Jo Amon (亜門 丈, Amon Jō) is a recurring minor antagonist in the Yakuza series introduced in the original Yakuza. He is the second leader of the Amon Clan, after his father So Amon, and the most recurring member featured in Kazuma Kiryu's saga.
Appearance
Jo matches Kiryu in build as a result of his rigorous training. He has short black hair slicked back and has prominent sideburns. His face is in a nearly constant scowl, just like the rest of the Amon Clan. Per Minamida's account, Jo has numerous scars across his body. In Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, he uses Shin Amon's character model for unknown reasons.
Attire
Jo's signature all-black attire consists of a car coat worn over a dress shirt, pants, and dress shoes. He is always seen with his trademark aviator sunglasses. In Yakuza 0, he also wears a dark gray fedora similar to Sango Amon's.
History
Yakuza 0
For Jo's first mission as an Amon Clan member, he is ordered by his father, So Amon, to battle and defeat Goro Majima. While considering various ways to greet Majima, Majima suddenly arrives. Jo proceeds to explain the situation, and Majima accepts the fight.
After an intense battle, Jo is defeated by Majima. With the shame of failing his first mission, Jo requests to be killed by Majima; however, Majima denies, causing Jo to feel shamed even further. Before departing, Jo promises he will train for the next 17 years, claims that Majima will regret letting him live, and that someone stronger will regret it even more.
Yakuza/Yakuza Kiwami
In his first appearance, Jo is a hidden boss, only encountered after completing every substory successfully. As he believes himself to be the sole master of this world, he challenges Kazuma Kiryu to a duel, but loses, which then sparks a rivalry between the two.
Yakuza 2/Yakuza Kiwami 2
In Yakuza 2, Jo employs the services of his three apprentices Kazuya, Jiro, and Sango in order to attack and defeat Kazuma Kiryu. However (and arguably expectant that they'd lose) he assaults Sotaro Komaki and steals his scroll of secret arts waiting for Kiryu at the pier having apparently mastered the arts of the scroll. When Kiryu appears before him he reveals that he trained in Mexico, the Himalayas and swam 10 laps on Iceland's frozen cliffs. Eventually and despite his arsenal of attacks he is unable to fully master the Komaki style's ultimate techniques and is defeated. He then returns the scroll to Kiryu.
Yakuza Kiwami 2
While the story is the same, Jo is found in the lobby of the Millennium Tower rather than the pier. He now changes his way of attacking to four different katana (Sakura Fubuki/Lightsaber/Red Lightsaber/Two Lightsaber style), and he can also throw grenades to stop a combo. Additionally, after beating him, he can be found on the roof of Serena to be recruited into Majima Construction, and can be refought in the Coliseum.
Yakuza 3
Jo's obsession with Kiryu reaches its peak and he contracts the services of Dr. Minamida in order to develop his game machine, giving him the blueprints needed. Minamida then creates his virtual device which Jo wanted in order to play the game itself and adapt the techniques of Kiryu and of several of Jo's already faced enemies, showing monstrous levels of proficiency that scared Minamida, with the machine being made with the sole purpose of helping him defeat Kiryu.
After Minamida witnesses Jo killing a man he had hired Minamida knew he'd be killed next and thus escaped into Kamurocho knowing Jo wouldn't follow since Kiryu would be there. Upon meeting the real Kiryu he was joyed that he could find salvation and had Kiryu play his game.
Eventually Minamida tells the truth to Kiryu but the two are interrupted by Jo who calls both of them by cell phone. He reveals that he had taken the data from Minamida and also manufactured his own machine since the design was originally his and only gave Minamida the blueprints in order to test whether the machine could be used on regular people.
His psychotic personality comes to face when he demands Kiryu to face him now or he will kill somebody close to him every month (having apparently done a full background check on Morning Glory Orphanage) and if he even refuses to comply, he will murder anybody that has ever known Kiryu one person per month so as to torment him with the guilt.
Kiryu faces Jo and defeats him, with the latter demanding Kiryu to kill him or he will have his loved ones killed. Kiryu refuses and claims he will not break his code to not kill and will not play by Jo's rules and that if he so desires he will face him as many times as needed and not to get anybody else involved, leaving Jo alone.
Apparently accepting he could not defeat Kiryu neither in combat or in ideology, he vanishes for the time being.
Yakuza 4
Jo sends a letter to Kiryu challenging him to fight him and his apprentices. Kiryu in response brings his own friends to match the Amon Clan in number. He watches as all his comrades are defeated and declares that all of them were only the warmup and that the real show would begun. Kiryu defeats Jo once again, leaving the group to vow to return stronger.
Yakuza 5
Jo brings members of the Amon Clan to assist in fighting Kiryu, who invites his three friends to even the match. Jo grows impatient with each subsequent defeat of his apprentices. Feeling insulted by all the numerous defeats handed down by Kiryu, he vows to defeat him and leave him to the point he cannot fight anymore. Despite this, Kiryu defeats him once more and tells him that, so long as he sticks to pride and revenge, he will never acquire true strength and defeat the likes of those that hold to their dreams. Jo vows to return stronger and face Kiryu once more.
Yakuza 6: The Song of Life
Jo will contact Kiryu via e-mail to fight him after completing two certain substories. His initial phase is somewhat similar to his previous encounters, however things will change when his health is at a lower level where his defense increases and he starts to summon drones and land mines that may interrupt Kiryu's attacks. Once defeated, Kiryu offers him a chance to join his family, which he agrees. This enables him to be recruited as a member on the Clan Creator mode.
Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth
Once Kiryu returns to Japan, his presence is quickly detected by the Amon Clan. Aware of Kiryu's cancer and necessity to rely on others to fight, Jo sends a message telling him to go to Isezaki Ijincho's Restaurant Row, alone. There, he challenges Kiryu once again. Yu Nanba, Saeko Mukoda and Seonhee arrive to see what's happening. They fight against Jo, but Kiryu loses instantly. When Jo threatens to kill one of his comrades for the sake of reawakening the dragon, Kiryu brutally beats Amon the same way he used to. Jo, now realizing that Kiryu's strength comes from his new bonds, decides to leave him be until those bonds are strong enough for them to have another match.
Jo appears as the final boss of the Yokohama Underground EX Sector. Realizing that Kiryu has regained strength since their last encounter, Jo challenges Kiryu to a proper battle. He summons Kazuya, Jiro and Sango to assist him in his fight against Kiryu and his party, though all four of them are ultimately defeated. As Kiryu leaves the dungeon, Jo declares that the Amon Clan will be the one to kill him, and not his illness.
Other appearances
Yakuza: Dead Souls
Jo makes a brief appearance once Kiryu explores the Kamurocho Subterranea a second time. He accuses the latter for having killed his apprentices, though Rasetsu Amon reveals himself to be the true perpetrator, and knocks Jo out. When Kiryu defeats Rasetsu and returns the Sacred Treasures, Jo thanks him for breaking the curse and promises another battle with him before modifying the Subterranea and subsequently leaving.
Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise
Amon appears in Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise, albiet with his name in katakana (アモン). Having learned Kenshiro was in the city of Eden, he gives a letter to Lyra to have Kenshiro meet him at the Central Wasteland. There, he fights Kenshiro to prove his own lethal arts superior to Kenshiro's Hokuto Shinken. Amon loses this fight at the cost of his own life, but not before swearing that the Amon Clan would hunt Kenshiro down.
Personality
Jo is a ruthless and cold-blooded individual likely as a result of his profession which he executes with deadly accuracy. Like the rest of his clan he is prideful to no known boundaries and seeks to prove that the Amon Clan are the strongest fighters in the world. With none of his targets ever surviving, he is very confident in his abilities.
The sole exception however, is Kiryu, as Jo has been defeated by him in all of their encounters, severely damaging his pride and leaving him with years worth of obsession to defeat Kiryu, training himself almost to death and in the most extreme areas possible in order to become strong enough to defeat Kiryu.
His obsession is such that he will do everything that is needed in order to defeat him, going as far as assaulting Sotaro Komaki to steal his scroll of secrets in order to learn more powerful techniques, coerce Minamida, and even went as far as threatening Kiryu over the phone that if he did not face him, he would kill somebody dear to him every month and if there was no one left, he would kill anybody that ever knew Kiryu with malicious glee.
His pride goes to the point that he demanded Kiryu to kill him after his third defeat or else he will kill somebody dear (seemingly in an attempt to make him "lose" by turning him into a murderer and thus reject his principles).
In later games this psychotic behavior is less visible although he remains just as malevolent as the cumulative insults earned through his defeat have made him declare that defeating Kiryu alone will not satisfy him but that he will injure him to the point that he cannot fight any longer.
In the end, while his pride and desire for revenge are the fuel for his continuous growth in strength, it is also his greatest downfall as his cumulative negative motivations impede him from acquiring true strength, which is why Kiryu manages to always beat him.
Trivia
- One of the rewards for defeating Jo in the first Yakuza is 893 experience points. This is because 8-9-3, read as "ya-ku-sa" through Goroawase, is the etymological origin of the word "Yakuza."
- Jo is one of only three characters to have appeared in every Kiryu saga game, the other two being Kiryu himself and Majima. Out of the three, he is the only one to have never been playable.
- Jo's death cry in Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise, as shown in the text box, is "Nagoshi!", in reference to Toshihiro Nagoshi, creator of the Yakuza series.
- Jo's appearance in Yakuza Kiwami marks the most health bars for a boss in the series, with 16 health bars total with both phases of his fight.
- He does not have any voice in Yakuza. In all subsequent entries, he has a voice, varying between reusing existing voice lines and having his own voice actor.
- In Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, Jo and the rest of his brothers Sango, Kazuya and Jiro, are all seen using Shin Amon's face model (and hair as is with Jo) from Judgment, Lost Judgment, and Yakuza: Like a Dragon for reasons unknown.
- Jo Amon's name is derived from the term "hamonjo" (破門状) which is an order of excommunication from the yakuza, albeit one that is reversible. Kazuma Kiryu received one of these orders while in prison. It is one step under "zetsuenjo" (絶縁状), which is irreversible.
External Links
- Jo Amon at the Yakuza/Like a Dragon Wiki