Jujutsu Kaisen Season 3 is streaming on Crunchyroll, with episodes dropping weekly on Thursdays.

The Culling Game arc in Gege Akutami’s Jujutsu Kaisen manga swings on a heavy pendulum, back and forth from drawn-out battles and tedious explanations of its world’s rules to some of its best, most creative chapters across the entire story. For me, from this point until the end, Jujutsu Kaisen was a frustratingly jagged read, and I had reservations that the on-page material would be too wily to make good anime. Then again, one of the advantages of the medium is being able to whittle a story into something newly transmittable, and studio MAPPA once again confidently asserts its grasp and vision of bringing its source material to life in the first two episodes of Jujutsu Kaisen’s Culling Game Part 1. Though there’s still plenty of time to get lost in the sauce, the smart pacing, direction that seems to actively subvert anything that could be easily clipped on TikTok, and sharp animation up top sure all have me hopeful that we’re headed in the right direction.

Off the bat in the first episode “Execution,” the wordless prologue takes a tonal swing in resetting Jujutsu Kaisen after the bloodbath of the Shibuya Incident in Season 2. It opens on our main boy Yuji Itadori, still traumatized from the utter devastation Sukuna caused from his bodily takeover, seemingly alone, living off of energy bars and cleaning up the apocalyptically sparse neighborhood from an influx of cursed spirits. That is until he’s nabbed by an especially big one before being saved by a mysterious slice that crashes him and the spirit through the roof of a building.

Cut to Itadori pinned on his back at sword point by Yuta Okkutsu (watch the movie Jujustu Kaisen 0 if you need a refresher on what that guy’s deal is) on a stage in a transfixing wide shot so long that I almost thought my internet had sputtered had it not been for the specks of gleaming light. That’s interrupted by a deluge of purple blood and a cut to the title sequence – a bop as always, even if it’s not quite the series’ undefeated “Vivid Vice” opening. Just these three-and-a-half minutes are stuffed with bold cinematic choices that hint at how much of the rest of the runtime across 50-ish minutes will go: kinetic and cleverly choreographed battle sequences halt into still moments that let the whole thing – the characters, the sets, the viewers – breathe a bit.

Not long after, we’re plunged into the first new bits of world lore – the Zen’in clan appoints a new head, done in a highly stylized and shadowy back room – which made me nervous before it all played out. The Culling Game Arc will certainly balloon its cast with brand-new characters, jujutsu sorcerers who have just acquired new powers, to make up for all the ones lost in Shibuya. But these episodes show remarkable restraint, keeping the core cast small and story relatively tight before it inevitably lets out the leash.

The show obviously respects the beats of the manga it’s based on and knows how to use just enough explanatory information as is necessary, while holding more space for the darker emotional spots that color this end-game setup and, of course, very sick fights. (Alas, say farewell to most of the joke-y bits from the first season, especially with Gojo Satoru still trapped in that damn Prison Realm box.) Look no further than introducing the rules of the Culling Game itself: In the last third of the second episode “One More Time,” a not-insignificant chunk of text is plastered on the screen, but the cards don’t linger long enough to read it all, instead quickly flashing to key words and phrases. “Blah, blah, blah, you get the gist,” they’re basically saying, “we’ll explain soon.” Lo and behold, Episode 3 is titled “About the Culling Game”; prepare for a talk-y breakdown about what to expect for the rest of the season.

Once again, I’ll mention the fights since badass combat is JJK’s bread and butter, and they’ve truly never looked better than they have here. Unlike the back half of the Shibuya Incident arc, each of these sequences are carefully executed and unrushed, set to JJK’s distinctive synth-y battle score. Whether it’s Yuji and Choso cleaning up the streets in “Execution,” with flashy colors and outstanding cinematography, or Choso vs. Naoya Zen’in, the jerk of a new clan head, with its trippy visualization messing with frame rates and color inversion, the fights shine. If the rest of the season can keep up with this momentum, Jujutsu Kaisen’s Culling Game anime could transform a tricky manga arc into a thrilling televised take that’s been downsized for the better.