since youre a Jojo fan, Dio Brando for the listing meme
favorite thing about them
God, fucking DIO. Back in the days when JoJo was THE big obsession of mine, DIO, being my favorite character, was pretty much my favorite character in general, and while obviously my tastes changed a bit since then, he's still around the top for sure. I could talk your ears off about him and I genuinely can't just pick one, so for now I'm gonna just say three.
I love how big he is. Not just physically, but in that he's this villain who just never stops growing in scope and strength and reach over the course of the saga. Every Jojo part from 1-6, Dio is there. We grow up with him and, for all intents and purposes, he's practically the protagonist of Phantom Blood, as outlined by Araki even. Part 2, he's a ghost from the past who's been both surpassed as well as immortalized as a curse on the Joestars. Part 3, he's this huge, unsurmountable threat both to the world as well as the family personally, king of legions of monsters and a almost literal ticking time bomb that must be eradicated. Part 4, he's indirectly responsible for both the protagonist as well as the antagonists' ascension to power, a cancer on bloodlines other than the Joestars. Part 5 is about his son rising out of his evil legacy to guide others out of their dark pasts, and Part 6 he's become this god-like fragmented myth of memories and body parts, guiding the main villain in a final war of legacies, as it takes the literal destruction of the universe to rid the Joestars of DIO for good.
And though he grows and changes, he never stops being the same Dio. He never stops being the egomaniac hellbent on wiping out every weakness that gets in the way of his ambition, he never stops being the manipulative monster lying and scheming and fighting his way to the top, he never stops being the restless and intellectual pursuer of a way to overcome his bad circumstances, he never stops being the raging bully with a temper problem, he never stops being a pest. We just get to see more and more of his facets from more and more perspectives that enrich him more and more as a character, and it's such a fascinating way to develop a character.
On a more personal anectode, I also really, really like DIO's confidence. He's got a lot of shonen hero virtues that make for great protagonist material, he just happens to be 100% awful with them. I think getting into JoJo in general, taking the time to study it and it's influences, definitely helped boost my own self-esteem and sense of style, as weird as it sounds. It got me to think about my own fashion and how I wanted to present myself to the world and, things I had never really thought of or was taught to think about, but absolutely make all the difference in someone's self-esteem, and I think getting into JoJo kinda led to that. It was like getting hit in the face by a world of colors and styles I didn't know existed.
DIO is dressed in just, the most completely ridiculous outfits, outfits that look so stupid whenever you dress up other characters in them, but he makes them work because he's DIO, and he can rock any outfit. I cosplayed DIO once and it felt really good getting to just, strut like that, in such a ridiculous get-up, with the genie shoes and pants, with such confidence, not worrying about how I looked, and having all these people approach me and asking me to do cool poses and, god I miss cosplaying. Yeah, Jojo is real special to me for this and other reasons, and DIO's my favorite JoJo character so obviously I got too many feelings on him.
least favorite thing about them
Not at all a fan of Over Heaven, or Jorge Joestar's take on DIO, or how his story turns out in Eyes of Heaven (I do think Heaven DIO's design is great though). I'm really adverse to takes on DIO that try to soften him or explain him more than what canon already does, and to be honest, I'm not the biggest fan of Diego either, partially because he's just kinda perpetually stuck on Dio's pre-vampire Phantom Blood character but he gets treated everywhere like he's a dramatic improvement because he's more overtly sympathetic and tragic and people find that easier to compartmentalize and understand nuance in than a character who is just 100% evil incarnate. I really, really don't care at all for the mindset that sympathetic villains are inherently better and more complex.
Also he's killed at least a couple of cats on and off screen, and also everything he did to Danny, and animal abuse is a really sore spot for me, but that happens in Jojo to the point of running gag so it's not like Dio in particular is to blame for it, even if he was the first.
favorite line
I deeply love how the Phantom Blood dub made all of his dialogue twice as pretentious and more appropriately supervillain-y, even with some Shakespeare references, and one in particular that stuck out to me is this
From the earth I called them to wreak their vengeance, all these centuries later!. Such is the power at my command!
In life, they were fearsome. In death, they are invincible!
Which really gives the Tarkus and Bruford resurrection the proper build-up the concept deserves.
I also deeply love this scene with him and Pucci, partially for the dialogue but because of how significant it is.
brOTP
Besides Pucci, who is my other favorite Jojo villain, I really liked the few snippets we got of DIO's interactions with his followers in Part 3 like Hol Horse and N'Doul, and I would have liked to see more of them. Also, she's a wretched character, but I have a really soft spot for Enya and I really like seeing her and DIO together. It's a very fun dynamic and I was genuinely pissed at DIO when he killed her. Not because she didn't deserve it, but it's kinda like that moment in Batman 89 when Joker kills Bob, who had been nothing but loyal to him up to that point and they had a fun thing together.
OTP
None.
nOTP
Any Joestars, Jonathan included.
Now, to be clear, the Jonathan x Dio relationship is pretty much THE big reason why Phantom Blood is my favorite part (and why Jonathan’s my favorite Jojo) and the one I've rewatched the most time and time again, I adore their dynamic and find it incredibly compelling and fascinating. But they're adopted brothers and unless we're shipping Dio's face with Jonathan's fist anything else is gonna be a hard nope.
random headcanon
DIO has extremely unpredictable and dorky tastes in pop culture because he frankly just wants to try out whatever the world's got to offer him. He absolutely played videogames with Terence D'Arby and I imagine him liking cartoons that are absolutely not at all in line with his image. And he's not embarassed about it because, he's DIO, he's not embarassed about anything. Nobody says a word when he strolls down the manor singing the Spongebob theme song.
unpopular opinion
I guess my unpopular opinion towards Dio is that I do think he's a layered and multi-faceted villain and character when the universal opinion towards the character seems to be that he's fun but basic and fairly stupid compared to the other Jojo villains. I used to be pretty bitter about this, but I reckon it's a lost cause and, frankly it doesn't affect my enjoyment of the character at all. It's not like DIO is "underrated" as is, I just kinda wish he was appreciated more as something other than a giant meme or cartoon maniac (which I guess is kinda how I feel about JoJo in general, where I'm really not a fan of how the overwhelming Western thought towards it is that it's all just a giant dumb meme, but, whatever).
Also, not sure how unpopular this is, but I truly detest how the anime handled DIO's World visually. I really love the anime in general but we got cheated hard on that one.
song i associate with them
Any of his themes across JoJo media, but other than those, I don't actually associate Ronnie James Dio's songs with him that much, because I got into him first and so his songs have a different meaning to me. The Dio songs I associate with him are Evil Eyes and Egypt (The Chains Are On). I also really like DASJO's theme for DIO, especially for the Rainbow In The Dark riff.
favorite picture of them
I thought I was gonna have a harder time answering this one but, nope, it really is the Orange Dio cover. This right here is peak DIO.
