Joco

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Joco, known in the Japanese versions as Chocolove Mattel* (チョコラブ・マクダネル), is one of the main characters in Shaman King.

In the English versions, he is called Joco, most likely because "Choco" was considered a racist name for an African American character.

Joco is an African American who came from New York. This shaman was raised by his mentor, Orona, who died of an illness. He may have been an orphan who was adopted by his mentor. He was born on October 2, 1985.

He met his mentor on a snowy night when he was young. Orona was among the crowd of people who circled around a victim who was being robbed. The police had the robber surrounded, but he threatened everyone by threatening to kill the victim. Orona stood out from the crowd and asked the police to give him a chance. Chocolove was watching him, and before he knew it, the robber was laughing his head off and was being carried off by the police.

In the manga, the circumstances between Orona and Joco's first meeting are different. After killing a man on Christmas with his gang members from Shaft (the name of the gang, not a specific person or place), Joco walks alone on the streets, reflecting on the horrible murder of his parents on Christmas day years ago (this resentment of the day and humankind is why he shot the man mentioned earlier). After making a little comment, a stranger (Orona) appears and makes a pun with a sight gag using fake blood. After telling him to go away, Joco shoots his gun, but Orona dodges all his shots. Saying that he could not use laughter to help Joco, Orona uses his oversoul with Mic to punch him. The fact that Joco laughs at Orona's comment about using laughter to save the world and that Joco sees Mic forges a relationship between the two.

His former master used to own a power spirit named Mic Jaguar (a takeoff from Mick Jagger), who was passed down to Joco when he died.

In the manga, he gains a second spirit guardian named Pascal Avaf. Joco killed Redseb's and Seyram's father (the man he killed on Christmas) before he repented under his teacher. He went blind in order to atone for his sins.

Joco likes to tell jokes to his companions a lot; the only draw back is that his jokes/puns are corny (at times involving mistranslation/mispronunciation of Japanese words and phrases) and make no sense most of the time. The others have the tendency to run after him or beat him up after telling a joke (or in Ren's case, poking his nose with one of his weapons). Typically, he gets on people's nerves with his jokes; however, the anime has shown there are a few moments where people enjoyed his jokes. Yoh occasionally let off a light chuckle to them, and both Tamao and Pirika laughed hysterically (though it should be noted that Pirika took some time to understand the joke, and Tamao had her spirits explain it to her before she cracked up).

His goal in life is to be the Shaman King and a great comedian because he was inspired by his master. Both of them believe that laughter is the best medicine, so even if people don't think his jokes are that funny, he doesn't give up and he tries even harder to achieve his goal to give the world what it needs the most, laughter.

One of his jokes actually saved his friends. While in his oversoul, he told a joke which only the spirits seemed to understand (the other shamans responded with an ellipsis...). It is true that most of his techniques involve making spirits (and very rarely, humans) laugh, making them a vulnerable target to attack.

[edit] Joco's joke differences in the US and Japan

Joco's jokes differ between the Japanese and American versions.

Typically, the Japanese Chocolove makes jokes based on puns between Japanese words and uses some visual effect to enhance it. (ex: In episode 50, the shaman Nyorai tries to break Chocolove's will to fight by telling him the darkness in his heart will hurt him the longer he denies it. The Japanese phase for "darkness of heart" would be close to "Kokoro no Yami". Chocolove, in order to break Nyorai's spell over his teammates and himself, creates his Giant Oversoul, except there are horns added to Mic's head, and proceeds to have Mic dance after saying "Otorou Yagi", which is Japanese for "dancing goat"). Since the jokes cannot make sense when translated to English, the anime has new jokes made in that language.

[edit] Joco's Oversoul

Joco's oversoul may be a bit complicated to understand because it seems very similar to spirit fusion (spirit unity in the English anime). He uses his own body as a medium (just like a weapon), so he will grow black markings all over his body and claws, which makes his a similar resemblance to that of a Jaguar, hence the name "Black Jaguar".

A possible explanation for Joco's oversoul is it can be some form of advanced spirit fusion. The original Spirit Fusion used by most shamans will allow them to unite with the spirit in body, mind, and heart. In Joco's case, he was able to further improve this unity by using his own body as a weapon too. It may be possible that he was a martial artist because a martial artist's weapon is either fists or feet; but then again, this theory may be falsified because there was no proof in the anime that Joco knew martial arts.

Another possible explanation is his body markings. It may have been already printed all over his body but it is not visible. He may have used this markings as a medium, therefore allowing the markings to become visible. This is also only a theory however and it may be proven wrong.

One more possible explanation is that his weapons are his claws. If you observe closely, the claws on his fingers when he has an oversoul is some sort of "stick-on" or "put-on" nails, something similar to that of fake "glow in the dark vampire fangs". He uses this as a medium for his oversoul. This would be possible if there would be an explanation as to why Joco has black body markings when only the weapon and not the body is involved in the oversoul process.

Another idea to explain Joco's oversoul is that it focuses Mic's spirit more into his body and claw attachments, whereas Integration may focus more on a uniting the two spirits together to control the body.

[edit] Editing of Joco's lips

The U.S. manga edits Joco's lips so that they are like the other characters' lips.

Shaman King
Techniques
Over Soul (Spirit Control)| Giant Over Soul (Giant Spirit Control) |Techniques of Shaman King
Characters
Asakura Family:Yoh Asakura | Anna Kyōyama | Kino Asakura | Yohmei Asakura | Hana Asakura | Yohken Asakura
Allies/Teammates: Horohoro (Trey Racer) | Manta Oyamada (Morty) | Chocolove McDaniel (Joco) | Faust VIII | "Wooden Sword" Ryu (Rio) | Tamao Tamamura (Tamara)
Spirits: Amidamaru | Bason | Lee Bailong | Tokagero
Native American Shamans: Silva | Kalim
Tao Family: Tao Jun (Jun) | Tao Ren (Len) | Tao Yúan (En)
X-Laws: Iron Maiden Jeanne | Lyserg Diethel | Marco
Enemies: Hao Asakura (Zeke) | The Hanagumi | Opacho