Summary

• Jujutsu Kaisen's anime gives Aoi Todo a much better sendoff than the manga by making his final move bigger and more impactful.
• The anime expands on Todo's final moments, adding depth to his character and explaining why he can't fight anymore.
• Todo's hand is shown to be severely damaged in the anime, providing a better justification for his inability to use his cursed technique.

Warning: spoilers for Jujutsu Kaisen season 2, episode 21.Aoi Todo has long been considered one of the best characters in the Shibuya Incident arc, all of which has been seen as poor treatment for such a beloved character.

Todo's treatment has been a major point of criticism in the manga, but the Jujutsu Kaisen anime has given him a much better sendoff. Episode #21 of Season 2, "Metamorphosis", covered the end of the ongoing fight against Mahito, which is the last time Todo appeared or was mentioned, and the sequence of events is largely the same as they were in the manga.

However, Jujutsu Kaisen's anime adaptation expands on Todo's final moments to not only be big enough to justify this being his final appearance, but to better explain why Todo wouldn't be able to fight anymore, and overall, it makes for a much better sendoff for Todo than how things played out in the manga.

Jujutsu Kaisen's Anime Makes Todo’s Final Moments As Big As Possible

Created by MAPPA, and based on the manga by Gege Akutami

The biggest way the Jujutsu Kaisen anime gives Todo a better sendoff is by making his final move much bigger than it was in the manga. Just like in the manga, Todo's final move against Mahito was slapping Mahito's hand with his own to activate Boogie Woogie, but the Jujutsu Kaisen anime added onto that by having Todo imagine himself beating up Mahito alongside his idol, Takada, with one of her songs even playing in the background. It's an incredibly goofy scene that's also perfectly in character for Todo, and seeing it play out with such great animation makes it the perfect sendoff.

Adding to that was the setup for the sequence. Just like in the manga, Todo using Mahito to activate Boogie Woogie was preceded by his locket falling to the ground and revealing a picture of Yuji next to a picture of Takada, meaning that Todo loves Yuji as much as he loves Takada, who's always been referred to as Todo's favorite person in the world, so Yuji can be seen as an equal motivator for Todo's imaginary beatdown of Mahito. That idea adds even more depth to such an incredible scene, and it all comes together to give Todo a much better sendoff than what the manga gave him.

Jujutsu Kaisen's Anime Gives A Better Explanation For Todo's Absence

Another way that the Jujutsu Kaisen anime improves on Todo's final moments is by better explaining why he can't fight anymore. In the manga, Todo's statement that he couldn't use Boogie Woogie anymore didn’t make much sense since he had previously shown he didn’t necessarily need two arms to activate it, but the Jujutsu Kaisen anime showed Todo's hand to be far more damaged and disfigured compared to the manga, so Todo's hand may be too injured to keep using Boogie Woogie. It's a much better justification than what is given in the Jujutsu Kaisen manga, and when combined with the scene that preceded it, it makes for an all-around better sendoff for Todo.

Jujutsu Kaisen releases new episodes Thursdays on Crunchyroll.

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