Santana

"Cease this foolishness, primitive..."

- Santana

Santana (サンタナ) is a secondary antagonist featured in the second part of the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure series, Battle Tendency.

Santana is a member of the ancient Pillar Men race and is first introduced hibernating inside an ruins discovered by Robert E. O. Speedwagon. After being intercepted by the Nazis, he awakens from his slumber and wreaks havoc on their research facility until Joseph Joestar arrives and challenges him.

Appearance
Santana is a very tall, muscular man with long, wavy light hair up to his shoulders, and two bangs over his forehead. He has thick spiked eyebrows and two small horns on the top of his head. He is almost fully naked aside from a loincloth. In the anime, he also has a symbol shaped like a gear that is tattooed on his lower right eyelid.

While he was hibernating, Santana wore armor consisting of shoulder pads, a which is curved inward on the sides, spiked forearm guards, and knee pads. A column of several protrusions resembling bones is embedded on the center of his armor from his chest down to his stomach. After he awakens, his armor breaks and falls off.

Personality
Santana is a calm, observant, and highly intelligent Pillar Man. He is adaptable and inquisitive about how the world has changed while he was asleep. Although Stroheim initially assumes that Santana is a primitive creature due to him slipping on water and then scratching his body and hair for a while, Santana proves that his knowledge is far beyond what humans are capable of. He quickly learns to become fluent in another language shortly after hearing the Nazis speak, easily discovers how to escape from the shelter he was locked inside by contorting his body to escape through a vent, and is capable of disassembling a gun in seconds which would normally take humans hours of training to learn.

Like the other Pillar Men in Kars's group, Santana is vicious and detached toward humans. After being awoken, he brutally kills nearby Nazis for disturbing his sleep. He initially ignores Joseph's introduction and shows disinterest, taking the time to examine his surroundings instead. However, when Joseph's probing begins to annoy him, Santana loses his composure and instantly attempts to kill him. After witnessing Joseph's Ripple, Santana inquires as to whether humans have evolved or if Joseph is just special. Nonetheless, Santana lets Joseph attack him so he could learn how the technique works. Even when exposed to sunlight, Santana is unconcerned and enters Stroheim's body as a shield against it.

Abilities
As a Pillar Man, Santana is capable of performing the most basic abilities of one. While much younger and not as experienced, Santana has demonstrated several techniques similar to ones used by those in Kars' group, as well as some of his own.

Background
Santana had originally lived in Mexico with the other Pillar Men. After Kars' rampage and slaughter of the Pillar Man race, the child Santana, along with Wamuu, was adopted and trained by Kars and Esidisi. He was later left behind in Mexico by Kars, who deemed him only useful as a guard dog, while he and the others left for the old world to find a flawless Red Stone of Aja. As a result, Santana would be unaware of the energy called Ripple which the other Pillar Men learned and developed defenses against. Eventually, claiming that it was because he used too much power, Santana entered a 2000 year-long rest by fusing himself into a pillar within a temple that was one of the proponents for Kars' Stone Mask project.

Battle Tendency
Santana is discovered in a Mexican pyramid in 1938 by an expedition team led by Robert E. O. Speedwagon that is later betrayed by Straizo. However, Straizo notices that Santana had been absorbing the spilled blood and to prevent Santana from awakening, dumps the bodies of the men he attacked into a nearby river. Santana is then excavated and studied by a team of Nazis in an underground base. The team, led by Major Rudol von Stroheim, conducts live human experiments with the Stone Mask in order to try to strengthen the Nazi Army. The blood from multiple prisoners causes the Pillar Man to awaken, Stroheim naming the being "Santana" while he and the rest observe him. When one of the vampires created is brought into the chamber, Santana allows the creature to attack so he could absorb the vampire and gain nourishment. Despite the Nazi's initial opinion that he was a dim-witted savage rather than an Übermensch, Santana catches everyone off guard further by uttering Stroheim's full name once he finished his meal.

Santana, sensing hostility within the iron, fortified room, breaks many of his own bones in order to squeeze himself into the 4-by-20 cm ventilation outlet of the room, doing so at a speed faster than human eyes can perceive. By the time Stroheim realized what occurred, Santana reached the observation room while entering the body of a German who was too close to the vent. After absorbing the host and getting shot at, Santana fires the bullets inside his body from his fingertips, killing almost everyone in the room. Joseph Joestar (disguised as a Nazi) protects Speedwagon, Stroheim, and himself from Santana's attack by channeling the Ripple into Stroheim's hair and using it to shield them.

Toying with the Pillar Man, Joseph assumed Santana killed the Nazis out of self-defense before being attacked. Santana, expressing annoyance at Joseph's antics, realized he could not absorb the human and attempted to do the same with Speedwagon out of assessment. This enrages Joseph as both learn that ripple was preventing Santana's cells from digesting him. Using this to his advantage, Joseph allows himself to be absorbed by Santana and then unleashes the ripple from the inside, splitting the Pillar Man in half. As Santana's body begins to regenerate, his torso is dragged by Joseph to be exposed to sunlight and turn into stone again. After a struggle involving Stroheim sacrificing one of his legs, the door to the outside is open and a fully regenerated Santana is exposed to the light. But the Pillar man quickly forces himself into Stroheim's body in order to escape the sun while attempting to hide in a well, forcing the Nazi to sacrifice himself to leave Santana into the open.

Desperate, Santana charges Joseph as the two go flying down the well. Santana realizes too late that Joseph allowed him to enter the well as it was exposed to the sun's reflection, turning the Pillar Man back to stone with some damage caused by the fall. Santana's remains were later taken to the Washington branch of Speedwagon Foundation, the Pillar Man kept immobile by UV lights and revealed to still be alive. Santana's ultimate fate is never addressed.

Major Battles

 * Santana vs Vampire Prisoner
 * Santana vs Rudol von Stroheim & Nazis
 * Santana vs Joseph Joestar & Rudol von Stroheim (Retired)

Famicom Jump: Hero Retsuden (NES)
Santana appears as a Boss in Area 4. The player faces him in a one-on-one battle using only Joseph Joestar.

Due to the game's release date, Part 2 had only reached prior to Esidisi's battle against Joseph. Thus, only Santana and Esidisi appear as the enemies faced during the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure part of the game, instead of Kars or Wamuu.

All Star Battle (PS3)
Santana is briefly mentioned during the dialogue in Part 2's Story Mode. For the Western version of the game, he was renamed "Santviento" to match the Crunchyroll subs. Initially, his name was "San Tan" in a press release from Bandai Namco Games Europe.

Stardust Shooters (Android/iOS)
Santana is one of the several Part 2 characters who possesses a Metal Striker for the game. His Finish move has him fire bullets from his fingertips at the defeated opponent (similar to his retaliation against the Nazis), and his second special ability allows him to counterattack any Metal Striker enemy who attacks him by using his Ribs Blades.

Gallery
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Trivia

 * By appearing on the 1989 game Famicom Jump: Hero Retsuden, Santana is the first antagonist of the series to ever appear in a game, alongside Esidisi.