Chocolove McDonell

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

Appearance
He is African- American guy of average height. He always has his hair in an Afro shape. He wears an African wrap on the lower half of his body and a dress shirt as his street clothes. When in battle he wears a vest and a different wrap to increase his speed.

Personality
Chocolove 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 laugh hysterically (Pirika takes some time to understand the jokes, and Tamao had her spirits explain it to her before she cracks up). One time, Ren states that he is jealous of Chocolove's courage to tell an obviously corny joke.

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 do not believe that his jokes are that funny, he does not give up and he tries even harder to achieve his goal to give the world what it needs the most, laughter.

Abilities and Powers
Chocolove is a supposed comedian but in reality is not really funny. One of his jokes did save his friends. His oversoul is different that most shamans since he and and Mick literally become one. This uses the full power of both Choco and Mick at the same time but is taxing since they both be synced the entire time they are oversouled. While in his oversoul, he tells a joke which only the spirits seemed to understand (the other shamans responded with an ellipsis...). Most of his techniques involve making spirits (and very rarely, humans) laugh, making them a vulnerable target to attack. After going blind, some of his other senses seemed to have been increased as he is able to smell the position, of Yoh and the others, who were currently at the time running from Golem.

His oversoul with Pascal is a giant stone head. It is the same as most other shaman in the sense that he is literally using Pascal as a weapon but it also differs than most shaman in that it uses absolutely no attacks. Instead it provides Choco the power to literally walk on air and move at an incredible speed.



Spirits

 * See More: Mic the Jaguar|Pascal Avaf|Spirit of Wind

His former master used to own a power spirit named Mic Jaguar (a takeoff from Mick Jagger), who was passed down to Chocolove when he died. In the manga, he gains a second spirit guardian named Pascal Avaf. With the power of Pascal Avaf, Choco creates his new armor oversoul, Jaguarman. 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. He also became the strongest of the Five Elemental Warriors, and gained the Spirit of Wind.

Past
After killing a man on Christmas with his gang members from Shaft (the name of the gang, not a specific person or place, and he used this name for his attack), Chocolove 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, choco 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 Chocolove laughs at Orona's comment about using laughter to save the world and that Chocolove sees Mic forges a relationship between the two.

Shaman Fights Second Round
Choco was first shown during the three month wait at the patch village. He was the one who explained the team stipulation to yoh and company. Ren quickly put his team together. Ren and his team was paired with hao's Earth team in the first match of the second round. BoZ attacked first and was easily defeated by Choco's Shaft attack. Peyote then used the BoZ as mediums for his oversoul. Choco tried fighting back but was almost defeated by them. He remembered his past and pulled out the winds of laughter and the Ayers Rock Sunrise. This forced the BoZ to laugh and freed them from peyote's control. Choco ran out of power and fainted. Ren finished off peyote and won the match.

Anime/Manga Difference
In the manga Chocolove met his mentor after having killed a man. In the anime, Chocolove met his mentor, Orona, 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. Also, in the manga Chocolove chooses to be revived without his sense of sight when this is done by the Gandara. There is no reference to Chocolove's sight loss in the anime.

Dub/Translation Errors
Joco's jokes differ between the Japanese and American versions.

Typically, the Japanese Joco makes jokes based on puns between Japanese words and uses some visual effect to enhance it. (ex: The word for "impossible" in Japanese is pronounced "bakana". As a play on words he would hold up a banana). Since the jokes cannot make sense when translated to English, the English manga and anime have new jokes made in English

The U.S. manga edits Joco's lips so that they match that of the other characters. This was to avoid a blackface stereotype. His lips remain unedited in the 4Kids version of the anime and the credits for the game Shaman King: Master of Spirits.