Volume 26: The Mist of Emptiness, Vanilla
Ice. The arc where we were introduced to Vanilla
Ice, the stand user of Cream. The first interaction between Vanilla Ice
and the Stardust Crusaders was an immediate fatality. That alone was able to establish the group’s
situation when matched up. See, the group had been split up by having
2 groups of three. The first group being taken away by Telence
T. D'Arby, and the second group waiting for the first group to come back. First group being Jotaro, Joseph, and Kakyoin. Second being Polnareff, Abdul, and Iggy. Why wait for the first group to come back? The loss of the number one, range, and the
fear of the unknown. Atum, the stand of Telence D’Arby, had enough
strength to pull in Jotaro while he’s being held by both Kakyoin and Joseph. By disappearing in front of them, there are
so many thoughts when it comes to the second group. We learn later on that D’Arby just wants
to play some games at the cost of people’s souls, but he’s not overpowering the first
group with ridiculous strength or faster than eyesight speed. The second group had only been shown that
the enemy stand user was stronger than all three of group one and the ability to pull
them into a black hole, and when you think between the group members you have left, it
goes back to what I said about multiple thoughts. One of being to continue on into the mansion
despite what was told to them. So what do they do? They act on further pursuing DIO. Now the combination of Avdol and Iggy should
be enough when it comes to detecting life. It should easily detect any form of life including
stands and stand energy. Kenny G, the stand user that they had detected
with the combination of Life Detector and Iggy’s sense of smell. They had easily dealt with Kenny G, so maybe
there’s a possibility the future stand users will be the same as him. They don’t know, but that’s what highlights
the whole situation. The audience had seen Vanilla Ice before the
Stardust Crusaders did, and the potential of Vanilla Ice had seemed vague when first
introducing him, but when his introduction had ended, it solidified that the group is
going to be in some deep trouble. After the defeat of Kenny G, the group turns
to more of a neutral mood and not as cautious as they were when they first entered. They are very much alert when it comes to
detecting, but since they have a reliable detection, they don’t have to be on their
toes as much. But all attention was drawn back to Avdol,
this is where the art of the unknown begins. After defeating Kenny G, the Life detector
had gone back to normal with the flames not reacting to anything. But on his hand, someone had carved directly
into the stone wall. When you turn your heads, you will die. So in this instance, what is there to do that
would seem rational? If I don’t turn around, will I still die? If I turn around do I immediately fight? What. Is. Behind. Me. What had seemed rational to Avdol was to turn
around, despite the warning. Would you turn around if something had told
you that you would immediately die? Well, the question varies to many because
it depends on how someone views what they don’t know. Avdol had turned around and saw Vanilla Ice’s
stand Cream, ready to attack. In that instance, there was a lot to think
about. Highlight questions like, “What is that? What does it do?” and “Where did this
even come from?” When it came to Avdol the questions were more
of, “How did Iggy or I not detect this stand? How do I tell them in time? What the hell is that?” But after very quick thinking, putting Iggy
and Polnareff ahead of himself was what he had done. Despite what he had said to both Iggy and
Polnareff before they entered. Which in the end, had been the fatal end to
Avdol. Now our view through Polnareff’s perspective
begins exactly when Avdol had sent both Polnareff and Iggy flying. “Why did Avdol hit us? Why are his arms on the ground? Where is Avdol?” This isn’t because Polnareff genuinely knowing
if Avdol is dead or not, he knows he’s gone when he sees the arms. It’s more of just purposely not believing
it, it’s the 5 stages of grief, but probably excluding bargaining. But following the rest of the arc through
the eyes of Polnareff had really shown you the feeling that him and Iggy shared when
confronted by what they couldn’t understand. By itself, the scene was enough to show you
exactly what they were going through. Iggy specifically when focusing on him had
shown that he’s very much overwhelmed when Vanilla Ice reveals himself inside of Cream. Then that feeling of being trapped, because
how exactly do you know if you’re ever in the clear when you’re being pursued by something
you can’t even see. Moving further on in pages or in time in the
anime, you notice that Polnareff and Iggy try to cover each other as well as possible
due to this invisible force that can wipe them out from existence in an instant. The feeling of being trapped because you don’t
know where something is. Piecing that together with the destructive
yet silent power that Vanilla Ice has, is a setup for misfortune. Going back to when Polnareff had tried to
strike at Cream, he revisits a feeling he knows well in Part 3. That feeling being a type of mourning, but
at the same time containing regret, despair, and rage. All of this due to Vanilla Ice & Cream. See, I believe that Vanilla Ice was one of
the more better villains in part 3. He’s the boss before the final boss, and
getting past him means you’re going to have a couple of casualties to understand what’s
going on. Especially since there was no information
on Vanilla Ice before going in, and his whole existence is a random factor. At the same time, the Stardust Crusaders commonly
go against stand users without knowing their abilities until during the fight. Majority of the time that gets them hurt and
instances where they could be close to death, yet there was never a villain to put a nail
in the coffin. Vanilla Ice was the first to do so off of
his first attack on the group, which is a lot to say about his rank versus Dio’s other
lackeys. Vanilla Ice still very much follows under
Dio like a servant and there is no equal ground between the two. The only way Vanilla Ice could look at Dio
is if he’s looking up, meaning that he puts Dio on the large pedestal. At this point not being a pedestal, but possibly
a tower of some sorts. Yet the combination of the two is art. Dio and Vanilla Ice, originally the combination
of Time and Space. Araki had stated manipulation of space and
or time gives a villain that property of being ridiculously strong. Imagine if Dio and Vanilla Ice had worked
together when the Stardust Crusaders had came into Dio’s home. Dio grouping them up in stopped time to be
right in front of Cream. Now for that to working there would have to
be timing and other tidbits, but regardless the combination of those to would deadly. Vanilla Ice alone could’ve taken out 3 of
the Stardust Crusaders, but that didn’t happen because Vanilla Ice wanted to set some
sort of mood and positioning. Where he would be in the position to say “You
guys had lost as soon as you entered”. So how exactly do you lose a character like
this in the process of making one of the most best fights in the part? You lose him due to madness. See once you know the unknown, then it isn’t
the unknown. And once you know something, you know for
the most part what’s going on with it. The problems, how to exploit it, how it works,
the tricks behind it’s process or power. Once you remove Vanilla Ice out of his shell
which in this case would be Cream, you just have another follower of Dio. Notice that when Vanilla Ice starts showing
his true colors, Polnareff starts to read Vanilla Ice. Catching his paths, the pattern of how he
destroys things, the timing so he knows when to strike. It all comes to fruition when you start to
know what you didn’t. Although it did seem that Polnareff had lost
when it came to the final moments of him and Iggy versus Vanilla Ice. Even though Iggy was suppose to be out of
commission, he does save the day. My issue on it being that Iggy didn’t save
the day though, my grip is how Cream works. Both Vanilla Ice and Cream can’t see when
devouring everything so basically what Cream had done with the spiral was a physical interpretation
of the process of elimination. It’s not here or there, but if I go all
the way around to the last dot, I’m going to find it. In the midst of that, you have Polnareff actually
going through the stages of grief that I had mentioned. Except his bargaining was replaced with optimism
in a sense. His best case scenario being that his friends
would end up saving him and taking care of this whole mess. So you get his denial from the loss of his
friend, the anger / fear caused by the unknown power of cream, his optimism when getting
his chances of survival literally spiraling down, and well… I wouldn’t consider it to be depression
in his case. At the same time, I wouldn’t say he’s
putting on a front either when saying he’s going to be saving Iggy and all. He came to acceptance pretty quick, which
is the last step. He believed that Iggy had to be the one to
tell the others about what had happened, somehow. I’m not even sure exactly how he would do
that being a dog. Explaining how Cream works by barking seems
like a pretty difficult task, but regardless he put that trust into Iggy. Iggy used said trust and redirected it back
towards Polnareff, which had ended up in a second loss of a member. It’s sad, Polnareff had accepted death and
said good-bye to Iggy, yet it was Iggy to meet his fate. But in the last moments, now you have Vanilla
Ice out of his shell and Polnareff with more resolve than ever. Then the final fight had seemed one sided
due to Polnareff’s flurry of attacks with ease and Vanilla Ice repetitively coming back,
but it never seemed that Vanilla Ice could pull the win off anyways. So what had happened? Did Vanilla Ice thought less and less when
compared to when he was first shown? Yes, it’s very easy to say that Vanilla
Ice had changed in some ways. But that’s not why he lost. Vanilla Ice had lost due to him turning into
a vampire for one, but the biggest reason is because he lost the unknown factor. See, you can’t remove a key factor of something
because then that specific thing is no longer the same anymore. Imagine removing stealth from a ninja, speed
from a runner, the secrets of a secret agent. Anything! Anything has a key trait that defines it,
and when you remove that trait then it’s nowhere near the same. Vanilla Ice had became massively exploitable
and weak, even when being compared to someone who could barely get up. Vanilla Ice was a character that had power
in the darkness of the unknown. But, it was all over as soon as Polnareff
had shown him the light. Or well, pushed him towards the light. Thank you guys so much for watching. I had been wanting to do a character/stand
analysis for a while, but I wasn’t ok with just looking at the stand. I believe there’s a lot to characters and
stands and I would love to go over any possible connection that would fit best with the video. If you guys made it this far, thank you again. I would love to know if you guys enjoy these
longer videos, I would do these more if they’re very much requested for. I appreciate all the support on the last video
and I would love to know if you guys did enjoy this video by leaving a like and commenting
if you guys want another one of these. You can also put what character or stand you
want me to talk about! Or you could even just put a part and I could
just pick a stand from that part. I’ll see you guys in the next one, until
then… Peace out, and God Speed.
