Jujutsu Kaisen - Episode 3 Recap

Kugisaki arrives in Harajuku, Tokyo. She is excited to finally be there and thinks of someone named Saori. Meanwhile, Fushiguro and Itadori hook up with Gojo Sensei. Itadori is wearing his new school uniform, and Gojo remarks that it’s a little different from Fushiguro’s because it has a red hood thanks to a customization request that he made.

After Kugisaki and the rest of the team meet for the first time, the four head to a building in Roppongi to exorcise a curse. Gojo tells Itadori not to transform into Sukuna and gives him a knife to fight called Slaughter Demon. Although Fushiguro wants to join the hunt, Gojo orders him not to, stating that he still needs to recover from his injuries. Gojo also reveals to Fushiguro that this is secretly a test to see how Kugisaki handles curses in Tokyo. Tokyo curses tend to be more powerful and more cunning than countryside curses, where the population is much smaller.

In the building, Itadori takes the hunt very seriously. He suggests that Kugisaki do the same and that they stick together, but Kugisaki is standoffish and decides to split up so that they finish the task faster. After splitting up, a minor curse tries to get the jump on Itadori, but he’s too quick for it. He slices it up with Slaughter Demon easily. Meanwhile, Kugisaki finds a cursed mannequin and destroys it with her hammer and nails. She then notices a small boy cowering behind the mannequin and tries to get him to come with her. Suddenly, the major curse haunting the building appears and snatches up the boy to use as a hostage.

Kugisaki thinks for a moment that the logical thing to do is let the boy die and attack the curse, which guarantees her own survival. But instead, she drops her weapon to negotiate with the curse. She asks the curse to let the boy go, but it doesn’t. Without warning, Itadori breaks through the wall behind the curse and cuts off its arm. Without the boy as a hostage, the curse tries to escape through the window. Kugisaki throws a straw doll on the curse’s severed arm and slams a nail into the doll’s heart. The jutsu damages the curse’s heart, killing it before it can get away.

Kugisaki thinks about Saori again. Saori was an older girl who moved to Kugisaki’s town. She was kind to the child-aged Kugisaki. The town’s residents thought Saori looked down on them, so they ostracized her. Eventually, it was too much and Saori moved back to Tokyo. Kugisaki hopes to reunite with Saori some day.

With the boy saved and the curse exorcised, Kugisaki thanks Itadori for his help. The two go back to bickering soon after. As a reward, Gojo offers to treat the team to dinner. In the epilogue, a powerful cursed womb appears in the sky above a detention center. The prisoners, normal humans, can see the curse and wonder what it is.

(image source: Amazon)