Stardust Crusaders

Stardust Crusaders (スターダストクルセイダース), initially referred to as Dai San Bu Kūjō Jōtarō: Mirai e no Isan (第三部 空条承太郎 ―未来への遺産―), is the third story arc in the Japanese manga series JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. It spans chapters 114-265 of the series, which were collected in volumes 12 to 28 of the Jump Comics tankōbon edition. It is also, by far, the most popular of the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure series as it introduced the audience to the concept of Stands, which made it stand out from its predecessors and has kept the series running since then. This popularity later spawned video games, an anime OVA, future installments to the series, and an English adaptation of the manga currently published by Viz Media.

Plot
Part 3 follows Jotaro Kujo (空条 承太郎 Kūjō Jōtarō), the grandson of Joseph Joestar. Jotaro is a troublesome student given to getting into fights at school and antagonizing his teachers. He is put in prison after beating up three armed men and a trained boxer, but he refuses to leave, claiming he's possessed by an evil spirit. To demonstrate, he takes a gun and shoots himself in the head, but the bullet is stopped by an arm shooting from his hand that only he and his mother Holly can see. Joseph Joestar soon arrives with his friend Mohammed Abdul. A battle ensues between Abdul and Jotaro in which Abdul manifests his own evil spirit, using it to provoke Jotaro out of the cell. Joseph reveals that Jotaro's "evil spirit" is actually a Stand, a manifestation of psychic power. Jotaro's Stand, named Star Platinum, possesses incredible precision and strength; Avdol's Stand, known as Magician's Red, can control fire; Joseph's Stand, Hermit Purple, manifests as thorny vines that allow him to manipulate cameras and other mediums, capturing images from a great distance.

Joseph reveals that Jotaro's and his own Stand, having both manifested recently, appeared because of the reemergence of Dio Brando. When he sank to the bottom of the sea, Dio attached his severed head to Jonathan Joestar's body, using his new body's energy to remain alive. However, Dio's Joestar blood linked him to the rest of the family, and thus when Dio began to develop a Stand, Joseph and Jotaro did as well. Dio vows to destroy the Joestar family and sends a student, Noriaki Kakyoin, to dispose of Jotaro. Kakyoin's Stand, Hierophant Green, possesses a nurse and attacks Jotaro with its Emerald Splash maneuver, but Jotaro defeats him soundly.

It is soon discovered, however, that Holly has developed a Stand. Her Stand appears as ivy growing from her body, but because she lacks the fighting spirit to control it, the strain of its activity begins to slowly kill her. Joseph and Abdul determine that unless they kill Dio within fifty days and thus break his Stand's influence, Holly will die.

Star Platinum's keen eyesight helps the three determine that Dio is somewhere in Egypt. Kakyoin, freed by Jotaro from Dio's mind control, comes along to help the group. On a jetliner the group is ambushed by the insectile stand Tower of Gray, forcing Kakyoin to prove his worth. Jean-Pierre Polnareff, user of the swordsman Stand Silver Chariot, challenges Abdul in Hong Kong but is eventually freed from Dio's control, joining the group to avenge his sister. The heroes take a ship to Singapore but are forced to battle the aquatic Stand Dark Blue Moon, controlled by an assassin who has murdered and impersonated Captain Tennille, who sinks their ship. Accompanied by a stowaway girl, the group boards an abandoned freighter but discover that the entire ship is a Stand called Strength, controlled by an orangutan. Devo the Cursed (Soul Sacrifice in the American version) uses his Stand, Ebony Devil, to accost Polnareff in Singapore, while Rubber Soul and his Yellow Temperance impersonate Kakyoin before attempting to consume Jotaro. In Calcutta they encounter the team of Hol Horse, user of a gun Stand called the Emperor, and J. Geil, the man with two right hands and the user of the Hanged Man, a Stand of light that attacks from mirrors. Polnareff avenges his sister by slaying her murderer, J. Geil, but Abdul is apparently killed by Hol Horse, who flees the scene.

Joseph is infected with a boil that turns out to be the Empress, a Stand controlled by Nena, but outsmarts the cancerous foe. En route to Pakistan the party battles Wheel of Fortune, a car Stand controlled by ZZ. Enya Geil, mother of J, attempts to use her stand (Justice) in an attempt to avenge her son, sending an army of animated dead after Polnareff and Jotaro. In Karachi, Steely Dan (Rubber Soul in the American version) uses The Lovers to hold Joseph hostage, forcing Jotaro into the role of personal manservant. Arabia Fats, user of The Sun, attempts to thwart the group in the Arabian desert but is discovered and easily defeated. The group is soon saddled with the baby Mannish Boy, who uses his Stand, Death 13, to attack in dreams. Only through Kakyoin's quick thinking does the group survive Death 13's dreamworld. On an island in the Red Sea Polnareff is accosted by the genie Stand Judgment, but Abdul returns and saves the day. Abdul appropriates a submarine, but the vehicle is infiltrated by the High Priestess, a Stand controlled by Midler that can take the form of anything metallic; however, Star Platinum's power proves a simple but effective counter.

Upon arriving in Abu Simbel the heroes are joined by Iggy, a Boston Terrier and the user of The Fool, a simple but powerful Stand of sand. They are immediately attacked by the blind Stand user N'Dour, who attacks with Geb, a Stand of water and the first of the nine Egyptian god Stands; he is able to slash through Kakyoin's eyes before he is defeated by Jotaro and Iggy. Oingo and Boingo, users of the face-altering stand Khnum and the future-predicting comic book Thoth respectively, attempt to defeat the heroes, but Oingo is incapacitated without the heroes even knowing he was there. Anubis, a sword with a Stand, possesses a farmer named Chaka, a barber named Khan, and then Polnareff, nearly killing Jotaro. Mariah, the sultry user of Bast, magnetizes Joseph and Abdul and leads them on a wild goose chase. Polnareff and Silver Chariot are reduced to children by Seth, the Stand of the child-abuser Alessi. Later, the group encounters Daniel J. D'Arby, who offers information if they gamble with him, but when Polnareff and Joseph lose, D'Arby's Stand, Osiris, transforms their souls into poker chips. Only by laying everything on the line can Jotaro hope to defeat the gambler, which he does successfully. In Cairo the group meets Hol Horse again, who has partnered himself with Boingo, resulting in one memorable chapter revolving on the concept of a "prophecy going awry without contradicting itself". Later, Iggy battles Pet Shop, Dio's pet falcon and the user of the ice-slinging Stand Horus. Kakyoin returns soon afterwards, his eyesight mostly recovered.

The doorway to Dio's mansion is guarded by Terence Trent D'Arby, younger brother of D'Arby the Gambler. His Stand, Atum, steals Kakyoin's soul after a round of video games, but despite D'Arby's mind games Jotaro is able to outwit him. Meanwhile, Polnareff, Iggy, and Abdul easily dispose of Kenny G, whose Tenor Sax Stand creates an illusory maze. Abdul is then killed by an invisible force that is revealed as Dio's henchman, Vanilla Ice, whose Stand, Cream, swallows itself into another dimension and instantly obliterates anything its sphere of destruction touches. Ice, who killed himself for Dio but was revived by Dio's blood, is able to nearly eliminate Polnareff, but a valiant maneuver by Iggy allows Polnareff to ultimately win. Unfortunately, this results in Iggy's death. Meanwhile, Jotaro, Joseph, and Kakyoin encounter Nukesaku, the Idiot, but easily defeat him.

Though wounded and alone, Polnareff confronts Dio but is confounded by the vampire's powers. When the four surviving heroes are reunited they climb to Dio's tower with the Idiot in tow, but when the Idiot opens the casket he inexplicably ends up mutilated inside it. Dio chases Joseph and Kakyoin across Cairo until Kakyoin, at the price of his life, discovers that Dio's Stand, The World, is able to stop time. With most of his friends dead or injured, Jotaro confronts Dio. Though The World has a huge advantage in the ability to stop time, Jotaro nearly defeats Dio, but the vampire restores himself by draining Joseph's blood, becoming even stronger. Finally Dio attempts to finish off Jotaro by crushing him with a steamroller, forcing Jotaro to use Star Platinum in ways he never thought possible.

After Dio is defeated, Jotaro oversees a blood transfusion from the remains of Dio, which lies next to the newly deceased Joseph. As a result, Joseph is resurrected.

English adaptation
Viz Media began publishing an English adaptation of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure in 2005, which begins the series with the Stardust Crusaders arc. The English edition is edited by Jason Thompson, author of Manga: The Complete Guide. As of April 2010, fourteen volumes have been published.

Minor edits were made to artwork where certain scenes of animal violence were redrawn by Hirohiko Araki for the English release. Volume 3 of the English edition features a single panel of a dog being decapitated which was redrawn from an alternate angle, and Japanese volume 18 (volume 6) has several redrawn panels where a mutilated dog was changed into a large rat. Some names were altered for the English release, presumably for copyright reasons. The character named Devo was changed entirely, and the names Oingo and Boingo were changed to Zenyatta and Mondatta after the Police album, Zenyatta Mondatta.

Protagonists and allies

 * Jotaro Kujo
 * The protagonist. His Stand is the Star Platinum.


 * Holly Kujo/Joestar
 * The daughter of Joseph and Suzi Q. Joestar, and mother of Jotaro Kujo. Her sweet charm known by all, Holly is a caring and passionate individual who believes in her son deeply, proud of the compassion that he has shown to others, as evidenced by her narration involving him in the beginning chapter. Formerly Holly Joestar, she moved to Japan at some point in time and has lived there since then for twenty years. She later met and married Sadao Kujo, a Japanese jazz musician and Jotaro's father. Sadao is never seen in the series because he's always on tour, leaving Holly to raise Jotaro herself, which she doesn't seem to mind at all. She is also known as "Seiko" in Japan as it's her Japanese name.
 * After her father's arrival and with her son "freed" from jail, Holly soon learns of the vampire Dio Brando's resurrection and his possession of her great-grandfather's (Jonathan Joestar) body. This eventually leads to the awakening of her unnamed Stand; although most Stands are used for fighting, this Stand worked against Holly's gentle, non-violent soul and slowly made her ill, nearly ending her life by the ending volumes. It takes on the form of vines with roses, very much similar to her father's, Joseph Jostar's Stand, Hermit Purple. Calling Holly's Stand an actual "Stand" is being very generous because it works against its user, barely moves at all, and so far as we know, has no abilities or powers, so it could just be considered a Stand-like infection. A woman who loves her family, she came to deliberately lying about her illness so as to lessen their worry. Her ailing condition later becomes the catalyst for Jotaro and company's quest to Egypt. After Dio's defeat, she is last seen as finally cured of her sickness, back to her feet and once more the loving person she is.


 * Joseph Joestar
 * Jotaro's grandfather. His Stand is Hermit Purple.


 * Mohammed Avdol
 * An ally of Jotaro. His Stand is Magician's Red.


 * Noriaki Kakyoin
 * An ally of Jotaro. His Stand is Hierophant Green.


 * Jean Pierre Polnareff
 * An ally of Jotaro. His Stand is Silver Chariot.


 * Iggy
 * An ally of Jotaro. His Stand is The Fool.


 * The Runaway Girl
 * She first appears in the manga as a stowaway on the cruise ship that Captain Tennille's impersonater had abducted. Posing first as a boy, her identity is revealed when she threatens to cut one of the crew members. She jumps off the ship in an attempt to swim for safety and is begrudgingly saved by Jotaro. After being saved, she admits having running away from her parents in Hong Kong, though the group is more concerned about dropping her off and they do not listen. Despite stern warnings from Joseph about their journey, she tags along with the team for several times afterwards — possibly due to her crush on Jotaro and "having nothing else better to do."

Antagonists

 * Gray Fly
 * An old man, known for carrying out mass killings disguised as accidents. He wields the Stand known as Tower of Gray, which resembles a large beetle. The Stand is faster than even Star Platinum, and kills its victims by cutting out their tongues using its extend-able jaws.


 * Captain Tennille's impersonator
 * An agent of Dio who kills a ship's captain and takes his place to trick Jotaro and friends. His Stand is Dark Blue Moon, an underwater Stand reminiscent of "The Creature from the Black Lagoon". The name "Captain Tennille" is named from the pop artist Captain and Tennille


 * Forever
 * An Orangutan whose Stand is Strength, a Cargo Ship/Freighter that Forever has free control over. Once it is defeated, the ship reverts back to a small fishing/cruise boat, giving the group the understanding that the Stand's real power was influence over the boat to resemble something more "powerful".


 * Devo the Cursed
 * A Native American shaman who works as an assassin for hire. To aid him in his craft, he employs the Ebony Devil Stand, the strength and ferocity of which correlates with its user's raw hatred for his or her opponent. To enkindle such a grudge, Devo goads his victims into attacking and injuring him. He then leaves the immediate area, letting his Stand assault the victim at a later, unguarded moment. Though this strategy has earned Devo countless scars, none of his targets has ever survived his retribution, nor been able to relay any information on the nature of his powers. For this reason, it is said that they have succumbed to a curse. Due to his proficiency, Devo's services are sought after by politicians, police forces, military officials and Mafia dons alike. Like many of the series' antagonists, Devo displays sadistic tendencies, streaks of insanity and unhealthy levels of confidence in his abilities. He appears to take pride in his principle of never allowing a slight to go unpunished, and it is clear that he pursues his career for purposes of blood-thirst as much as monetary gain. He is named after the New Wave group "Devo".


 * Rubber Soul
 * A user of the Yellow Temperance Stand, which allows him to devour flesh, enlarge himself, and assume any form. He first appears diguised as Noriaki Kakyoin where (unknown to Jotaro at the time) his strange behavior makes Jotaro punch him, which causes a seemingly unremovable glob to attach to Jotaro's hand; neither ice nor fire can remove it. As the two engage in a battle inside a cable car again, Jotaro breaks the bottom of the cable car, drowns Rubber Soul in the lake underneath so that Rubber Soul is forced to deactivate his Stand to breath, thus removes Jotaro's glob. Jotaro threatens Rubber Soul to give information about Dio's squad, which Rubber Soul knows little about. However, Rubber Soul manages to reach the land nearby and sends Yellow Temperance through a manhole to noose Jotaro. Jotaro counters by blocking the entire manhole, sending water pressure back to Rubber Soul, drowns him once again and beats him to the depths. A running gag in the chapters is Rubber Soul's unusual taste for fruits and other living beings. Before his identity is being discovered, he eats cherries by rolling them with his tongue and making "rero rero" sounds. Later after Jotaro defeats Rubber Soul he finds out that the real Kakyoin likes to play with cherries in the same manner. Rubber Soul is a playable character in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Heritage for the Future. He is disguised as Noriaki for the most of the time, and has some similar moves as Noriaki does. The major differences are that Rubber Soul does not have a stand mode, and that he is not as fast as Noriaki is to deliver large combo, and he is voiced by the same seiyū as Noriaki. Rubber Soul is named after The Beatles album, "Rubber Soul".


 * Hol Horse
 * An arrogant cowboy and the wielder of the Emperor Stand, which takes the form of a revolver. Upon being fired, the Emperor can control the bullet's flight path, allowing it to turn in midair. He, however, prefers to operate with a partner, as his Stand is fairly weak and not effective without backup. While originally seen working with J. Geil, he later becomes partners with Boingo. Despite his arrogance, Hol Horse prefers to see himself as a "No.2 kind of guy" rather than a "No.1 kind of guy". He is named after the hip-hop group Full Force.


 * J. Geil
 * A user of The Hanged Man, a light-based, knife-wielding zombie Stand that only appears in reflective surfaces, within which it is immune to attack, J. Geil is a deformed man with two right hands. He is also a hated rival of Jean-Pierre Polnareff, whose sister he raped and murdered. He is named after the musical group The J. Geils Band.


 * Nena
 * A villain who uses the Empress Stand. Nena appears in earlier chapters as a woman in love with Hol Horse (during his and J. Geil's introduction). She is not seen again until the end of Hol Horse's first confrontation with the group, where she poses a distraction so that Hol Horse can make his escape (which he does).  From here, the group (sans Avdol) escort her to town, and it is around this time that she uses her stand.  The ability of her stand consists of contracting blood (a drop is all that is needed) onto a host, where it then grows into a body of its own until the host body is completely assimilated/taken over.  Joseph Joestar, being the unfortunate candidate, parades through town with the Empress stand growing on his arm;  first as a drop of blood, then into a face, and throughout the final portion of the confrontation as a smaller body. With Joseph not aware of who the stand user is, he decidedly fights directly with the stand itself. Once he dispatches and kills the stand, the Stand user appears as Nena herself, or rather a small, fat lady hiding inside the body of what was known as Nena. It is unknown where the stand user recovered the body of Nena as disguise, but there is speculation that the body of Nena was the last host to have been fully assimilated by the Empress stand. She is named after the artist of the same name.


 * ZZ
 * A user of the Wheel of Fortune Stand, which takes the form of an old car. He ambushes the protagonists on the road to Pakistan, attacking with super-strength, projectile gasoline droplets, and by transforming his car into a fanged monstrosity capable of tunneling through or climbing through rock. After his defeat it is revealed that the old car the Stand looks like is really an even more ancient jalopy without Wheel of Fortune's influence, and that he is puny with only his arms muscled, the latter being the reason why he appeared strong when he gave hand signals in the car. ZZ is named for the rock band "ZZ Top".


 * Enya Geil
 * An ancient woman with two right hands, the mother of J. Geil and an apparent confidante of Dio Brando. She was responsible for granting him the power of the Stand. Her own stand, Justice, takes the form of a massive mist, which can take control of anyone with an open wound, allowing Enya to control them as she would a puppet. Enya is named after the artist of the same name. In the anime, she is also able to use her mist to morph her appearance into an attractive woman. Her dual transformations were used to wound Hol Horse and trick Polnareff. Her stand was also able to craft the entire city that the group rested at, disappearing to reveal a barren desert. The tweaked English-manga name (Enyaba Geil) may be an oblique reference to both the artist Enya and the Swedish pop group ABBA.


 * Steely Dan
 * Named after the band of the same name, he is an attractive and arrogant man and the user of The Lovers Stand, which he admits is the weakest stand of all. The Stand is a microscopic insect, which enters Joseph Joestar's ear and taps into the pain receptors of his brain, causing any pain inflicted upon Dan to be felt by Joseph tenfold. He orders Jotaro to follow him and do demanding tasks as the others dealt with his stand inside Joseph's brain. Once it was defeated, Jotaro throttled him severely.


 * Arabia Fats
 * A Stand user who ambushes the protagonists in the Arabian desert. His Stand, The Sun, is capable of generating overwhelming heat waves and focus such waves into lasers. He was defeated when the protagonists see that the scenery is a mirror image and that he was hiding behind a little air conditioned station covered with mirrors. His name is not mentioned in comics.


 * Mannish Boy
 * A Stand user named after the Muddy Waters song Mannish Boy. He appears to be a small baby of diabolical intelligence, deceiving the protagonists by behaving as an innocent child. His first sets of teeth are fangs, which often disturb the people around him. He is the user of Death 13, a sickle-wielding clown stand that appears in and manipulates dreams. Kakyoin manages to defeat him and, as punishment, has him be fed some of his own feces (unknown to the other as he slipped it into his baby food when they weren't looking).


 * Cameo
 * Named after the R&B group of the same name. Cameo is a Stand user who conceals himself underground while attacking. He is a user of the Judgement Stand, which appears as a genie capable of resurrecting people in clay form. He used this ability to attack Polnareff by "granting" his wish of bringing Abdul and his sister back to life. His stand has a habit of saying "Hail 2 U" after most of its sentences. He antagonizes Polnareff for the most part until Abdul returns and defeats him.


 * Midler
 * Named after Bette Midler, she is a Stand user never seen except waist-down in two frames of the manga. Her stand is The High Priestess, which can take the form of anything utilizing the metals and minerals around it. Causing trouble for the heroes as they traveled in a submarine. When Capcom produced their JoJo fighting game, they wanted to use Midler, but because her face was never shown, they asked Araki to redesign her into something like a belly-dancer.


 * N'Dour
 * A Stand user named after Youssou N'Dour, a Senegalese artist. He appears as a blind man leaning on a cane and uses his sensitive hearing to track his opponent. His Stand is Geb, an extremely fast stand of water. After his defeat he committed suicide, shooting himself through the head with a high-pressure water jet, lest he "slips" any secret of Dio to protagonists.


 * Oingo and Boingo
 * These two brothers are named after the group Oingo Boingo. Oingo is the (often overconfident) elder brother and the user of the Stand Khnum, which allows him to change his face at will. Boingo, the introverted younger brother, is the user of Thoth, a Stand that takes the form of a fortune-telling comic book. Oingo attempted to kill Jotaro Kujo two times: first by poisoning Jotaro's tea, and then by making him eat a bomb that looked like an orange but Polnareff threw the bomb out of the car in the direction of Oingo and it went off. After Oingo's defeat, Boingo teams up with Hol Horse to avenge his brother (even if this was forcible on Hol Horse's part). Hol Horse's intricate shot guided by Boingo through series of tubes was foiled because Hol Horse's watch was off a couple of minutes when directed to fire at a certain time. In the Viz translation the brothers are named Zenyatta and Mondatta, after The Police album "Zenyatta Mondatta".


 * Anubis
 * A Stand encased within a sword, that has no user. The original user — an Egyptian swordsmith named Caravan Serai, whose name is not mentioned in comics — died nearly 500 years ago, but his Stand lived on, bound into one of his scimitar. It is capable of cutting through anything like butter, possessing its wielders (Chaka and Khan), and memorizing any attack it experiences. It claims that it can never lose to an opponent more than once. It possesses a variety of people including Polnareff until finally most of it is destroyed and the rest is fling into the Nile.


 * Mariah
 * A user of the Bast Stand, which inflicts an increasingly powerful magnetic charge upon a victim. She appears as a long-legged woman in a miniskirt and a hood. She magnetizes Joseph and Avdol attracting metal upon then and even into each other, giving them all sorts of problems. The two managed to outsmart her by manuvering her in between them then have their metal cluttered bodies slam into her, breaking her bones in the process. Mariah is named from American singer Mariah Carey.


 * Alessi
 * A user of the Stand Sethan, a stand that appears as a shadow with two glaring oval eyes at a pointed head. Its name may derive after the Egyptian God Set.  The stand's ability transforms anyone who steps on the shadow to become younger the longer they stand on the shadow, even to the extreme point of becoming a fetus as was the case with an unfortunate victim (In the case of Joseph however, he merely changed back to his youthful appearance found in the second story arc of the series). Alessi is a cowardly man who prefers to battle children because he knows that he can win easily. However Polnareff manages to outsmart and wound him causing him to flee. He ran right into Jotaro, who he manages to de-age, but Jotaro just punched him in the face, knocking him out. Alessi is named from American duo Alessi Brothers.


 * Daniel J. D'Arby
 * A compulsive gambler, a proficient poker player, and excels at cheating. His Stand is Osiris, which transforms the soul of D'Arby's defeated opponent into a poker chip, and gives D'Arby himself an almost superhuman sense of touch. He plays Jotaro in a Poker game after beating Polnareff and Joseph. Jotaro bluffs him into a nervous breakdown, causing him to forfeit the game in the process.


 * Pet Shop
 * Named after the British group Pet Shop Boys. He is a large falcon set by Dio Brando to guard his mansion. Pet Shop is a user of the Horus Stand, which is a skeletal pterodactyl-like stand that attacks with large projectiles made of ice. He gets into a lengthy fight to the death against Iggy and is killed by him, but not before cutting off one of Iggy's paws.


 * Terence Trent D'Arby
 * Daniel's younger brother, and the keeper of Dio's mansion. His stand is Atum, a stand that (like his brother Daniel), allows the soul of his defeated opponent to transform/migrate to whatever he wishes; rather than his brother's use of poker chips, he prefers to transfer his captured souls into life-like dolls (as they allow the souls to talk back). However, instead of using the method of gambling to capture souls like his brother, he prefers the use of videogames. He also, unlike his brother, prefers to keep an honest game, and discourages cheating.  Maybe it is because of this attitude that his stand Atum gives him an almost superhuman sense of ESP, where he can read the truth of other's minds using Yes or No questions.
 * After beating Kakyoin, he plays Jotaro in a baseball game. He has the upper hand for the most part, but Jotaro soon starts doing different actions despite his predictions. Like his brother, he loses his cool and subconsciously forfeits the game. Ironically, he was outsmarted because the Joestars used cheating to beat him (Joseph was actually playing the game controller using his Stand)


 * Kenny G
 * He uses the Stand known as Tenor Sax, which creates an illusory maze inside Dio Brando's mansion. His maze is easily defeated by Iggy's smelling ability. Kenny is named after Jazz artist Kenny G, and his stand is named after one of his occasional instrument, a Tenor saxophone, though his stand's name in never mentioned in comics.


 * Vanilla Ice
 * Named after the rapper of the same name. He is Dio Brando's most loyal henchman. He uses the Cream Stand, which is capable of creating an invisible, spherical void after devouring itself and Vanilla Ice (much like an ouroboros). Vanilla can control the sphere, which is capable of free flight. If any part of an object or being touches the sphere, that part is irrevocably gone, sucked into the void and vaporized. Unfortunately he is unable to see or hear anything inside the void, so he has to at least partially come out to check the exterior. He proves his loyalty to Dio by cutting his own head off as per Dio's request. Satisfied with this display and unhappy with his loyalty gone without justified merit, Dio repays him by resurrecting him into a vampire using his own blood. He fights against Polnareff, Avdol and Iggy. Killing the latter two in battle before being defeated, his new vampirism ultimately being his downfall. In the game, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure his name is changed to Iced; losing the pun of Vanilla Ice Cream as well as to avoid a possible lawsuit from the rapper of the same name.


 * Nukesaku
 * A minor vampire with the ability to grow a face on the back of his head. It is not certain whether this is because of a Stand, or is simply a vampiric bio-organic power.


 * Dio Brando
 * The main antagonist. Uses the Stand The World, which stops time. It has been said that The World was originally meant to have the powers of all the stands, but whether this remains to be true or not is unknown; however, it is shown in the beginning chapters that Dio also is shown to be using a form of Hermit Purple (like Joseph) to spy on Joseph and Jotaro using a photo. Whether this is because of the original purpose of the World's powers, or another purpose entirely is left to the readers.  However, another contention to this is that The World could be a Stand that wields the powers of all the Stands within the Joestar bloodline.

Related media
The Stardust Crusaders arc has been adapted into a fighting game by Capcom, simply titled JoJo's Bizarre Adventure in 1997. It was released internationally as JoJo's Venture, which predated the English adaptations of the manga and anime (hence the different title). It was followed by an upgraded version, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Heritage for the Future. The international version this time retained the manga's full title of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, dropping the Heritage for the Future subtitle. The upgraded version was ported to the PlayStation and Dreamcast.

There was also an RPG adaptation for the Super Famicom, produced in 1993 by Winkysoft.

A six-episode OVA series was produced by Studio APPP in 1993, covering the later parts of the arc, followed by a seven-episode prequel series in 2003 covering the beginning of the story. Media Blasters produced an English version of the anime, which were released in the order of the fictional chronology.

Controversy
In May 2008, both Shueisha and Studio A.P.P.P halted anime/manga shipments of JoJo after a complaint had been launched against them, claiming that the series depicts Muslims as terrorists. A scene in the anime had accidentally used pages from the Qur'an in a book read by the villain; the pages are not depicted in the manga, but Shueisha is taking a close look at scenes that might depict mosques. Unfortunately, this recall affected the English edition of the arc as well, causing Viz Media and Shueisha to cease publication for a year, even though the manga did not feature such scenes. However, Viz resumed publication a year later, with the eleventh volume being published on April 7, 2009, and thus publication of the English language edition has been continued since then.