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Jujutsu Kaisen Has Outgrown the Shonen Template It Started In

Jujutsu Kaisen review: MAPPA's 59-episode anime about Yuji Itadori and Sukuna's cursed fingers scored 8.6/10, with a dub, soundtrack and film.

By mitch·3 min read
A young jujutsu sorcerer battles a towering shadowy curse spirit in a dramatic anime-style scene.

Jujutsu Kaisen opens with a boy eating a cursed finger, and it never lets him put it down. The anime television series, produced by MAPPA and based on Gege Akutami’s manga, first aired on October 3, 2020, and ran for one season of 59 episodes, ending March 27, 2026. It scores 8.6/10.

Trailer, via Crunchyroll.

Yuji Itadori Swallows the Finger of Ryomen Sukuna

Yuji Itadori is a high school student with tremendous physical strength and a completely ordinary life. That ends when he eats the finger of Ryomen Sukuna to save a classmate attacked by curses. The act takes the curse into his own soul.

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From then on, Itadori shares one body with Sukuna, a legendary and immensely powerful ancient sorcerer. Guided by Satoru Gojo, described as the most powerful of sorcerers, Itadori is admitted to Tokyo Jujutsu High School, an organization that fights the curses.

His mission is grim and specific: find and consume Sukuna’s remaining fingers, then be executed along with Sukuna to prevent a catastrophic threat to the world.

Cursed Energy and the Curses at Tokyo Jujutsu High

The mechanics hold the series together. The sorcerers combat monstrous manifestations of negative human emotions, known as Curses, using a supernatural energy source called Cursed Energy. The premise is a closed loop: a boy becomes a curse to exorcise a curse, a life from which he could never turn back.

That loop is the show’s best invention. Itadori is not a chosen hero who gets to keep what he gains. Every finger he swallows brings his own execution closer.

The Dub, the Soundtrack and Jujutsu Kaisen 0

Release Format Date
Jujutsu Kaisen TV series, 1 season, 59 episodes October 3, 2020 – March 27, 2026
English dub Streaming, via Crunchyroll November 2020
Original soundtrack Album April 2021
Jujutsu Kaisen 0 Film, released by Toho December 2021

Crunchyroll licensed the series for worldwide streaming outside of Asia. The film Jujutsu Kaisen 0 adapts Akutami’s prequel manga and is set before the main series.

The Numbers Behind the Series

  • Score: 8.6/10 (TMDB audience score, 4,645 votes)
  • First aired: October 3, 2020
  • Last aired: March 27, 2026
  • Episodes: 59 across 1 season
  • Genres: Animation, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Action & Adventure
  • Japanese broadcast: MBS, TBS and their JNN affiliates

Where Jujutsu Kaisen Actually Stands

The 59-episode run is the detail that matters most. Jujutsu Kaisen arrived in October 2020 as a fall-season adaptation and turned into a six-year project, with a dub, a soundtrack and a theatrical film folded in along the way. That is a long commitment for a single season.

The weaker part is the premise’s own arithmetic. The series tells you the ending early — Itadori will be executed — and then asks you to care about the search anyway. It mostly earns that, because the Curses are manifestations of negative human emotion rather than generic monsters, and Cursed Energy gives the fights a cost. But the tension lives or dies on whether you accept a hero whose win condition is his own death.

An 8.6/10 is the right number. Jujutsu Kaisen is not a flawless adaptation, and its structure leans hard on a bargain the audience already knows the price of. It is, though, one of the sharper action series of its run, and the film and soundtrack prove the material travels beyond the weekly broadcast.

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