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The Brilliance of Giorno Giovanna

Before I go ahead and write my review of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Part 5: Vento Aureo written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki, I wanted to somehow put into writing why I think that it’s main protagonist, Giorno Giovanna, is truly a brilliant character. There is one more thing I’d like to prefix this character analysis with, and that is how I experienced Vento Aureo.

Vento Aureo was serialized in Weekly Shōnen Jump from November 20, 1995 to April 5, 1999. The anime first premiered in October of 2018 and ran through July 2019. So, I devoted the past couple weeks to both WATCH and read Vento Aureo. Reading the manga, and then watching the episodes that covered the volume(s) I previously read. So I really got to soak in the entire story. I also live tweeted my entire “Readwatch” but thats besides the point. I’m a bit late to the party in terms of covering the series but this is also my first time ever doing something like this, and I thought that there’d be no better place to start rather than breaking down one of my favourite characters across all mediums of fiction, Giorno Giovanna. Needless to say, this character analysis will divulge into spoilers of Vento Aureo.

Giorno Giovanna, born Haruno Shiobana, in Vento Aureo is age 15. He is half Japanese, Half Italian. Giorno as we know is the bastard son of DIO, the Joestar lineage’s sworn enemy across time. Giorno’s stand is Gold Experience, named after the Prince album The Gold Experience. Gold Experience is a close-range Stand, with a range of 2 meters from its user. Gold Experience has many different abilities. The first one being Life Giver. Life Giver gives Gold Experience the ability to endow anything its fists touch with life, which translates into a variety of different effects. It’s second ability is Life Shot. Gold Experience's ability can also be applied to living individuals, causing their thought processes to greatly accelerate. Life Shot basically makes Giorno’s opponent experience a psychedelic trip in the middle of combat. Gold Experience also has the ability to recreate Flesh and Organs. Inspired by Baby Face's ability to transform body parts into inert cubes, Giorno discovered that he could do the reverse and create singular body parts and organs out of inorganic matter. Thus he is able to heal gruesome wounds through various means. Gold Experience also has one more ability, Life Sensor. When he [Giorno/Gold Experience] touches someone or something, he can sense other lifeforms from within, allowing him to check if someone is alive or even determine how many souls there may be inside a given vessel. (Below is a picture of Giorno and Gold Experience)

But the interesting part about Giorno is not only is he the son of DIO, its also the fact that he is also considered a Joestar as he was conceived with Jonathan Joestar’s body, with DIO controlling it (after killing Jonathan Joestar, DIO took over his body to become the ultimate life form 100 years before Stardust Crusaders took place.) 

We don’t get to see the signature Joestar Star Birthmark on Giorno often, but we do get to catch a glimpse of it in the first episode of the anime and the second chapter of the manga during his fight with Leaky Eye Luca. Which cements him as being the 5th main Joestar in Araki’s story. 

Because of his lineage, we know he’s destined to be a special character from the get-go. Inheriting traits and skills from both DIO and Jonathan. Now, I could spend all day pointing out what Giorno has done in the series that he got from DIO, and things he’s done because of the Jonathan in him. But instead of that, I’d rather point out the more notable things he’s done that he’s taken from both his fathers.

We know that DIO was rotten to the core. He had a similar upbringing to Giorno in the sense that their parents neglected him. Dario (DIO’s father) constantly abused DIO calling him both physically and mentally. Whereas, Giorno’s mother neglected him and his step father abused Giorno to no end. Both DIO and Giorno are portrayed to be very smart in their groups. Giorno somehow always knew what animal or insect he’d have to give life to depending on the situation to help him overcome the conflict he was in. For example, in the fight against Man In The Mirror, Giorno also was faced with the issue of Fugo’s stand, Purple Haze and its ability, (A virus that quickly kills you if you inhale it or if your skin comes into contact with it. It also has no cure. Purple Haze is so powerful, that Araki had to write Fugo out of the story.) So to overcome this, Giorno used Gold Experience’s ability Life Giver to give life to an inanimate object (In this case, turning a brick into a Snake - Read left to right i took panels from different pages for the sake of my point)

Also, Both DIO and Giorno are natural leaders, wherever DIO went, be it in Phantom Blood or in Stardust Crusaders, he had followers do his bidding for him. Giorno inherited DIO’s natural ability to lead as later on in Vento Aureo, we all see the team members, inspeseficallfy Guido Mista, in his internal monologue after their battle with White Album, that he sees Giorno being more of a leader than Bruno Bucciarati, the actual leader of the gang at the time. Another attribute that Giorno inherited from DIO, is the need to make his opponent feel powerless. During Giorno’s beatdowns, he is known to shout “MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA” with Muda being a direct translation from Japanese to English meaning “Useless”, something that DIO was known for, in his fight with Jotaro in Stardust Crusaders. Giorno also uses the “WRYYYYYYY” battle cry a couple times in Vento Aureo. Also, Giorno’s hair used to be black, similar to the other Joestars before him, but when Gold Experience awoken in him, it caused his hair to change to the golden yellow colour we see him as throughout the series. One more thing to point out in Giorno that is reminiscent of DIO that separates him further from the rest of the Joestar lineage, is that Giorno ignited his own change. Giorno had a dream that he wanted to see through, whereas the other Joestars reacted to things happening to ones the hold dear to them that made them want to save others. Jonathan reacted to DIO killing his father, Joseph reacted to the Pillar Men awaking, Jotaro reacted to his mother falling ill because of DIO’s awakening, Josuke reacted to Angelo killing his grandfather, so on and so forth. It was Giorno who kicked the events off of Vento Aureo by himself, persuading Bucciarati to take down the Boss of Passione (Diavolo).  

The traits and attributes that Giorno inherited from Jonathan consists of Jonathan’s heart of gold that ultimately guided Giorno down the path he took to heroism, infiltrating Passione and taking down Diavolo. Jonathan’s selflessness also passed onto Giorno. Throughout Vento Aureo, Giorno was willing to sacrifice himself/his body for the benefit of the group despite. Cutting his nose off to spite his face. A great example of this is when Giorno and the gang was on their way to Sardinia. On the flight to Sardinia, they encountered the undead stand named after the world’s biggest rapper at the time, Notorious B.I.G. Giorno deduced how B.I.G was tracking them despite being dead, and it was motion. B.I.G reacted to any and all motion around it, causing the stand to automatically hunt down, attach itself, and attempt to kill whatever surface around it that was the fastest. So, while on the airplane, Giorno selflessly lured B.I.G onto the only arm he had left (Giorno had already lost an arm to B.I.G earlier in the fight and had not used Gold Experience to make himself a new arm) 

Giorno knew it was a gamble, he had cut both arms off to save the team. Naturally, this incapacitated Giorno for the rest of the fight. But before he could cut his arm off, he turned one of his ladybug brooches into a his own hand, which carried the power of Gold Experience. Thanks to this, after the fight was over, he was able to accomplish two things. First, He helped Trish mature as B.I.G came back and Trish ultimately defeated the stand by awakening to her stand, Spice Girl. The other thing that Giorno was able to accomplish was that he was still able to heal himself and the team using the brooch that Trish worked to protect from B.I.G.

Just as Giorno had a similar upbringing to DIO, he also had parts of his childhood that Jonathan went through as well. Giorno was always the kid that got bullied by the other kids, much like Jonathan. But that all changed when he met the man he came to idolize. 

Giorno saved the life of this unknown Gangster, so in return, this Gangster protected Giorno from his abusive step-father, the kids that bullied him, and made sure that young Giorno didn’t go unfed.

Because of the unknown gangster, Giorno was inspired to protect the little guy. In a world of corrupt government and crime, Giorno had a dream of being a GANG-STAR. Instead of using power to benefit himself, he wanted to use his power both literally and figuratively to make sure that nobody would have to go through the same kind of upbringing he had to go through.

Giorno truly is all the best parts of both DIO and Jonathan rolled into one character.

In Giorno’s bio page in the second last chapter in Vento Aureo, it is said that “What Giorno desires most is hope. He has faith that he can reach any destination, as long as he has hope.” This bio page also states that the source of Giorno’s hope and justice was the unknown gangster.

You can argue that his hope was able to manifest itself and what ultimately turned Gold Experience into Gold Experience Requiem (GER) in the final confrontation with Diavolo. Giorno literally becomes unbeatable with GER. GER’s PASSIVE ABILITY is that any hostility directed toward Giorno gets nullified and all action and intent of the attack gets set back to zero, preventing any attack that is directed to him from becoming “real”. (Pictured below is Giorno and Gold Experience Requiem)

You can say that Giorno has hope and faith in himself that nobody will be able to stand in the way of his dream. So Requiem literally makes it so that nobody can harm him.

Giorno’s whole life, he had struggled with finding his own self worth and managed to find self satisfaction in saving a stranger which made him realize what he enjoyed doing in life. Helping others, putting himself in danger to make his own dream come a reality. Giorno’s admiration, spirit, pride, and willpower to fight is contagious and quickly spreads throughout the entire cast of characters in Vento Aureo.

One of the most important characters to Giorno’s development is his right hand man, Bruno Bucciarati who has done even more selfless acts than Giorno has done for the sake of others. 

From the moment they met, they both realized that each other were special people. Bruno from a young age was infatuated with assisting others, easing the burdens of others just to make them happy, much like Giorno, which is what makes their relationship so special.

During the turning point of Vento Aureo, Bucciarati died in his fight with King Crimson. Giorno was going as fast as he could to save Bucciarati from his mortal wounds but it was too late. Or so he thought. In that moment where Giorno healed Bucciarati’s body, his soul had already left his body and was on his way to the after life. However, Bucciarati knew that the job was unfinished. His determination, and sheer willpower to see Giorno’s dream come to fruition kept his body alive for the rest of the series until their fated encounter with Diavolo and King Crimson in Rome. Where Bucciarati was finally able to see that Giorno was capable to finish the job himself.

This steeled Giorno’s resolve in his fight against the brutal, merciless, and thoughtless Diavolo, who killed for his own personal gain, not caring for his victims. Diavolo’s ideals and morals are severely distorted and blatantly evil. He thought that he was the one chosen by god to carry out his will to reign over humans as their king. He believed that he was supposed to be the one to judge humans if they should live or not, killing anyone he didn’t see fit into his plan. His mafia also contributed to his heinous crimes as the main reason that Giorno and Bucciarati connected, was their hatred for the boss’ policy of who the mafia sold drugs to. Passione often sold cocaine to women and children, which led to Bucciarati’s father’s murder, and Giorno’s abuse from his father and the bullies.

The abilities that Gold Experience granted him, let him see his dream come to fruition. That mixed with the attributes that he unconsciously inherited from his two fathers, Jonathan Joestar and Dio Brando in combination with Giorno’s will and resolve that was demonstrated to be contagious throughout the events of Vento Aureo. It ultimately affected me on a personal level, which is why I wrote this analysis. I personally deeply admire Giorno and his just dream. Doing anything it takes to see his just dream come true to benefit others despite all his shortcomings in his childhood, and everyone that wronged him in his life. Giorno still believed that he could ignite the change and illuminate the path of those around him to believe his golden dream. Giving others hope, that everything will be alright in the end. 

That, is why Giorno Giovanna is brilliant.