Jujutsu Kaisen (2020)

A high school student who swallows a finger belonging to a special-grade cursed spirit becomes the vessel for the most powerful sorcerer. Produced by MAPPA from Gege Akutami’s manga of the same name, Jujutsu Kaisen generated an explosive domestic and international response immediately after airing in 2020. The director is Sunghoo Park; the season runs twenty-four episodes.

What it’s about — A High Schooler Carrying Sukuna

Yuji Itadori (Junya Enoki) is an ordinary high school student with extraordinary physical ability. After swallowing a cursed object as his grandfather is dying, he ends up carrying the special-grade cursed spirit Ryomen Sukuna within his body and becomes a student at Tokyo Prefectural Jujutsu High. Sorcerers fight the entities created from cursed energy to protect humans. Season 1 follows Itadori entering the sorcery world and growing alongside his companions Satoru Gojo (Yuichi Nakamura), Megumi Fushiguro, and Nobara Kugisaki.

Direction — The Border Between Horror and Action

MAPPA’s animation quality is consistently high throughout Season 1. Intense combat sequences have a real sense of speed and impact, and the bizarre designs of the cursed spirits straddle the line between horror and action with elegant precision. The mid-season episodes featuring Kento Nanami and the final push toward the confrontation with Suguru Geto in the back half both demonstrate theatrical anime-level direction. The music hits the peaks of battle momentum and emotional shifts with precision. The opening and ending songs also match the series’ own atmosphere, contributing to overall quality.

Performance & characters — Supporting Players Who Build Team Chemistry

The voice cast is excellent across the board. Junya Enoki’s Itadori is convincingly a bright, reckless boy who genuinely shakes in the face of death. Yuichi Nakamura’s Satoru Gojo plays the series’ strongest character with a combination of playfulness and overwhelming menace that has become central to the character’s popularity. The supporting cast is uniformly distinctive. Nobara Kugisaki and Megumi Fushiguro in particular show contrasting value systems from Itadori and generate a team chemistry between them.

What the work says — The Question of a Proper Death

Jujutsu Kaisen is a work that faithfully follows the shōnen manga grammar. A weak protagonist grows stronger; companions are made; stronger enemies appear. But where this drama stands out is that it does not evade death. Characters around the protagonist disappear without warning, and that loss is not handled lightly. The theme of “a proper death” running through all of Season 1 is what gives it weight beyond a simple battle series. The premise that cursed energy originates from human negative emotion also leads to questions about the boundary between horror and humanity.

Ratings & reception

IMDb score is 8.5, among the top tier of anime from the 2020s. It was counted among the most talked-about anime series of its year. It is assessed as the work that announced the revival of Shōnen Jump-based anime to global audiences. The Episode 4 battle sequence went viral repeatedly on YouTube and social media.

What doesn’t work

The pacing of the first twelve episodes among the twenty-four is somewhat uneven. The world-building explanations and character introductions are handled in compressed fashion, and in some episodes the emotional breathing feels cut short. There are also some omissions that source manga fans may find disappointing. Additionally, since this series began while the manga was still running, Season 1 alone doesn’t deliver a complete narrative resolution — it ends by making you wait for the next season.

Verdict

Jujutsu Kaisen Season 1 is a work that reset the benchmark for battle anime. Strong animation, distinctive characters, and a narrative that takes death seriously combine to give the series a texture that exceeds the genre’s usual confines. If you want the excitement and emotional expenditure characteristic of shōnen manga, this is an unconditional recommendation. My rating is ★4.0.

Recommended for

• Battle anime fans who are particular about animation quality
• Viewers who enjoyed emotional shōnen manga series like Naruto and Demon Slayer
• Those looking for an anime they can get absorbed in quickly over a short episode count