Key takeaways
- Evil Eye in Dandadan is a curse spirit that causes death on eye contact.
- Dandadan combines action, comedy, romance and supernatural elements effectively.
- Jiji in Dandadan fights the evil eye spirit within him by controlling hot water.
Yukinobu Tatsu's Dandadan has a unique blend of both sci-fi and supernatural elements that feed humans' long-documented obsession with “that which is not of our world”, and therefore borrows many of its concepts from urban legends, folklore and the vast number of unexplained phenomena and events that it has been speculated about for a very long time.
One such concept is the evil eye, a concept held across a number of geographical regions including the Mediterranean, the Levant, Asia, Africa and the Caribbean, all of which have an account of a curse brought upon a target by means of a malevolent glare. What is the evil eye in? Dandadanand how does the concept in the series differ from its perception in reality?
FAMILY
Dandadan and how to make a great premiere
Sometimes hectic, other times human and earnest, Dandadan gets off to a great start that will have you locked in for a long time.
What exactly is the evil eye?
Curse of Evil Intent
The evil eye is a curse that people have believed in since prehistoric times, and it involves a malevolent glare (you know, like glaring “daggers” at someone?) that is thrown at someone. The inspiration behind such a curse is usually jealousy, which is why it is a fairly common idea to delay telling people good news until sometime in the past to prevent envious individuals from casting the evil eye and thus doing what the cool kids would describe as “blocking your blessings”. Talismans or artefacts created to protect against this curse are believed to date back as far as 5000 years ago, and the most famous include the nazar, a gem or amulet fashioned after an eye, which looks like this🧿; and also that Hamsa/kHamsaalso known as the Hand of Fatima, a palm-shaped amulet representing the five fingers of the hand commonly used as a wall decoration and a well-known protective charm against the evil eye.
The association of the gaze or eyes with misfortune has been represented in different cultures in widely different ways; for example, the story of the Gorgon Medusa tells of an evil monster that takes the form of a woman with snakes for hair with which eye contact leads to petrification. The eyes have also been considered “windows to the soul” throughout history, possibly in part because of their function as a primary way in which humans take in information from the world, and also for their role in the myriad facial expressions that humans have in their repertoire that communicate important information about how a person is feeling or what they are thinking.
In Dandadan
A childish malignant spirit
Jashi, known in English as the Evil Eye, is a yokai bound to Tsuchinoko sacrificial house. Jin Enjoji, better known as Jiji, Momo's childhood friend, unknowingly lived in a house bound to a giant earthworm monster to which a certain family had been secretly sacrificing people for over two centuries to keep the nearby volcano dormant. The evil eye is a spirit bound to the house Jiji lived in with his parents, one that had become the sacrificial altar. Originally, the Evil Eye was a young boy whose entire life was spent in solitude and captivity only to end up being sacrificed to the volcano. Since then, the boy's spirit remained bound to the place of his death for several years until at some point a house was built over it and a new family moved in. Their young boy could see the ghost, but his parents could not. The family's stay ended when the parents committed suicide as a result of the psychological effects of it Tsuchinoko earthworm monster, which would drive the house's inhabitants to suicide.
When it was decided that the child would also be sacrificed, the evil eye became enraged, took over the boy's body and vowed to kill anyone responsible for the human sacrifices that had taken place. IN Dandadanis the evil eye an evil spirit that causes anyone who makes eye contact with it to kill themselves, making it a similar type of entity to Tsuchinoko. While it had protected Jiji from the psychic waves Tsuchinokothe evil eye finally wanted to possess Jiji, who possesses immense spiritual energy and athleticism, and use his body to destroy humanity. Momo and Okarun soon discover that Jiji can regain control of his body if hot water is poured on him, and the evil eye takes over when a non-hot liquid comes into contact with him (it's like Ranma 1/2). After seeing its memories, Jiji empathized with it and its deep desire to play with other children, but likely due to its long quest for revenge, its idea of play and violence have become intertwined. Okarun promises to entertain its bloodlust once a week if it promises to only fight him and let Jiji control its own body.
Based on Yukinobu Tatsu's popular manga that debuted in 2021 on Shonen Jump+, Dandadan blends action, comedy, romance, and supernatural suspense to create a unique and satisfying adventure. Momo Ayase and Ken Takakura believe in the extraordinary, although the former believes in ghosts and the latter believes in aliens. Determined to confirm their side's existence, they set out to find their evidence.