A War of Reason vs Instinct

An Analysis Thread on Yuji vs Mahito

(MANGA SPOILERS)

#JujutsuKaisen #yujiitadori #mahito

"The instincts of a curse, against the so called dignity obtained by human reason. It's a battle to determine who will be left standing in 100 years".

-Mahito chapter 126

This eternal battle between Sorcerer and Curse has been a problem long before this clash ever came to be. But a certain Getou Suguru knew in advance the circumstances would worsen and tried to end this vicious cycle. However, with him failing fate inevitably took place-

These centuries of conflict between these two beings worsened and these two characters' conflict may be the literal manifestation and worst fear Getou envisioned of the result of this never ending battle.

Throughout the story of Jujutsu Kaisen, both Yuji and Mahito have been geniusly intertwined into a war of ideologies and in this thread, I want to highlight this conflict in dedicated sections discussing this conflict in detail.

1. Yuji and Mahito as characters

2. Their impact on each other

3. Their parallels

4. Mahito's downfall

Yuji-

Yuji is a fairly carefree, genuine, sometimes airheaded, but extremely determined guy usually giving the vibe of your usual teenager

However, Yuji is plagued with a profound sense of loneliness only really having his grandfather in his life to look and care for but it is his grandfathers last words that light a spark within Yuji and will stick with him for the rest of his life.

Yuji's newfound purpose ignited a strong sense of duty to use his god given strength to protect those in need, and give those people a natural and peaceful death so in return when he dies one day he may receive a natural peaceful one surrounded by those he loves as well.

Mahito-

Mahito is as if not more carefree than Yuji, while having a very child like persona and inner thoughts being a newborn curse growing in power even faster than Yuji in each altercation and even being compared to Gojo in his playful personality in the middle of combat.

However, he is very violent, sadistic, psychotic, manipulative, while still being strategetic, unfeeling, and calculative. Being a curse he fully detests logic or reasoning over the feelings and impulses of a cursed spirit feeling that it is just a restriction and doesn't matter-

In the grand scheme of life because in his eyes, all life *including his* (REMEMBER THIS) is meaningless, an insignificant speck of dust, and that the lives of humans are his to play with like dolls on a string to deepen his understanding of his cursed technique and his soul.

Individual Impact-

Now First, Mahito since he is the easiest to discuss on this topic. Yuji is responsible for the majority of Mahito's evolutions due to being pushed to his limit, being forced to evolve like the species he's based on when put in do or die situations-

compared to Yuji, for Mahito Yuji was nothing but a stepping stone to achieving a higher goal, polishing his cursed technique and his understanding of the soul to perfection and at full potential would have most likely spelled death for all sorcerers.

Now, for Yuji.

At the start of the Junpei arc Yuji confessed to Junpei that he wasn't very fond of the idea of killing people, it made him sick to his stomach as if the meaning and value of life would become ambiguous and he would lose himself and the teachings his grandfather-

passed onto him. However, after decepting and murdering Junpei right before Yuji's eyes Mahito and Sukuna showed Yuji a dose of reality laughing in his face as he screamed and pleaded for his friend's life showing cursed spirits cannot be reasoned with logic or emotion and are-

cold blooded killers establishing themselves truly as an antagonistic force. To add insult to injury this event made Yuji so angry, so furious he completely discarded what he previously said and said to a curse just not any curse but a *HUMAN* curse that he would *KILL* it-

Even Mahito himself corrected this just showing how angry and enraged Yuji became at that moment.

OK, Shibuya

What Mahito did to Yuji here was nothing less than a deconstruction of Yuji's already broken resolve, ideals and dreams of dying surrounded by others. Mahito picked and pried at every little bit of resolve Yuji had left in every action leaving Yuji feeling helpless-

Killing Nanami and both Kugisaki right before his eyes, he could take no more of it and Yuji began to have a mental breakdown through Mahito's actions through the story he not only directly took from Yuji's goal of helping others but also his goal of dying around those he loves-

This also means Mahito was directly taking away from Yuji's choice in how he wanted to die in having a natural peaceful death.

Mahito took quite literally everything left from Yuji at this point. Mahito beat and barraged him with insults in how his resolve wasn't enough and how his comrade's deaths could've been avoided if he had done better and come to Shibuya with more resolve.

But however, when a certain bruza stepped onto the stage did the tides change. Todo told Yuji the burden that they as jujutsu sorcerers must endure and must see things through till the end for their lost comrades reinforcing Yuji's resolve to finally exorcise Mahito and this war.

Parallels-

I see many people get confused on these lines that Mahito is saying here and immediately writes it off as "a generic villain line" and this is certainly not the case. What Mahito means here is that they're 2 direct counters of each other like the night and day.

He means that they are both walls that must overcome each other to reach greater heights. Mahito kills indiscriminately guilty or innocent, Yuji saves indiscriminately guilty or innocent, Mahito kills for the sake of killing, Yuji saves for the sake of saving-

Mahito kills on a journey for self discovery while Yuji does the same vice versa. Yuji prioritizes life while mahito discards it. This all comes back around to the major Theme of life in this series and what it means to these two individuals-

how it molds them, and makes them whole, happy, and content but also makes them clash.

Mahito’s Downfall-

Mahito has never truly been BEATEN on a physical or ideological level yes, he’s come across a few close calls but nothing has ever really turned the tables on him at least not like this.

After Mahito has exhausted all of his options Yuji says something that personally will forever stick with me with his character. He accepts reality, realizes Mahito was right in his assumption that they were one in “the same” and realizes he’s nothing but a cog in a machine in-

Mahito has always been in control of the situation, hunting his prey killing whoever he desired whenever trapping them like a rabbit. Junpei, Nanami, Nobara, Kokichi, thousands of others. He was described by Jogo to be “The mirror of death” for humans-

Mahito stated himself he saw no worth in his own life and said many times that it doesn't matter and was as well insignificant.

But… why when confronted with death he runs in fear? It’s a clear contradiction because obviously his desperation shows how he’s not prepared to die. This is honestly in my opinion a brilliant move be Akutami Gege making mahito in his last moments a poetic hypocrite.

To add poetic justice to the injury Kenjaku (the brain) absorbs mahito and does what he did to many others… Manipulated, Used, and then Discarded.

Welp, that's the end of the thread if you enjoyed leave a like or a follow I put a lot of work into this and too much time tbh.....

sauce for the gif btw yall should watch