Noriaki Kakyoin

Noriaki Kakyoin (花京院典明, Kakyoin Noriaki) is a major character featured in Part III: Stardust Crusaders. He is easily recognizable by his fitted school uniform (usually colored green), green eyes, double cherry-shaped earrings and reddish hair.

Personality
Though Kakyoin comes across as cold, he is actually a warm and loyal fighter. He will support his comrades actively and fights for things that are ethically right. He hates bowing down or brown-nosing and only respectable people can be viewed as his friends. He is straight to the point but nice and cares very strongly for his friends. He resents people who plot secret schemes. He mentions he could never relate to people because of his ability, and thus never desired to make friends for most of his life; this changed when he discovered other people who also had stands.

After Jotaro releases him from Dio's control, Kakyoin joins Jotaro's group in the quest to destroy Dio as compensation for having acted as Dio's pawn. Some of his personality undergoes changes in the middle of the story, and this is attributed to the events after his encounters with Mannish Boy and N'Dour. He eventually sheds his "repentant" attitude. In addition to the above traits, he now has more confidence and has regained a lot of his pride.

He also has a profound respect for his parents, remembering them before his eventual death.

History
About 2-3 months prior to the start of Part 3, Kakyoin was approached by Dio Brando while traveling in Egypt with his family. Dio, having sensed Kakyoin's Stand powers, asked for a demonstration which led to them fighting. When Kakyoin lost, he was brainwashed into following Dio's will via buds from Dio's own cells and given the mission to kill Jotaro Kujo. Kakyoin returned to Japan around the same time as Jotaro left prison and attended the same school as Jotaro.

Stardust Crusaders (1987-1988)
Kakyoin carries out Dio's orders on his first meeting with Jotaro. He manipulates the school nurse with his Hierophant Green, using her to attack Jotaro, but Jotaro defeats him and ends up dragging him home, both considerably injured. Jotaro soon discovers that Kakyoin was under Dio's influence and uses Star Platinum to remove Dio's implant from Kakyoin's head - despite the risk that it might openly attack both of them. Kakyoin is freed from Dio's control as a result and joins Jotaro, Joseph and Avdol on their trip to Egypt to fight Dio.

In the beggining of the trip the group is attacked by Gray Fly, whose Tower of Gray proves to be a match even for Star Platinum. Trying to prevent the fight to take down the plane, Kakyoin knocks Gray Fly and volunters to fight the stand by himself, tearing it apart with his stand.

In the trip Kakyoin proves to be a useful ally, but Joseph's Hermit Purple says that he is a spy, making everyone suspicious of him. In the end it is revealed that the spy was actually Rubber Soul posing as Kakyoin, who separated from the group for unknown reasons. Returning to the group, Jotaro then tells Kakyoin the battle and his impersonator.

When Jean Pierre Polnareff is attacked by Hol Horse and J. Geil he is saved by Kakyoin and Avdol, but not before the later is almost killed. Kakyoin manages to discover The Hanged Man true ability and tricks the stand into having only place to go: a coin. This makes Polnareff be able to finally defeat him and revenge his sister.

In the desert the group is attacked by Arabia Fats's The Sun, who proves to be even more powerful than Hierophant Green and forces Kakyoin to cancel his attack on the stand.



He also is the first to realize that Mannish Boy is a stand user, and that his stand attacks while the group is asleep. Though the rest of the group don't believe him and come to believe he has succumbed to stress, Kakyoin is ultimately able to defeat Death 13 inside a dream by bringing Hierophant Green with him. He then teaches Mannish Boy a lesson by mixing some of the baby's own poop with the baby food.

During the encounter with N'Dour's stand Geb, Kakyoin is slashed across the eyes and put out of commission for a while.

The Genesis of Universe: One-Way Trip from Desert To Hell
(The italicized information below derives from a Light Novel not written by Araki. As such, it may or may not be considered canon.)

Even with his injured eyes, getting worse with the sun, Kakyoin manages to save Avdol from Absalom's Satanic Coupler.

Kakyoin leaves the group to recover from his injuries at the Speedwagon Foundation hospital in Aswan. He returns just before the group finds Dio's mansion and is the first to face Terence in a videogame competition with his soul on the line. They play a racing game that Kakyoin is familiar with, and Kakyoin even uses Hierophant Green's speed and agility to accomplish complicated moves via the game controller. Ultimately, however, he loses and his soul is placed inside a small doll until Terence is defeated, at which point it is released again.

Later, he battles Dio and traps him with his stand, claiming that he would be attacked even if he moved just a inch. However The World ability to stop time allows Dio to kill Kakyoin with a punch through the abdomen. Before dying, however, he manages to leave a message in the form of an destroyed clock tower, enabling Joseph and Jotaro to figure out Dio's stand ability.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Heritage for the Future
Kakyoin appears as a playable character in the Arcade/PSX/Dreamcast game, and his gameplay is primarily designed for defense. A lot of his techniques reflect this; he also has limited forms of offense but plentiful techniques for striking back, punishing or even ticking. With the Stand activated, he can dash and double jump in the air. He also has one of the longest reaches in terms of physical attacks - particularly with his Stand attack.

In the arcade version, he has considerable offense power but is slightly slow. This was changed in the playstation port, but at the price of losing damage strength. He also gained a new super move that helped him in his offensives. Additionally, his appearance with sunglasses (a result of his encounter with N'Dour) is named New Kakyoin or 恐怖を乗り越えた花京院 (Kakyoin who overcame his fears) in the Japanese version of the game, having different attack methods and physics offsetting him from the original.

It is noteworthy that even in the video games (excluding the Super Famicom RPG), especially in the fighting game made by Capcom, Kakyoin's fate in his own storyline is to die, whereas other characters have more pleasant endings (excepting Midler). However, because of how the dialogue was done in the game, some may argue that it could be open-ended, suggesting a possibility of his survival. The ending seems to imply that Kakyoin died on the trip home inside the airplane, possibly due to the wounds suffered in the battle with Dio, and him keeping quiet about it. This could be otherwise explained as fainting or severe weakening, in the absence of solid illustration that he did die. On the other hand, New Kakyoin's storyline in the game confirms his death, as it occurred in the original storyline from the manga.

The endings where Kakyoin survives the adventure are in Iggy's and Abdul's storylines. This is because Dio attacks Iggy or Abdul before going after Jotaro, Kakyoin, and Joseph.

Techniques

 * Emerald Splash: Best used as part of a combo. It has shorter range without the Stand activated, but reaches full screen with the Stand activated. The only downside is that the move cannot be integrated into combos in the way 2 in 1 attacks are performed. New Kakyoin's version of this move is reduced in terms of range, reflecting his eye injury in the story.
 * 20m Radius Emerald Splash: The powered-up version of "Emerald Splash." If the opponent doesn't have an active Stand, this inflicts massive chipping damage.
 * Tie Wrap Snake: Used for both offense and defense, this is one of Kakyoin's lesser-known but most feared moves. Without his Stand activated, he can join in and punch the enemy, but with his Stand activated, buttons can be pressed repeatedly to fire emeralds. Expert players can inflict massive damage from just this move alone.
 * Mystic Trap: Can't be sensed until it has been deployed. It can be hit with another Stand attack, but some realize the position of the traps too late. With this technique used in conjunction with specials or super moves, Kakyoin wears down an enemy very quickly, even though the damage is limited.
 * Oshioki no Jikan (Time for Punishment): Demonstrates Hierophant Green's ability to enter an enemy's body. This move is similar to Akuma's Shun Goku Satsu, but with one striking difference - it inflicts damage from within the body. While the damage it inflicts fares lower, the fact that it cannot be blocked and can be incorporated into combos provides a pressure tactic in battle.
 * India's Arm: Hierophant Green's arms can be steered by the player to attack at unique angles and directions. Done without an active Stand, the arms do predefined patterns depending on the button combinations used. (eg. QCB + LA & MA have patterns different from QCB + MA + HA) The move can be used right after a Mystic Trap to juggle an enemy upwards.
 * Hierophant Finish: A combination of Emerald Splashes from different directions that end with a 20m Emerald Splash. The effectiveness of the attack depends on where the enemy is when the move connects. A standing enemy can yield more hits as compared to an enemy juggled by this move.
 * New 20m Emerald Splash: A move only available to New Kakyoin, Mystic Traps appear everywhere, that upon connecting, holds the enemy in place as Kakyoin moves far to the background where he strafes the victim with Emerald Splashes.

Trivia

 * Kakyoin is the only protagonist to wield a long-range stand in part 3, and hence, is the first ever protagonist in the JoJo universe to do so.
 * His favorite fruits are cherries. It seems that the producers of the OVA adaptation overlooked this and replaced Kakyoin's cherry earrings with string-like piercings. Additionally, he has brown hair in the anime instead of the usual pinkish-red hair seen in the videogame, manga and various artwork.
 * His favorite baseball team is the Yomiuri Giants.
 * Amongst other differences, in the OVA, he utilizes a female student instead of the school nurse to attack Jotaro, and their battle occurs in the forest outside the school rather than the school's medical room.
 * Along with Koichi and Giorno, who are voiced by Romi Park. Both Kakyoin and Josuke (Jojolion) are the few characters to have the same voice actor, Mitsuaki Madono, in different games. Mitsuaki Madono dubbed Kakyoin in the "Heritage for the Future" and Josuke in "Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle ".

In Popular Culture

 * It is well known that the shoujo manga group CLAMP are JoJo fans. It is curious to note that in their series Wish, the main character, Kohaku, is an angel who greatly resembles Kakyoin in hairdo and appearance. Ironically, the love interest of said character roughly resembles a hat-less Jotaro. Although the angel is sexless, some fans have speculated this story is a shounen-ai interpretation of the two.
 * Neo, the main character of the Matrix movie trilogy, bears a strong resemblance to Kakyoin after he returns with sunglasses.