Hi Anon! Thanks for reading 🙂 And yep, Sensei said that UT is the most beautiful character (whether she means pre or even post scars is unknown) but that certainly doesn’t mean he has a good hygiene, haha! [x]
Whether the overall reason is that it’s supposed to fit his image of the creepy mortician or that he’s depressed (or a little of both), I don’t know, but I think we’re all going to be shocked once we get a flashback about him (without the scars and nails, with washed hair and not working as an Undertaker):
I’m actually a little frightened to meet his past version because, well, there is a chance back then he had 0 idea about what fun even meant (since it’s no important to him now, I guess he learnt about it post desertion), so we’re definitely in for massive differences about his character.
On the other hand, I can’t wait, because I love his character and I want answers. xD
Thanks again for reading Anon! Have a nice weekend. :3
Hey again Anon! Ah, well, I’m totally biased, but I don’t find that Grell and Seb are on UT’s beauty levels. Vincent, Ciel and Edward are, though! 😀
Anyway, yeah, since we know that UT ended his own life, he must not have had a fun existence at all originally.
In fact, I’m pretty sure that his warning to the Phantomhives is something that he experienced himself, which makes it all very ironic.
Besides, him enjoying fun so much to the point of making this his payment in exchange of info is how comic relief tends to work with Sensei, implying that whoever taught him about fun was someone important to him (like Claudia possibly indeed, since Vincent liked to have fun too). Or so I think.
I also made a post before about a possible parallel between UT’s story and Ciel’s, so I do agree that a comparison between how UT ended up learning about fun when Ciel won’t smile anymore is likely to be meaningful. If anything, “living” is probably something that UT learnt about after he deserted the Shinigamis 50 years ago.
However, I’m not so sure about a flashback for UT anytime “soon”. At least, I’d say that this arc will have to be over first, kinda like it happened with ch105, because I doubt UT is the one who will talk about himself. Not at first.
It doesn’t have to be because he doesn’t want to tell Ciel, but because he doesn’t want Seb to have any leverage against either of them + because the subject of his past alongside Ciel’s predecessors must be painful to him (otherwise he wouldn’t have cried in ch105).
So, if someone else is supposed to introduce UT’s backstory (Othello? Tanaka? Frances?), the arc will probably need to be solved first before we can focus on that. And frankly, seeing the current pace, I just doubt it’s gonna be this year. xD
Of course, I could be totally wrong. So take it with a grain of salt. 🙂
Thanks for passing by Anon and have a nice weekend!
You’re welcome Anon! Thanks for passing by and chatting. :3
To answer you, personally no I don’t feel that this is rushed at all. In fact I’d say the pace is rather slow (I mean the twin was introduced in the 26th volume) and I had expected our!Ciel to be framed for a while now.
As for what’s the point, it’s a chess game and UT & real!Ciel are the ones who initiated it from the moment they revealed themselves to Ciel. I agree they’re not the simplest characters to understand though, but I theorized about what they could be after here and here respectively! 🙂
Overall, I think the most important to keep in mind about this arc and the latest developments is that our!Ciel is supposed to be confronting all that he never did until now (in order to gain character development), which is something mainly illustrated by the return of his undead brother.
Rewinding the story
back
a little, try to remember why Ciel took on his brother’s identity in the first place and maybe it will make more sense. From the moment his bro died, our!Ciel became Vincent’s successor and the next Earl Phantomhive, so he had no real need to take his brother’s identity.
The reason he did it anyway is because…
he felt extremely guilty about not being the twin who died. It’s a condition called survivor’s guilt, because of the trauma induced by the horrible experience he lived through.
As such, he hates himself for having survived, even more after Seb made him believe that he had willingly sacrificed his brother’s soul into summoning him (which isn’t true, he never wanted any of this, it was an accident)…
and it’s all of this that led to his decision to take on his brother’s identity: because he wanted to make it as if real!Ciel was the one who had survived, both for himself and for what was left of his family (because
he saw himself as inferior to his twin brother and guilty, so he didn’t want to disappoint them).
And this, this mentality right here -that he is guilty and that Seb eating his soul will be his punishment for not having died instead of his brother- is what I believe needs to change for our!Ciel.
Hence the current arc and this face-off between brothers because, if there is any time when Ciel can reflect about his brother’s death from 4 years ago, especially when Lizzie and Soma (who are the closest to him) are also involved, it’s now with the current arc.
Basically, what I’d personally love to get from this arc is for our!Ciel to finally realize that people are happy he’s the one who came back (Lizzie, Ed), that they are happy to have met him during these 4 years (Soma, Sieglinde) and that’s he’s certainly not worthless compared to his brother.
Because, if our!Ciel gets this kind of positive development about himself, then later he may end up starting to question whether or not the terms of the contract are still something he agrees to.
And personally I’d love to see this type of conflict eventually happening between Seb and Ciel, because it’s just way more interesting narratively speaking than their highly functioning duo that exists ever since vol1, especially if Seb is truly supposed to be Kuroshitsuji’s main character (because main characters need to be challenged and to develop, be it in a good or bad way).
There you go Anon! I hope this makes sense? Honestly ever since this…
I’ve been waiting for a build up to an eventual conflict about the contract between Seb and Ciel. If it happens it will be way later though, if just because Ciel needs to get a better view of himself first if he’s to ever reflect back on the covenant he made with his butler.
That’s why Ciel having to confront what he decided 4 years ago and most of his behavior towards people who care about him is important right now. For me that’s mostly what the current arc is all about, with possibly some answers about the Phantomhive family and UT’s personal issues with them.
Sorry for rambling, as with everything it’s just my take on the subject but I hope this wasn’t too hard to understand. Thank you again for the kind words and have a lovely day ahead Anon! :3
Sorry for the delay, Anon! Basically your explanation is above: I tend to see it as a matter of dynamic progression & character development.
The story started with a highly efficient duo between our!Ciel and Seb, so addressing underlying issues that will at some point possibly be too many not to be considered is very relevant, narratively speaking.
+ As I said, if Seb is the main character, then he should be bothered a little, hm? So far, Ciel was pretty lenient about becoming his dinner (since a deal is a deal), so the biggest hurdle for Seb would be for his master to change on that fact.
Seb said it, he enjoys this game and doesn’t want to have to retort to acting like the beast he is by nature and yet…
isn’t that precisely what he did when Ciel wouldn’t snap out of PTSD? So, like, a few hours before he said “I don’t want to act like a beast”?
So, look Anon, all I’m saying is that stagnation is never good when it comes to storytelling. 🙂
It took 27 volumes, but Ciel is on the verge of confronting what happened 4 years ago with his brother and the consequences of his choices back then. I don’t see why he wouldn’t eventually do the same about the contract, should he get enough positive development to stop seeing the contract as “a punishment he deserves”.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t believe in a happy ending for Ciel, but that doesn’t mean that Seb should never have to worry about being able to eat at the end. For now, UT is mostly the person who’s making him fear this…
…but one day I’m hoping our!Ciel himself will make Seb worry.
No one has to agree on this obviously, but that’s how I see their duo’s evolution. I hope it answers your question, have a nice weekend Anon!
I just thought about how people (Sullivan, the prefects, the circus troupe, RCiel if RCMT is true, and probably others) sort of foreshadows how this arc’s mastermind (so to speak), Undertaker, is gonna fail miserably.
Presumably, his intentions are good. He wants to save OCiel’s soul. But boy oh boy are his actions bad.
Hey Anon! I watched the anime a few years ago and I’m in the process of rereading the manga from the beginning (currently I’m on ch139, I will catch up soon :D), so yup, I can definitely confirm that the anime follows the manga!
The anime covers ch1 to ch47 actually (with 24 episodes), but I will just say this one thing: it’s only my opinion, but I had a harder time with the anime’s pace than with the manga’s.
I remember being rather bored with the anime at first, because its first third is very slow-paced: don’t get me wrong, the content is the same as in the manga, but somehow the pace is different. I can’t be sure why, maybe it’s because the episodes always tried to stop at appropriate cliffhanger-y moments and so it kinda disrupted the pace of the first 8 episodes?
Anyway, that’s why I’d recommend reading the manga over watching the anime if you don’t have a preference, because I didn’t have the same pacing problem with the manga when I started rereading.
Besides, the anime in itself doesn’t bring much more besides the music score, while the manga’s art style is quite superb and the story flows nicely + the gags are funnier somehow (probably because it’s harder to convey them the same way when animated).
That being said, if you are interested in giving AnY a try and don’t want to read the manga, then by all means give a chance to the anime because it’s exactly the same story and still a good work of animation overall.
I may not have had the patience to catch up with the series regularly before but I will from now on, because it’s truly a good and interesting series, so whatever you choose between manga and anime, don’t hesitate to give it a go indeed!
I hope it answers your question, Anon! Have a nice weekend!
Not only do I think that Frances is very much happy and in love with Alexis so she wouldn’t be seeking another guy, but I am also of the opinion that…
she sees through Seb’s human disguise and thus knows he’s not human (can’t be sure she’d know he’s a demon though), which is why she’s always so harsh with him.
for now. Besides, on the account that apparently Seb looks a lot like Vincent on purpose (even if I don’t see it but ok), it would be totally weird to have her lusting after her bro’s doppelgänger so, really, nah on every aspect of this.
Sorry Anon! Feel free to ship them if that’s what you want to do, but don’t expect any basis for it in canon is all. :))
Have a nice weekend! ^3^
I remember how much I loved this scene the first time I read the manga.
Quite an aesthetic all by itself, very beautiful and moving.
midnight-in-town 