Don't get me wrong, there's some good stuff, but part 3 to me is ultimately an extremely forgettable story. Part of why is because Part 3 is longer than part 1 and 2 combined (The anime is even longer, but I'll compared the two at the end). Now, 16 volumes is not an overly long length compared to other series, but I feel Araki made the series long just to be long. Take part 2 of Jojo, where the plot is almost always moving forward in some way. You can't take much out of the story without changing it drastically. This isn't the case in part 3. Only about 10-20% of encounters here are story-pertinent. While we see a map of the Crusaders' progress, once a fight ends, not much has changed. You could remove or even rearrange half of the arcs here and nothing would change.
Now, you might be thinking I simply hate episodic stories, but that's not the case. Episodic stories can work, but they don't work in Stardust for several reasons. To those who've experienced Stardust Crusaders, let me ask you this: What can you tell me about Avdol? How about Kakyoin? Not much, really. Characters in previous parts weren't great either, but parts 1 and 2 were so short that it didn't matter as much, and despite the length, I feel like I understand Caeser much more than I do Kakyoin or Avdol. Avdol gets nothing, and Kakyoin gets a sad backstory near the very end of the story, which is usually an example of bad writing. To be fair, Polnareff is kind of interesting, and has his own motivation for joining the crusaders, and the same goes for Iggy honestly. Joseph is fun as usual, and Jotaro is serviceable, but I prefer him in later parts. And then there's Dio. Dio is as charismatic as ever, but part of what made him good in Phantom Blood was his relationship with Jonathan. In Stardust Crusaders, Dio is just the final boss, and 'da bad guy' to Jotaro. He's not a bad character, just not nearly as good as he was in his debut.
Of course, as long as the battles are entertaining, this can all be ignored, but the thing is the encounters here are hit or miss. Part of this is because the crusaders have very simple powers that don't leave much room for creativity. The best battles are the story essential ones usually, but that's not always the case. Often, battles are won because Jotaro is randomly able to do something that was never established, and the series acts like it's because Jotaro is some genius or something. When I'm watching an arc that isn't entertaining and has weak and static characters that adds nothing to the story, I feel like my time is being wasted.
I will say this though; Once the Crusaders get to Egypt, the manga as a whole gets much better. The battles are more creative, Iggy is introduced, and the final battle, while a bit contrived, is good. That's why I rated it a 5 instead of a 3 or 4. Also, the art is pretty good.
While I respect Araki for trying to improve his series, the shift not only means early battles weren't as entertaining, but his characters weren't either. I guess you should read this if you've read the other parts up until now, but I definitely won't ever again.
The anime is longer and has some filler, but Kakyoin is given a bit more character (He still isn't good though). It's probably better, I guess.
