Sukuna’s 2 Paths: My Character Anyasis of Sukuna and his Backstory
This will contain minor spoilers for the Sukuna Backstory comic I am working on, I’ve flagged them just in case. Also, you should check out my explanation on why I think Sukuna was raised by monks first!
This is kinda long so if you don’t wanna read all that, just read the parts in bold, you’ll get the gist of it.
I believe Sukuna is an extremely nuanced character that can be interpreted a number of different ways, and this is my interpretation of him. I’ve had some people be genuinely mad at me that I gave Sukuna a loving figure in his life and that he’s not pure evil from birth. I understand that is how some people see Sukuna, which is completely valid, but I also wanted to make my own analysis that will explain why I made these choices and how they still align with Gege’s writing of Sukuna. This analysis will also inform how I’ll be characterizing Sukuna in the rest of my backstory comic! I also want to preface that Sukuna having a “tragic” backstory does NOT absolve him of his actions, he is 100% pure evil in JJK and aware of the own cruelty of what he does.
The Sukuna we see in JJK is pure evil, there is no denying that. However, I am of the personal opinion that he wasn’t just born like this but was instead made this way.
His conversation with Mahito at the end of JJK I believe supports this best. Here it’s revealed that Sukuna never truly followed his own ideals of being “detached” from humanity’s afflictions and the pursuit of only pure strength, instead his underlying motivation has always been seeking revenge against a society that shunned and persecuted him. Sukuna was never above human desire, he was always motivated by his own desire to retaliate against those who had treated him with cruelty. Now to me, that doesn’t sound like the underlying motivations of someone who is evil by nature, instead, evil is Sukuna’s response to his circumstance. His own reply to Mahito is “what’s the difference? I lived in the only manner I knew,” because to him cruelty is what he was taught and what he began responding in turn with.
Sukuna then explains why he went down the path he did, and it is because he “feared his own curse would immolate me.” This could mean a number of different things, he could have feared the way others persecuted him and those around him for his appearance or he could have feared his own capacity for destruction. Either way, this shows that Sukuna was motivated by a desire for revenge and motivated by his fear above all else. Cruelty probably became a necessity for Sukuna as the only way to survive his “curse” and once he embraced that cruelty, he “couldn’t help but spit out the curses stirring in his viscera.” His purist of strength was also probably came out of necessity, because if he was strong enough, he would no longer need to fear.
I believe Toranosuke, the tiger that appears in Modulo, is meant to be Sukuna. Considering how much Gege associates both Sukuna and Yuji with tigers (Itadori literally has the kanji for tiger in it), I don’t think it’s a coincidence that he picked a tiger out of all animals to appear in Modulo. Also interesting that the tiger lives in the Gifu providence, which is where Mt Hida is, the mountain that Sukuna’s corpse was inside. The mythological Sukuna was also from the Hida providence (which is where Gifu is now).
Here’s a summary from the JJK wiki about Toranosuke for those who haven’t read Modulo:
“[A] man Osada, a former jujutsu sorcerer [is] hunting the true culprit behind the recent killings: a tiger named Toranosuke. When Tsurugi expresses disbelief that a tiger could even exist in Japan, Osada explains that Toranosuke's grandparents were smuggled into the country by illegal foreign traders over twenty-five years ago and eventually made their home in the mountains of Gifu. However, the recent restoration of a massive solar power plant atop the mountain caused the river to dry up from the heat, forcing Toranosuke to descend in search of water and prey, leading to the attacks on villagers...
Osada reveals his intention to save Toranosuke rather than kill him, planning to contain the tiger in his home far from town. Tsurugi objects to the idea, insisting that any beast that has eaten humans must be exterminated…
After Tsurugi kills Toranosuke… a tiger cub emerges from the bushes. Instead of attacking the cub, Tsurugi gently hands it over to Osada, asking him to raise it well and ensure it doesn't become another Toranosuke. Tearfully, Osada promises he will.”
The parallels in this one page to Sukuna are crazy. I have no idea if Gege ever intends on giving us a straight Sukuna backstory but I feel like this is pretty close. Both Toranosuke and Sukuna began life innocent, but because of human circumstances, they were forced to become “man-eaters” for survival, changing them completely.
*Minor spoilers here* My backstory for Sukuna will be based on Toranosuke. The Old Monk that raises Sukuna is Osada, a lonely soul who finds another lonely soul to take care of. However, similar to Osada, the Old Monk will be unable to help Sukuna and by the end of the story Sukuna will become entirely unrecognizable to him. Also like Toranosuke, Sukuna will be forced down from his mountain (the mountain shrine he lives at) then be forced to fight for survival down below. I hope that makes sense lol *End of spoilers*
I also believe the new tiger cub that Osada gets after Toranosuke represents Yuji. Yuji and Sukuna are foils to each other, at their core they are same person, but circumstance changed who they eventually became. It’s the same as how Toranosuke was once the same as the tiger cub, but because of their different circumstances, they will most likely end up very different.
I’ve seen a lot of people say that Sukuna had absolutely no one in his life but Uraume. I agree, but I only think that is true for the Sukuna we see in JJK, which is after his whole human life and 1000 years as a cursed object. I believe earlier in life, Sukuna had at least one other person who thought he could be good and tried to teach him such.
I believe this because of this page right here. The woman on the left 100% isn’t Yorozu. If Gege had intended her to be Yorozu she would have actually resembled her, as other than having black hair, they have nothing else in common. She is also dressed as a shrine maiden, and I love Yorozu but she is the farthest thing from a shrine maiden LMAFO.
In this panel Sukuna talks about how a life driven by fear and revenge wasn’t his only option, he did in fact have another path open to him. Uraume represents the path we see him take in life, the path of a curse and a monster. As while I do believe Sukuna cared for Uraume, Uraume simply walked along with Sukuna down the path he was already on. Uraume never challenged Sukuna’s perspective, held all the same beliefs and is complicit with him in his actions.
The shrine maiden then represents the other path he could’ve taken in life. She was probably his teacher, someone who tried to show him the path of good, but instead he chose to give into his fears and desires and go down the other way.
Sukuna is more than aware that his actions are wrong, cruel and selfish. Despite the cruelty he faced, he must have had at least one person that tried to teach him wrong from right, tried to show him love, so that he could reject it later.
I also think that it is important Sukuna did have the option to be good at some point in his life, but he chose otherwise. If his life was nothing but rejection and cruelty, if he had no option but to become a monster, then that deprives him of the agency of choosing to be evil. He chose to be evil, he chose to embrace his curse and become a monster. His “tragic backstory” shouldn’t absolve him from his sins, because he ultimately chooses to go down the path of a curse despite having another option. This is why Yuji pisses him off so much, because despite everything Yuji has endured (even the stuff Sukuna put him through personally), he stays on the path of good, something Sukuna failed at. Someone he considers weaker than him and beneath him can do something he couldn’t, and that infuriates him more than anything else. Yuji recognizes this too, and that’s why the only time we ever see Sukuna truly angry is when he realizes Yuji is pitying him.
Imagine you’ve tried to be good, but the world is horrible and cruel so you just give up and decide being evil is wayyy easier but then this STUPID BRAT comes along and cages you and then shows you you’re actually the weak one for not being able to stand by your ideals and giving up. AND THEN he’s the one who looks down on you and pities you!!! Shiiii I’d be pissed asf too!!!
I find it so interesting that the only name Sukuna refers to himself as is “the fallen.” It implies he had to come down from somewhere ya know? The backstory I am writing will not try to make Sukuna a sympathetic character, you are NOT ment to forgive him for all the horrible things he’s done just because he has a sad backstory. If anything he is supposed to be a tragic character, where the tragedy lies in the fact that he’s let the cruelty he’s experienced become his own.
Thank you for anyone who read all of that!!! It’s a long ramble but I really wanted to make sense of Sukuna’s character. If you have any questions or anything I can elaborate on, let me know!
