the jjk s2 ending for the hidden inventory arc is filled with beautiful symbolism. i've been thinking about this so much and i just wanted to get it all down. workers at mappa clearly thought it out and how they wanted everyone to leave each episode. note that i definitely don't have everything all down in this post. i'm not that attentive, so if you have anything else you noticed please let me know.
tl:dr an overwhelming amount of satosugu brainrot filled with betta fishes, water, and pain
NOTE: THERE WILL BE SPOILERS FOR SHIBUYA ARC AND FURTHER. IF YOU ARE AN ANIME ONLY DO NOT READ THIS.
OBVIOUSLY i have to talk about the betta fish. i'm gonna go on a pretty long tangent so bare with me but i used to have 4 betta fishes, o, a, p, and e and they all lived in the same tank (it was my first time owning fish). a died of natural causes, p got swallowed whole by o, and e got decapitated by o. if you put betta fishes in a tank together, they will fight it out till the one that is the strongest survives. other than the eyes of the fishes ofc we can also determine which one is the strongest based on the state of their fins. an indication that a betta fish is unhealthy is through their fins. if they are slightly stringy (unless they're a specific kind of betta fish) it is a sign that they're not healthy. sometimes the health issue could come through malnutrition or fighting between betta fishes. we can now further deduce that because geto is the less healthy betta fish, gojo is naturally the strongest of the duo (thus the end of the strongest duo...) another thing to note, by using betta fishes to describe gojo and geto LITERALLY it means that in no world can those two ever be together. they will always fight and one will always emerge victorious while the other will frankly die. they're not fated to be together but rather they're fated to be each others natural enemy.
this is a little bit of a stretch and something that kinda makes zero sense at all but stay with me for now. water in jjk openings and jjk endings is typically used to indicate danger. think sukunas finger literally growing plants out of water and sukuna (no offense to sukunas stans) kinda is just danger all around. through each opening and ending we get to see how each character interacts with danger through the way they interact with water. satosugu is no exception to this. gojo is protected by the water with an umbrella, something he most likely brought with him because he knew it was gonna rain. a couple of things about this are that gojos technique obviously protects him from danger. as long as the technique is activated and he's using reverse cursed technique to unfry his brain, he knows that he will not get hit and it's very hard to actually get him into a dangerous position. the nature of his technique protects him and distances himself away from the danger of curses and whatnot. geto however only has his school bag protecting him and he's obviously going to get wet there is no denying that. even if the schoolbag managed to cover his entire body, his hands would still get wet. getos technique unfortunately is just not as powerful as gojos and can't protect him as well. i am not saying getos technique isn't powerful there's a reason why he's a special grade sorcerer. i'm just repeating what is established in the story and that is geto is simply not as powerful as gojo thus is more susceptible to danger. additionally, the nature of geto's technique quite literally exposes him to danger. he has to literally absorb curses by making them into spheres and using his hands to swallow them. HE IS CONSTANTLY INTERACTING WITH DANGER IN ORDER TO FIGHT AND SURVIVE, which is why he will never be fully protected by it unlike gojo whose technique distances himself away from these curses. geto has to as his technique draws himself closer to these curses. it's the only way he can fight, something he learned a lot from school which is why he is using his schoolbag to protect himself from the rain
this section is going to be shorter than the rest BUT theres this beautiful section of the ending dedicated to these red spider lillies. if you watch a lot of anime you probably already know what these symbolize but they symbolize death and rebirth. pretty obvious as to how it connects to satosugu but this one article i read specifically said that these flowers could also represent the separation of lovers. pretty interesting to think about isn't it? (gege i'm gonna catch you one day just so satosugu can finally live a happy life)
THE BETTA FISHES ARE BACK WOOO. anyways, in the scene with gojo, getofish floats by and gojo doesn't actually fully notice it until its gone. and off the screen.
which is LITERALLY WHAT HAPPENED IN THE STORY.
gojo didn't notice geto's struggle until it was too late. by the time gojo noticed geto had already finished his little mass murdering of the village and he had already decided what he wanted to do. also important to note, gojo follows the fish and continues to stare the second he notices (you guys remember how gojo immediately noticed geto's residuals after 10 years. yeah. me too.) in geto's scene, gojofish floats by all healthy and geto actually immediately notices the fish and immediately avoids eye contact with the fish. geto's pretty naturally attentive. you can actually notice him all throughout the season just quietly staring at gojo. and much like the ending of their friendship, geto can't face gojo directly. i'm not necessarily calling him a wimp?? but like he did the kfc breakup in front of so many people. he's not really talking to gojo directly, more like talking very loudly over others and speaking in identity crisis riddles. i have more thoughts on this but they keep coming out onto the post not the right way i think the fact that geto can't look at gojofish directly has something to do with the fact that geto was the morality check that gojo needed and because of geto's new "mindest" (because i'm a firm believer that geto's morality still remains the same. he is still a very caring individual just he really can't stand non-sorcerers and might be protecting them in his own very fucked-up way) the morality that gojo initially thought was correct kinda just crumbled. but i can't actually formulate a reason for this morality check because it's just a bunch of jumbled thoughts in my brain.
SPOILERS FOR SHIBUYA ARC
arcade games really make their way into these don't they. a lot of people have noticed this so i'll keep this brief. the people on the winning side are gojo and shoko, the only people currently alive from the students we're introduced to in hidden inventory. the people on the losing side are geto, haibara, and nanami, all of which are currently dead. something else i noticed is that it's directly gojo and geto that are versing each other in the arcade game and it's rather sad because technically in the end gojo did "win" against geto.
a lot of people have also talked about this so i just want to add my two cents. obviously gojo and shoko are in the light and geto is in the dark, symbolizing the contrasting sides they've taken. but i wanted to specifically talk about this white line. let's just say this white line is the clear shift in what gojo called getos "moral argument". geto is completely past this line and he has rejected his past ideals and shifted his ideals to match his new understanding of the world. gojo is walking away from this line. he was previously on this line, and didnt' understand what geto's "moral argument" was before. now he fully understands and is talking steps to maintain this moral argument. sure he also wants to change the world to be better and where curses are slightly less prevalent, but he's doing it through education and still willing to protect non-sorcerers. shoko is also past the line but she is walking parallel to it. in my opinion, shoko was far more relaxed when she heard about what geto had done and even joked around with him a little bit when they ran into each other. she still has an understanding of geto's previous "moral argument" but she's not necessarily taking any deliberate action to further this argument. she just understands it and isn't rejecting it. do not get me wrong though, she has a very important role in the jujustu world it's just very different from the motivations of gojo who is furthering said moral argument (this is like very messy and i know it probably makes no fucking sense at all)
FINAL ONE and it's probably gonna be pretty long. once again this is talked about a lot so i'll keep the first part sort of brief. irl this bridge only has one road but for the sake of the story, mappa made it two. gojos path leads to land (safety) and geto's path leads to danger (water) (IT'S ALL COMING BACK TOGETHER). what i wanted to talk about was the animation that occurs in this scene. a couple of things happen
1. gojo crosses over to geto's half of the screen
2. geto pushes him back
3. gojo remains on his half for the rest of the scene
gojo would've crossed over to geto's side when he was carrying riko's body if geto just said yeah i'd like to kill those fucking annoying people cheering on the death of a literal teenager because they want their god to become something akin to a tree. gojo would've literally obliterated them and probably wouldn't have thought too too much about it as geto was literally his moral guide. at that time whatever geto thought of as moral, gojo kinda just went along with it (he did argue about it ofc, it's gojo). geto however pushes him and says no there's not really a point to kiling them and so gojo remains on this set moral path for literally the rest of his life. in my personal opinion, gojo remains set on this path because riko meant a lot to geto and gojo and for geto to say there's no point in killing them even though the organization was so cruel for no reason, then this argument obviously becomes incredibly compelling. this also could explain why gojo couldn't find the point in geto's mass murder of the village
those are all my thoughts that i really wanted to get down. please let me know if theres anything else that is in this ending that will cause me to sob i am all ears. satosugu actually has ruined my life so a little more probably won't hurt (it will)
