Characters / JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: DIO

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Main Character Index
Phantom Blood: DIO
Battle Tendency: Joseph Joestar
Stardust Crusaders: The Joestar Group (Jotaro Kujo | Jean-Pierre Polnareff) | Egypt 9 Glory Gods | DIO's Household
Diamond is Unbreakable: Heroes | Yoshikage Kira
Golden Wind: Team Bucciarati (Giorno Giovanna) | La Squadra di Esecuzioni | The Boss
Stone Ocean: Heroes | Enrico Pucci
Steel Ball Run
JoJolion: The Higashikata Family
The JOJOLands
One-Shot Characters | Spinoff Characters

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Character subpage for DIO, the main antagonist of Phantom Blood and Stardust Crusaders, with his influence lingering in Diamond is Unbreakable, Golden Wind, and Stone Ocean.

Beware of potential spoilers for all Parts. Spoilers for Part 1 will be unmarked!

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Dio Brando (Joestar) / DIO (Stand: The World + Unnamed Precognitive Stand^note Generally nicknamed Hermit Purple #2.)

Voiced by: Takehito Koyasu (TV anime, All-Star Battle (R), Eyes of Heaven, Last Survivor), Norio Wakamoto (CD drama), Nobuo Tanaka (OVA), Hikaru Midorikawa (Phantom Blood video game and film), Isshin Chiba (Heritage for the Future video game), Kaneto Shiozawa (commercial for the SNES game) (Japanese), Andrew Chaikin (OVA), Patrick Seitz (TV anime) (English)
Young Dio voiced by: Takehito Koyasu (TV anime), Kenji Nojima (Phantom Blood video game) (Japanese), Patrick Seitz (TV anime) (English)
Played by: Mamoru Miyano (Phantom Blood musical)

"Humanity's greatest desire is to latch on to serenity. So, why? Why refuse to serve me? What greater serenity is there?"

^{Dio as he appears in Phantom Blood}
"JoJo, it was hubris that led me to this ignominious end. This fall from grace has taught me well. However one may scheme and dissemble, my downfall this night is part of the human condition. ...A condition I now forsake!"

"You were a fool to attack me. I have disowned my weakness in favor of life everlasting!"

The first main antagonist to be introduced. DIO's peerless hunger for domination and evil has either directly or indirectly resulted in conflict for each member of the Joestar family, making him the overall Big Bad of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.

Originally a scornful child of a petty thief in 1880s England, after poisoning his own father, he is adopted by George Joestar and makes it his goal to utterly ruin Jonathan's life in order to become the estate's sole inheritor. When that plan fails, Dio ends up using the Stone Mask to become a vampire and plans to take over the world for himself; however, a daring battle with Jonathan ends with him left as a disembodied head. Sometime later, Dio makes his return on a ship when he turns most of the passengers into monsters and announces he will take Jonathan's body for his own and manages to deliver a fatal blow to his foe, though Jonathan uses the last of his strength to ensure Dio would not be able to escape as the ship explodes and sinks to the bottom of the sea.

Dio would reemerge in the 1980s during the events of Stardust Crusaders, having attached his severed head to Jonathan's body in the intervening century or so. Now going by the mononym DIO (all-caps included), he attempts to resume his goal of obtaining his ideal world, but meets resistance from Jonathan's descendant Jotaro Kujo. After meeting with Enya Geil, he gains a Stand called The World.

Named after Ronnie James Dio (and later, named after Dio's band, DIO). His last name comes from Marlon Brando. It was also confirmed that his likeness was originally based on Roy Batty.

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#-D

• '80s Hair: DIO sports one hell of a mullet in Part 3, although he does at least have the excuse of the events actually taking place in the 1980s.
• Adaptational Badass:
  • Randomly gains the ability to teleport in the Phantom Blood anime, which is an ability he would only gain later in other adaptations, when he has The World.
  • Also his hypnotic ability in the anime (where he hypnotizes Jack the Ripper into servitude, whereas in the manga, DIO simply convinces Jack verbally to work for him).
  • Again in the anime, Dio's last-ditch Space Ripper Stingy Eyes are much more powerful than in the manga, being almost depicted as a Wave-Motion Gun attack capable of splitting a cloud formation in half, whereas they simply sliced a stone column apart in the manga.
  • In the 1993 OVA, DIO himself gets to fight toe-to-toe with Jotaro without having the need to use The World. In addition, when he gets punched in the skull by Star Platinum on top of getting Silver Chariot's rapier through the brain, DIO recovers much faster and after using his Time Stop, he backflips to the car he uses to make a getaway rather than painfully crawl over to it.
  • The OVA also gives him a significant boost in terms of strength; he's shown lifting an entire barge out of the River Nile — a scene that was never in the manga — and several cars to launch at Jotaro, dismantling a Minaret tower thrown at him by Star Platinum with Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs in mid-air, and more famously uses an oil tanker truck to try and kill Jotaro instead of a road roller, complete with punching it so much that it explodes and causes a massive fire on the bridge.
  DIO: AN OIL TANKER FOR YOU!
  • In the original manga, DIO in spite of his upgrade with The World, is still a normal vampire—albeit still a head attached to a body that's constantly rejecting it—and thus weak to Hamon. Two instances are proven when he stops when Joseph consciously wraps Hermit Purple to conduct Hamon in the off chance DIO touched him and DIO opting for the thrown knife to weaken Joseph enough to lower his Hamon defences. In the OVA, Joseph manages to not only touch DIO with the Hermit Purple, but also immediately pour Hamon into it—only for DIO to be unharmed, but also cut through the Hermit Purple with ease. It helps to make the statement that DIO was no longer affected by Hamon when it nearly killed him last time due to The World's benefits more credible.
  • In the CD Drama, DIO uses his Eye Beams (an ability that he hasn't used since Phantom Blood in the original manga) to distract Jotaro in addition to spraying blood from his wounded leg. Not to mention that, unlike the original manga, DIO was able to use The World's time-stop ability one last time before unleashing his final attack, making the battle between him and Jotaro a much more narrow victory for the latter.
• Adaptational Intelligence: In the original manga and the 2015 anime, he initially decides to just cut off Jotaro's head with a street sign after hitting him with knives just to make sure he's dead—with his later attempt to make sure he's dead via hearing his heartbeat or any reaction—is actually a ploy by Jotaro to lure him into a trap. In the OVA, his first reaction is to calmly listen if he has a heartbeat or any breathing, causing Jotaro to stop both; and in doing so, trapping Jotaro himself in a situation where he's helpless to stop DIO from killing him. He's only able to escape thanks to Polnareff arriving in the nick of time.
• Adaptational Personality Change: The 1993 OVA depicts him as a Soft-Spoken Sadist and Cold Ham rather than the Evil Is Hammy No Indoor Voice he actually is in the 2012 anime and original manga. Once he absorbs Joseph's blood, however, he becomes significantly hammier.
• Adaptational Wimp: In the OVA version of Stardust Crusaders, Polnareff's sudden sneak attack managed to momentarily stun him, giving Jotaro the chance to land the blow to his head. However, this also leads into the Adaptational Badass moment mentioned above.
• All According to Plan: One of the best examples in the series. After receiving Jotaro's most savage beating yet and getting launched down the streets of Cairo on a direct route to Joseph, who lies unconscious with all the Joestar blood DIO needs to both heal and finally assume full control of Jonathan's body, what does he have to say?
  DIO: You fell for it, Jotaro! Now my victory is all but assured! ONCE AGAIN, MY GENIUS HAS TRIUMPHED OVER YOU! DOESN'T THIS STREET LOOK FAMILIAR?!
• All for Nothing: With the death of Enrico Pucci and his Made In Heaven plan rendered moot, all of DIO's ambitions are put to an end.
• Alliterative Family: His father is named Dario, and one of his sons is named Donatello.
• Almost Dead Guy: Towards the end of his fight with Jotaro, DIO gets punched in the side of the head so hard that it almost completely fractures that side of his skull, giving him severe blunt-force trauma and a concussion, as well as leaving him in immense pain. Even with his inherent vampiric abilities, DIO is left so incredibly weak that the only reason Jotaro doesn't immediately kill him is due to The World stepping in, and his recovery through Joseph's blood.
• Always Someone Better: He was initially this to Jonathan in their childhood, with Dio being better than Jonathan in many aspects such as fine dining and boxing, to the point he was seemingly favoured by George over Jonathan. But once Jonathan Grew a Spine, the tables turned.
• Aimlessly Seeking Happiness: In Stone Ocean, Dio seems to imply that his plots in Phantom Blood were fueled by the desire to be happy. This doesn't excuse all his actions nor it may even be a innocent admission, as he may or may not have been manipulating his second in command in the first place. Even so, this is the only time were he seems to genuinely reflect on his past actions, but it is clear he doesn't really feel remorse, more along the lines of regret that he didn't succeed nor brought him true satisfaction.
• Ambition Is Evil: DIO's staunch ambition is the core force driving his actions throughout the series. DIO's overall goal is to always stand on top of everyone else through any means available to him. At first, he desired to take the Joestar fortune for himself. Then, after becoming a vampire, he sought to rule over the world. After re-emerging from the Atlantic, he set in motion a plan to recreate the universe in his image.
• Ambiguous Situation: Initially, DIO is portrayed as a straight Card-Carrying Villain with little nuance, which evolves to him being more introspective in Part 3 before becoming a Large Ham against the Joestar Group (though still significantly calculating). However, Parts 5 and 6 give him very uncharacteristic traits that even the usually omniscient narrator isn't exactly sure about and never elaborates.
  • DIO's decision to spare certain women to have his heirs, when he usually sees women as food, pawns, or something to abuse, especially in Part 1, when he didn't act as pragmatic as he would post-escape of the ocean. Was it a whim, an attempt to have his potential offspring have a happier life, or have backup minions for any surviving minions of the Heaven plan? The OVER HEAVEN light novel implies a possible mix of the first two options; applying harsh treatment to his children to toughen them up, while Part 6 heavily implies the latter.
  • His relationship with Pucci, especially compared to even his most loyal subordinates—which he either treats as potential risks to be killed to ensure his secrets or slight annoyances from their pestering loyalty—seems much more casual and mutual, with Pucci being able to get away with arguments that DIO would have killed another servant for. Is it an extension of his manipulative nature to have a pawn fulfill his grand plan, possibly romantic, a rare show of friendship, or initially manipulative in nature before becoming genuine?
• Amoral Attorney: Before he became a vampire, he was preparing to graduate from law school.
• And I Must Scream: Trapped for almost a century under the sea with only Jonathan's corpse for company. Nevermind enduring the agonizing process of fusing with a body who actively rejects his presence, to the point he still isn't fully healed when he comes back in Stardust Crusaders.
• Antagonist in Mourning: Possibly? At the end of Phantom Blood when he kills Jonathan, he appears clearly distraught. And considering he could still take Jonathan's body after death, his apparent sadness is most likely this trope.
• The Antichrist:
  • Very much so; he was evil from birth, was a sociopathic teen, and even gets vampiric Legions of Hell once he vampirizes.
  • Defied in following arcs, where his followers see him as a Dark Messiah and call him "DIO-sama" ("Lord DIO" in the English version). It's an act and he's very much the Antichrist underneath this facade.
• Answers to the Name of God: A variant takes place in the English dub of the anime's first episode, which rewords the original Japanese to something a little more God-complexy.
  Dio: Hush, boy! You won't speak my name in vain again!^note In Japanese: "That's a name you should speak with a great deal more reverence!"
• Arch-Enemy: Overall, DIO declared war on the entire Joestar Bloodline after his resurrection in Part 3. But specifically...
  • First and foremost, to Jonathan. Their conflict is very personal, as Dio forcibly kisses Jonathan's girlfriend, burns his dog alive, kills his father, and fatally wounds Jonathan to steal his body. They also have at least six fights throughout Phantom Blood, which is by far the highest number between two opponents in any part of JoJo. To put in perspective just how personal their conflict ended up becoming, Jonathan never claims to hate any character aside from Dio, and Dio hated JoJo so much that it somehow circled around to a twisted form of affection and seeing Jonathan as the only person worthy of being his new body. Even after Jonathan's death and the theft of his body by Dio, every cell in his body is still fighting against him and keeping DIO from using his full vampiric powers.
  • To both Joseph and Jotaro in Stardust Crusaders. The two heroes travel across continents to kill DIO and prevent Holly's Stand from killing her, and he responds by sending dozens of assassins to kill them and their party.
    • Joseph says that he feels like he's known DIO all his life, and that it's the fate of every Joestar to fight DIO at some point. Joseph also takes DIO's theft of Jonathan's body as a personal slight, especially for his grandmother Erina, who (as Joseph knew) endured the grief from losing Jonathan for the remainder of her life. DIO, however, doesn't seem to pay Joseph all that much attention aside from wanting his blood to control Jonathan's body better.
    • Jotaro, meanwhile, didn't care until DIO (inadvertently) made Holly deathly ill by somehow activating her Stand. He also calls himself DIO's worst enemy after the latter kills Joseph. DIO held a playful attitude with Joseph, but most certainly feels an equal amount of hate and animosity towards Jotaro.
• Archnemesis Dad: Subverted. He's the Big Bad and Greater-Scope Villain of the series, and the father of Part 5's Giorno Giovanna. By all accounts, DIO should have been this, but thanks to Jotaro they never get a chance to meet. Not to mention that in their video game appearances together, DIO is oddly fond of Giorno if they're fighting on the same team.
• Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: By far the most prideful and arrogant villain in the series. And considering that the other villains include Kars, that's saying something.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: In Part 1 for the zombies, and he has an even bigger cult that ranges for several sagas involving Stand users.
• Ax-Crazy: While he was never mentally sound, especially after becoming a vampire, he loses what little sanity he had when absorbing Joseph's blood and goes completely psychotic.
• Badass Bookworm: He keeps a library in his hidden base that he actually reads. He also studied law in university.
• Bad Boss: Zigzagged despite being such a sociopathic monster. DIO prefers to cultivate loyalty through charm and profit, even paying his minions upfront and fully accommodating them if they get a job done. On the other hand, DIO doesn't really tolerate failure. He sends Steely Dan to kill Enya Geil on the possibility she could be used to find out the truth about DIO's stand. Even though she said nothing, she was still killed despite her being both a huge asset and the reason he even manifested a stand in the first place. He implants flesh buds in some of his followers that'll kill the host when removed or drive their stand into overdrive and potentially cripple them for the rest of their lives. However, despite being aware of Hol Horse's ineptitude and multiple failures, he offers him another chance despite the man even attempting to kill DIO out of sheer spite. Though it's largely implied he does this because he's impressed that Hol Horse had the will to try and kill someone infinitely stronger than him while many would not even think of it.
  • This gets muddled further with individuals like Pucci who is able to make arguments with him, arguments that a lesser minion would be instantly killed for—showing his strong independence and eventual dedication to fulfilling DIO's goals; and Vanilla Ice, who personally kills himself to provide DIO blood—resulting in an impressed DIO to revive him to defeat his enemies due to his conventions. It's implied from this DIO likes those who are resolute enough to do his tasks properly and is unforgiving to those who balk under pressure, which, unfortunately for him, includes the majority of his current followers.
• The Bad Guy Wins:
  • He kills Jonathan at the end of Phantom Blood. And in Stone Ocean, his plan to reset the universe comes to fruition, though it backfires on him. Pucci makes a grievous error that gets him killed, resulting in a universe where Pucci never existed, therefore leaving no one to carry out his plan, and those who were killed by Pucci are alive once more. For all his work, all he ends up with was a world where his greatest enemies escape him.
  • In Eyes of Heaven, Heaven Ascension DIO is an alternate version of DIO who succeeded in attaining his goals. Though that doesn't stop the Joestars uniting and fighting to destroy him.
• Bad People Abuse Animals: The first thing he does upon arriving at the Joestar home is to knee Jonathan's dog Danny in the face. Later, he locks him in an incinerator and burns him alive. This was back when he was still human. He would get much worse as a vampire—mix-matching heads of animals onto the bodies of others--notably human heads on dogs. And even after he reawakens for Part 3 and enlists an animal like Forever the orangutan into his army, he slowly walks down the streets of Cairo to approach Joseph, and bludgeons a frightened cat into mush on his walk completely unprovoked.
• Badass Family: Technically, he is a Joestar. His three sons in Part 6 are badasses, too. And his first son, the protagonist of Part 5, gets what is possibly the most broken Stand in the series.
• Baddie Flattery: Prone to doing this from time to time. He gradually grew to respect (and even admire) Jonathan, mentioned that Kakyoin "did quite well" for Jotaro, when the former gave out his Dying Clue, and applauded Polnareff for surviving the entire journey (although he was simply trying to get him back on his side). He even admits that Joseph is quite cunning once or twice. Completely averted towards Jotaro, who he despises.
• Bad Powers, Bad People: Alongside the standard set of vampiric abilities, DIO has several other nasty powers such as hypnotism, flesh parasites that enslave a victim to his will and will kill anyone who tries to remove them, prehensile veins, fusing creatures together to create mutant chimeras, etc.
• Barbaric Bully: Dio is basically a violent, egotistical bully, and as a vampire, and as DIO, also one with supernatural powers, and that's to say the least of his evil deeds in Phantom Blood and Stardust Crusaders in both of those forms when he's being an active threat.
• Battle Strip: In the OVA after draining Joseph's blood, he removes his already ruined short jacket to show off his new power and symbolically removing any pretenses he had of regality to show the crazed monster he truly was.
  • Downplayed in the original manga and the 2015 anime where the short jacket had been destroyed by Star Platinum's barrage leaving only his backless outfit and pants remaining.
• Berserk Button: DIO has many, particularly those related to his childhood and weaknesses.
  • DIO absolutely does not stand anyone looking down on him or considering him weak, or even worthy of pity. This in particular has led to the death of George Joestar, who Dio believed saw him as nothing but a charity case.
  • Dogs really piss him off.
  • He hates the very mention of his father.
  • Do not disrespect Jonathan Joestar. whom he considers a Worthy Opponent.
  • Anyone invading his world of stopped time. His internal monologue after he discovers this is LIVID. The lady in the store he crash landed into and Jotaro found out about this button the hard way.
• Big Bad: He serves as the main villain of Part 1 and Part 3. Though he meets his end at the conclusion of Stardust Crusaders, the following arcs show how much his influence has affected them during the years after he returned. Moreover, Araki has gone as far as to state that he will always be the main antagonist of the entire series due to every villain carrying his legacy whether he is actually present or not, just like how the spirit of the Joestar family lives on within every main protagonist.
• Big Brother Bully: Well, adoptive brother, anyway; during their youth, Dio would bully and humiliate Jonathan at any given opportunity and spread false rumors about him to turn his friends against him. After Jonathan finally stands up to him and beats his ass and Dio kills Danny as payback, the animosity between the two becomes far more serious.
• Big Ego, Hidden Depths: DIO, even with his god complex, his apparent personal cult, and his braggadocio regarding opponents, seems to have changed as a person after his first defeat. Though he shows his introspection outwardly to his inner circle and other minions, he seems to do it more as a theatrical display, or just to preach to the choir. On the other hand, when he speaks with Pucci, he opens himself far more than anyone he has before since his mother. He implies that the previous schemes he did failed and didn't bring him the happiness he wanted. He confesses he sees the priest as the only person who'd calm him and shows respect to him becoming a priest in the first place (this is the same man who'd casually destroyed a metal holy cross just to show holy objects offer him no harm alongside implying disregard for religion.). And most tellingly of all, he apologizes to him after his loyalty test, even after literally forcing Pucci's hand to remove his Stand disc. Even more out of character for someone with a huge ego and a deep refusal to die, but he did it nonetheless. This shows that, behind the bluster, DIO is either a far greater manipulator than he is commonly shown, willing to take risks on his own life, or he genuinely cared about Pucci. Alongside the fact that, despite desiring all of the power in the world, what he truly wishes may just be a happy, eternal life.
  DIO: I understand that happiness cannot be attained by having an invincible body, or mountains of money, or even being the ruler of the human race. True happiness lies there... If one is able to go to Heaven.
• Big Man on Campus: Both he and Jonathan were the top students of their university, excelling in sports and law. Unfortunately, Dio had to become an immortal vampire instead.
• Big, Screwed-Up Family: He is a jerk himself, Giorno's mom was a bitch, and among his other three sons in Stone Ocean, Rykiel is the only one who isn't a jerk. Along with all that, due to having Joestar blood in him, DIO is this towards his new family.
• Birthmark of Destiny: Three spots on his left earlobe. According to Wang Chan, this marks him as extremely lucky. Also the Joestar Birthmark after succeeding in stealing Jonathan's body.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: In Part 1, he acted as such, presenting himself as a model gentleman upon being adopted to the Joestar family, when behind George's back, he relentlessly tormented Jonathan and did everything he could to make his life a living hell, going to such twisted lengths as throwing Jonathan's dog into an incinerator and stealing his crush's first kiss just to spite and hurt him. After Jonathan grows a spine and beats Dio to a bloody pulp in response, Dio spends the seven-year Time Skip acting friendly and brotherly to Jonathan, all to lure him into a false sense of security while he poisons George in order to steal the Joestar fortune. After Speedwagon exposes him as a monster to the Joestars and the police, declaring that abusive father or not, Dio is pure evil and was born that way, Dio throws off the sheep's clothing and embraces Speedwagon's summation of him, becoming a Card-Carrying Villain.
• Blood Knight: Downplayed, but DIO surprisingly has this aspect amidst his cautious nature. While he does want to eliminate the Joestars as swiftly as possible and he will retreat to regroup, DIO, particularly after the draining of Joseph's blood, but especially in the OVA, is relishing his fight with the Joestar Group, prolonging the fight longer than necessary to continue the battle. DIO would soon pay for this lapse of judgment with his death.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: He came to respect Jonathan and see him as a Worthy Opponent after killing him, and then stole his body to continue living, because he felt that Jonathan's body was the only thing in the world worthy of containing his will.
• Bold Inflation: From Part 3 onwards, he addressed himself by his first name and everybody else refers to him as such, even in the original Japanese.
• Bond Villain Stupidity: He has a bad habit of indulging in needless theatrics to play to his ego and sadism instead of just killing his opponents when he has the chance. Shown most clearly in the finale of Stardust Crusaders where he wasted time playing pointless games with the heroes when he has them together with a power they couldn't possibly defend themselves from. This is what leads to his ultimate defeat.
• Born Lucky: Wang Chan interpreted the three moles on his left ear as a sign of good luck.
• Breakout Villain: By far the most popular villain of the series and one of the most popular characters. He managed to survive his first appearance to get a notable return in the third Part, his actions ripple into events of the later parts, an alternative version (two, in fact) play a significant part in the reboot, and another alternative version of himself manages to become the Big Bad of the second crossover video game. Only Yoshikage Kira, comes close with multiple appearances, original and alternative self, in other works, while the rest of the major villains getting one significant role in a project if they're lucky.
• Brain Theft: The full-head version. After his own body is destroyed, he decapitates Jonathan so he can hijack his body by putting his own head on it.
• Bright Is Not Good: In Part 3, as if to contrast his depiction in Part 1, he wears golden yellow clothes with hearts, while his Stand is generally portrayed as bright yellow in color.
• Broken Ace: Of the evil variety in Part 1.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: When Zeppeli asked him how many people he killed in order to heal his injuries from a previous fight with Jonathan. Dio's answer was to ask Zeppeli if he remembered every time he ate bread. Zeppeli was not pleased with that answer.
• Byronic Hero: Mostly alluded to while he's still alive, but starts to come out piece by piece in his flashbacks with Pucci in Part 6. Most explicit in the dubiously canon novel OVER HEAVEN, which may or may not represent him lying out of his ass for 309 pages.
• Cain and Abel: Although adopted, he plays the Cain dangerously straight to Jonathan's Abel to the point that he kills him and later takes over his body.
• Call-Forward: If one regards the Pillar Men and the Elemental Modes they have, Dio becomes an Ice Mode.
• Came Back Strong: An interesting case; after his revival in Part 3, he is actually physically weaker than he was in Phantom Blood due to Jonathan's body resisting him, and he seems to have lost (or simply neglected out of pride) many of the vampiric abilities that he showcased back in Britain. However, he more than makes up for this by unlocking his Stand, The World, which far surpasses any ability he had previously.
• The Cameo: DIO himself makes a sudden brief cameo in Chapter 99 of JoJolion via a flashback alongside few other characters from previous parts.
• Campy Combat: He has the over the top demeanor like many of the series' characters, wears green lipstick and heart knee pads, and his Stand, The World, is a muscled gold man. According to the author, he's bisexual and doesn't care about someone's gender so long as they interest him.
• Caps Lock: Starting in Part 3, his name is spelled in all caps to differentiate from his Part 1 incarnation.
• Car Fu: Forced Senator Phillips to run over several people to catch Joseph and Kakyoin. And of course, the Road Roller. Even more so in the OVA, when he also throws several cars at Jotaro; and instead of the road roller, tries to crush him under an oil tanker truck that he then spectacularly blows up.
• Card-Carrying Villain: After being exposed by Speedwagon and becoming a vampire, he embraces it fully, declaring himself to be the "evil elite".
  Dio: Most humans are bound by the laws of good. They fear the power of evil. However, a rare few are born unfettered by good... the evil elite!
• The Casanova: Four of his sons from numerous liaisons appear in the series, and it's implied that there may be many more.
• Catchphrase: "Kono DIO", roughly translated as "I, DIO". Literally, it translates to "this DIO", which does not flow as well in English, but still serves to illustrate DIO's boastful nature. Many other characters into the series also picks up this third-person tic, but it is DIO who first used it.
• The Chain of Harm: Abused by his biological father Dario, Dio would go on to do the same to Jonathan and many others.
• Character Development: Undergoes it throughout both Phantom Blood and Stardust Crusaders.
  • Before becoming a vampire, Dio was self-justifying, preferring to tell himself that his problems stem from his background and being Dario's son and that anyone would do the same things he did, never thinking of himself as a bad person and not yet intending to use the mask. After Speedwagon shows up and strips him of his self-justifications and beliefs about himself, and exposes him in front of Jonathan, George, and the police, Dio, cornered and with little choice, rejects his humanity and becomes a vampire. From that point forward, Dio starts to do as he pleases, playing with his power like a child with a new toy and never even attempting to pretend to be a normal human.
  • After his century-long imprisonment under the Atlantic, DIO appears far more thoughtful, introspective, self-aware, and seems to have abandoned his views of obtaining merely power through money and physical abilities. He appears questioning his goals and the nature of metaphysical concepts such as happiness and fate, and has matured significantly. He also seems to have lost his views of detachment and superiority to humans thanks to Jonathan and has very few vampiric followers in Part 3, with most of his loyal servants being Stand-using humans. However, after ingesting Joseph's blood in Stardust Crusaders, and gaining a power high, he slips back into his insane, childish, and borderline feral characterization from Part 1. This suggests that DIO's level of maturity is tied to how strong he feels he is.
• Charm Person: Even separate from his Stand and vampiric powers, DIO commands a nigh-inhuman level of charisma. During his meeting with Avdol; the fortune-teller described the vampire’s every word as filling his heart with a serene peace, and right before his climatic battle with the Crusaders, part of Polnareff felt a slight desire to submit to his will even knowing his responsibility for his comrades’ deaths.
  • At some point, while discussing the nature of human fear with Enya, DIO is even shown to have seduced a few young girls, one of whom, of course, falls dead after he sucks the blood out of her; judging by her borderline blushing face expression when DIO calls her in and holds her face, she didn't seem to be hypnotized or brainwashed.
• The Chessmaster: Especially in Part 3, where he plays with everyone, so he can get more powerful, and to get rid of his enemies, namely the Joestars. He was also the one who manipulated Enrico Pucci into carrying out his plans posthumously, and came dangerously close to succeeding.
• Chewing the Scenery: No matter who provides DIO's voice, they probably have the time of their life doing it.
• Classic Villain: DIO is classic in many ways. He represents Ambition, Pride, Envy, Lust, Wrath, Gluttony, and Greed—the only thing DIO isn't is Slothful, unless you count Orcus on His Throne.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Somewhat downplayed, but it takes a special kind of person to defile their arch-enemy's corpse to use as their new body... out of respect.
• Cold Ham: In the 1993 OVA, this forms a key part of DIO's Adaptational Personality Change. He's just as verbose and sadistic as in the anime and manga, but a lot more quiet and philosophical in general. Instead of being furious at Jotaro copying his Time-Stopping power, for example; DIO commends him and the late Kakyoin on figuring it out without a trace of anger in his voice, and muses aloud about how long Jotaro is able to do it for as he silently warps around. Notably, this visibly frightens even Jotaro.
• Combo Platter Powers: Super-Strength, Healing Factor, Fighting Spirit projection, Mind Manipulation, Prehensile Hair, prehensile veins, time-stopping, blood-freezing powers, high-pressure blood Eye Beams, and the ability to turn people into zombies. In the non-canonical game Eyes Of Heaven, his Stand has evolved into The World Over Heaven, which can overwrite the reality of an object by punching it.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: While DIO is the first villain of the series, he has several differences between himself and future main antagonists, with Kars being the most direct comparison.
  • While both he and Kars are vampiric beings, DIO became a vampire with the latter's Stone Mask to reject his humanity, sacrificing his ability to stay in sunlight in order to embrace his newfound powers. Kars on the other hand, was non-human to begin with, being of a human-like race that had vast lifespans, but had a weakness to the sun—which he attempted to remove via the Stone Mask—something he eventually overcame with the Red Stone of Aja.
    • While DIO convinced himself that he had an excuse of an abusive drunk of a father that drove his actions, he was eventually convinced that he was a Card-Carrying Villain from birth—embracing it—with any well-intentioned plans he had afterwards, being implied extensions of his ever-increasing godhood. Kars, on the other hand, genuinely wanted to give his race a chance to overcome his weakness—being forced to kill them out of self-defense when they rejected it—embracing that it would only be for himself and a few followers.
  • While DIO on the surface, was a heartless monster, he had the capacity of respecting a worthy opponent, spare women for unknown reasons, that he would've fed on normally to give birth to heirs, and even develop some implied bonds with some of his followers. Kars on the other hand, seems to be honorable, constantly displays respect for his fellow Pillar Men, and sees his opponents as worthy, it's all a façade as he is willing to disregard his comrades' dying wishes to play underhanded and actually views his enemies as annoyances he has no respect for.
  • While DIO, back when he was Dio Brando, was defeated by being sunk into the ocean for a century before eventually escaping, Kars would be flung into outer space, eventually going brain-dead to escape the horror being unable to die in the ever-expanding frontier.
  • DIO is unique in that his actions leave a larger shadow beyond his direct appearances within a Part with future villains, aside from Part 7 onwards, being retroactively connected to his rise to power or being extensions of his influence, with Enrico Pucci being the most direct and prominent example.
  • DIO is also the most blatantly evil of the main villains, with the worst of the others being amoral with few redeeming qualities, and the best of them being well-intentioned. Any nuance DIO has is ambiguous as to whether it's genuine or a part of his manipulative nature.
• The Corrupter: DIO is a corrupting influence who turns whoever weren't already irredeemable monsters, into his warped way of thinking, either through literal brainwashing or his charisma.
  • Bruford and Tarkus, especially Tarkus, were turned from loyal knights to their queen to being crazed fanatics of Dio. He also turned a loving mother of a baby into a crazed zombie that would devour said baby without a second thought.
  • Enrico Pucci was a well-meaning priest before meeting DIO, who molded him into a homicidal Knight Templar who wanted to remake the universe in DIO's twisted image.
  • He also corrupted Kakyoin and Polneraff to his side, but also made sure to implant flesh buds to make them more in line with his way of thinking.
  • His short interaction with Senator Phillips turned the unassuming stranger into a crazed loyal driver due to the sheer power of his Stand.
  • Avdol is aware of this trait enough that when DIO approaches him to have him join his organization, he straight up bolts to avoid the scenario.
  • Crazy Diamond's Demonic Heartbreak reveals that the minions in Stardust Crusaders who weren't outright monsters or given a flesh bud were effectively subjected to Mind Rape that left them viewing DIO as an all-knowing and vengeful god. The underlings who are still alive following his death all are horribly traumatized and live in constant fear of his possible return because of this.
• Crazy-Prepared: DIO retroactively reveals in Stone Ocean that he had a backup follower to carry out his Heaven plan in the case he were to die at the hands of the Joestars, setting up the requirements that would eventually be fulfilled a few decades after his death.
• Create Your Own Hero: Dio had managed to corner Jonathan socially and mentally, but when he takes away Erina's kiss meant for Jonathan, the latter finds the inner strength to finally fight back, creating Dio's most tenacious enemy, and by extension, his descendants.
• Creepy High-Pitched Voice: After absorbing Joseph's blood in the 2015 anime, Takehito Koyasu's normally deep voice raises an octave higher whenever he's excited, sounding more childish and Yiddish as he revels in his power.
• Crocodile Tears: DIO is a very convincing actor. Naturally, Dio begins crying to try to manipulate Jonathan's sympathy in Phantom Blood when Jonathan finally had Dio cornered and about to be arrested for poisoning his father. It would have worked had Speedwagon not shown up and seen through the ruse. Dio is quick to drop the act once caught.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: A lot of his fights end up being this way. He tossed Jonathan and Zeppeli around and killed Dire with ease in Phantom Blood, and in Stardust Crusaders, he killed Joseph (though he got better) and Kakyoin. Then he defeated Polnareff without trouble, and had Jotaro at his mercy until Jotaro began using his own Time Stop against him. To put it bluntly, the only time he was ever on the receiving end was once when he set off Jonathan's Berserk Button, when they were both kids.
• Cult of Personality: In some unknown ways, Dio created a (apparent if Part 4 is to be believed alongside 6) extensive following from all parts of the world. Joseph himself says that Dio's charisma is comparable to the most notorious tyrants of history and he has quite a sizable amount of true believers: Johngalli A., N'Doul, Gray Fly, Mariah, Enya, Pet Shop, but the ones that seem the most dedicated are Vanilla Ice and Enrico Pucci. The former basically being obedient to the point of loyal self-destruction while the later basically proclaims he loves Dio as he would love god. The vampire offers both money, stand powers and intimacy to all those that interest him. He also brooks no failure nor hesitation on doing his will. With Demonic Heartbreak (which is dubiously canon) offering insight on the fact that he psychologically conditions his followers into frightful obedience.
• Dark Is Evil: In Part 1, he wears very black or darkened colors associated with night, not to mention his creations of zombies are sometimes extremely demonic.
• Dark Messiah: Many of his servants, such as Enya and N'Doul, see him as at least akin to this, despite him not caring for them in the slightest if they fail and treat them favorably if they succeed if only to have further use for them. Pucci is possibly the only exception. As N'Doul put it, "even the bad guys... need a savior."
• Darwinist Desire: It is said, in Over Heaven, That Dio was searching for women to bear his children. He looked for ones who were the opposite of his mother—in other words, selfish, abusive and uncaring, believing the resulting offspring would become strong-willed. To some extent, he did succeed, given that four of his sons were able to manifest Stands, which require a strong fighting spirit to control. It is unknown if this is canon, but in a way, his children were able to aid in his plans in Part 6, so it is ambiguous if he planned to sire future pawns.
• Deal with the Devil: In regards to his lesser subordinates. DIO is always willing to pay upfront and accommodate handsomely, but a lack of faith has him implant parasites into their brains to monitor them better. When he dies, the parasites go out of control and turn their hosts into a Humanoid Abomination. Keicho Nijimura even likens dealing with DIO to selling your soul.
• Death by Irony:
  • His fight with Jotaro ends with the only part of his original body that survived Part 1 exploding violently.
  • After spending much of his battle with the Joestar Group boasting that the power of The World has made him truly invincible, it’s his Stand that enables DIO’s final defeat. As it lacks its Master’s powers of regeneration, Jotaro is able to bypass DIO’s vampiric immortality by inflicting a lethal wound on The World that transfers to DIO himself.
• Death from Above: After he traps Jotaro in another time freeze, instead of using his fists, he decides to do something a bit more extreme; dropping a steamroller.
  DIO: RODO ROLLA DA!^note IT'S A ROAD ROLLER!
  DIO: Seven seconds! I'M GOING TO ROLL ALL OVER YOU!
• Defeat Means Explosion: His upper body bursts into a bloody mess from getting punched in the leg.
• Depraved Bisexual: According to Word of God, if one of his minions earns his deepest respect, he will romantically pursue them, regardless of whether or not they're male or female. Doesn't stop DIO from being a menace to society.
• Desecrating the Dead: In spite of he viewed as a sign of respect to the man who managed to utterly defeat him, he still decapitated Jonathan's body in order to use it for his own means. And nothing in the narrative is ever said to what he did to Jonthan's head once he took over the body. Not to mention, he knows on some level the vileness of the act, given that he gloats to both Jospeh and Jotaro on this fact.
  • His draining of Joseph's body to a corpse- having already killed him already at the time. And proceeding to mock Jotaro on his inability to not only prevent it, but provided the means for him to get there in the first place.
• Determinator: Dio manages to cheat death a total of three times during Phantom Blood. The second time was because he ripped off his own head as his body was burning away due to Hamon, and then he maintained his (highly questionable) sanity while being stuck under the ocean for a century.
• Diabolical Mastermind: In Stardust Crusaders, he controls a giant villain network made of Stand users and vampires fanatically loyal to him, has a ridiculous amount of money to throw around, his influence reaches out across the globe, and he has a ridiculously swanky mansion in Cairo with a fabulous looking bed.
• Didn't Think This Through: Most of the time, it's the opposite, as he is a meticulous planner that accounts for many, many details in his operations, right down to how the heroes will react. However, Evil Cannot Comprehend Good in the end, and DIO's two biggest mistakes that cost him his goals, come from very short-sighted and impulsive actions born out of a need of superiority and general sadism:
  • Dio, having gained the respect of George over the years, could've played the long game and earned a portion of the inheritance legitimately (not to mention the impeccable reputation he'd built up for himself as a budding law graduate). However, being the utterly selfish and sociopathic prick he was, Dio decides to use the exact same poisoning method on George that he did to his father, Dario. And even more inanely, he didn't destroy the letter detailing his method that would incriminate him, which Jonathan, quickly picking up on the similarities, uses as evidence to send Dio to jail. If it wasn't for the Stone Mask, Dio's ambitions would've been stopped by short-sightedness and his greed overcoming his judgment.
  • DIO while on a power-high that made him err in judgment attacks Jotaro before he was fully healed after Jotaro broke his leg. Since Jotaro was at full power at that point, his attack proved stronger and destroyed DIO's Stand, which in turn killed DIO.
  • If Dio had acted like a kind and upstanding brother to Jonathan from the very beginning instead of being a cruel bully who made Jonathan's life miserable, it's entirely possible he could have gotten away with poisoning George. Dio's mask when he was pretending to get along with Jonathan was seamless; the only reason why Jonathan didn't trust him and suspected him of George's poisoning is because he remembered how much Dio tormented him 7 years ago. Poor Jonathan's interior monologue even has him beating himself up for not trusting Dio after he supposedly turned over a new leaf. Had Dio made Jonathan like and trust him from the beginning instead of being needlessly antagonistic, in all likelihood Jonathan would have chosen to believe in his adopted brother even if he had found the letter detailing Dario's symptoms.
• Dirty Coward: Above all else, DIO is determined. This does not mean that he is particularly brave, and for all his pride, he isn't above fleeing or begging for his life when things turn sour. Though it should be known that every time he begs, it is a ploy. In fact, he prefers only fighting when he has some sort of an advantage, when Jotaro appears to have the same power as DIO does, he stops attempting to try to beat the other in a straight forward fight and instead attempts to use every dirty trick in the book to get an edge over him.
• Disappeared Dad: Part 5 reveals the existence of Giorno, his illegitimate son who he never met and most likely never knew about. Then Part 6 reveals that he had three more.
• Discard and Draw: Downplayed. After obtaining Jonathan's body in Part 3, his vampire abilities are hampered on the left side, forcing him to rely more on his new Stand. That said, he still utilizes his vampire powers during said part, such as flesh buds for Mind Control and his Healing Factor for recovery. After acquiring Joseph's blood, DIO regains full control over his vampire abilities but mostly sticks to seeing how long he can stop time with his Stand.
• Disc-One Final Boss: For the whole series after Stardust Crusaders. DIO is built up as the ultimate enemy to the Joestar Bloodline, and is finally destroyed in his fight against Jotaro. However, DIO still manages to have a looming shadow, with the remaining parts of the original continuity dealing with the aftermath of his actions, and the final part being the culmination of his greater plan via a very loyal subordinate.
• Disney Villain Death: Subverted. After his battle with Jonathan at the castle of Windknight's Lot, he's plummeting from the balcony while Hamon disintegrates his body. In the midst of his fall, he detaches his head from his body and eventually survives his fall.
• Disproportionate Retribution: After receiving a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown at the hands of Jonathan (which was both completely deserved and delivered completely fair and square with no underhanded moves), Dio retaliates by killing Danny, Jonathan's Big Friendly Dog, by having him placed in the mansion's incinerator to be burned alive.
• The Dreaded: He was feared by many in Part 1 due to how efficient he was able to gather power enough to potentially overrun England in addition to becoming a direct threat to Hamon users after becoming a vampire as well as his monstrous behavior. This gets amplified in Part 3, where not only his ruthless behavior, but his Stand's incredible power both physically and its hidden true ability that leaves those who know about it in terror. Main characters Noriaki Kakyoin and Mohammed Avdol are shown in flashbacks to have feared DIO greatly, with Kakyoin being so paralyzed with fear that DIO manipulated him into becoming his servant, and Avdol had already been told by Joseph about the threat he poses and ran away in fear. It's also implied that some of DIO's servants obey him out of fear, notably Daniel J. D'Arby who was Driven to Madness on the mere thought of potentially exposing DIO's Stand on the off chance he would be killed for doing so and Hol Horse who was frightened into loyalty after seeing how easily DIO could've killed him.
• Drunk on the Dark Side: In Stardust Crusaders, DIO goes off the rails while fighting Jotaro in demeanor and appearance after absorbing Joseph's blood, reveling in his boosted powers. It gets him killed because he spends so much time playing with his food and lording over Jotaro rather than going for a straight, easily verifiable kill or fatal blow, he gives Jotaro enough time to realize he could also stop time.
• Dub Personality Change: Downplayed, as his personality between versions is largely the same. Compared to Takehito Koyasu, Patrick Seitz's DIO is quicker to recognize when he's outmatched, and his uses of This Cannot Be! suggest panic more than anger—compare the English and Japanese dubs of one of their first fights.
• Due to the Dead: Zigzagged. While DIO does desecrate Jonathan's corpse to use as his new body, certain materials state that he feels guilt about demeaning his old foe's remains, but he also feels that Jonathan's body is the only thing in existence worthy of containing his will. Yeah, DIO's weird like that.
• Drowning My Sorrows: During Phantom Blood, after Jonathan head out to find proof of him poisoning George, DIO felt certain Jonathan would die at ogre street but soon finds himself walking out into the streets with a bottle in-hand feeling something would be his undoing.

E-M

• Early Installment Character-Design Difference: A minor one. In the first chapter in the manga, Dio is depicted with black hair instead of his trademark blonde hair. He wouldn't have blonde hair until the next chapter that features him. The colored edition made many years later attempted to fix this by coloring his black hair yellow to mixed results.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Some of DIO's initially displayed Stand powers become odd when taking The World's abilities into account.
  • Initially, DIO is able to display an ability similar to Hermit Purple yet more refined to serve as a clairvoyance to look at the Joestars' progress before being forgotten about by the final battle. It would be later clarified by Araki to be the Stand of Jonathan, specifically his body while DIO's own Stand is The World, making him the one of the few users with multiple Stands.
  • It's also the only Big Bad Part 3 onwards, to not have a name explicitly based on a musical reference; rather a Tarot Card reference.
• Enfant Terrible: As a child, he killed his father (who was abusive, but still), got adopted into the Joestar family, made Jonathan look like a bitch for all of his early childhood years, kissed the girl that Jonathan liked (against her will to top it off), burned his dog in an oven, and beat him up in a boxing match. And this is all before he becomes a vampire and causes trouble for three of Jonathan's descendants. When Dio tries to use his abusive father as an excuse for his behavior, Speedwagon shoots it down and states outright that no matter what he says to justify his actions, it changes nothing; he's evil and has been since the day he was born.
• Ephebophile: He tried to seduce Poco's sister into joining him as a vampire at the age of 16, but this is downplayed, as this was largely the norm during that period of time, and all of DIO's confirmed partners are by all accounts adult women.
• Establishing Character Moment: He literally kicks Jonathan's dog Danny because he was running towards him and due to attempt to show dominance over Jonathan.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He killed his father for working his mother to death. The ambiguously-canon light novel OVER HEAVEN downplays this by establishing that while he did love his mother, he considered her foolish for her compassion and generosity.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: He might be a heartless monster, but Jonathan loves him as a brother all the way to the grave.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: While initially despising his adoptive brother, he eventually grew to care and love Jonathan in his own twisted way after being embraced by him before death, even appearing sad that he had to die. Assuming he just wasn't that good at emotional manipulation, it's possible that he did unconditionally love Pucci, as he interacted with him more like an equal and even apologized for putting him through an impromptu test of loyalty.
• Even Evil Has Standards: As sexist, cruel and murderous Dio can be, he makes it pretty clear that he has no desire to force himself upon Poco's sister, instead attempting to seduce her into being a willing vampire, he even kills one of his creations for openly lusting over her. Downplayed however, as Dio has no issues with her being killed once she rejects his offer.
• Even the Guys Want Him: Dear lord, do they ever. Many male characters mention how handsome DIO is. Avdol, in fact, mentions he was incredibly-good looking even when terrified of him.
• Evil Mentor: Enrico Pucci seems to see DIO as someone who encouraged his growth as a person and DIO likewise seems to speak of him about Stand abilities in their meetings, so the feeling is a unexpected combination of this and genuine camraderie.
• Evil Brit: Even if only in the literal sense, since the entirety of Phantom Blood takes place in Britain.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: He underestimated Jonathan's nobility until the very end. His last words to him were an attempt to bribe his rival with vampiric immortality so he could survive his wounds, not understanding that someone willing to sacrifice himself in such a way would never take up that offer.
  • Previously, he had also offered vampiric immortality to Poco's elder sister, in the belief she would like to preserve her beauty, not even realizing how horrified of him the young girl was. This earns him a reprimand and a slap for his trouble.
• Evil Counterpart:
  • Towards Jonathan; while Jonathan grew up to a kind gentleman, Dio is cruel, uncaring, and has no respect towards anyone.
  • To Speedwagon, who grew up in similar dire circumstances on the streets of London, but managed to rise above his misfortune to be a true man of greatness. Ultimately, by choosing to fight the darkness he was born into instead of spreading it, Speedwagon gets everything Dio wanted, striking it rich, living his life out with peace of mind, and ultimately gaining a form of immortality through the Speedwagon Foundation.
  • In hindsight, DIO also serves as a Shadow Archetype to Jotaro. Both possess Stands that are gifted with Super-Strength, Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs, and the ability to stop time. Both are also raised by loving mothers whom they would cherish in spite of their otherwise rough demeanor, while having... less than stellar relationships with their father (DIO's father being an abusive drunk while Jotaro's father being notably absent). What sets them apart is that DIO's mother died too soon and so is unable to remain a positive influence in the same way Holly was to Jotaro.
• Evil Eyebrows: Has a very thick, distinct pair of eyebrows that are very expressive, as seen here.
• Evil Is Deathly Cold: His freezing powers in Part 1. He doesn't use this ability in Part 3 despite it being immensely helpful to him, relying on his Stand Power.
• Evil Is Hammy: While spending most of his time as a reserved individual, it's only fighting his opponents that he starts to really out his true nature.
• Evil Is Not Well-Lit: Spends a good deal of time in the dark, being a vampire and all.
• Evil Laugh: Exhibit A, B, and C. Yes, he has three kinds of laughs.
• Evil Overlord: Tried to be one in Phantom Blood, though it didn't really pan out. He had much more success in Stardust Crusaders as a Diabolical Mastermind.
• Evil Is Petty: He went out of his way to make Jonathan's life a living hell and treat him like crap, doing such things as throwing his dog in the furnace and stealing the first kiss of his love interest Erina just to spite him. This last one, however, backfired, as after learning of it, Jonathan finally Grew a Spine and beat Dio to a pulp. Later on, we see Dio as a vampire, having turned a mother into a zombie and watched her devouring her own child, because he promised her not to harm the child, but said nothing about making her a zombie to kill the poor baby as well.
  • Crazy Diamond Demonic Heartbreak has a flashback where he threatens Daniel D'Arby with death should ever lose even a game without anything on the line, rather than potentially revealing his secrets, just to protect his reputation rather having a loser for an underling, further demoralizing him for no reason other than to be a prick when the gambler didn't want anything to do with him and was forced to serve him in the first place.
• Evil Plan: Early in Stardust Crusaders, Joseph presumed DIO was in the midst of plotting a way to allow him total control over the world. While this scheme wasn't explored much in Part 3, it isn't until Stone Ocean reveals DIO found the means to obtain "Heaven" and wrote it in his personal notebook, which would be carried out by his most trusted follower, Enrico Pucci.
• Evil Redhead: Is depicted as one in this image.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Being voiced by Takehito Koyasu in Japanese and Patrick Seitz in English tends to have this effect.
• Evil Uncle: He's Joseph's evil adoptive grand-uncle and Jotaro's evil adoptive great-great-grand-uncle.
• Evil Virtues: Ambition, Determination, Valor.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: His hair spikes up to Super Saiyan levels when he takes Joseph's blood, showing how much power he gained and sanity he lost.
• Eye Beams: Sort of. He can shoot blood from his eyes at the speed of a bullet in Part 1, though in the 2012 anime, it's treated as a laser, slicing a few zombies in half along with the top of the building he's in. But for some reason, he did not use this ability in Part 3 despite being able to do so even as a head.
• Face Framed in Shadow: In Stardust Crusaders, DIO's face is always obscured in the darkness... presumably just to seem more threatening, since he looks exactly the same as in Phantom Blood.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: DIO is a very handsome man and is noted by others as having physical beauty, but his heart is pure evil, to the point that in Part 4, Keicho Nijimura refers to the deal his father made with DIO as if it was a Deal with the Devil himself.
• Familial Foe: The various parts of the series chronicle the exploits of individual descendants of the Joestar family and their battles against the incarnations of DIO, their family nemesis.
• Fangs Are Evil: He doesn't use them to drink blood, though.
• Fanning the Knives: In the final battle between him and Jotaro, DIO doesn't want to underestimate Jotaro by getting in close since their Stands are relatively evenly matched, and Jotaro has proven himself capable of throwing punches for brief periods inside DIO's Time Stop. Instead, DIO stops time and informs Jotaro that he simply intends to overwhelm him with a Flechette Storm from a safe distance while he fans out knives he stole from a nearby restaurant during their fight.
• Fatal Flaw:
  • Pride. He's so overconfident in his vampiric abilities that he leaves Jonathan to his minions (elite minions, but still), allowing him to get both his sword and a massive power boost, both instrumental in Dio's eventual defeat. Then, even when he's actually facing Jonathan, he doesn't use his Space Ripper Stingy Eyes until he's already defeated, and even when he has JoJo at his mercy (he literally has his carotid artery between his fingers), he gloats about his victory, and puts himself in a position that makes JoJo's body warmth a necessity (Jonathan calls him out for this flaw), giving him the opportunity to strike back and almost killing him. At the end of the part, reduced to just a head, he gets serious using the aforementioned Eye Beams and curb-stomps JoJo in seconds. When he comes back in Stardust Crusaders, he commits the same mistake by taking such pride in The World's ability that he uses it exclusively, ignoring his vampiric powers, and taking his sweet time in actually going for the kill while also making an intentional spectacle of it giving Jotaro the possibility to fight back, defeating him and killing him for good this time.
  • Wrath is one of his major weaknesses, as he himself states. Whenever he's pushed too far, DIO can fall into his temper quite easily and will use brute force to satisfy his anger rather than his tactical plans. This comes back to bite him during Phantom Blood, where he is called out by Speedwagon, who claimed that Dio was born evil, causing him to put on the Stone Mask and accepting what the people around him view his identity as, a monster. During this altercation, he murdered many of the officers there to arrest him and killed Jonathan's father George in the process, which led Dio down the deep end by plunging his humanity down the drain, and he attempts to unleash his malevolent rage upon those he deems unfit to share in his world. By the time Stardust Crusaders rolls around, he seems to have gotten control of his anger by rarely lashing out while becoming more cold and calculating, but he later reverts back to his old psychotic self after absorbing Joseph's blood and goes into a homicidal rampage to try and kill Jotaro. This costs him his victory, as he let himself fly off the handle, which led to his defeat.
• Faux Affably Evil: A case which swaps between this and actual Affably Evil, since while he's a smooth and suave talker who's deep down a megalomaniacal sociopath, he's not completely faux. DIO usually does not attack unless he is provoked or deems his foe dangerous, though this is usually due to a smug sense of superiority rather than kindness. He will first try persuading people to work for him, then fight them if they oppose. He's also not incapable of forming friendships with those who are nice to him, and trusted Pucci enough to give him control of his plan to recreate the universe if he ever "veered off track". Played completely straight in his younger days, where he would have people brought to his castle. He would act like a Noble Demon only to play mind games with the kidnapped person before brutally killing them, turning them into vampires or using them for his Body Horror hobby. When wounded by Dire's Hamon-Rose, he proceeds to reveal his true colors after staying (relatively) composed for several chapters, howling in fury and sending his zombie hordes at the heroes to massacre them all.
  Speedwagon: There it is! His dark personality worse than any evil in the world! His calm and collective attitude was all a mask! This is his true self!
• Femme Fatalons: When he became a vampire, his nails became sharp and pointed claws. and when he appeared in Part 3, they were black and the anime gave special focus to them. They serve to make him sinister, but unlike the weaponized variation, it's his strength alone that grants him the ability to pierce his fingers into his victims' skin rather than the claws themselves.
• Fighting Spirit: His Stand is The World.
• Final Boss: He's the last enemy the Joestar Group faces, and in video game adaptations of the arc, this is quite literally the case.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: Averted, and also a literal example, as he's shown no discomfort in the 1980s, though he does take a moment to idly marvel about the speed and power of an automobile while remembering about how in his time, it was all horse-drawn carriages.
• Flechette Storm: One of his iconic moves against Jotaro is by throwing as many knives as his hands could hold.
• Foil:
  • Everything Jonathan was, Dio is the antithesis to. And their legacies have opposed each other throughout series. Jonathan is a dorky Nice Guy All-Loving Hero born in an aristocratic family, while Dio is an ambitious evil since birth Card-Carrying Villain born to the lower class. Jonathan wants to be "the perfect gentleman" and is willing to risk himself for strangers; Dio seeks to exploit and manipulate everyone for his own goals, culminating in his plan to take over the Joestar household (who willingly adopted him when his father died). As Jonathan and Dio gain supernatural powers, Jonathan wields Hamon to fight vampire Dio. Their appearances are further contrasted: Jonathan has Tareme Eyes and a blue shirt and is built like a Juggernaut, while Dio has Tsurime Eyes, red clothing and, in the anime, is more slender than Jonathan.
  • He's also this to Jotaro. DIO is a hammy, immortal vampire who revels in kicking dogs (figuratively and literally) with a smirk, presents himself with a superficial image of charisma that's enough to make others fanatically loyal to him, while he himself cares nothing for them in return. Jotaro is an unforgivingly stoic Japanese Delinquent who starts his introduction telling his mother to shut the hell up, and doesn't bother with politeness for anyone else either. Beneath that, however, Jotaro does care for others, has a great sense of justice, and is remarkably more intelligent than what you would expect from a delinquent.
• For the Evulz: DIO's favorite pastime is indulging his sadistic whims on those around him.
  • While Dio did all those atrocities to Jonathan when they were 12 because he hated Jonathan and wanted to be the only one worthy of the Joestar fortune, some of the things he does after becoming a vampire fall straight into this category. Creating fusions between animals and humans, tricking a woman into eating her own baby, and turning several of the people in Windknight's Lot into monstrous zombies falls straight into this trope.
  • The ambiguously canon (not created by Araki) novel OVER HEAVEN has DIO state that the biological experiments he performed at Windknight's Lot taught him how to fuse a head with a different body, leading to his eventual possession of Jonathan. His other projects and sadistic games do not receive an explanation.
    • In the same novel, DIO mentions that during his boyhood, he'd quickly learnt to despise justice, morals, and ethics, believing them to be incapable of overcoming the hardships of this world. He used to watch his mother suffer scorn and abuse when she struggled to live up to those ideals. DIO goes as far as to mention that indoctrinating children with moral ideals in the cruel world was tantamount to abuse.
• Forceful Kiss: In one of the most memorable moments in Phantom Blood, he makes Erina kiss him so that he can beat Jonathan to the punch, in an effort to demoralize him further. It doesn't end well for Dio, as Jonathan showed him by beating him to the point of tears. Thus, Dio's attempt to weaken Jonathan's resolve strengthened it to the point he couldn't truly bully him anymore.
• Forgot About His Powers: Never uses his vampire powers in Part 3 aside from bloodsucking, even though body freezing and eye-beams probably would have come in handy. While he does state that the residual Hamon in Jonathan's body is weakening him, he still doesn't bother using his powers after Joseph's blood helped him purge it.
• Foreshadowing: At first, his forced fusions between animals and humans seem to be nothing more than show his cruel personality. He makes use of this to steal Jonathan's body as a disembodied head.
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: Dio tries to blame his villainy on his upbringing, but Speedwagon says he can smell that Dio's been evil since birth, and brutally exposes him for the monster he is (which ends up changing Dio's view of himself as well).
• From Nobody to Nightmare:
  • On a literally cosmic scale. Dio was originally the son of a drunken bum with no super special secret origins or evil Chosen One status, but through cunning and charisma, he became a very dangerous vampire. Even then, he would have just been a Mook compared to the Pillar Men. Then he still set into motion a plan that led to the destruction and recreation of the initial universe, on top of gaining a power to freeze and move through stopped time.
  • The Eyes of Heaven adaptation presents an alternate version of DIO that managed to complete the initial version of his plan that takes it to its logical conclusion, becoming a Multiversal Conqueror on top of being a Reality Warper, infinitely countless leagues above a time-stopping vampire and infinitely above his humble origins as a murderous member of the lower class.
• Fully-Embraced Fiend: He was happily evil as a living human, but got even worse as a vampire. Seconds after his transformation, he jumped right to draining people to death and making zombie servants with no hesitation. He reveled in his new state as an undead monster and delared all humans as filth that exist to cower under his immortal evil rule.
• Genius Bruiser: He has a passion for reading and dropping steamrollers on people.
• A God Am I: After becoming a vampire, Dio, who already had a bit of a superiority complex to begin with, decided that he was superior to humanity itself and tried to become the ruler of the world. In Part 3, DIO was actually getting better in this regard, becoming intrigued in the power of humanity and how normal humans could surpass him. However, realizing that he had the power to stop time, completely threw all of that out the window.
• Godhood Seeker: His motive after reappearing in the 1980s, as revealed in Stone Ocean. DIO seeks to use Made In Heaven to finally achieve the world he desires and control his destiny.
• God of Evil: In Eyes of Heaven, he attains godlike power as Heaven Ascension DIO. And as you might guess from the whole rest of the page, he doesn't use this power for good, instead becoming a Multiversal Conqueror.
• Gold and White Are Divine: The reveal of what Heaven Ascension DIO would have looked like in Eyes of Heaven shows that he has alabaster white skin with golden accoutrements and facial tattoos, and his ascended Stand, The World Over Heaven, has a predominantly white color scheme compared to its original gold.
• Gone Horribly Right: The moment Dio realized he has finally killed Jonathan is also the moment he realized that he had, in his own twisted way, come to love his adoptive brother and was unprepared emotionally for how to process actually coming out on top. In the manga, he's seemingly on the verge of tears.
• Good with Numbers: He is skilled at mathematics from a young age, something he uses to make himself look better than Jonathan when he first comes to the Joestar mansion.
• Grand Theft Me: After killing Jonathan, Dio attaches his own head to the body's neck.
• Gratuitous English: "Good-bye, JoJo!"
• Gratuitous French: He addresses Poco's sister as "mademoiselle".
• Gratuitous Japanese: In the English dub, his battle cry is still "MUDA MUDA MUDA".
• Greater-Scope Villain: He's this of the entire series, affecting the plot whenever he doesn't take on the Big Bad mantle directly, especially in Part 6.
• Green-Eyed Monster: It's heavily implied that his immediate hatred of Jonathan, and by extension the entire Joestar Family, is born out of extreme envy and jealousy for being born into a MUCH better lot in life (wealthy home, loving father, etc.) than he did.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: Just after becoming a vampire, he throws a constable's body with enough force to kill two others and break Speedwagon's arm.
• Guyliner: While DIO in the manga had the lipstick from his moment he fought Jotaro, the anime changed it so that he spontaneously sprouts bluish-green lipstick after draining Joseph's blood, which combined with his more manic than usual behavior, leads to him looking like a Monster Clown. Averted in the OVA that has him with normal lips throughout.
• Half the Man He Used to Be: Jonathan nearly slices him in half in their final fight. It barely slowed him down.
• Handicapped Badass: His greatest feat as a Hero Killer was done when he was just a head. Not to mention he was handicapped for the majority of Part 3 despite having a Stand due to Jonathan's body rejecting him and weakening The World.
• Hate Sink:
  • More so in Phantom Blood than in later stories, but Dio wastes no time demonstrating how vile he is, usurping Jonathan's life, forcefully kissing Erina and killing Danny, all of which being before he even becomes a vampire. Stardust Crusaders does see him pull off no shortage of loathsome deeds, but he isn't quite as personal in his cruelty.
  • What makes DIO so unique is how he still remains a fairly complex character compared to more one-dimensional versions of this trope, his cruelty helping make him into a Breakout Villain more than hurting it.
• He Was Right There All Along: Meta example; in the 2015 anime opening, if you look carefully during the scene where Star Platinum breaks the glass/screen, you can make out the outline of The World, and DIO is standing behind Jotaro's shoulder when it zooms into his face. This was not a stylistic choice or an Easter Egg; "DIO's World Part 3" reveals that DIO was actually there the whole time on our side of the glass/screen, which The World actually broke during a Time Stop rather than Star Platinum. This is then followed by the camera panning around to Jotaro's back and showing DIO casually strolling past him during the Time Stop with a smirk before assuming his position behind him (now fully illuminated) before restarting time and engaging The World in a Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs duel with Jotaro and Star Platinum.
• The Heavy: Aside from his own appearances in Parts 1 and 3, the plots of most other parts are propelled by pursuing leftover plot points related to DIO or his followers (the Stone Mask, the Bow and Arrow, his children, the Bone, and Green Baby). He's also the reason why the Joestars became so badass in the first place.
• Hell Is That Noise:
  • In Stardust Crusaders, much like with Vanilla Ice and Cream's Portal Cut, The World's Time Stop is signaled by a loud buzzing noise as well as the sound of a clock's hands slowing down and stopping.
  • The Time Stop in the OVA is less intimidating and a heck of a lot more creepier, sounding like a low-tuned siren going off before fading away as the Time Stop expands outwards.
• Heroic Build: Inverted; he may have a strong physique, but he is far from benevolent. Even more prominent when he steals Jonathan's body in Part 3.
• He-Man Woman Hater: He's viciously sexist. Hell, the first interaction he has with a female character is forcefully kissing and slapping her.
• Hero Killer: His direct kills include George Joestar, Dire, and Jonathan Joestar in Part 1, and Noriaki Kakyoin and Joseph Joestar in Part 3 (though the last one got better).
• Hero's Evil Predecessor: He is the father of Giorno Giovanna, the protagonist of Part 5.
• Hidden Depths: Given the sociopathic asshole he is, it's hard to understand why anyone would be devoted to the man. But going by N'Doul, it seems DIO was capable of genuine generosity to the downtrodden outcasts who made up a portion of his followers. After all, he knows what it's like given he came from such a background.
  • DIO has a tendency to at best, use women as disposable pawns and a meal/target of abuse at worst. However, DIO would occasionally spare woman that would give him heirs, notably Giorno Giovanna. Even the Narrator is perplexed at DIO's odd choice and wonders why he did this.
• Humans Are the Real Monsters: The Stone Mask brings out the more violent tendencies of the user while suppressing their positive traits when they become a vampire, as seen with William Zeppeli's father. In the case of Dio, who was already a sociopathic, manipulative, and deranged person even before becoming a vampire, the transformation doesn't change his personality much. All it really did was finally allow him to act on his inherent evil without the limitations of his human body.
• Humiliation Conga: His "Take That!" Kiss against Jonathan led to him being publicly humiliated by Erina and getting a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown from Jonathan that caused him to burst into tears. He also suffers a second one after returning from Ogre Street when he discovers that Jonathan is still alive, Speedwagon exposes his plan to deceive Jonathan, and having his plot to poison George Joestar exposed. When he used the Stone Mask, it was because vampirism was the only option he had left other than prison.
• Hypocrite:
  • Hates dogs for being "bootlickers", but goes out of his way to make his minions fanatically loyal to him, not to mention the whole restart-the-universe-into-one-that-worships-me plot.
  • Hates his father for working him and his mother to the bone so Dario could buy booze for himself, but as an adult, DIO dives straight into the very same alcohol-abusing lifestyle his father did (for different reasons, but still).
  • He has no problem gleefully beating on Jonathan and poking him in the eye in a boxing match in front of a crowd of onlookers and forcefully coming onto Erina with his buddies, but when Jonathan puts him in his place after the latter incident (with no one else but George around to witness the beatdown, no less), DIO has the sheer gall to curse him for the "humiliation" he made him suffer.
  • When one of his zombie-animal minions starts lusting over Poco's sister, DIO kills him, stating "those lacking in manners are not fit to exist". That's fucking rich coming from him.
  • In Part 3, he refers to Joseph as a "cunning old geezer"... despite technically being over 40 years older than him.
  • He also refers to Erina as a "backwater shrew", despite being born and raised in the slums himself before George Joestar adopted him.
• I Control My Minions Through...: Throughout his appearances in the series, DIO displays several different methods of control.
  • Loyalty: Most of DIO's minions are fanatically loyal to him, many of which would much rather kill themselves than fail him. In Part 1, his henchmen consisted of the worst criminals he could find turned into zombies. In Part 3, DIO took advantage of Stand users and how they have a hard time fitting in society to convince them to serve him.
  • Fear: His vampire minions are said to have surrendered themselves to him by fear, and he threatens Hol Horse with his power to scare him back to his side.
  • Mind Control: In Part 1, Dio uses his hypnotic abilities and vampire abilities to turn people into subservient zombies. And in Part 3, he utilized flesh buds to make those he didn't trust surrender to his will, and used them to keep Enya under control.
  • Money: A lot of DIO's minions in Part 3 are hired mercenaries. There's also Nijimura Sr., who was given vast quantities of money by DIO.
  • A Piece Of The Action: In Part 4, it's revealed that DIO used the arrows owned by Enya to create powerful subordinates by granting them Stands.
  • Power: Those who know of his power are deathly afraid of him. After Hol Horse experiences the effects of The World, he immediately rejoins DIO again.
  • Love: Most of his minions are absolutely in love with his charisma, but particularly Vanilla Ice and Pucci.
• I Hate Past Me: In a conversation with Enya during Stardust Crusaders, he came to view his time as a human as when he was entirely weak, and only transcending that weakness by becoming a vampire was what truly evolved him.
• I Know You're Watching Me: He can tell when Hermit Purple is being used on him.
• An Ice Person: One of the vampiric abilities he demonstrated in Part 1 was to snap-freeze parts of his body (a really exaggerated version of evaporative cooling), which, in turn, would drain heat from, and freeze, the bodies of any who came into physical contact with him. This makes him a much more realistic version of it than most as rather than projecting cold, he's absorbing heat. This proves to be effective against not only close-range attacks, but Hamon as well: frozen blood can't carry oxygen throughout the body as effectively, and thus, considerably weakens his victim's Hamon. After returning in the 1980s, he replaces it with his Stand, The World, and its power to stop time.
• Iconic Outfit:
  • His Part 1 outfit consists an ornate shirt and breeches, a large pair of boots, vambraces, and two suspenders attached to a band around his waist. The anime version of this outfit made it look like his legs were much bigger than they actually were.
  • Part 3 had him wear a suit colored yellow. He wears a jacket with a backless tank-top underneath. He now also wears a heart-shaped circlet, and rings for his cuffs. His pants are held up... somehow, and also wears... elfboots. No, really. And he's still the most terrifying villain of the JoJo franchise.
• Immortality Promiscuity: After he returns in Part 3, he uses his immortal vampire body (well, Jonathan's) to sleep with women across the globe, siring at least four kids from different mothers.
• Improbable Weapon User: Part 3 has one of the most famous examples in all of anime and manga. After trapping Jotaro in a Colour Coded Time Stop, DIO grabs a nearby road roller—or in the OVA, a barge on the River Nile, then an oil tanker truck on the bridge—and smashes him underneath it; repeatedly punching them with The World for good measure and causing the tanker truck in particular to explode violently.
  DIO (anime): I'M GOING TO ROLL ALL OVER YOU! (…) IT'S TOO LATE! TIME TO DIE!
  DIO (OVA, Barge): SINK STRAIGHT TO THE BOTTOM!
  DIO (OVA, Oil Tanker truck): AN OIL TANKER FOR YOU! (…) CRUSHED, TO DEATH!
• In the Blood: Speedwagon states that Dio was evil from birth, which heavily implies that he got his repugnant personality from the already unpleasant Dario.
• In Their Own Image: Stone Ocean reveals that DIO's ultimate plan is to remake the universe into his own twisted vision of "Heaven". A "Heaven" where all will know their fate from the moment they are born.
• Ironic Echo: In the original Japanese, DIO's famous line is "kono Dio da!" ("I am Dio!"), which is often translated as "[It was] I, DIO!" When Jotaro finally manages to kill DIO, his final line is "kono DIO ga!"
  • The English dub downplays this where his famous line is translated as "But it was I, Dio!" His last words before his death are translated as "I am DIO!"
• Irony:
  • His Forceful Kiss on Erina, which he performed to further demoralize Jonathan, is what ultimately causes Jonathan to stand up to him the first time, and it's the point where his life starts falling apart.
  • If DIO hadn't become a vampire, the Joestars wouldn't have gained the strength to fight future enemies like the Pillar Men and Stand users, as Jonathan would've remained a normal man having normal descendants.
  • Not only that, but DIO's attempt to kill Jotaro is almost darkly amusing. He attempts to defeat an opponent by separating the head and the body, and seemingly expects it to be fatal.
  • DIO is quite the badass, but for all of his power, he is almost always relying on the Joestar family for really, everything. To elaborate; he needed George's money and wealth for his own greed, needed George's stone mask in order to become a vampire, needed Jonathan's body after he was reduced to a head, needed Joseph's blood to work better with Jonathan's body, and he relies on Jonathan's Hermit Purple #2 for surveillance.
  • He fancies himself as The Ultimate Lifeform (or at least well on his way to becoming one) after becoming a vampire, but vampires in the setting were originally created as a Servant Race for The Pillar Men, whose leader also aspires to become an Ultimate Life Form and succeeds. One wonders how they would have come into conflict if they had met.
• I Surrender, Suckers: If Dio ever grovels and begs for mercy, don't ever buy it. He's just waiting for an opening.
• It Amused Me: As highlighted by the community, a lot of DIO's Part 3 moments can be chalked up to this:
  • Him trolling Polnareff by taunting him on the stairs to get him to start climbing up, followed by using The World on and off to relocate Polnareff down several steps, then rinsing and repeating, which eventually leads to him spawning a chair after a few rounds and speechifying to him.
  • Him performing a similar manner of trolling on Senator Phillips to make him drive the car to chase after Joseph and Kakyoin counts, what with using The World to grab him and put him in the driver's seat despite his repeated attempts to escape or resist. And the only reason that happens is because DIO took a shine to the car in question and decided to ride in it rather than chase them down on foot which was completely within his ability, along with the fact he has no idea how to drive a car himself given the century he spent underwater.
  • Randomly killing a cat and then dumping it in someone's drink during his Time Stop to kill Joseph.
  • Using a steamroller to crush Jotaro. Since there are no signs of construction in Cairo from what we see, DIO somehow managed to use his vampire speed to run around, find a steamroller, and bring it back to Jotaro to crush within the span of seven seconds of his Time Stop.
  • In Part 1, there's no good reason other than this for him to fuse the heads and bodies of various animals together to serve as pet zombies.
• I Shall Taunt You: He loves messing around with his opponents, to the point that his Kiai literally translates as "useless".
• It's All About Me: "Selflessness" is not in DIO's personality, or pretty much anything about him, really; he only cares about himself, and he subverts any hint that he cares about someone besides that.
• It's Personal: He endured over a decades' worth of abuse from his father, but it was when the latter sold his mother's dress to buy more booze for himself that finally cemented DIO's desire to murder him.
• Jerkass: One of the first things he does in the manga/anime is kicking Danny in the face for the hell of it. To say the man is unpleasant would be the nicest way to describe what a reprehensible, deliberately vile person he is.
• Jerkass at Your Discretion: As a child, he hid his true nature from the adults and acted like an upstanding gentleman in front of them. Outside of the adults' view, he's a Barbaric Bully who encourages the worst in his followers and torments Jonathan, Erina, and Danny, since he doesn't expect them to be able to retaliate against him.
• Jerkass Has a Point: While DIO's beliefs and way of thinking has been consistently been portrayed as being in the wrong, in OVER HEAVEN, his thoughts on his mother being foolish due to believing that Dario was only unpleasant due to excessive drinking rather than being inherently callous and sticking by him in spite of the abuse that led to her early death has some merit as to why he would believe this.
  • While his execution of Enya to keep his secrets safe in spite of her loyalty speaks how little he cared for even his closest followers, it does have some practical reasons. Enya, one of his closest aides, with vital information on his Stand's true power, decided to put herself into harm's way by directly confronting the Joestar Group, who would use her as a means to learn this secret, with Enya having done so out of personal reasons that were prioritized over her boss' benefits. Enya had to die due to the potential risk she caused for acting so haphazardly.
• The Juggernaut: His vampiric healing abilities are played to horrifying effects in Phantom Blood. Not even Hamon, which is designed to fight vampires, puts him down for long.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: DIO wasn't exactly stable to begin with, but all that power slowly yet surely chips at whatever sanity is left in him. Especially after absorbing Joseph's blood.
• Kiai: MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA!!!!^note Muda means "useless". and WRRRYYYYYYYYY!!!!!^note A vampiric screech, pronounced "OO-REEEEEEEEE".
• Kick the Dog: He has a constant succession of such moments, but his first, and the one that establishes how awful he is, is when he forcibly kisses Erina just to get at Jonathan; this is immediately followed by a literal dog-kicking incident when he ties Jonathan's dog up with wire and throws it in the incinerator.
  • Taken quite literally when he kicks Jonathan's dog in the face when the two young men first meet.
  • He zombifies a woman and makes her eat her baby alive, right after he had promised he wouldn't harm it.
  • After awakening from his 100-year slumber, he proves he has not changed one bit when he orders Steely Dan to assassinate Enya Geil (his most loyal servant, who even helped him master his Stand's abilities) by planting a flesh bud inside her, on the off-chance she would reveal his Stand's secret to the heroes. Even if you put Pragmatic Villainy into consideration, he had a whole array of assassins at his disposal who were more than capable of killing her quickly and painlessly, yet he deliberately chose to make her suffer the most cruel, agonizing death possible.
  • He breaks into Senator Phillips' limo, brutally assaults him, and makes him run over dozens of pedestrians to catch up to Joseph and Kakyoin. And he still kills him anyway.
  • It doesn't stop even after he's dead - Crazy Diamond's Demonic Heartbreak shows that DIO kidnapped a random person who happened to be Pet Shop and Petsound's original owner, doused him in gasoline, and demanded Pet Shop burn him alive, to which the bird gleefully obliged to. All for literally no reason beyond experiencing the fear humans feel in their final moments.
• Killed Off for Real: His death in Stardust Crusaders is definitive and final, even if it's not the end of his machinations.
• Killing Intent: During Dio's encounter with Will Zeppeli, after their exchange of words, Zeppeli remarks on Dio's evil atmosphere and majestic presence as it physically pushes him back.
• Kill Me Now, or Forever Stay Your Hand: In a flashback in Stone Ocean, he forcibly questions Pucci if he intends to ever betray him by stealing The World for himself and offers him an opportunity to do so. After Pucci declares his admiration for DIO and only wants to see his reverence at its peak, DIO instead gives Pucci a bone from himself and sincerely apologizes for the insulation.
• Knight of Cerebus:
  • Everything went to hell for Jonathan once he showed up to mess with his life for no reason other than to drive him down the Despair Event Horizon, and it gets worse with the Genre Shift when he becomes a vampire by killing his adopted father, leading him to be an effective Hero Killer, culminating in the death of Jonathan to have his body used for Dio's now decapitated head.
  • In Part 3, when he finally steps up to fight, it results in the Darkest Hour of the saga, with the majority of the cast killed and Polnareff being injured so badly he is unable to help Jotaro, leaving Jotaro to fight DIO and his godlike powers alone. Not to mention how Bloodier and Gorier the fight was.
• Lack of Empathy: He pretends otherwise in Part 1 through Bitch in Sheep's Clothing, after becoming a vampire and by the events of Part 3, he's more of a Dark Messiah at least to his followers who think he shares the same compassion to them as their loyalty to him. It's not the case at all, except possibly Pucci.
• Large and in Charge: DIO is quite big in his own right in terms of height and his physique, and is the leader of his minions that follow his every command.
• Large Ham: It's probably easier to list the moments where he isn't delivering some kind of bombastic, over-the-top speech. Primarily this is shown during his sections in Part 1 and 3 when confronting that part's Joestar.
• Laser-Guided Karma:
  • Towards DIO, being a threat to mankind killing some of the heroes gets him killed by Jotaro. For DIO, being killed by Jotaro gets Jotaro himself killed in Stone Ocean.
  • Shortly after DIO, in one of the most iconic scenes of Part 3, impales Kakyoin as he's helpless in DIO's frozen time, Jotaro unknowingly avenges his companion by doing the same to his nemesis with Star Platinum. This time, by catching DIO off guard by being able to move in the frozen world. DIO's healing factor closed the gaping hole in his stomach, though.
• Laughably Evil: Make no mistake, DIO is one of the most petty and depraved characters in the franchise. Yet he carries it in such a bombastic and over-the-top manner that he comes off as entertaining at the same time.
• Lean and Mean: He's skinnier (by JoJo standards) than the heroically-built Jonathan in Part 1. During Part 3, he gains significant muscle mass by stealing Jonathan's body.
• Leitmotif: Hidden Feelings and From The Dark Abyss, both of which play a sinister violin revealing his true vile nature.
  • In Part 3, it switches to the omnious Dark Rebirth and later the menacing Awakening Darkness of The World.
• Light Is Not Good: Compared to the Joestars, who often incorporate dark, cool shades of blue and purple in their color schemes, DIO typically incorporates warm, vivid shades of yellow into his color scheme. Even with how bright he gleams, he's still the most vile of the series' main antagonists.
• Like a Duck Takes to Water: After being adopted by the Joestars, a young Dio takes easily to developing the skills that a young nobleman is expected to have, including fine dining, boxing and mathematics, despite having come from the poorest slums of London.
• Like Father, Like Son: As much as Dio would despise being compared to his father, the latter's own abusive and overall unpleasant behavior, along with Speedwagon telling him that he was already evil since he was born, pretty much point to his cruelty being something he inherited in order for that statement to be true.
• Logical Weakness: DIO is an immortal vampire, making most forms of physical attacks a temporary inconvenience at best, and his Stand is a manifestation of his soul or life force. Jotaro kills him by destroying his Stand, thus destroying his soul and getting around that pesky regeneration.
• Looks Like Cesare: Even before becoming a vampire, Dio had unusually pale skin in comparison to everyone else, have a hint of his future inhumanity.
• Magical Species Transformation: Dio was already an evil piece of shit when introduced, and then things get worse when he attaches an ancient stone mask to himself and becomes a vampire, becoming not only forever young but also a superhuman menace that can tank gunfire and suck blood from people. He revels in his newfound power by becomingly increasingly cruel and inhuman.
• Make Sure He's Dead: DIO isn't quite satisfied with sticking Jotaro through with knives and dropping him from over a dozen stories high, so he grabs a policeman's gun and shoots him. Afterward, he puts his ear to the ground to listen for Jotaro's heartbeat from a safe distance. Despite hearing nothing, he then decides to behead him with a street sign just to be sure. He fails, as Jotaro used his Stand both to catch the bullet just after it pierced his skin and to temporarily stop his heartbeat. Polnareff then intervenes and attacks DIO before he can attempt to decapitate Jotaro. Even after dropping a steamroller on Jotaro, he was so caught up in believing he finally won he forgot to even check to make sure Jotaro was dead.
• Makeup Is Evil: After he gains a power boost through draining Joseph's blood, DIO suddenly gains green lipstick.
• Manipulative Bastard: Manipulation is pretty much a superpower of his, considering most of the enemies in Parts 3 and 6 are composed of those who have been charmed to his side, whereas another one of his followers plays a major role in the plot of Part 6.
• Mask of Sanity: DIO hides his true, psychotic heinous nature through initial politeness and sophistication that made him appear like a dutiful son and later a young man to be admired by his peers in spite of doing horrific actions. He stops the caring young man act when exposed by Speedwagon, dropping it completely to embrace his overtly villainous and deranged nature. Whenever he acts charismatic or suave from that time onwards, is a transparent mask to hide his vile nature from potential victims in Part 1.
  • This becomes zig-zagged following his return from his 100 year imprisonment at sea. On one hand, he acts much more charismatic, regal and soft-spoken than beforehand, convincing others to follow him while in truth, using them as pawns in scheme to gain more power in addition to being more introspective and cautious; proceeding to throw away all pretense once he drains Joseph's blood to his true psychotic behavior that's even more deranged than his worst in Part 1. On the other hand, with certain individuals such as Enrico Pucci, he acts more generally rational and is able to converse with him on various matters without any overt undertones to manipulate him.
• Meaningful Name: "Dio" means "God" in Italian. To say he has a god complex would be an understatement.
• Meaningful Rename: In Part 3, he's DIO to distinguish him from his Part 1 self. It's even written that way in the Japanese version.
• Meaningless Villain Victory: Ultimately, DIO's actions lead to a world where the Joestars are alive and, by all appearances, better off... but where Pucci apparently doesn't exist, meaning DIO's legacy is erased forever.
• Menacing Stroll: DIO does that in the streets of Cairo.
• Microwave the Dog: He doesn't use a microwave (they hadn't been invented yet in Phantom Blood), but Dio kills Jonathan Joestar's dog, Danny, by burning him alive in an oven.
• Milking the Giant Cow: DIO tends to make dramatic poses, even when landing as a child, but his post-draining of Joseph's blood has him doing even more exaggerated cases of, especially when summoning The World.
  • To an extent. Considering that he was able to achieve Heaven in Eyes of Heaven, he'd be unstoppable, tearing apart the JoJo canon. Well, he would, if not for Jotaro's trump card at the end of the game.
• Mobile Menace: In Part 1, Dio was always one step ahead of Jonathan. However, after his return in Part 3, Orcus on His Throne sets in.
• Mr. Fanservice: Dear lord, is he ever. This is especially noticeable in Part 3, where the audience is treated to scenes such as this◊ and this◊. And then there's his voice... It's not hard to see why his followers are openly lustful towards him: he's clad in skin-tight apparel to show his muscular body shape.
• My Death Is Just the Beginning: Although he wasn't planning to die to Jotaro's hands, his death would still provide an auxiliary route to the Heaven plan, as him entrusting Pucci with his bone would still qualify for providing him The World, in which bringing it back to life as the Green Baby allowed for Pucci to fully complete the Heaven plan after fusing with it.

N-R

• Narcissist: This is DIO's most defining trait, especially after he becomes a vampire. He is entirely self-absorbed, and so wholly assured in his superiority that he doesn't hesitate to gloat and demean everyone else as beneath him. And if that's not enough, then his grand plan to remake the universe in his own image where everyone will worship him as a god would definitely be a dead ringer of a narcissist.
• Never Be Hurt Again: Dio started out as a nobody street urchin with a cruel father who drove his mother, perhaps the only one he genuinely loved, to her death. His motivation through Part 1 is to usurp the rich Joestars and transcend the weakness of his human youth. When he re-emerges in the 80s he takes a major step beyond and wants to be the master of everything.
• New Powers as the Plot Demands: In Phantom Blood, after his debut fight, he displayed the power to heal by sucking blood through his fingers, freeze the blood in his enemies, can't die unless his head is destroyed, and Eye Beams.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: He's largely responsible for the JoJos getting as strong as they did. Forcing Erina to kiss him is what finally drives Jonathan to beat him up and prove himself "worthy of respect" in Dio's eyes.
• No Indoor Voice: Almost ALL of his lines have him speaking much louder than his opponents.
• Nothing Is Scarier: The way his Time Stands Still-induced teleportation works in the OVA. Instead of making a big show of warping around like he did in the manga and anime, DIO simply disappears silently from one spot, and can then be casually seen in another, as if he was always there. It's a genuinely unsettling effect that even manages to frighten Jotaro, with DIO giving him a soft-spoken Breaking Speech all the while.
• Not Quite Dead: After Jonathan defeats him by filling him with Hamon, Dio manages to separate his head from his body before the Hamon gets to it, allowing him to survive as a disembodied head and later steal Jonathan's body.
• Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: Enrico Pucci reveals that the Heaven plan that DIO came up with, would lead to an end of suffering due to everyone experiencing the entirety of their lives—leading to them accepting their fates—removing surprise/trauma of the unknown that cause so much conflict in the universe. Given that DIO has been constantly portrayed as a God complex sociopath, the ulterior motive of the plan is heavily implied to give him even more absolute authority unto himself than the actual concern for others.
• Non-Specifically Foreign: While Dio is assumed to be British due to Phantom Blood taking place in England, the names and surname of him and his father may indicate they're Italian immigrants or have Italian roots.
• Obviously Evil: In Part 1, nobody notices he's evil despite his literal Kick the Dog, beating Jonathan for no reason, driving his thumb into Jonathan's eye in a boxing match he already won, and nobody but Jonathan notices that he's evil until the forced kiss on Erina.
• Offscreen Villain Dark Matter: It’s never really explained how DIO managed to acquire his mansion, vast wealth and army of fanatically loyal Stand-Users in the six years between his return from the sea-floor and the beginning of Part 3.
• Off with His Head!: Dio chops off his own head in order to not be affected by Jonathan's Hamon.
• Only Friend:
  • Dio Brando cares for nobody but himself. That is, except Jonathan Joestar. At first, Dio despises Jonathan for what he sees as foolhardy friendship and brotherly love. This eventually turns into a bizarre form of respect as Dio decides that Jonathan is the only person worthy of becoming his new body. As the years pass and DIO reflects on his life and the meaning of happiness, he comes to realize that Jonathan's affection extended even to his last moment and was truly sincere. This realization prompts Dio to recognize Jonathan Joestar as the only person he truly considers a friend rather than a pawn or worthy opponent, to the point he almost regrets that Jonathan had to die to allow himself, Dio, to live.
  • Aside from Jonathan, Pucci may also be one as well. Unlike many of DIO's subordinates like Enya or Vanilla Ice, DIO seems to treat Pucci as an equal rather than a lowly servant, casually chatting with Pucci on various topics like art or the nature of the universe itself.
• Only One Name: From Part 3 onward, he's known only as DIO. (Yes, in all capital letters)
• Orcus on His Throne: Justified; as he is Weakened by the Light, he can't go far before the sunlight destroys him, so he has his human minions go and kill the Joestars.
  • In Part 3, he is this because for the majority of the Part, he is getting accustomed to Jonathan Joestar's body, and it's only when the heroes are literally at his doorstep that he decides to come out and deal with them.
  • OVER HEAVEN (and Stone Ocean, to an extent) reveals that he pretended to be this, when in actuality he was secretly researching ways to upgrade his Stand so he could bring about The End of the World as We Know It.
• Our Vampires Are Different: He sucks blood with fingers, freezes his own limbs, and fires beams from his eyes. Then there's the fact that awakening human potential via Stone Mask results in vampirism in exchange for sunlight becoming lethal on contact. He also gains a Fighting Spirit that is able to stop time and in one alternate continuity, becomes a Reality Warper bent on becoming a Multiversal Conqueror.
• Personality Powers: An egomaniac with the ability to render himself untouchable in his own world of stopped time while leaving everyone else a sitting duck. Enya also reflects on how DIO's Stand power reflects his uncanny ability of getting out of trouble.
• Pet the Dog: Some of his most loyal disciples (like Pucci and N'Doul) serve him because he gave them a purpose in life and treated them with kindness when the world beat them down. Although, DIO himself has no problem with them dying in servitude to him in turn.
  • His decision to allow some women that he'd normally eat, use as pawns, or abuse, to have heirs and live happy lives away from him, so he could have his children for reasons that even the Narrator isn't sure about. Given how DIO normally treats the people around him, it's one of the nicer things he ever does.
  • He treats Pet Shop well enough for it to have Undying Loyalty towards him. Considering DIO's usual treatment of animals, that's saying something.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: DIO is a Grade-A misogynist. The first interaction he's shown having with a girl his age (Erina) is flirting with her, forcefully kissing her, and slapping her across the face when she washes her mouth off. As a vampire, he lures countless women into his lair to bed them and drain them of all their blood afterwards, seeing them as nothing but disposable and food sources. And during his fight with Jotaro, he spouts rude, sexist comments at the cashier of a jewelry store he crashed into (while also demanding her help), before killing her as well.
• Poor Communication Kills: If he bothered to tell Vanilla Ice about his newfound vampirism, along with the strengths and weaknesses, the battle against Polnareff might have ended differently.
• Pop-Cultured Badass: In Part 3, he develops an appreciation for contemporary music.
• "Pop!" Goes the Human: How he meets his end in Part 3. Jotaro and he have one final clash with their Stands. But Star Platinum proves stronger and destroys The World, the feedback transferring to DIO and making his body and his very soul explode to pieces.
• Posthumous Character: Continues to influence the later parts from beyond the grave.
• Posthumous Villain Victory: DIO almost gets this in Stone Ocean. He had been killed during the events of Stardust Crusaders, resulting in his idea of Heaven being taken up by his closest disciple, Enrico Pucci. Through a combination of the Green Baby, the fourteen phrases from his diary, and the gravitational effects of the New Moon at Cape Canaveral, Pucci manages to transform his Stand into Made In Heaven, which ends up accelerating time to the point that the universe is destroyed and reset. Doing so allows everyone in the universe to have effectively experienced the events of their entire life, and subconsciously be aware of what their entire life will be from beginning to end. This is what DIO refers to as Heaven, and while time was in the process of speeding up, Pucci also managed to kill off Jotaro and Jolyne, the final members of the Joestar Bloodline who were considerable threats. However, while the universe had successfully reset, Pucci didn't manage to kill Emporio, who proceeds to take the Weather Report Stand and murder him with oxygen poisoning. Unfortunately for DIO, because Pucci hadn't accelerated time to the point where he first got Made In Heaven, this new universe he so desired doesn't stick, resulting in it collapsing and creating another new universe where nobody knows their fate like before, and the Joestar Bloodline is brought back to life, albeit with new identities.
• Power Makes Your Hair Grow: Immediately after becoming a vampire, Dio's short hair becomes a shoulder-length and spiker mules.
  • Inverted when he absorbs Joseph's blood, his hair shortens, loses his bangs, and becomes much spiker. This is emphasized in the OVA, where DIO's hair initially had more volume than his 2015 anime/manga counterpart, with Joseph's blood causing it to recede into a shorter, spiker hairstyle.
  • Heavenly DIO takes this even further, with his hair reaching his waist.
• Predecessor Villain: The overarching villain of the series, even after his final death at the end of Part 3, climaxing as far forward as Part 6. The only segment he's outshone in is Part 2, where Kars is revealed to have been the Greater-Scope Villain to Part 1. DIO and his twisted plans remain a constant threat, even with the man himself being deceased.
• Properly Paranoid: Despite having an overwhelming advantage in terms of strength, speed, and his Time Stop, DIO is infinitely more careful fighting Jotaro than he is in dealing with any of the other protagonists, because he knows Jotaro is not to be underestimated. Up until DIO takes Joseph's blood, nearly all of their fighting together is just DIO gauging the full extent of Jotaro's abilities, and staying at a distance to safely force Jotaro to reveal his hand.
• Psycho Knife Nut: In Part 3, he carries an array of knives with him to make up for The World's short range and likes to combine this with The World's Time Stands Still power. Especially against Jotaro. It suits his Yandere persona.
• Psychopathic Manchild: In Part 1, Dio treats his newfound power as a toy to be played with. In Part 3, he's usually calm and strategic, until he slips back into this state after draining Joseph's blood.
• Psychotic Smirk: After absorbing Joseph's blood, he does it again before his steamroller attack.
• Pulling Himself Together: In Phantom Blood, after being essentially split lengthwise, pushes his two halves together to allow them to heal. Stardust Crusaders has him calmly asking a horrified onlooker to fetch his dismembered leg during his fight with Jotaro.
• Really Gets Around: He has at least four illegitimate sons with four different women. And it's implied that those women are just the tip of the iceberg.
• Really 700 Years Old: By the time he returns in Stardust Crusaders, he's over 120 years old, but hasn't aged thanks to being a vampire.
• Real Men Wear Pink: In typical JoJo fashion. Who else could get away with wearing heart headbands and elf boots?
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Begins with blue (orange in the anime) eyes that become red upon his transformation into a vampire.
  • In Part 3, he retains his oranges up until his absorption of Joseph's blood, which causes his irises to permanently become red.
• Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain: Subverted. To kill a vampire, Hamon or sunlight energy has to reach the target's brain. Burning him to cinders would still allow him to regenerate unless Hamon or sunlight are involved. Decapitation only results in an angry vampire head eager to find a new body to attach itself to. As an example, Straizo was blown into tiny chunks by grenades in Battle Tendency and recovered, so it's unlikely that complete brain destruction short of destruction on the atomic level even works. However, his regenerative powers are slow enough that it heavily cripples him until he recovers, as seen when Jotaro damages his brain that left him incapacitated until he absorbs Joseph's blood. The only other way to kill him is by completely destroying his Stand, which is a method that works on every Stand user.
• Returning Big Bad: He was seemingly stuck at the bottom of the sea by the end of Phantom Blood. However, by Stardust Crusaders, he makes it back to the surface, and once again serves as the Big Bad of the Part.

S-Z

• Sacred First Kiss: Does this in an infamous scene with Erina in order to throw a wrench in her relationship with Jonathan. Why? Because he likes Jonathan to suffer for kicks!
• Sanity Has Advantages: DIO was never the most sane person around, but his cautious attitude allowed him to get pretty successful in a rather short amount of time he was released from his coffin. In fact, his cautious attitude almost guaranteed him the win against Jotaro who needed both Polnareff's interference and Jotaro to stop his own heart to just get a shot at the vampire. However, once he drains Joseph's blood, he's on a self-admitted power high, being far more reckless in his approach to Jotaro, which ultimately does him in when he fails to realize the other stand user outmaneuvered him.
• Sanity Strengthening: Severely downplayed, but in Part 3 and the Part 6 flashbacks, DIO has become more self-aware. He no longer has tantrums at the defiance of others (like with Erina, Dire, and Poco's sister), but he actually reacts to them with amusement; at least with Hol Horse, whose betrayal he saw as a sign of strength of will. He seems introspective, asking about concepts such as fear and fate. His concept of strength in Stand power is even more nuanced than his simple Darwinistic swagger in Part 1. Compared to the Dio of Phantom Blood who acted in pretension by speaking French and saw Jonathan's studies as a waste of time who couldn't give him money, now DIO seems to see monetary gain and others' desires as something he is above. Being able to read books far more often (even if we did see him do that on rare occasions in Part 1). Being far more skillful in manipulating people and suave, he seems like he is outwardly more mature, despite his over-the-top theatrics. This all goes out the window the moment he obtains Joseph's blood, though, reveling in his newfound strength.
• Sarcastic Clapping: His taunt in the Part 3 fighting game, while wearing his jacket. It's Played With in that his teleportation move in that form also has him clapping, instead of turning his back to the opponent.
• Satanic Archetype: A handsome man, yet possessing enormous pride and ambition, DIO ultimately seeks to become a god and tempts people he deems as valuable pawns into evil to further his goal. Further adding to his satanic qualities are his forsaking of humanity to pursue power paralleling the Fallen Angel archetype, and his Part 3 design having light-based motifs, with his Stand The World evoking the image of a god. There are plenty of devil references made in regards to him, from Speedwagon in Part 1 saying Dio smells like "fire and brimstone", to Keicho Nijimura in Part 4 alluding to Nijimura Sr.'s deal with DIO as a Deal with the Devil. To further drive the point home, Dio means God, which adds further to his god complex.
• Saved by the Coffin: Part 3 reveals that he survived the explosion of the ship by hiding in the same coffin that saved Erina.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: He lets out some borderline campy screeches in his first serious battle with Jonathan in the David Production anime adaptation.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Trapped under the sea in a coffin for almost a hundred years.
• Self-Made Orphan: Poisons his own father and tries to do the same to his adoptive father George, but is foiled. Later, he does manage to stab him to death with a knife.
• Self-Mutilation Demonstration: Starts using it as an intimidation tactic after draining Joseph's blood, tearing off parts of his face and casually ramming his finger through his skull just to show Jotaro how little it affects him.
• Sexy Backless Outfit: Has apparently developed a thing for backless halter tops in Part 3.
• Shed the Family Name: In Part 3, he stops calling himself Dio Brando and simply refers to himself as DIO.
• Sibling Rivalry: With Jonathan. And it becomes worse later on.
• Single Sex Offspring: After stealing Jonathan's body, he conceives four sons with four different women — Giorno, Ungalo, Rikiel and Donatello.
• Skilled, but Naive: DIO battles Jotaro with a few advantages: a Stand that's faster and stronger than Star Platinum, the knowledge needed to use its special ability, and his vampiric strength, speed, and resilience. However, the night he fights Jotaro is the first time his Stand sees direct combat period, whereas Jotaro had built up plenty of experience via defeating DIO's Stand-wielding assassins.
• Smug Smiler: He provides plenty of arrogant smirks during the events of the anime adaptation of the series, which clearly show just how overconfident he is in himself. DIO will rarely drop the smirk, but when he does, it's usually a sign he's been outdone by one of his opponents.
• Smug Snake: For all his smarts, it still doesn't stop him from letting his arrogance get the better of him.
  • After he defeats Jonathan and Zeppeli, he avoids killing them because he decides his method for countering Hamon means they aren't a threat. When Jonathan came to face him again, he avoids killing him because he wanted to turn him into a zombie. Once he reveals his Eye Beams, it became clear he could have killed him without so much as throwing a punch if he didn't let his ego get in the way, further emphasized when he managed to kill him when reduced to a head.
  • In Part 3, despite wanting to make sure Jotaro was dead at first, after he tried to crush him with a steamroller, he was so caught up in the idea that he finally won, he didn't check to make sure that Jotaro was dead.
• Smug Super: DIO is insufferably arrogant, but this arrogance is mostly justified by having a Fighting Spirit able to stop time and being a nigh-immortal vampire with superhuman strength to back it up.
• The Sociopath: For starters, he is extremely arrogant, to the point where he'll reset the universe just to become its ruler. He also has a supreme Lack of Empathy, though he hides it very well for the sake of manipulating his minions, who revere him as a deity, even though they'll inevitably meet their ends at his hands. He treats dog-kicking as a hobby, and burned a dog alive just to mess up his adopted brother. Finally, his idea of love boils down to stealing the body of the ones he "cares about" and warping someone to become obsessively fanatic towards him. When he tries to use his abusive birth father to justify his behavior, Speedwagon responds with a Shut Up, Hannibal!, declaring that Dio is just straight-up evil and has been since the minute he was born; notably, Dio actually agrees with this assessment and fully embraces it.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: In contrast to all the hamminess and pomposity that comes with his A God Am I beliefs in most other adaptations, DIO in the Stardust Crusaders OVA is quieter and more soft-spoken; being just as verbose, but chillingly-calm and almost casual in how he interacts with the Joestar Group. It's especially noticeable during his Breaking Speech to Jotaro after finding he can also stop time; instead of flying into a rage, DIO commends Jotaro and Kakyoin for figuring it out before he killed the latter—silently teleporting around Jotaro to visibly unnerve him all the while—and theorizing aloud how long he can do it for.
  DIO: (warps atop a lamppost, his eyes glowing red in the darkness) How very unexpected of Star Platinum to come into my frozen world. (warps to a balcony, leaning back on the wall) You watched me, from within the frozen time. Hmm... not unlike a child first learning how to ride a bicycle, you'll get the hang of it in no time. After Kakyoin revealed the secret of The World, you were able to figure out the idea of Time Freeze, and then become aware of moving inside the frozen time. I suppose your comrade's death was not wasted after all...
  Jotaro: (appalled) You killed Kakyoin...?!
  DIO: (warps atop a nearby car, sitting casually on it) So now, I have to say to myself... about how many seconds are you actually able to move within the frozen time? One second, or two seconds? Or maybe you can move around for five seconds or so in the frozen time like me, and are just pretending that you can't? (chuckles to himself) Well, I'm sure you don't want me to know about it. But from what I can see, you're able to move around only for an instant at best. (stands atop the car) But, you are able to move inside the frozen time, no matter how brief... to approach you without caution is not something a wise person would do. The attack you made earlier was quite... stimulating. (chuckles) Ah, but Jotaro... (pulls out two giant handfuls of throwing knives) Regardless of all that, I just thought of a way to execute you! (laughs sadistically) You're quite pale. Have you realized that your end will be much more terrible than Joseph's?
• So Last Season: He uses none of his vampiric Body Horror attacks in Stardust Crusaders, favoring his Stand instead. This may be because his body from the neck down is Jonathan's and not his own, but that doesn't stop him from draining blood through his fingers, and there's no excuse for not using the Eye Beams—something he possessed even without a body. Downplayed however, in that he does at least use the Space Ripper Stingy Eyes and Charisma attacks in the video games.
• Sore Loser: When Jonathan beat him in a fistfight, fair and square, Dio retaliated by burning his dog Danny alive in an incinerator. He does get slightly better over time, gaining a certain degree of Villain Respect towards Jonathan after being defeated twice more by him, which causes Dio to view him as a Worthy Opponent (and an appropriate vessel for his severed head to take over).
• Sparing the Aces: Interestingly, DIO not only recruits all manner of people for his forces, but he's even willing to let them rejoin him should he deem them useful enough to keep around. It's why he doesn't even flinch as Hol Horse attempting to kill him, and later offers Polnareff a chance to rejoin him.
• Spiteful Spit: He spits on his father's grave before setting out to see the Joestars.
• Start of Darkness: One could argue that the death of his mother didn't help his mental state in the slightest. Dio's mother possibly could have curbed Dio's own sociopathic tendencies if she had lived.
• Starter Villain Stays: Given his importance, it's easy to forget DIO was the very first antagonist of the franchise introduced. Not only does he rise to be the Arc Villain of Phantom Blood, but the overarching villain of the original continuity and the returning main villain of Stardust Crusaders.
• Stealth Pun: DIO spent the interim between Parts 1 and 3 stuck in a coffin, trapped at the bottom of the ocean for a hundred years. In short, you could say he was "down too long in the midnight sea".
• Story-Breaker Power:
  • While Jotaro can stop time as well, he's nowhere as proficient as DIO was with it. While Jotaro can only use it as a desperate gamble for only one or two attacks or more if he's desperate, DIO can spam it as long as he wants to, has an overall longer use for it, as he has the super speed and strength in order to use it more effectively (an infamous example would be his Flechette Storm attack), and had an overall advantage over everyone until Jotaro cleverly stopped time on him in order to get a shot at him. Had Jotaro not stopped him, DIO's Time Stop would eventually have reached infinite duration, as demonstrated by DIO's Time Stop gradually increasing in duration after using Joseph's blood to finally sync Jonathan's body with his head.
  • Hell, even Dio's flash-freezing powers were a clear breaker. Since the only thing that could kill him was the Sun and Hamon, he could simply freeze any attack thrown at him. Objects would freeze, then the user; even a full sword filled with Hamon froze easily. For him to actually be defeated, Jonathan had to literally light his hand on fire and use Hamon. If he had used that and The World...
  • The worst, however, has to be his high-pressure blood from the eyes. Granted, it doesn't sound impressive at all like that, but they are basically lasers (hell, the anime actually shows them that way) that he can shoot from his eyes. They are so powerful that, while the other two were spammed, he only used them twice in the whole series, and outside main fights, because there would have just been no way he'd have lost otherwise. Let's see: they have a ridiculous range, speed, and power (he cut a freaking tower in half), making them an excellent ranged weapon, they have no charging time, and requires him merely to look at his target to be used, making them not only usable, but even worse at close range, and can work as long as he keeps his head even if the body is destroyed, as Jonathan found out the hard way. On their own, they would have been strong enough to be a serious threat, if not lethal, even for the Stand users. Combined with The World? It would have been a Total Party Kill right there.
  • In general, Dio's vampirism makes him a unique threat to the heroes because 1. He pulls new abilities out of his ass pretty much every time he appears and 2. Since DIO can never tire, his Stand also never stops being as strong as it is the first time he whips it out. Any significant injuries a Stand User sustains can take them out of the fight immediately but what does that mean to a man who can regenerate with a little blood? It's all but stated that if DIO had been able to fully complete merging with Jonathan's body or even evolve The World in any way, he'd be the most powerful being on Earth.
• Stupid Evil: Zigzagged. At first, he wisely makes the decision to stop antagonizing Jonathan and instead pretend to turn a new leaf to lull him into a false sense of security. However, as a young adult, he poisons George in order to get his inheritance faster, but with the same exact poison he used on his father, leading to Jonathan connecting the dots and exposing him. This also comes off as unnecessary and For the Evulz due to the fact that Dio is already doing great in studying law, could have waited for George to die of natural causes, and could have used George's continued support while he was still alive. However, his actions do lead to him becoming a powerful Stand-wielding vampire due to his crazy luck.
• Superpower Lottery: DIO is notable in that he is only vampiric Stand user in the series, meaning that he has superhuman powers completely independent from his Stand. (Vanilla Ice kind of counts, but he was a zombie rather than a Stone Mask vampire and didn't even realize he was turned) Not only does DIO have a Stand, but it is the most physically powerful Stand in the entire series, overwhelming even Star Platinum. Whereas most power-type Stands are limited by their short range, usually of around 2 meters, The World has a whopping range of 10 METERS. On top of this, it has time-stopping powers to boot, and unlike Jotaro, DIO's vampiric strength allows him to abuse his Time Stop as much as he likes and with longer durations. Once DIO drained Joseph's blood and allowed him to properly integrate with Jonathan's body at long last, not only did his physical abilities get a boost, but the Time Stop started rapidly increasing in duration with each usage.
• Super-Strength: His vampire physique gives him enough strength to punch through pillars and lift a road roller (or a barge and a tanker truck in the OVA) and seemingly fly through the air while carrying it.
• Symbol Motif Clothing: His outfit in Part 3 features multiple hearts, possibly referencing his natural charisma that helps him win the "hearts" of his minions.
• Take Over the World: His main goal is to obtain an ideal world he desires.
• Talks Like a Simile: He loves using long-winded and strange analogies, like asking a store clerk to bring him his severed leg like she was "serving champagne and caviar to a passenger in first class."
• Tarot Motifs: The World. In addition to being the highest-ranking card in the Major Arcana, representing that DIO is the biggest obstacle the Joestars face, it symbolizes fulfillment, completion, and achieving what we desire most. DIO is constantly striving for perfection and completion in everything he does. When the card is reversed, it can symbolize being incomplete (meaning that he has not yet reached the perfection he strives for), and isolation (symbolizing how DIO holes himself up in his mansion and lets his minions fight for him).
• Tears of Fear: He was reduced to crying when Jonathan beat him bloody for what he did to Erina.
• Thin-Skinned Bully: He took sadistic glee in tormenting Jonathan and making his life hell, but couldn't take a fraction of the abuse he dished out. When Jonathan beats him up after his Forceful Kiss on Erina, Dio's reduced to pathetically crying and berating him for attacking him, revealing the true coward he is underneath his smug attitude. He does toughen up after becoming a vampire, withstanding devastating blows with little complaint.
• Third-Person Person: Often talks about himself like this, with an "I, DIO" instead of just "I" or "Me".
• This Cannot Be!:
  • He's in absolute disbelief when Jonathan beats the crap out of him after he stole Erina's first kiss.
    Dio: Impossible... Impossible! How could a pampered brat like him best me in a fight?!?
  • His last words pretty much drip with this after Jotaro wins their final duel as his attack was more powerful, shattering his Stand's body right to his head, imploding DIO from the inside out. All the while, he's screaming "I AM DIO!!!" in disbelief that his recently gained newfound power has failed him.
• Took a Level in Badass: First, the major jump from human to vampire, and then he took a million more when he got his Stand.
• Transhuman Treachery: What Dio says before becoming a vampire with the Stone Mask while attempting to kill Jonathan, but getting George Joestar instead.
  Dio: I REJECT MY HUMANITY, JOJO!!! [Cue Laughing Mad]
• Troll: DIO absolutely loves getting under people's skin, and will take every opportunity to infuriate people around him. Until he loses the upper hand, almost everything out of his mouth and action he takes is done with the purpose of terrifying or pissing off someone for his own amusement.
• Tsurime Eyes: His eyes are very edgy and slanted, compared to Jonathan's Tareme Eyes, signifying his evil nature. It becomes exaggerated as he becomes a vampire.
• The Ugly Guy's Hot Daughter: Gender-flipped, but his father Dario is a hideously ugly old man while DIO has always been handsome and charming, even from a young age. He must get it from his mother.
• Undeathly Pallor: As a vampire and due to spending most of his time indoors, DIO has unnaturally pale skin in comparison to everyone else.
• Underestimating Badassery:
  • In his youth, he came to provoking Jonathan's wrath after constant domination and stealing Erina's kiss which led to him receiving a beatdown that had him in tears. This would continue after turning himself into a vampire and still ended up losing to Jonathan.
  • In Stardust Crusaders, he speaks with Enya on how he must eliminate the Joestar family for being unpredictable and how he'll overestimate them. Ironically, DIO ended up doing this exact mistake with his overconfidence in The World's ability, which ultimately led to his final defeat by Jotaro.
• Ungrateful Bastard:
  • George Joestar took him into his home when he had no reason to, loved him like a son, and gave him everything he could ever need or want. Dio repaid this kindness with nothing but concealed hate and scorn, and he spent his entire time in the Joestar household scheming to kill him and Jonathan in order to inherit their fortune. After discovering the power of the stone masks, he kills George for the blood to activate it and he and his actions plague his descendants for over a century.
  • Enya had been nothing but both DIO's Evil Mentor and his Psycho Supporter, but the moment she's defeated and at the heroes' mercy, DIO decides to have her killed in the off-chance she'd give up his Stand's power to them. She doesn't, having Undying Loyalty towards him until the very end, not that he cares.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Downplayed. Dio is incredibly powerful due to his vampiric strength and ability to recover from almost any attack. As a result, he tends not to rely on evasion when fighting Jonathan and throws caution to the wind at the end of their fight on the castle balcony, costing him every part of his body below his head. However, he's still more intelligent than most vampires when it comes to using his abilities, since he invented a blood-freezing technique specifically to counter Hamon users, making him and Straizo the most effective vampires in overcoming their weaknesses. When he gains the time-stopping Stand, The World, he can defeat most opponents effortlessly with a combination of his temporal abilities and The World's physical power. He also understands his own ability enough to realize that Hamon can still hurt him during stopped time. However, he has less experience in fighting Stand users, making it hard for him to deal with unexpected abilities like Jotaro's own time stop. While he initially uses some caution and strategy when fighting Jotaro, he charges his opponent like a berserker once he thinks drinking Joseph's blood is enough to overpower Jotaro. This allows the more experienced Jotaro to win despite having a shorter and less spammable time stop.
• Unstoppable Rage: When he finally drinks Joseph's blood, he goes completely psychotic and attacks Jotaro violently in a homicidal rage, hoping to kill him. Though this comes back to bite him.
• Useless Accessory: In Part 3, DIO wears pants with suspenders, but he never uses or seems to need the suspenders the suspenders to hold up his pants. In the anime, the suspenders are attached to his bodysuit, making them even more “USELESS, USELESS, USELESS!”
• Vampire Bites Suck: Rather than biting, he uses his fingers to suck blood via the fingers' blood veins.
• Vampires Are Sex Gods: Has fathered at least four sons with four different women in the span of less than four years. Not to mention many of his minions are pretty open about their lust for him.
  • In Stardust Crusaders there's a scene when we see him having a discussion with Enya on fear and humans' desires. As DIO talks to Enya, he is shirtless, and we see three nude young women on a bed in the room, one of whom DIO calls in. Although the girls were obviously seduced (and the one who DIO beckons even blushes as he calls her in) he doesn't have sexual intercourse with them, implied or otherwise. He just stabs her in the neck with his fingers and sucks her blood dry. And she seemed rather pleased as he killed her. He killed many women in the same way, before and after the scene (notoriously, when Hol Horse tries to kill him, he stumbles upon the corpses of the girls DIO has fed from).
• Villain Ball: On a few occasions in Part 3, he decides to use his time-stopping powers to troll the heroes instead of scoring an easy kill:
  • When Polnareff encounters him in his castle's staircase, DIO waits for Polnareff to start climbing, freezes time, and puts him back at the bottom of the stairs when he could easily have taken the opportunity to kill him instead. This one instance is partially justified, though, as DIO was actually trying to break down Polnareff's mind into submission in order to get the French Crusader into working for him again. It doesn't work because of Polnareff's determination, and later the timely appearance of Joseph, Jotaro and Kakyoin, but Polnareff confesses to the group that he thought he was becoming insane, so DIO might actually have pulled his gambit off had he kept trying. Not long after that, DIO uses a similar tactic on Senator Phillips, and this time he succeeds in breaking Phillips' sanity and making him his driver.
  • When the whole gang opens his casket, he uses the frozen time to swap places with Nukesaku instead of taking the opportunity to kill any of the Joestar group. However, this is justified in DIO's time limit being short and everyone else taking a precaution to keep away from the coffin just in case. Joseph even comments that if DIO wasn't limited by his time stop's duration, he would've successfully killed them all.
  • Most noticeably, after draining Joseph's blood and being empowered fully, he jumps straight into Drunk on the Dark Side mode and never leaves, settling for using Jotaro as his punching bag to flex his power-up. At several points he stops to intentionally mutilate himself just to show off his Healing Factor rather than go on the attack, and when he finally goes for the kill he forgoes just using a Stand Rush to force Jotaro into wasting his window of opportunity in the Time Stop before pounding him into Ludicrous Gibs with his superior duration to wasting most of his time to find the steamroller, and then neglecting to make sure Jotaro was actually dead this time to commit Evil Gloating. Thus, he doesn't realize his Time Stop is over while Jotaro triggered his own, wastes his own window of opportunity, and takes the crippling hit that leads directly to his demise.
• Villain No Longer Idle: After his Praetorian Guard have all been defeated, personally steps out to confront the heroes and annihilate them himself.
• Villainous Breakdown: Experiences several during his feud with the Joestars.
  • His most notable one is probably the one he has after Jotaro Kujo finally defeats him.
    DIO: NGAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH! WHAT THE HEEEEEEELL!? IT'S IMPOSSIBLE! I AM THE IMMORTAL DIOOOOO...! I AM DIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!
• Villainous Friendship: He possibly had this with Pucci. Their scenes together portray them as interacting more like equals than the typical master-servant dynamic he has with his other henchmen, and Pucci is the only one who he ever confided in regarding his greater plans for godhood.
• Villainous Legacy: Even after his death, his shadow looms over the Joestars, causing them and the world much trouble. Even he, however, is a result of a much more ancient evil from Mesoamerica.
• Villain Protagonist: According to Araki, Dio is the true protagonist of Phantom Blood, not Jonathan.
• Villain Respect: Between all of the malice and abuse Dio handed out to him, he had a brotherly relationship with his stepbrother Jonathan, and respected him as a fighter after his defeat.
• Villainous Valour: His first reaction to being confronted by a genuine vampire was to grab a knife and take up a battle stance.
• Villains Act, Heroes React: While the Stand Arrow and Bow would've still existed even without him around, if Dio hadn't given in to his ambitions, the Joestars would not have had the drive to learn Hamon, as it wasn't necessary to do so until Dio presented a threat to the world.
• Virtue Is Weakness: Having witnessed his kind-hearted mother being violently abused by his father and overworked to death, Dio came to the conclusion that virtue, as symbolized by his mother, was a source of weakness that must be purged if he ever hoped to achieve his ambitions. Later in life, as a vampire, DIO sired children with women that were roughly the opposite of his mother in personality (i.e. abusive, selfish, uncaring) due to his belief that such children would be strong-willed.
• Vocal Dissonance: At parts in the 2012 anime, due to Gratuitous English, DIO sounds less like a cultured villain and more like a southern hick, most notably including this famous moment. It makes a little more sense when considering his origins in poverty as a delinquent in the bad part of town and his desire to actually be Wicked Cultured. The cultured personality is repeatedly shown by DIO's thoughts and actions as well as stated by the other characters to be a mask he uses to cover up his Ax-Crazy tendencies.
• Walking Spoiler: His presence in Part 3 means that he didn't die at Jonathan's hands.
• Was Once a Man: Started out as a human until he used the Stone Mask to become a vampire.
• Weakened by the Light: Which comes with being a vampire, and justifies his Orcus on His Throne act in Part 3, since he can't move in sunlight.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: OVER HEAVEN discusses two moments from the series.
  • Why didn't Dio ever kill Jonathan or George Joestar with the Stone Mask? Practicality. Even if he were to inherit the Joestar fortune, the damaged reputation of the family name would ruin any commercial plans Dio may have had in the future, meaning he couldn't take the risk.
  • What exactly stopped DIO from killing Holly by sending his minions to Japan while the Joestar Group was on their way to Egypt? OVER HEAVEN claims it was experience, based on how Jonathan reacted when he kissed Erina (where he was no longer a pup but a raged beast), and how hurting "holy ladies" have brought nothing but bad luck to him.
  • In Phantom Blood, after losing too many times to Jonathan and losing his body, he is forced to resort to this. It actually works, but because Wang Chan did not follow his advice to do the same, Dio still suffered a major setback.
• Wicked Cultured: When not making the Joestars' lives suck, he enjoys the finer things in life, like drinking blood champagne and reading books in his private library in his hidden base. Or watching Michael Jackson concerts.
• Wicked Heart Symbol: He has the Heart Symbol on his headband and knee pad, but he's the Big Bad of three parts of the story.
• Worthy Opponent:
  • After losing his head, he considers Jonathan this, but it's to yandere extremes and he needed his body to move again.
  • Subverted with Jotaro, while DIO refused to underestimate Jotaro's Star Platinum, DIO had no actual respect for the man, even when he had some actual fear beaten into him by Jotaro's craftiness.
• World's Strongest Man: In the game Eyes of Heaven, he has succeeded in the events of Stardust Crusaders and has gone through the process of achieving heaven and now becomes that of a god among multiple dimensions.
  • However, he could be considered one in-universe due to him becoming a vampire with his advanced physiology and unique powers and no normal human besides Jonathan was able to overpower him or even defeat him. However, with the introduction of the Pillar Men, practically being a more powerful version of a vampire with their own more unique abilities, Dio is ultimately outclassed in their department. This changes once more in Stardust Crusaders where he arguably has the strongest Stand to his advantage that can stop time itself along with having the strength, speed, and durability to back it up. Finally, when he absorbs Joseph's blood to regulate his bodily functions, he becomes even stronger and is able to outclass Jotaro in all departments to where he nearly killed him in the end, and his Time Stop is rapidly increasing in duration with each usage during the fight. Unfortunately for him, due to his arrogance and recklessness, Jotaro ends up defeating him while taking advantage of his gloating and finally puts an end to his reign.
• Would Hurt a Child: An indirect example, but he still makes a woman eat her own infant child alive after zombifying her, right after he had just promised that HE wouldn't hurt it. He also has no issue with his vampires potentially killing Poco, a child he hypnotized minutes earlier.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: When Jonathan uncovers his poisoning of George Joestar, Dio plans to kill him using the Stone Mask, mistaking it for being some sort of murder/execution device activated by blood, and then make it look like Jonathan activated it accidentally while studying it. However, Dio when tests the mask on a vagrant who pissed him off, it doesn't kill the guy but instead turns him into a mindless vampire that nearly kills Dio.
• Yandere: Dio had a twisted relationship with his brother, Jonathan. While he wanted to take Jonathan's body for his own, he also had wanted Jonathan to die, but he also didn't want Jonathan to die? He also believed that Jonathan was the only one to match him perfectly.
• You Are What You Hate: By the second episode of the anime, the stress over his failing schemes turn him into an alcoholic like his hated father.
• Your Head A-Splode: After Jotaro's Stand punched his own Stand in the knee, the damage spreads to his head and his whole upper body explodes in a bloody mess, including his head.

The World (SPOILERS)

The World

"The World! Bring time to a halt!"

"With my Stand, I have the ability to rule the world! What can you do in the face of such awesome power?! Behold, THE WORLD!"

Named after the tarot card of the same name, The World is a short-range Stand with the power to stop time for 5 seconds. It was awakened thanks to the Stand Arrow, but is not considered a sentient Stand. It is considered one of the most powerful Stands in the series. An offensive Stand with extremely formidable combat skill, speed, and reflexes, it is also the Evil Counterpart to Jotaro Kujo's Star Platinum.

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• Adaptational Wimp: The World has a range of 10 meters, a significantly decent amount of range for a short-range stand with it being roughly five times that of Star Platinum's range. However, every video game adaptation as The World function identical to any other stand of its type, where it's never anywhere more than two meters away from DIO himself.
• Always Someone Better: Played With in relation to Star Platinum. In terms of stats and abilities, The World is basically "Star Platinum +1", having equal if not superior stats, a larger effective range, and a superior Time Stop that not even Star Platinum at its peak can match in either duration or spammability. However, DIO is far less skilled in combat with his Stand than Jotaro is with his, and this experience gap lets Jotaro keep up and match against him. And while Star Platinum does ultimately destroy The World in their final clash, this was only made possible by striking it in the same spot on the leg DIO himself had just been grievously damaged in without time to heal it.
• Breakout Character: The World has received more variations than any other Stands, with Diego's version in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Steel Ball Run and The World Over Heaven in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven. Besides Killer Queen, no Stand ever gained this privilege.
• Bright Is Not Good: The World is a divine-looking Stand that is primarily colored in bright yellow but it belongs to the truly evil DIO.
• Evil Counterpart: By virtue of being DIO's Stand, The World is this to Jotaro's Star Platinum. To boot, it generally has a more sinister appearance of a masked threatening deity, its face adorned by a grim scowl and its other expressions generally concealed by its helmet. Needless to say, The World is far more violent.
• Foil: To Star Platinum. Both are the same kind of Stand, but while Star Platinum is a barbaric-looking spirit with varied emotions serving The Stoic Jotaro, The World is a royal-looking stoic spirit serving the hamtastic DIO. And since the Stands reflect the person's soul, it reflect DIO's true nature as a soulless, narcissistic psychopath with a God complex.
• Glass Cannon: In comparison to Star Platinum. It's slightly stronger and faster, but at the same time more fragile with Star Platinum being able to punch clean through The World's torso. Even after DIO powers up by sucking Joseph's blood, another Pummel Duel between the two Stands ends with Star Platinum breaking The World's hand, and this fragility contributes to DIO's ultimate defeat when a direct punch to The World's already weakened leg shatters its whole body.
• Gold and White Are Divine: Representing its Master’s raging god complex. although the tarnished, greying shade of the white parts seems to represent the fact that DIO falls well short of true divinity.
• Informed Flaw: The World is supposed to be a short-range Stand to offset immense physical capacities, as per Stand rules. However, whereas most comparable power-type Stands in the series have a range of around 2 meters from the user (eg. Star Platinum, King Crimson, D4C), The World's range is an immense 10 meters, five times that of the norm. It is never explained why it has such exceptional range in the series, although it may have something to do with DIO's vampirism.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Jotaro proves he can move in the stopped time when Star Platinum punches through The World's chest the same way it killed Kakyoin.
• Light Is Not Good: It is a light-colored unexpectedly divine, and heroic-looking Stand for the pure evil that is DIO, while showcasing the immense god-complex of the vampire as the Stand is truly vile at its core, which perfectly foils the darker-colored and savage-looking Star Platinum who is ultimately noble at heart, which Jotaro embodies.
• Lightning Bruiser: It's stronger and faster than even Star Platinum on top of having DIO, a vampire, as its user. This means The World essentially shares DIO's Healing Factor and ability to survive non-brain injuries, making it difficult to deal lasting damage to even if someone manages to overcome its strength, speed, range, and time-stopping powers.
• Megaton Punch: A single punch from The World is strong enough to impale a person, as seen with Kakyoin.
• Mirror Boss: It's completely identical to Star Platinum in terms of damage-dealing and special ability, but their battle reveals they have some minor differences in practice. DIO gauges The World as faster and stronger than Star Platinum, but the latter's superior experience (helpfully provided by DIO's Stand users) still allows it to match and defeat The World in combat. The World can also keep time stopped for longer while Star Platinum goes into the fight not knowing how to stop time. Given that DIO's advantages become more pronounced after he assumes control over Jonathan's body, it's likely that his Stand's power also stems from his vampirism.
• Muscles Are Meaningful: The World is a ripped-looking Stand, with the power to back it up.
• Nepharious Pharaoh: The design of The World is a Pharaoh-inspired one, with some cylinders on its back. You may call it a "Holy Diver".
• Not So Stoic: Its unflappable demeanor changes to an Oh, Crap! face as it starts falling apart after Star Platinum punches its weakened leg.
• Personality Powers: A Stand with the power to stop time and leave opponents sitting ducks wielded by a Narcissist with a god complex that enjoys toying with people that defy him.
• The Quiet One: Compared to Jotaro's Star Platinum, The World never even says a kiai while fighting.
• Reality Warper: In Eyes of Heaven, this is the power of The World Over Heaven, the final evolution of DIO's Stand. The extent to which it is able to overwrite reality is unlimited, to the point it could even counter and overpower the likes of Gold Experience Requiem and Tusk ACT 4, but it does have a major limitation: its power can only be initiated through its or DIO's fists, meaning that the Stand or DIO would have to punch something in order to rewrite it.
• Shout-Out: It's pretty likely that the inspiration for The World comes from the song "Holy Diver" by Ronnie James Dio, DIO's namesake. This is due to his royal-looking appearance, alongside the diving cylinders on his back. (Araki mentioned it's oxygen so DIO can breath during the time stops)
• Simple, yet Awesome: Compared to the esoteric, reality-bending properties displayed by other time-manipulating Stands like King Crimson or Killer Queen Bites the Dust, The World's Time Stands Still is far less complex, but just as potent: leaving any opponent that lacks a similar ability completely incapable of defending themselves for 5 full seconds against its Super-Strength.
• Smug Smiler: Sports a rather smug smirk after DIO seemingly defeats Jotaro.
• Stealth Pun: We repeat—The World looks like a Pharaoh wearing scuba gear, making it a "Holy Diver". This is never commented on in-universe.
• Super-Strength: Along with Super-Speed, The World is by far the strongest and the fastest conventional Stand in the series. It is the only Stand to physically overwhelm Star Platinum in both aspects, and combined with its time-stopping power, The World eclipses nearly every other to be introduced in the series.
• The Stoic: Unlike its user, who loves to ham the situation, The World hardly emotes at all.
• Synchronisation: While all Stands abide by this, The World is notable because the potency of its ability is tied to its User’s infirmity: It is implied the Stand had the potential to stop time indefinitely, but was held back by DIO’s inability to fully control Jonathan’s body.
• Time Stands Still: The power of The World is to stop time for 5 seconds. Combined with its Super-Strength, it's effectively a One-Hit Kill machine. The initial main weakness was that the Time Stop's duration was so short, but as his synchronization with Jonathan's body improved the amount of time The World could stop steadily increased, to the point it's outright stated by DIO himself that The World would eventually be able to keep time frozen for as long as he desired (or at the very least, continuously long enough that DIO would have no problem destroying any foe at his leisure). This is proven once DIO drinks Joseph's blood to speed up the integration, with The World immediately getting a jump in time-stop duration that increases with every usage of it from that point onwards.
• Walking Spoiler: The secret of The World's power is one of Part 3's central mysteries. We only learn the truth of its ability during the very last fight, after DIO uses it to kill Kakyoin. Since it only shows up during the final battle, it's impossible to talk about The World without spoiling Part 3's ending.
• Wicked Heart Symbol: The World has heart-shaped symbols on his chin and kneecaps, like its user, and it's utterly vile and villainous, just like its user.

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"IT'S IMPOSSIBLE! I AM THE IMMORTAL DIOOOOOOO...!!! I AM DIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!"

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