Rating - ⭐⭐⭐⭐
"The first-years are sent to investigate a series of strange disappearances at Fushiguro's former school - and even worse, this threat might just involve his sister! A dangerous new group of foes makes its appearance as the trio pushes past their limits."
The Death Painting Arc is the sixth arc in the Jujutsu Kaisen series by Gege Akutami. It covers chapters 55-64 of the manga, and episodes 22-24 of the anime.
This is the arc that concludes the anime and, I have to say, it did so pretty well as there were a lot of intense moments in this.
Now, like in my previous reviews, I am first going to go into detail without spoilers, but there will be a spoiler section full of my thoughts and reactions afterwards, so if you don't want to be spoiled, stop reading when you are prompted.
Let's get into the details.
WRITING
My only complaints about this arc are two very minor details that I picked up on. For one, at one point in the manga, they use 'area expansion' instead of 'domain expansion' for some reason. I don't know if it was just a translation error or something, but it sounds nowhere near as good.
Secondly, I don't get why for Vol.7, they put Choso on the cover, when his character is barely in this.
PLOT
With the end of the Kyoto Goodwill Event, we now follow the big three, (Itadori, Fushiguro and Nobara), as they embark on a mission together to investigate the mysterious deaths of three people.
This arc, while it does have its fair share of fight scenes, best depicted character growth as we get to learn more about them and as they push past their limits and get stronger. Due to this, I don't have much to say about the plot and will go into more detail in the character section.
The only plot aspect that I really liked that I wanted to mention was the fact that Itadori eating the finger and bringing Sukuna back created a kind of power vacuum that ended up waking up curses that were previously inactive. I think that, while the manga might not lean into this, it was a great way to expand the story as it leaves a lot of room for possible plot points.
As a final note, I would like to give a warning that there are mentions of suicide in this, should anyone be worried about trigger warnings (besides the usual gore and violence).
CHARACTERS
We get some glimpses of what Fushiguro was like when he was younger, and we also get to learn a bit about his sister, Tsumiki. We also get to see him break his usually calm façade and he does end up growing stronger because of it.
Similarly, Nobara displays the same kind of unhinged behaviour, and I was here for it. I've been pretty neutral towards her up until this point, not necessarily liking or hating her, but she was an absolute badass in this.
The only one who ended up getting the short end of the stick when it comes to character development is Itadori. He isn't very prominent in this arc, but that is entirely fine because we have already seen him begin to grow and get stronger, so it was fair to focus on the others instead.
Now I will go into spoilers about the reaction and thoughts I had while reading.
WARNING - SPOILERS AHEAD - PROCEED WITH CAUTION
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Seriously though, the badass moments in this.
Fushiguro just loses it and goes 'screw it, let's go out with a bang'
And Nobara stabbing herself with the screws was something else
Sukuna in his domain though just watching Fushiguro get stronger.
Sukuna also being sly and summoning a hand to eat the finger himself.
I would take a spin-off or special chapter any day of just Gojo going around eating sweets.
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