Dio's World, Part 3 (Episode)

DIO's World, Part 3 (DIOの世界 その3) is the forty-seventh episode of Stardust Crusaders, the twenty-third episode of the Egypt Arc, and the seventy-third episode of the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure anime. It covers the second half of Chapter 256 through the first page of Chapter 262 of the manga.

Summary
The clash between Jotaro Kujo and DIO continues. As The World and Star Platinum exchange blows, their Users begin to emit so much power that they start to float. The World eventually beats Star Platinum; a satisfied DIO thus proceeds to stop time to try and finish Jotaro. However, when Jotaro's finger briefly twitches in the stopped time, DIO becomes initially very distraught and began to realize Jotaro's words he said moments earlier about The World and Star Platinum being the same types of Stand could possibly be true. Time resumes and DIO asks Jotaro if he's seen him, but Jotaro plays dumb and simply flees from him, with DIO taking chase. The Vampire recalls the day he discovered his time stop ability and his belief in his supremacy. Stopping time once more, DIO then discovers a magnet on himself and Jotaro. Both magnets were on the same side, giving the illusion that Jotaro could actually move. DIO then moved in for the killing blow, but Jotaro, having lured DIO into a false sense of security, was able to land a powerful punch in the frozen time, indicating the magnets to be a red herring. DIO is sent flying into a shop but quickly regenerates with the blood of a nearby vendor. DIO halts the battle and wonders how much Jotaro can accomplish in the stopped time. Jotaro tries to hide the fact that he can only briefly move for a moment, but then DIO devises a plan to make this irrelevant as he reveals his hands and belt full of knives. Worried, Jotaro tries to jump to safety but DIO stops time while he's in mid-air. With no way to escape, Jotaro sees DIO throwing dozens of knives from all sides. Jotaro was able to block several knives in frozen time but found himself unable to stop them all once time return to normal. He was stabbed multiple times and, for a good measure, The World throws an extra knife into Jotaro's hat, seemingly killing him as the student falls to the ground.

However, anticipating such an attack, Jotaro stuffed his jacket and hat with magazines, thus preventing his body and head from actually getting injured. But he still had been stabbed deeply in his arms and right leg. He decides to play dead as DIO approaches, and the Vampire is aware of the resilience of the Joestar. To make sure that he had truly killed Jotaro, he breaks a road sign and wields it like a halberd; DIO prepares to decapitate Jotaro until suddenly, Polnareff intervenes and stabs DIO in the head with Silver Chariot's rapier.

DIO stops time and easily swathes Polnareff aside. However, DIO now approaches the Frenchman, forcing Jotaro to divert his attention to himself to save Polnareff. He willingly twitches his finger to catch the Vampire's attention. Suspicious, DIO makes a policeman shoot in Jotaro's corpse. Surprisingly, Jotaro had used Star Platinum to catch the bullet aimed to his body. Dio then checks for any breathing or even heartbeat; Jotaro is forced to use Star Platinum to stop his heartbeat and almost dies as a result. DIO continued on with his original plan to cut Jotaro's head off but Jotaro was able to use this opportunity to land a strong blow directly into DIO's head and shattered a part of his skull.

Now heavily injured, DIO tries to crawl to safety. However, DIO is disabled, causing him to be unable to stand up. Jotaro catches up and plans to burn him with some oil. As a taxi passes nearby, DIO began to crawl away while simultaneously employing The World's time stop to assist him in distancing himself from Jotaro, pulled himself behind it, and allowed himself get dragged behind it but then Jotaro makes it crash with one of the knives stuck on him. DIO attempts to take shelter in a sewer but Jotaro is already under the cover. DIO is then violently pummelled away by Star Platinum. However, DIO has outsmarted Jotaro: he's manipulated Jotaro into sending him to his "escape route"; back to where Joseph's body was, and the old man's blood allows him to not only fully recover, but also completely synch his body with that of Jonathan Joestar.

Commentary
"In this episode, time stops during the opening itself. At Kamikaze Douga, which is the studio in charge of the animation, it was something that Junpei Mizusaki wanted to direct ever since the beginning of the Egypt Arc.

The confrontation between Jotaro and DIO is full of power. The animation is striking in the power it conveys, and the casting was just as good, they were both remarkable.

Mr. Mimuro, our key animator, had bought a model of a human heart to use as reference for the scene where Jotaro manually stops his own heart. To this day, this model stands on my desk. (laughs).

The second part of the episode is dedicated to Jotaro's furious counter-attack against DIO. But at the very end, a sudden twist reverses the situation, next stop: the last episode for the conclusion...

This episode being dedicated to the fight, it was surely one of the heaviest episodes in terms of production. It is full of action scenes which will be impossible to reuse. The number of shots is also well above the average of the season. I want to deeply thank the whole team for having held the line despite this considerable work."

- Naokatsu Tsuda, Blu-Ray limited edition commentaries

Trivia

 * This episode has a different ending to the opening credits. Rather than Star Platinum punching the screen, The World punches it instead - stopping time. A fully revealed DIO then walks past Jotaro and unfreezes time. As Jotaro turns, The World and Star Platinum begin their attack rushes as both of their users look on.
 * In addition, the English dubbed version removes Dio's The World! shouting in the intro.
 * Footage of the first season of the anime is shown as flashbacks.