Diavolo: Personality, Themes, Motivations and Beliefs
In this article, I will try to define Diavolo’s themes and character traits. This will be a mix of attempting to pinpoint authorial intent and personal interpretation.
Identity and Connection
Diavolo has a few major themes present in his character, but I have always believed that his most compelling one is the idea of identity and connection to other people.
How characters relate to each other is a major theme in Jojo as a whole. Vento Aureo in particular explores the concept of trust and connection being risky, but a worthy gamble; there's always a risk in putting your trust into someone, but as much as it can be someone's downfall, it's a fundamental part of life and can be your greatest strength. This is expressed in all of the cast, but especially in Giorno, the protagonist, whose ability to make friends and inspire others is constantly noted as his main strength.
Diavolo is arguably the series' most ideological "opposite" to this theme that it has ever written. Going beyond other villain characters who simply don't form desire for socialization like Toru or hide their true selves from others like Kira, Diavolo sees any connection to others at all as a danger. As a result, he scrubs his identity and presence from the world completely and never lets a single person see his face or interact with him in any way.
Theoretically, I could criticize Diavolo's writing right here. Having nobody in his mafia know anything about his identity despite him being their Boss, a highly communication-necessary position, is absurd and realistically impossible. But for all my complaints of how shakily written Passione is, it's such a Jojo-level impossibility that I can suspend my disbelief. Instead, I find Diavolo’s self-erasure a fascinating character trait.
It’s important to note that we have no evidence Diavolo sought to erase himself because it was his only option. Bruno once insists that he did this because there are specific enemies he knows are already after him or something else specific to hide, but they find no evidence that this is the case. As of what we know, Diavolo is simply incapable of trust; even the slightest connection to anybody at all is a perceived threat to him, including any knowledge about him being in the open.
While there are also your regular themes of good vs. evil, this is what I'd argue is the boldest contrast Diavolo has to almost everyone else in the cast. While the others choose to trust, build connections, and find strength in allies, risking betrayal, Diavolo chooses to cut off anyone from reaching him before they have any potential to harm him.
Compassion
At first glance, Diavolo’s lack of sympathy towards others isn’t unique among Jojo villains. However, there are some differences between Diavolo’s value of people and, for example, DIO’s. While DIO is similarly self-centered, he understands other people very well, which he uses to charm and manipulate. In contrast, Diavolo also attempts to manipulate and convince his enemies into submission at several points.
In fact, deception is a significant part of Diavolo's character; he deceives Bruno into thinking he's fighting for a just cause only to sell drugs under his nose, and he deceives his group into bringing him Trish only so he can attempt to kill her himself. But, interestingly, whenever he tries to convince someone to give him what he wants face-to-face, it always falls flat.
