It wasn't really fair to say Aurora Entertainment and Sabrina had lost their minds.
Alex's dramas usually ran somewhere between twenty and thirty episodes, released in a two-episode weekend format. Most television productions, on the other hand, still followed the longer model, with forty episodes or more and daily updates. The competitive logic there was different from the film industry. And besides, this wasn't Bleach. Because of that, plenty of dramas still chose to premiere in the same window without showing the slightest hesitation.
That weekend, a small army of longtime JOJO fans, an even larger wave of Bleach fans, and a fresh crowd of viewers pulled in by the latter half of Death Note all gathered in front of their computers, tablets, and phones, entering Penguin Streaming at the same time.
Saying there were only a few JOJO fans was really just a matter of comparison. Next to the monstrous phenomenon that Bleach had become, anything would have looked small. But in absolute numbers, JOJO's fanbase was still more than respectable.
Penguin had bought the premiere rights to the entire franchise long before Phantom Blood aired. Even so, to this day, the executives still felt they had paid too much. Compared to Bleach, the gap in performance was brutal: one had already crossed the ten-billion-view mark, while the other had only recently managed to scrape past one billion. The difference was large enough to make any executive grit their teeth.
And yet, the moment the screen went dark, the live comments flooded the player like a storm.
"I reject my humanity, JOJO!"
"Your next line is…"
"WRYYYY!"
The older fans were already having the time of their lives with the inside jokes, but most of the audience who had come because of Alex's name or the momentum of his previous works had no idea what was going on.
"What are these people even talking about? I don't understand half of it."
"Go watch the first two parts. Seriously."
"But didn't Alex say you could watch this without seeing the earlier ones? Because I didn't."
"He put Bleach Season 3 and the second half of Death Note on hold to make this. I want to see what kind of series came out of that."
"If this turns out bad, I'm leading the criticism."
"There are still people doubting Alex's talent?"
The comments kept piling over each other, mixing mockery, anticipation, and that restless energy only a premiere could create - the kind that seemed smaller than the director's recent hits, yet still carried the full weight of his name.
The first episode began without an opening.
The sea appeared first. A fishing vessel moved across steel-gray water, and a group of sailors used a rough crane system to haul something enormous up from the depths - a coffin-like container covered in barnacles and hardened salt, as if it had spent decades forgotten on the ocean floor.
"Jackpot! Looks like treasure!"
"It's way too heavy… gold? Jewels?"
"Open it already!"
Greed flashed across their faces almost instantly, raw and childish. For a moment, it really did look like luck had come knocking. But the second their hands touched the lock and their eyes fell on the letters engraved in the old metal, the excitement vanished.
D… I… O…
Among the viewers who had seen the first part - few, but attentive - a chill ran down their spines.
Dio?
The name alone left a bad taste in the mouth. Weight. Warning. If it really was him, then the question wasn't only how he had returned, but what that return meant for the entire world.
Before the thought could settle, the scene cut.
The screen shifted to an urban district in Ishtar, dense and alive, soaked in heat, smoke, and the concrete exhaustion of a major city. At the bottom of the frame, a subtitle appeared in bright letters:
1987, Ishtar, Southport.
The camera finally came to rest inside a police station. A policeman held a clipboard and read out the detainee's information in a thick southern accent, casting subtle glances at the woman seated nearby.
"Jotaro Kujo. Seventeen years old. Six foot five. Father's a stage performer currently touring overseas. Mother has British ancestry. Correct?"
The woman beside him looked exhausted, with fine lines of worry around her eyes, but she still carried a mature, radiant beauty that was almost startling. The moment she appeared on screen, many older viewers straightened in their seats, caught off guard by the familiar face. No one had expected Alex to bring in a veteran actress of that caliber to play Holly.
"Yes… Jotaro is my son."
Another policeman walked over, trying to lighten the mood with a smile.
"So the kids at school took the 'Jo' from Kujo and the 'Jo' from Jotaro and started calling him JOJO, right?"
The line drew an immediate laugh from part of the audience. In Southport's accent, the sound clicked perfectly, naturally, as though the nickname had been born there.
But Holly barely seemed to hear him. Anxiety had already swallowed what little composure she had left.
"So then… how many people did he kill? Ah, no, don't tell me, I don't want to hear it, I don't want to hear it…"
The desperate, almost adorably dramatic way this mother on the verge of collapse spoke made plenty of people laugh. The longtime fans, however, had a different reaction. It wasn't just the face - it was the energy. That strange blend of tenderness, innocence, and emotional overreaction immediately called to mind the absurd bloodline of the Joestar family.
The two policemen exchanged a look, unsure whether they should laugh or sigh.
"Kill? Ma'am, who told you he killed anyone? It was just a fight."
"Just" was being extremely generous, and the second officer made that clear with a grimace.
"Four armed delinquents, including a boxer. Knives, batons, chains… fifteen fractures in total. One of them left the fight without… well… certain essential physical functions intact. Anyway, they were all taken to the hospital."
For a full second, the audience had no idea how they were supposed to react. The episode had opened with a cursed coffin rising from the ocean, and before the first few minutes were even over, it was introducing a protagonist who had beaten four armed men into a medical report.
Then the collective laughter hit.
The live comments exploded again, repeating the same word in unison, each message more exaggerated than the last. Those familiar with the earlier parts laughed even harder; those who weren't just stared at the flood of inside jokes, unable to understand why everyone seemed to be losing their minds over a single line. Before long, some viewers started explaining that it was a reference to an older part of the franchise, while others piled on with yet another joke, asking everyone not to make fun of certain past tragedies.
Without even realizing it, many people who had started with this third part began to feel genuinely curious about the first two. Others, however, found the barrage of comments irritating and simply turned the feature off, preferring to watch in peace.
Led by the officers, Holly went down to the underground holding area.
The moment the corridor appeared - coldly lit, damp, and lined with iron bars - the more attentive fans immediately remembered the extra scene at the end of Battle Tendency. The man sitting in a cell, most of his face hidden beneath his cap, that domineering posture, that heavy presence - it all made sense now. The protagonist of the third part had been shown a long time ago. Alex had buried that clue far too early for it to be accidental.
And now, the payoff was perfect.
The instant she entered the corridor, Holly lost what remained of her composure. She ran deeper into the passage calling for her son, and the editing threaded that movement together with fragments of memory: a beautiful little boy with a bright smile appearing and vanishing in brief flashes, as though the past itself were trying to shield her from what she was about to see.
"Jotaro… Jotaro… Jotaro…"
Her voice trembled with every step. Her eyes swept across one cell after another, desperately searching for that familiar face. And when she finally found him - standing behind the bars, motionless in the dim light - the relief hit so hard it nearly turned into tears.
"Jotaro!"
In the minds of a good part of the audience, this was the moment the series would deliver a warm reunion between mother and son - awkward, perhaps, but still tender. The soundtrack held its breath. The camera closed in.
And then came the blow.
"You're too damn loud! Shut up, you woman!"
The shout exploded through the headphones of anyone watching with a headset and nearly knocked some people backward in their chairs.
The camera finally revealed Alex in full Jotaro makeup.
It wasn't just makeup. It wasn't just wardrobe. There were still traces of Alex himself in there, of course, but everything had been shaped to support that brutal, impossible presence. More important than the appearance, though, was the way he occupied the screen. The closed-off expression, the dry contempt in his voice, the stillness of his body radiating restrained violence - it was as if the word invincible had been carved into his face in letters no one needed to see to feel.
Alex had tested foreign actors with imposing physiques before deciding to take the role himself. But none of them had managed to recreate that specific feeling. It wasn't enough to look strong. Jotaro had to feel like a man who looked at the entire world as though the world itself were the inconvenience.
And Alex nailed it.
"Okay…"
As if their roles had been reversed in an instant, Holly answered in a tone of almost obedient sweetness, making the scene even funnier. The contrast between a mother frantic with fear and the brutally dry way her son greeted her was so absurd that the audience simply collapsed.
"That is maternal bias in terminal condition."
"That bias filter is eight hundred meters thick."
"The third Joestar just did what the first one never could."
"I've never even watched this franchise, but I'm following just because of this protagonist."
"The Joestar family used to be gentlemen, remember?"
"Used to be."
"Ever since the second generation, there hasn't been a gentleman left in that family."
The viewers who had started without context grew even more confused, while the veterans enjoyed themselves on a wavelength that was almost impossible to follow. Then, a larger official comment, more prominent than the rest, slowly drifted across the top of the screen:
"Enjoy the references in moderation. Don't ruin the experience for people who are just getting started."
That message was there for a reason.
JOJO had always been a machine for creating iconic lines, unforgettable poses, and memes powerful enough to survive for decades. That was part of the soul of the work. But Alex, who understood both the brilliance and the irritating side of that phenomenon better than anyone, also knew how badly part of the fandom had developed the habit of dragging those jokes everywhere - and worse, using references as a disguised form of spoilers.
In the past, that behavior had already driven away more than a few casual viewers.
So before the episode had even truly begun, he made sure to plant the warning right there, where everyone could see it, like a line drawn on the ground.
Joking around was fine.
Ruining the journey for everyone else was not.