The entirety of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure is, unsurprisingly, bizarre. It starts as a Victorian-era drama about two feuding brothers and, within a few chapters, we see a ghoulified Jack the Ripper climb out of a horse’s neck. From the start, it was always weird, but out of all the generational leaps and multiple timelines, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Part 3: Stardust Crusaders remains the perfect distillation of the series.

I say this as someone who adores nearly every part of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure. Admittedly, 'Golden Wind' didn’t grab me – perhaps because it is so removed from the overall story without being totally separate – but I still love the outlandish character designs and the even more outlandish Stand powers. Those weird powers have become what makes it a JoJo’s story, but they don’t show up until the third generation of the story.

The first two parts, 'Phantom Blood' and 'Battle Tendency,' focus on a totally different power called Hamon, which is basically the same power as Kenshiro from Fist of the North Star, but instead of hitting pressure points, it is powered by intense breathing. It is basically only useful for attacking vampires, which is good because Parts 1 and 2 of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure are absolutely riddled with them. In fact, I maintain that Battle Tendency, with my personal favorite JoJo in Joseph Joestar, is one of the best vampire stories of all time.

However, it still feels too inspired by what came before, too beholden to the influence that Fist of the North Star had on Hirohiko Araki’s work, to have its own identity. That identity comes when Stands are introduced in Part 3: Stardust Crusaders. Instead of finding new and exciting ways to punch people, the characters of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure develop psychic powers that can manifest in almost any way. There is a guy who steals people’s souls through video games, a dog that controls the sand, and a perverted orangutan that creates a whole freight ship to be his Stand.

Things start to get truly, well, bizarre during this part, but there is still enough of a thread connecting previous chapters of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure to what is happening. Dio, the villain from Part 1, returns and is a great, flamboyant antagonist for the stoic Jotaro Kujo. Joseph Joestar, the hero of Part 2, is back as Jotaro’s mentor and occasionally racist grandfather. There are still instances of using Hamon, but the focus has clearly shifted toward Stands as the power that will be the series’ identity going forward.

Of course, Araki gets much more creative with Stands later in the series. Especially early in Stardust Crusaders, most of the Stands are some variation of punching enemies, but by Diamond is Unbreakable, we’ve got Stands that control hair, Stands that help a chef prepare miraculous food, and Stands that warp space and time. And that doesn’t touch on the outright horror of Rohan Kishibe’s Stand, which allows him to peel a character’s skin back and read them like a book, including manipulating their memories by writing in them.

The Stands become weirder and weirder, which is enough of a reason to continue reading JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, but Stardust Crusaders remains the point in the series where everything clicks. There is never a better villain in JoJo’s than Dio Brando, which helps give this globetrotting adventure its focus. The stakes are high (Dio is a vampire who will destroy the world if unchecked) and personal (Jotaro’s mother will die if they don’t defeat Dio in time). It is the sweet spot in the series, and JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure has never been as good as it is during Stardust Crusaders.

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