Jujutsu Kaisen's main charm is also its greatest barrier

Gege Akutami's Jujutsu Kaisen manga concluded its historic 6-year run with 271 chapters serialized on Weekly Shonen Jump on September 5, 2024. In its final phase, Jujutsu Kaisen became the best-selling manga of 2024, outselling even One Piece by 2 million copies.

While the series had several factors that contributed to its worldwide success, it had its fair share of cons that often held it back from being universally loved. For instance, a major barrier that the manga faced throughout its run is its unnecessarily complex power system.

At first glance, the unique power system may feel deep, complex, and well thought-out, which initially drew in a lot of viewers due to the mathematical nature of the abilities. However, upon closer inspection, one may discover that most of it is simply pseudo-intellectual. In fact, this very aspect of the series became one of its weakest points, because quite frankly, it alienated quite a lot of viewers.

Disclaimer: This article reflects the opinions of the author. Reader's discretion is advised.

How Jujutsu Kaisen's power system became the series' greatest barrier

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Jujutsu Kaisen's mangaka, Gege Akutami, made his series stand out from other battle shonen in a major way. Instead of giving his characters simple power-ups that would allow them to dominate their opponents, Akutami gave them abilities that were seemingly based on scientific, mathematical, or philosophical concepts.

For example, Satoru Gojo's Limitless technique brought the concept of Infinity to life. In essence, the Limitless technique operates in the same manner as convergent and divergent sequences operate in mathematics. To be precise, Infinity is the convergence of an immeasurable series. As such, anything that approaches Infinity will be slowed down infinitely, preventing it from reaching the user.

As Gojo explained, in the field of mathematics, irrespective of how many times a person divides a number, it will never truly be reduced to zero. Instead, the number will be reduced to fractional units so minute that it will almost be immeasurable to the naked eye.

Satoru Gojo in Jujutsu Kaisen (image via MAPPA)

What Limitless does, is basically bring this mathematical concept into reality, which enables Gojo to create an infinitely divided space around him, which in turn stops any object that approaches him and slows it down to the point it appears to have stopped in its tracks.

That being said, Gojo's Limitless technique and the concept of Infinity can also be interpreted as a reference to Zeno's Paradox. These are a series of philosophical arguments designed to challenge the notions of motion and change by presenting logical contradictions arising from the concept of infinite divisibility of space and time.

On paper, the application of such mathematical concepts and philosophical arguments just to create an overpowered ability certainly sounds good. It even made some fans think that Akutami might have a STEM degree since he seemed to have a profound knowledge of the field.

However, as some fans accurately pointed out, there was a Jujutsu Kaisen Volume Extra where Akutami admitted that he once tried to explain the concept of Gojo's Infinity to an engineer friend. Upon hearing Akutami's explanation, the engineer friend promptly told the mangaka that his explanation was all wrong and completely invalid from a scientific standpoint.

Yuji Itadori in Jujutsu Kaisen (image via MAPPA)

It's one thing to incorporate a mathematical or philosophical concept that you have no idea about into your manga. However, it's a whole different thing to confuse viewers with explanations that just sound complex, when, in reality, they are nothing more than superficial gibberish.

There's no denying that Akutami certainly has creative ideas for power-ups, with Satoru Gojo's Infinity and Naobito Zen'in's Projection Sorcery being shining examples of such extraordinary abilities. In fact, fans who love technical-sounding abilities will undoubtedly enjoy Akutami's effort to make the power system sound deep and engaging.

However, this often ends up having the opposite effect as well - given that the majority of the viewers who prefer straightforward combat would get lost while trying to understand Akutami's tedious explanations. In fact, the constant over-explanation of techniques often makes the fights more tedious and drawn-out than thrilling.

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When every attack requires a 2-minute lecture, it completely kills the momentum and results in uneven pacing of fights. What's more, Akutami often seems to be making things up as they go. This causes Jujutsu Kaisen's power system to become riddled with inconsistencies, often giving the impression that it's trying to be too clever for its own good.

All in all, Gege Akutami's habit of making a power system seem too complex to understand and then over-explaining it through massive dialogue boxes ends up pushing away casual fans. It's a given that not everyone would like to read a physics monograph for every technique.

That's not to say that this aspect of the series is universally hated on - in fact, many people enjoy and appreciate Akutami's efforts to make Jujutsu Kaisen's power system seem unique. However, many viewers consider it to be an unnecessary barrier, especially since the series' power system lacks clarity and consistency.

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, the superficial nature of Jujutsu Kaisen's power system did not resonate with most fans. In fact, many even hold debates on social media to this day, complaining about the series' downright confusing power system. While there's no denying that it's unique, many feel that it's an unnecessary element that the series could have thrived without.