and no, i don’t think he would’ve kept concubines just for status either. Sukuna doesn’t strike me as someone who feels the need to prove himself to others unless it gives him some kind of direct benefit, as in “(…) If no one can grasp that, then that’s their problem.” so, if someone ever challenged his “kingship” because he didn’t have concubines, he’d probably just kill the poor guy on the spot, right?

another thing that supports this idea for me: i can’t really imagine what kind of woman would actually interest him enough to stir sexual desire. he has a clear disdain for sorcerers in general, and would he really seek just plain, weak human women? desire, in the traditional and poetic sense, implies a loss of control, a pull toward something external, so what kind of person would even be worthy of that level of attention from him? would Ryomen Sukuna, who places so much value on strength, ever tolerate—let alone desire—someone he considers beneath him? not only that, a group of women? to me, the only real possibility would be if the person were just as strong as him, or even stronger. and let’s be honest, it’s not exactly easy to find a group of people who operate on that level.

I'm done with people misunderstanding Sukuna. That's why I decided to make a series, where we reread Sukuna's parts and Sukuna-related scenes together!!

Starting with Chapter 1, which we'll be covering in this post.

We'll be using japanese raws directly, so we don't get lobotomy.

WARNING: If you haven't watched or read jjk yet, go away.

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Translations:

Page 1

"Ahh, as expected!! Light is best felt raw!"

Yes, he actually said 'raw'

"A cursed spirit's meat or whatnot is boring!" "Where are the people! The women!!" "!" "What a great era it has become."

"Both women and children, too, are propagating like maggots."

Note #1: To him, the world is basically being infested with not only men, but also women and children.... like how maggots infest places....

Note #2: I translated it as 'Both women and children, too, are, not just 'Women and children' because of the particles 'も' attached to both '女' (woman/women) and '子供' (children). While it means 'also', 'too', and 'even' depending on the context, it is used after a word to show that the word is part of a set, which in this case, people infesting the world. Sukuna's phrase already implies that 'men' is already part of the set. Here are the following links for more information: [1], [2], [3]

Page 2:

"Wonderful!" "It'll be an extermination!"

The kanji 鏖殺 individually means 'massacre, annihilation' and 'kill' respectively. So, I used 'extermination' rather than just 'massacre'.

Page 3:

(I'll include Yuji's dialogues too cuz why not)

SFX: *Grab* M: !! S: "Huh?" Y: "What are you doing with a person's body? Give it back." S: "You, why can you move?" Y: "? Yeah, this is my body and all." Y (text in bg): "Did I turn into someone like Baron Ashura*?"

*Baron Ashura is a character from Mazinger.

S: 'I'm being suppressed - '

Takeaways From This Reading:

Sukuna is from an era where it's common for, not just men, but also women and children to die easily (e.g. diseases, starvation, physical threats). So the era Sukuna lived in obviously has a much lower life expectancy than modern era Japan.

We can infer here that Sukuna lived in an era where living wasn't easy and survival is the most important.

Sukuna loves the meat of people, especially women in the context of killing (and maybe eating, too). But based on what he said about cursed spirit meat being boring, do you think he has also tasted cursed spirit meat before? I mean if we think about it, Sukuna, a cannibal, didn't see himself as a human but as a curse, so wouldn't he have also eaten a cursed spirit meat?

Sukuna uses Yuji's memories to familiarize himself with the modern era for a bit. That's how he finds out that the current era is full of people, including children, living well.

Yuji feels like he became Baron Ashura now that Sukuna is in his body.

Yuji knows about Mazinger series.

Megumi is horrified that Sukuna has been revived through Yuji's body.

Sukuna is shocked that Yuji can still control his own body and he can be suppressed by him.

And that's it for chapter 1 Sukuna scenes.

Idk how long I'm gonna do this because I only originally planned to do this series up to the Detention Centre case part. But yeah, let me know if you want me to continue.

In the meantime, I will be doing part 2, covering chapter 2 Sukuna scenes of JJK manga.

Stay tune!

Recommended Readings from My Blog:

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The Details You Missed & The Context Behind Yorozu's Marriage Proposal to Sukuna

Missed Details from Sukuna's Introduction

But after reincarnation uraume is the first to meet sukuna and this time sukuna is surrounded by his own Carnage which he caused knowingly and is not regretting or feeling guilty for it.

idk Japanese Buddhism rly, just Bön (which is like the oldest, Tibetan Buddhism).

and when giving instruction on breathing / meditation technique, there was a lot of explanation through the sky analogy.

the mind is like a cloudy sky, and when you exhale out some attachment / aversion / doubt, then the sky opens up a little. and you focus on that clear patch, meditate in it. then continue to clear another channel.

There are moments that always stuck with me since we know that Sukuna said he was a „cursed and unwanted little wretch“. I think we can definitely assume what he was born with a deformed face and the four arms, causing him to be treated like shit in his youth.

"why is it that, when sukuna-sama is near me, he doesn't get cold?"

"that goes for you as well, uraume - why you did not get cold being by my side."

uraume meant it literally, sukuna meant it figuratively - but both are asking the same question:

why are you not scared of me? why do you stay by my side.

and maybe the answer is as simple as that sukuna saw himself in uraume, taking them in in an act against his own ideology. because despite being alone for so long, you can still crave that connection that was repeatedly denied you. sukuna was human, is human, and therefore can never truly relinquish the humanity he claims to have abandoned.

or maybe sukuna and uraume are content to leave that question unanswered, as they walk into the gentle night - because after centuries of living, it doesn't really matter why someone stays by your side, does it?

it just matters that they stayed. it is devotion, plain devotion - your attachment to one another that makes you human. it is attachment that keeps sukuna's soul human, even after centuries of metamorphosis, that allows him to finally concede to yuji's ideals, that allows him to move forward while mahito cannot.

and uraume walks with him, as they always have, because -

despite everything, it's still you.

248 confirms what I've always thought about Sukuna: he's an empty being. He has always been characterized as a hedonist but imo he's much more of a shitty deluded nihilist. There's an innate emptiness inside of him that he has rationalized to be a general meaningless to life, and for as much as he derides others for living for their "ideals," he spends his existence constantly reaffirming his own beliefs. The unshakeable sense of self he is always boasting about is nothing more than a defense mechanism to cope with the fact that he's extremely hollow.

Being trapped inside Yuji's head is the first time he's unable to ignore his own emptiness. He can't brush off Yuji like the meaningless enemies of his past because he's seen Yuji's reason for living. He's witnessed what it's like for life to actually mean something. And that irritates him because it goes against the pitiful belief he's clung to for a thousand years. If there's actually meaning in joy, pain, love, sorrow, friendship...then what the fuck has he been doing all this time?

The odds are extremely low, but I can picture a Hell's Paradise-type ending where Sukuna quite literally gives up. At this point, it's hard to see any way the main cast could actually overpower him, even with the power of teamwork and whatnot. Sukuna's just too OP. He's dropping sorcerers left and right. But I do see him growing bored of the fight and the possible future. And the realization that he has been pathetically clinging to his own ideals could be a character-breaking moment. Because otherwise, he activates the merger, plays around with the super being made from the merger...then what? He'd once again be bored and pass the time until death. And without Kenjaku around, there's no promise for future excitement. A future where Sukuna can't constantly reaffirm his own ideals is probably his own version of hell. Because Sukuna is Yuji's biggest hater, he might just activate the merger as a last fuck you and the final threat to the cast would be whatever eldritch abomination is created from Tengen.