Episode 8

"With true conviction, the human race can overcome anything! Let me demonstrate to just what heights a human being can rise!"

- Jonathan, as he and Dio have their final battle

Bloody Battle! JoJo & Dio (血戦！JOJO&DIO) is the eighth episode of the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure anime. It is also the eighth episode of Phantom Blood. It covers Chapter 37 through Chapter 41 of the manga.

Jonathan finally finds Dio in his castle. Despite Jonathan's Ripple, Dio's vampiric powers allow him to freeze limbs with a mere touch and thus Jonathan must find a way to directly strike the Vampire with his Ripple.

Summary
The group makes a detour at Poco's house, only to be told that Poco's sister has disappeared. Actually, the girl is imprisoned with Dio who is tempting her with the prospect of eternal life. When she refuses and slaps the Vampire, Dio leaves and sics the monster Doobie on her. However, Jonathan appears and easily defeats the Zombie.

Jonathan climbs the stairs and reaches the final room where Dio awaits. Jonathan challenges Dio to one final match to avenge the death of his friends, but Dire pushes Jonathan out of way and challenges Dio himself to avenge the death of his friend, Zeppeli. Dire attempts a Thunder Cross Split Attack, but Dio freezes his legs and shatters him. Dire's head manages to survive and launches a Ripple infused rose, impaling Dio in his right eye.

Jonathan thus steps in while Speedwagon, Straizo and Tonpetty stay back to fight Dio's Zombies. Inspired by Dire, Jonathan infuses the sword he had received earlier from Bruford, Luck and Pluck, with the Ripple. That way Dio shouldn't touch him. As the battle begins, Jonathan distracts Dio with roses and uses the Vampire's blind angle to cut off his arm then cuts him in half. However, Dio freezes the sword and Jonathan's hand before he can send the Ripple. Jonathan is thus immobilized and briefly at a disadvantage, but he exploits a fire behind Dio to heat the sword and free himself. Nonetheless, Dio breaks the sword and manages to freeze JoJo's fist before the Ripple can reach him.

As a last ditch attempt, Jonathan lights his glove on fire to counter the freezing effect and finally manages to hit Dio's chest with the Ripple. Dio is sent into a cliff and uses a spiteful last technique: he releases a jet of pressurized eye humor and almost kills Jonathan. The latter still has enough heart to mourn his lost half-brother and collapses from exhaustion. JoJo has won the battle.

Commentary
"Masahiko Komino was the animation director for this episode, and he's a big fan of JoJo. He preferred rendering the characters as close to the manga as possible, giving a very intense result. Ideally, it was the result we wanted for every episode. But a TV series has many imperatives to respect and we often had to make concessions. This time, the satisfaction was at its peak, we had the best animators to render the best battle. I also like the zombies' small moment of glory, where they use their Blood Vessel Needle Attack.

The fight against Dio also has a lot of iconic quotes, to such a point the fight itself begins to fall flat. Thus we thought about cutting some of the back-and-forth to accelerate the rhythm. However, it's one of JoJo's hallmarks so we didn't touch the dialogue. We mixed Dio's shout on two audio channels when he's cut in two. You really get the impression he's in the room with you. In general, we have the worthy final fight of this story.

Dio's attack where he propels his own eye goo is exaggerated compared to the manga where it simply cuts through a pillar. In the anime, we had it pierce through the clouds."

- Naokatsu Tsuda, Blu-Ray limited edition commentaries