Jujutsu Kaisen: Could Geto Still Be Alive Within Kenjaku? Did He Just Strangle Kenjaku?

The moment when Kenjaku took over Geto’s corpse proved to be one of the most important moments in Jujutsu Kaisen, as the consequences of this act were wide-reaching and are still an important plot element in the main timeline. While Kenjaku’s technique was thought to completely annul the presence of the original soul of the corpse he took over, a scene in Shibuya indicated that this might not be the case. This is why, in this article, we will explain whether Sugru Geto could still be alive despite having his corpse taken over by Kenjaku.

Geto is seemingly in there, but it is not clear how much control he could gain over Kenjaku

While the focus of this article will be the specific scene from Shibuya, we will start by explaining who the characters in question are and how they are related. Suguru Geto is, of course, well-known, and he was the original villain in Jujutsu Kaisen 0. Akutami expanded on his history and his relationship with Gojo in Gojo’s Past Arc, which explained how he became a villain in the first place. Jujutsu Kaisen 0 was the story of his downfall.

Kenjaku, on the other hand, is a mysterious figure who initially appeared as Geto in the series, then was known as Pseudo-Geto until his true identity was finally revealed; he is actually an ancient jujutsu sorcerer with the ability to possess corpses, and that is exactly what he did to Geto, whose body he took over after Gojo killed the latter in Jujutsu Kaisen 0. Now that we have introduced you to the two let us see how they are connected.

Back in Jujutsu Kaisen 0, Geto was defeated by Yuta Okkotsu in a surprising twist. Geto was gravely hurt, yet he would have lived if Gojo hadn’t come to the school grounds to aid his students. Then Suguru runs into Satoru, and the two begin discussing their pasts and futures.

Suguru returned Yuta’s student ID card before finishing. He advises Gojo to kill him because, if he does not, he will never give up trying to carry out his plan. Gojo then kills his former closest friend with a heavy heart and then departs, deciding not to get rid of his body; not giving his body to the Tokyo Metropolitan Curse Technical College was a big error.

Why? Not long after Gojo had left, Kenjaku, a shadowy figure, approached Geto’s body. Thanks to a particularly unique Innate Technique, Kenjaku can implant his brain into a corpse. As a result, he takes on all of that person’s abilities and memories; a horizontal scar on the forehead, which serves as physical evidence of the brain transplant, is a telltale sign of a Kenjaku-possessed body, but that is also the only one, as even Gojo could not tell that it was not Geto when he saw Kenjaku in his friend’s body for the first time. This unnamed Innate Technique has allowed Kenjaku to live long and be present in the world for millennia.

So, Kenjaku simply approached Geto’s body, possibly as Itadori’s mother, Kaori, as she was his last known host before Geto, utilized his Innate Technique, and transformed into Geto—or, to be more exact, Pseudo-Geto—knowing full well how strong he was. Why did he do it? The main justification stated was that he wished to own Geto’s Cursed Spirit Manipulation technique, which he eventually got. Still, as we’ve already mentioned, Kenjaku’s complete strategy has not yet been explained completely, so we’re not really sure what he intends to do with it in the future.

As you can see, Kenjaku’s Innate Technique enables him to seize control of dead bodies to “revive” them. Naturally, Kenjaku adopts these individuals’ memories and skills, giving the deception a lifelike feel. Since Kenjaku emits the energy of the original owner, it is impossible to distinguish between the two and determine whether Kenjaku is genuinely in charge of the body. This means that, despite his amazing imitation skills, Kenjaku merely assumes the subject’s role and does not resuscitate him or her.

But, while it was initially thought that Kenjaku had complete control over the body, a scene in Shibuya proved otherwise. Namely, Kenjaku’s and Mahito’s group of curses often discussed the nature of life and cursed energy. During one of these conversations, Mahito expressed his opinion that the soul came before the body and that they were two separate phenomena.

Kenjaku, on the other hand, believed that these two phenomena existed simultaneously and that they were connected, which explained why Kenjaku would retain the memories and emotions of the bodies he took possession of, even though the original souls were dead.

Mahito then concluded that both of them could be right, as their techniques are worlds of their own, but that conclusion doesn’t matter much about the topic of this article.

Namely, and we’re now getting to what happened in Shibuya, it was initially thought that Kenjaku had full control of a body he’d taken over. Even Kenjaku himself was of that opinion. But, as Kenjaku revealed to Gojo that he was a fake, Gojo, while he was being sealed in the Prison Realm, spoke to Geto directly, asking him how long he planned on letting Kenjaku do that to his body.

At that moment, the right hand of Geto’s body activated itself and began to strangle Kenjaku, who was initially shocked, but as the grip became softer, he started laughing. He commented how this was the first time something like that had happened and then stated his conclusions to Mahito.

Indeed, this scene suggests that Geto is not completely gone, and this could prove pivotal later in the series. Still, we don’t really know how much control Geto could gain, ever, i.e., whether that would be enough to actually do any damage to Kenjaku. At least no real damage. We don’t think that Geto is actually alive per se and that he could be resurrected. Still, this fact could be important in the future as a means of defeating Kenjaku without any major issues, although this has yet to be seen.

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