Listen, in light of the newest Gintama spoilers, I have to say a few things about the kind of character that our Zura is. To sum up:
he’s a main part of Gintama’s comic relief because sometimes often he can act stupidly
he’s actually a terrorist
he’s got the weirdest pet/right hand man ever
Zurako makes for the perfect okama
But the best part is what the summary is actually hiding about who he really is:
As a fellow student of Shoyo, he never held anything against Gintoki for his choice to protect Shoyo’s legacy (his students) over Shoyo’s life
He even went as far as to tell Gintoki that he wouldn’t let him shoulder the burden of killing their teacher a second time, because he knew how harsh the first time was on his friend
He fell in love with a widow who lost her husband because of men like him (Jouishishi terrorists) but, instead of trying to convey his feelings to her, he’s just happy to spend time eating her ramen soba and looking out for her without asking for anything in exchange.
Despite being anti-bakufu, he admitted that he and the Shogun may still have common goals and decided to fulfill their mutual promise after Shigeshige’s death
Also despite being enemies for most of the series, he helped the Shinsengumi at their darkest hour because he recognized that they were necessary to his goal of saving the country
He has many nicknames, like the Noble Youth of Madness or Runaway Kotarou, but to quote Sakamoto: “in order to carry on his family line and to protect his comrades, he fought on and on as a coward. But […] if there was an enemy he had that he couldn’t beat unless he put everything on the line, then you might learn the true name of that man once he sheds his coward skin”
kinda random point but he’s damn wild when he fights seriously
in the current arc post time skip, he took on the burden of becoming Prime Minister (”Donald Zurump”), making tons of enemies and experiencing many assassination attempts, still in order to achieve his goal of saving his country
as a terrorist, he’s actually acknowledged to be even more dangerous than Takasugi
and finally
according to the newest spoilers, he’s confirmed to be the one who went as far as to disband the Shinsengumi SO THAT THEY WOULD WORK ON REUNITING THE YOROZUYA
…that with Lizzie now back, we may finally be able to witness some interactions between her and the Undertaker (it’s been 27+ volumes…).
And it’s important because we know that UT cares about “the Phantomhive family”…
but we don’t know who that represents exactly.
He mentioned Vincent…
and the twins…
but we don’t know if he’d want to bring Frances and possibly her children back from the dead too, should something happen to them.
That’s why finding out about if UT includes Frances’ side of the family in the people he’d rather not lose is important, because that’d give hints about his possible identity, as well as his state of mind.
I talked about this before, but the way UT instantly declared that he liked the twins because “they’re both Phantomhives as regards [him]” in ch131 is… hard to take at face-value because:
if UT is Cedric K. Ros, then the twins are his grandkids so him instantly caring is logical and there is nothing else to say
if UT isn’t Cedric K. Ros tho’, then he automatically validated the twins “because they’re Phantomhives”, which means only because he loved Claudia or happened to find Vincent an enjoyable guy + which implies that, whatever the twins are like as their own person, he gives 0 care about and that’s meh. ://
Personally, I like to think that at least ch84…
…is enough to say that UT does see our!Ciel as a person different from his father and grandmother, but then there is ch35 which could be seen (in extreme cases) as a hint of the opposite…
so I’d like to know which one it is for sure: does UT care just because of Claudia, or does he care because he has a soft spot for all of them (whether he’s Cedric K. Ros or not)?
Hence me being really eager to see how UT acts with Lizzie, because it should be an indicator as to whether he cares or not about the Midfords and…
Should he care about Frances’ side of the family, it also implies that he should see Vincent and the twins as their own person and not as proxies for Claudia, which is a good thing (+ you can take this as another hint for the UT = Cedric theory).
Should he not care, well, I think that rules out the UT = Cedric theory + it’d also imply that UT’s attachment to the P family could just be all about Claudia and seeing proxies for her through her son and grandsons, which is… not good or healthy.
Sensei said before that UT was no villain despite the appearances, which I think is meant regarding our!Ciel’s character more than Seb’s. Nonetheless I think that it makes more likely the version that he cares and sees Claudia’s family (including Frances, Liz and Ed) as enjoyable people for different reasons.
I’d just like an official confirmation about this, since it’s a subject of debate,
as well as a big answer about UT’s characterization and a good clue about if he’ll stay in the narrative for a little while longer or not.
One last thing: whether UT cares about Frances’ side of the family or not doesn’t change the fact that he’s a selfish a**hole who should find a better way to cope about things. Sensei implied he was no villain but that doesn’t mean he’s free of guilt or that he shouldn’t change his ways.
Because UT is completely wrong about bringing back the dead thinking it will change everything about how he or Lizzie or our!Ciel feel. It’s just that also caring about Frances and her kids may just give him better odds at realizing that he messed up.
And, to add onto what I already answered you @mourninglockets, the other reason I like the idea that UT actually cares about Frances and her kids isthat the harder redemption is, the better character development will turn out to be.
Think about it, since UT is no villain, that means he’ll have to find a way to make it up to the people he cares about and whom he hurts, that is if he ever realizes that he was 100% wrong.
However, assuming he does, Ciel alone is not really a challenge in that aspect, because Ciel showed that even after the Campania and Weston arcs he still trusted the Undertaker (probably because he could guess with the lockets that UT had a special link to his family).
That’s why, should UT also care about Frances’ side of the family, that means he’d have to make it up to them too and that’s where it gets harder, not so much as far as Liz and Ed are concerned, but I doubt Frances would forgive him easily (Cedric K. Ros or not).
That’s why I favor this stance between the two. So far it seems UT really stays around because there are still Phantomhives to watch over.
So because he did some crazy shit during three arcs, if he claims to care about the Phantomhive family (even if just because of Claudia), then he’d better find a way to make it up to them properly.
He’ll just be more dedicated to doing it right for everyone if he cares about/stays and intends to protect more than just our!Ciel in my opinion, that’s all. 🙂
This is a theory blog for many fandoms and this will now include Black Lagoon lmao. No kidding, I love this series and the characters are amazingly written in a very raw and realistic way so y’all should give it a try.
Anyway moving on: the thing is, I’m worried about the climax of this arc which supposedly is for next month for two/three reasons.
First of all, apparently the bad dudes sent after Feng were a group of 4 “brothers” and we only saw three of them.
So either it means that the 4th brother will avenge the others next, or that he’s a character we already know but who left the group a while ago.
Since Dutch was said to be a liar about being a war veteran in the previous arc, it’d be interesting to have a little more info on him and that’s why I like the idea of him being that 4th brother who left the others behind a while ago, so that we ever get a chance to learn his backstory.
However, in case that 4th brother is really an enemy, he could go after Feng in the next chapter while they’re watching Revy’s show. Revy even has her guns on her, so this could mean a fight to truly end the arc.
Second thing, Black Lagoon’s arcs tend not to end
well more than often than they do: the mass-murdering fucked up kids, the arc in Japan and Yukio’s suicide, Garcia and Fabiola ending up despising Rock…
…to the point our MC had enough of trying to make things end the best way they could at the beginning of this arc (and him eventually helping Feng was mostly because she reminded him of himself in how similar their situation leading them to Roanapur were).
The interesting part is that bad endings always drive Revy and Rock closer when they happen, because Revy is dead set on trying to have Rock remain as “innocent” as possible, his act of The Good Guy being important to her who only knows violence and blood.
That’s why she’s the one who went after Feng in the first place, telling her about Rock’s circumstances…
…in hope it’d motivate him to try once more for this arc.
So I don’t know what outcome we’re going with for this arc, but it should be the one leading to even more proximity between Rock and Revy, since it’s kinda one of the main points of the narrative in the first place.
If this arc ends badly, it could have the same effect as the other arcs, because Revy will try even harder to make Rock stick to his Good Guy act. At the same time, Feng dying could depress Rock even more and Revy could blame herself so…
¯_(ツ)_/¯
And if this arc ends well, since this time Revy is the one responsible for making Feng Rock’s problem, he could be a little happier to have been useful, which in return would please Revy, which is why I’m not excluding that Feng will survive.
However and this is my last point, there is a death flag because Feng kinda possibly totally jinxed herself, not once but twice: at the beginning of this arc and in the newest chapter…
And for real, the fandom is more alive on Reddit than here, but this above legit
was everyone’s reaction to her kissing Rock for the second time. xDD
It’s not even a ship war thing, because no one can really doubt that Revy and Rock will end up closer than anyone else in this series, their dynamic being one of the biggest focus of the narrative:
And Feng herself is 100% conscious of Rock kinda being Revy’s territory, not that our main girl tries to hide it very well
(between punching Eda for joking about getting Rock into her bed, turning onto freaking Balalaika when she held Rock at gunpoint, or threatening Jane when she implied she’d make Rock join an orgy, you get it).
Even Rock himself doesn’t seem to question it when Feng half jokes that Revy could kill her for this, so basically the chances of Rock/Feng being a thing will never fly high and Feng seriously attempting it ever again would raise an even bigger death flag for certain, even if Revy is not the one to press the trigger.
I’m of the opinion that actually it would be fun to have Feng becoming Benny’s new girlfriend as she half joked there again, since no one likes Jane xD (and anyway, the woman herself is now in danger because of Feng getting revenge against her so maybe she won’t last long either), but that’s only if Feng manages to make it to the end.
TL;DR I like Feng and I don’t particularly want her to die, but the series has a history of making Rock disappointed about the way he handles the arcs, so Feng could be yet another example of that.
Maybe the whole point is to have Rock slowly being isolated from everyone but Revy (when his non-violent side used to make him the better interlocutor with everyone but her), especially since it was implied times and times again that Rock will probably never find a way to fit in Roanapur.
I mean sure, he’s got his place within the Lagoon company and he doesn’t want to go back to his previous life, but even his ways to handle what the 4 Big Bosses of the city can sometimes ask of him is starting to make Dutch, his boss, uncomfortable. And now he kinda indirectly targeted his colleague’s current girlfriend in the current arc so… oops.
On the other hand, Revy herself can currently only fit nowhere but in Roanapur, so I’d say Hiroe-sensei is building the narrative around the two of them slowly seeking an in-between.
…So I guess we’ll see next month whether or not Rock will finally be able to watch Revy’s S&M show, because it would be a shame for him to miss it just like during Shaitane Baidi’s arc. xD
Even though I initially thought that UT was calling Othello out because Othello had possibly proved in the past to have the same misguided curiosity towards humans (which is what the very original idea of UT’s BD project was initially), now I wonder if this wouldn’t rather be a Shakespeare reference?
For those who don’t know, the tragedy Othello is about a Moorish man living in Venice who’s tricked into believing that his wife is having an affair with his Lieutenant. So he kills her out of jealousy, before realizing the truth and killing himself as a result.
So if Othello in Kuroverse is supposed to be a reference to this tragedy, that’d mean our boy here became a Shinigami because he killed his wife. Meanwhile, if we’re considering that UT’s strong attachment to the Phantomhive family roots from the possibility that he had strong feelings for Claudia
and that ultimately he wants them all back because…
he doesn’t want his connection to the P family (to Claudia in particular?) to disappear
or because he promised Claudia he’d protect them all and he doesn’t want to fail his promise to her
…then I’m wondering if this isn’t what UT is referring to when he’s calling Othello out, as in, “I’m doing this out of love and you should be the last one to criticize me on the subject considering your own circumstances.”
Since some readers often have the wrong timeline in mind though, please remember that UT killed himself way before Claudia was even born and he met her after he deserted the Shinigamis, it’s not like he became a Shinigami because she died. So it’d go like this when it comes to Othello vs UT:
Othello: killed himself because he killed his wife
UT: killed himself, deserted, fell in love, lost the woman, decided to experiment about bringing back the dead
hence ch142 and UT telling Othello to back off about saying he lost his mind on the subject (sensitive subject for him and all).
So about this “anonymous report”, I’m wondering if Abberline might not be talking about Violet, because…
…he did tell a policeman in Bath about who the true blue star is in ch129 (something like “Earl Ciel Phantomhive” I guess) and so they could have showed up at Earl Phantomhive’s manor as a result.
The thing is though, Violet knew Bravat was in London, but nothing says he knew Bravat would be hiding at Ciel’s manor (but Scotland Yard could have thought of this by themselves, I guess).
In that case, more than anonymous, it would just mean they don’t want Bravat and his allies to know who sold them out, out of protection for Violet’s sake.
Otherwise it could be Paula…
but, rather than Scotland Yard, that should be the explanation as to why Alexis and Edward are here.
Some fans also mentioned Soma, but then again, Soma didn’t really involve himself with this case and would have no way to know that Bravat could be hiding in Ciel’s manor, so I also doubt it’s him.
In case Abberline means that they really got an anonymous tip however, then the third option is that Bravat was sold out by someone who’s already at the manor and that’s when it becomes trickier to guess, because the only ones who’d have a possible reason to sell Bravat out are:
Lizzie? friendly reminder we still can’t be sure of what she meant by “saving the twin” in ch113. It’s looking more and more likely that this was about not having the same blood type, but she could have meant rescuing him from the sect too, especially since she’s actually crying as she’s exposing our!Ciel as a liar. So we’ll need to see the next chapter to check just how far she’s likely to have been manipulated.
Tanaka? he already knew about real!Ciel coming back it seems and his attitude clearly shows that he’s not at ease with the situation, so who knows what he did or didn’t do at the moment?
Undertaker? that’s mostly if the idea that there are two sides being involved behind the blue sect is correct. If that’s the case, UT could want Bravat out of real!Ciel’s sight and leading Scotland Yard to him could be the easiest way to do this.
(The other servants hardly even noticed that real!Ciel =/= their young master so I don’t think it’s them either and there shouldn’t be anyone else besides the star lords left on Bravat’s side)
Don’t hesitate to share if you’ve got other ideas for that “anonymous report”!
Hey so maybe I’m reading too much into this, but…
look at UT’s face upon Scotland Yard’s arrival, compared to everyone else who is 100% surprised, he’s just… smiling.
So maybe he’s really the one who gave that anonymous report then? And in that case, either it’s because he wants to get rid of Bravat or because he wants a lot of witnesses to something that will happen???
Wait guys,
now that it’s confirmed Othello and UT really did know each other, that means…
that Will had forewarned Othello about UT most likely being the culprit behind this case if the dead was being brought back. And that means…
that UT was the one Othello was talking about in ch119???
I know I’ve been annoying with this theory, but I really think that overall this means there is possibly another party (besides just UT) involved behind the blue sect. [x][x]
And in that case if Bravat and UT aren’t on the same side, that could explain UT possibly leading Scotland Yard right to Bravat, to get rid of him?
As proposed on Friday, here’s a recap post about my take on it, for the few who wanted it and in hope that it might help some others with the few misunderstandings I’ve seen going around. Let me know if anything is not clear!
First thing first, despite the name of the theory, real!Ciel isn’t exactly the mastermind or the real target of Ciel’s revenge for me, if just because he and our!Ciel wouldn’t have ended up with child traffickers and sold to the cult if there wasn’t another party involved (and wanting for them to suffer).
So someone else definitely manipulated real!Ciel and his possible wishes, in order to get to the Phantomhive household. They sent someone, very probably a supernatural being considering how they appeared right behind our!Ciel, to kill almost everyone before making sure the boys would know Hell.
For simplicity’s sake and this post, we’ll assume the true mastermind is Queen Victoria (+ John Brown) and if there is a need for more explanations, please check these posts [x][x].
Moving on, in my take of the RCMT, there were only two attackers on December 14th:
and while #1 is the supernatural being (Brown?), #2 is real!Ciel (see below).
However, I know, why would a ten year old child ever wish doom on his own family?
Well, first of all, things very probably didn’t go according to real!Ciel’s plan, way before the boys were even given to child traffickers: I’m of the opinion that initially all that real!Ciel ever wanted was for his father to die. And why? Because with Vincent dead, he was the next head of the Phantomhive family and as such…
…he might have a say into his little brother’s project to go to London and become a toymaker, leaving him behind.
But things escalated from the twin’s initial plan, very probably because of the real mastermind who used real!Ciel’s little wish to get his father out of the way to almost entirely annihilate the Phantomhive household, before getting rid of the twins in a much crueler way
(possibly because real!Ciel was an accomplice).
So overall was it a horrible, irrational and childish idea coming from real!Ciel? Well, yeah, but he was ten years old and, mostly…
he apparently had (& still has as a bizarre doll) a rather pathological attachment to his little brother
(bordering on obsession really) and that could be enough of a reason for him to truly fear the future separation.
He might have even seen his parents as being unsupportive of him and his issue on the topic, because they clearly seemed to be okay with our!Ciel’s choice in ch133. Thus getting rid of at least Vincent to replace him and have his say on the matter was a minimal price to pay for not being separated from our!Ciel.
I disagree with fans labelling real!Ciel a psychopath in the past (it’s possibly different now because of UT), however I do think something was wrong with him if his little brother was the only one who mattered above everyone else to him. And, again, I really think that’s the case because…
…Lizzie, the Midfords, Ann (before she died)? Well, he didn’t/still doesn’t seem to consider them at all. :// Our!Ciel does though…
and that’s from where I draw a comparison between what’s normal and what seems to be less so, because it’s as if Sensei wanted to insist that they’re very different on this point.
So, looking at ch133/134, what happened?
First of all, it’s very important to realize that there is a one and half year time skip between real!Ciel breaking down about our!Ciel leaving him behind (with Vincent and Rachel not taking his side) and December 14th, 1885.
And it’s important because that means that Sensei purposely hid what the twin did or even how he acted between the incident and the actual massacre, after focusing for two chapters on real!Ciel being bothered by his brother leaving him.
So “he was a sweet kid, loved his parents and he would have never done that”? Well no one can know that for sure, since it’s not like we really saw anything about him between “I have no choice but to become Earl Phantomhive” and the attack on the manor. Besides, it’s kind of very Sensei-like to do foreshadowing this way, just saying.
Moving on, I’m not going to expand on how/when/why real!Ciel could have ended up as an accomplice of the attack of December 14th because we have no clue of that yet (that’s all in that one and a half year missing from the flashback), however I think everyone pro or against RCMT realized by now that the outsider who killed almost everyone received help from inside the house.
That helper is real!Ciel for me: he’s the one who muzzled Seb the dog and locked him in, so that he wouldn’t warn anyone/attack the intruder, but also maybe so that he wouldn’t be killed.
As I said above, I doubt that real!Ciel considered that anyone besides his dad had to die for him to get what he wanted and both the dog and servants could still be useful to him as the next Earl
anyway
(in order to keep the exact same household, except for Vincent himself).
As for Rachel, well, from the way she and Vincent died, embracing each other…
…I think she tried to shield Vincent and was killed first. ;_;
However,
had his initial plan gone perfectly, I’m not sure either that real!Ciel thought it necessary for his mother to die (just like the dog and servants). Either because he imagined that, once he’d be Earl, a woman would have no way to stop his decisions (I mean, look at what he said to Lizzie, I know he was a kid but ://), or because he thought she could understand after what she said about her and Ann in ch133.
There again, real!Ciel’s plan definitely didn’t go as expected, since the real target of our!Ciel’s revenge ordered her assassin to annihilate the whole household instead (the twins awaiting another horrible fate), which…
is
what
took
place. Well, almost because someone survived.
Before I get to this part though, I have to say: I don’t think real!Ciel is the one who killed his parents. He wanted his father dead, yes, but he’s not the one who stabbed them, or Seb the dog, or even most of the household.
Just look at ch134, all the dead people our!Ciel came across had a lot of blood pooling around the bodies, a lot of blood on the walls or furnitures around too, which in my opinion signs the work of a real skilled killer (that supernatural being, attacker #1).
So I doubt the twin would have been able of that, not at ten years old, not when he didn’t have blood on his clothes and not when he seemed to suck at fencing. What he did do however is at least muzzle and lock the dog, take the Phantomhive ring from his father’s hand (the ring that proved he could inherit the position after his father)…
and possibly stab Tanaka at least once (making him attacker #2).
The reason I think the twin is the one who stabbed Tanaka is the opposite as to why I think a real pro took down everyone else: Tanaka was stabbed twice
meaning that the first time wasn’t enough to kill him, so:
either he held his own against a supernatural being because he was strong enough
or real!Ciel is the one who wasn’t skilled enough to kill him on the first try.
Also, the second time Tanaka was stabbed was precisely as he attempted to warn our!Ciel of something about real!Ciel…
And if real!Ciel was in on the plan about December 14th, frankly I doubt he’d want his little brother to know that he was an accomplice in the massacre that took place.
The last chapter even implied that servants aren’t exactly people real!Ciel tends to care about anyway…
…so who knows if even Tanaka wouldn’t become disposable from the moment he caught on about real!Ciel being an accomplice? ://
So basically, real!Ciel is the one who stabbed Tanaka in the back, just as Tanaka tried to warn our!Ciel, but then the supernatural attacker showed up and took our!Ciel away before he could see who was the one with the knife.
I know Tanaka is still considered as a suspect by some fans, but honestly I just can’t see how or why. And when it comes to how Tanaka managed to survive his wounds and the fire that destroyed the whole manor, since that’s one point making him suspicious, I discussed it a little here for those interested.
Additional hints & details for the RCMT
To tie with the more recent chapters, since UT brought back the twin, but not mandatory when it comes to understanding the theory, so under read more:
the twin’s behavior towards our!Ciel
I think it’s a hint by itself, because he still seems very obsessed with the idea to finally “be able to be together forever”.
Real!Ciel being a bizarre doll though, that means UT brought him back through editing his cinematic record with “episodes” (i.e ”yearning for the future”).
In other words, if before he died real!Ciel was strongly envisioning his future as “being together forever” with his little brother (as the flashback showed well enough), it could explain why he’s still super obsessed with the idea, because that’s literally what keeps him going as UT’s current masterpiece.
A real obsession can be dangerous: look at Ann and the JTR arc, or look at UT who can’t mourn the dead Phantomhives and instead tries to bring them back through lots of horrible and bloody experiments. So in real!Ciel’s case, it’s not that impossible that it could have led to December 14th.
the attack on Soma and Agni
Could be a hint depending on why the twin became violent and what was the purpose of the twin coming to the house in the first place.
Was it to see our!Ciel? And that’s why they wrote a creepy message on the wall? In that case, discovering Soma living there or Soma acting familiar with him triggered his violent reaction.
Or was it because of Soma himself? It’s obvious that UT told real!Ciel about what life his brother led for the last 4 years, so he could have mentioned Soma. However, considering how real!Ciel only sees and cares about him and his little brother, Soma calling himself “Ciel’s big brother” could have made him super jealous. ://
why did the attack happen on December 14th precisely?
In case anyone else is wondering. I’ve seen three possibilities until now:
because it was easier for the twin to get everything ready (muzzling the dog, etc) while everyone else was otherwise busy preparing their birthday party. There is even a mention of real!Ciel reading till super late the night before, to the point of not getting enough sleep.
because, in the idea that real!Ciel was really missing some screws, the plan to kill his dad so that he could become Earl was supposed to be a birthday gift to both him and his little brother (since the plan was one way for them to “be together forever”) (proposed by @asthmaticastre [x])
rather than being related to the twin, the choice of the date is related to the mastermind, because Prince Albert was Queen Victoria’s love of her life and historically he died on December 14th, 1861. So if in Kuroverse the Queen thinks her Watchdog at the time (Claudia) was somehow responsible… she could hold a grudge => short version of the theory.
could someone have prevented the RCMT from happening?
Because I remember that a lot of readers used to despise Vincent and Rachel for “badly raising their son” and not paying attention, but I just don’t think it’s their fault, because I don’t think that real!Ciel behaved particularly oddly aside from that one trait.
That being said, as I explained here, I think there is a slight possibility that Vincent might have caught on about his first son’s strong (rather abnormal if the rcmt is a thing) attachment to his little brother…
Not that it saved him or Rachel, so I guess no one has to care, but we’re still missing one and a half year from the flashback and, in general, Vincent is a rather mysterious character so… in case we ever address that time skip again, it could be useful to at least consider the idea.
why would UT even bring back the twin if the RCMT is true, considering how much he cared about Vincent?
Though there is also the possibility that UT didn’t even watch this part of the twin’s cinematic record before editing his record post credits, because he was already convinced that the Queen was behind the attack on December 14th. In that case he wouldn’t even know that the twin played a role in Vincent’s death.
I’ll conclude by redirecting you to what @cielsama14 once said about the RCMT here, which I think is extremely fitting, especially considering what Sensei always said about the P family being cursed.
Long post as always with me, but I hope it was understandable!
Please keep in mind that this is my take on this theory, but there are other versions. Don’t hesitate to ask if there is anything. Thanks for reading. 🙂
Or simply my take on why Sensei started the series hinting at Yukio/Shiemi to end up focusing on Rin/Shiemi and possibly Yukio/Shura.
Disclaimer: Ship wars possibly being a thing, I just want to say that while this post is definitely subjective because it’s my opinion, I value canon above everything else and I hope that anyone who might disagree will at least not call me out on being biased, when I only care about interesting developments and no plot hole. x))
Also I caught up around ch34 which means I’ve been following this story monthly for about 6 years now and, if I’m writing this post, it’s because AnE is the only series for which my shipping list changed often, because of what I’m about to say regarding this part of Sensei’s writing.
Right so, starting with Yukio/Shiemi, I totally used to ship them because that’s what the story seemed to initially hint at, Rin being the outsider of the little trio since Yukio and Shiemi had known each other for years when Rin barely knew anything about himself or even his brother to begin with.
Besides, in Shiemi’s own words, she admired him for years and it always showed without a doubt…
…but Yukio’s
continuous and unresolved issues are ultimately what doomed the ship, because he and Shiemi ended up growing apart while Rin slowly made his way closer to Shiemi. The trio dynamic isn’t gone mind you, but Rin/Shiemi is now the only possible outcome for it.
Going backwards, the reason the narrative would hint at Yukio/Shiemi from the beginning was rather simple: initially the whole theme to Yukio’s character is that he’s a little kid thrown into the adults’ world.
He is the youngest exorcist ever (low-key surprising development when Shiro hated what Asylum was about but ://), when Shiro died he became responsible for Rin and also a teacher because he’s skilled, then there was the Morinath contract because of Toudou, etc, which has him forced to act and be burdened like an adult when he’s barely 16 years old right now:
Meanwhile Shiemi was the only kid of his age who knew about what his life
was like
and could provide him with comfort and normal friendship, at least until he started teaching his brother and the other students who were of the same age.
So in that regard, it’s natural that Yukio and Shiemi ended up forging a strong bond, which led to Yukio holding tight onto the most normal part of his life considering how old he is and eventually getting a crush on Shiemi as a result:
However, between Rin’s arrival in the trio and, again, Yukio’s tendency to act alone when it comes to facing problems, it drove him against a wall as far as Shiemi is concerned. Honestly this ship had many occasions to sail, especially considering Yukio’s feelings and Shiemi’s huge admiration towards him…
when Rin was discovered to be Satan’s son, since even Shiemi was mad at him
or during the Kraken arc, because Rin endangered both Shiemi and Yukio by acting rashly
or just before Izumo’s arc, when Shiemi and Yukio spent a lot of time studying together and since Shiemi wanted to go to the dance party with him (in order to cheer him up, of course, but still)
…but unfortunately, Yukio never took the chance due to having a lot on his mind
which in return left room for more interactions between Rin and Shiemi (and Rin never hesitated to go head first and be frank, as we all know).
Finally, the fact that all this time Yukio believed Shiemi had a crush on Rin because he always saw himself as inferior to his older brother…
…is in my opinion what cemented the widening distance between him and Shiemi.
After all, considering that Rin and Shiemi were slowly growing closer, Yukio probably felt he had no other choice but to also directly put some distance with Shiemi in order not to feel too jealous or bitter about himself. He even said as much, by not referring to her as a friend but simply as a student of his:
However this time he was right. Not about Shiemi despising him, obviously she would never, but about needing someone who knows the “real him”.
The most interesting thing (and why I shipped them initially) is that Shiemi was the person who used to understand Yukio the most. Or perhaps, to be more accurate…
Shiemi admiring him for years at least gave Yukio the solace of mattering to someone until even that fully vanished in ch93. I always found interesting that Shiemi was the one he had gone to, crying about being all alone and having no friend when she was still there trying to help him, until the mention of Rin (Rin who’s “the better twin”, Rin who Shiemi is in love with) shattered even that.
Yukio used to be able to rely on Shiemi feeling admiration for him because it gave him self-confidence. Unfortunately as time passed -between the constant pressure on Yukio, Rin getting his own place into the dynamic when Yukio feels inferior to him and even Shiemi herself growing up through experiencing a lot- this ceased to be true and Yukio started to raise walls around himself.
And that, Shiemi herself noticed it way before ch93. For example in ch69…
and that’s why she tried her best to reach out to him as often as possible, even if that hardly worked for now.
When it comes to Yukio’s need to be understood and thus for someone to know “the real him”, once Shiemi was out way before ch93, only Rin and Shura were left to fit the criteria. And out of the two, well, Shura is older, has known Yukio ever since his training days and is generally better at realizing that he hasn’t been doing well since basically the very beginning of the story.
To quote from this post: “actually there was a time in AnE where Yukio was not full of angst (until he meets Toudou), or so you could think because the truth is that he was just better at hiding everything behind his smiles, but anyway it never fooled Shura then…
and it’s still not fooling her.”
So it’s really as Shiemi said: she was the first to be pushed away between her, Shura and Rin, even if Yukio came to her one last time in ch93 in hope to feel better about himself since Shiemi had admired him for so many years.
Then it was Rin who ended up realizing he didn’t understand his little brother anymore, leaving only Shura who couldn’t guess what was wrong exactly with Yukio, but whose interactions with him remained as they always were (until he discovered about Section 13, tried to kill himself, leading to his realization about Satan and his departure for Illuminati).
In conclusion, Yukio/Shiemi was slowly doomed in more ways than one despite being the most likely outcome at the beginning of the story and I really doubt we’ll ever go back to it being a possibility in the narrative. Not now that Rin/Shiemi is a thing but also that Shura finally moved on from Shiro and can make sure to keep her two eyes on Yukio.
(more about Yukio/Shura & Rin/Shiemi under the cut)
To delve a little more on the subject of Yukio/Shura now, since this directly follows my points about Yukio/Shiemi, honestly the only reason I’m uncertain about the ship ever getting more focus is because of the age difference. Not that 10 years is a big deal, but Yukio is still a minor so… the hints are there in my opinion, but when it comes to Sensei writing more about it, I don’t know.
Anyway, to start with, Yukio and Shura contrast each other in almost everything
Yukio: a child thrown into the adults’ world vs Shura: pretends to be 18 forever because of Hachiro’s curse
Yukio: too serious and never knows how to have fun vs Shura: almost never outwardly serious and loves having fun
Yukio: wants to keep Rin under control with a leash on vs Shura: knowingly helps with Mephisto’s plans to make Rin a known asset to the Order.
Yukio: worries about Rin vs Shura: worries about Yukio
Yukio: used to believe in Shiro but ends up despising him for wrongly thinking he only saw them as weapons vs Shura: used to have issues about Shiro but ends up forgiving him and moving on
and that’s probably why it’s the only dynamic Yukio managed to keep intact until he left for the Illuminati (friendly reminder that in comparison he was aggressive with Rin, Suguro, Shiemi a little, Shima & almost Mephisto) because Yukio could always openly state to be 100% annoyed by Shura and she wouldn’t mind at all.
Personally Yukio/Shura used to be a NOTP until the Aomori arc which, despite having some rather controversial moments, is a gold mine as far as this ship is concerned.
I don’t know why I couldn’t see it, perhaps because for a long time I ended up pity-shipping Yukio with Shiemi (poor boy was so full of angst), despite knowing it wouldn’t lead anywhere compared to Rin/Shiemi, or perhaps because it was obvious Shura had a huge unresolved crush on Shiro before the Aomori arc finally tackled the issue…?
As it happens though, the Aomori arc allowed for Shura to move on about Shiro, while Yukio/Shura also could be thought to have blossomed and that’s when I became really fond of this ship and its possible potential.
First of all, we got the confirmation that Yukio never really hated Shura despite how much he claims she annoys him and obviously no one ever believed he did, but it’s a good thing that he went as far as to admit it to himself.
The other point is that, between hypnotized!Shura almost forcing herself onto Yukio and Yukio’s lie to Hachiro about giving Shura a kid…
we still had a genuinely sweet moment between them, surprising enough that Shura got kinda flustered and teased him a lot afterwards, to the point even Rin told her to calm down.
Of course, it doesn’t have to be that meaningful and maybe even Yukio just wanted to cheer Shura up after everything that happened but…
We had another similar moment later, with Yukio admitting to Shura only that he didn’t really want to go to that Christmas party. There again, it’s all about Yukio being the most honest to almost no one else but Shura.
I’m aware that the marriage-hunting party could sound like the end of Yukio/Shura though, but Shura ended up showing up at the Christmas party and anyway, with the current arc and her possibly chasing after Illuminati for Yukio’s sake, I doubt she’s going to settle down any time soon, not with the twins constantly getting in danger.
Again, a huge part of Yukio’s character arc is him needing to be reassured about who he is: it showed through him desiring answers about the secrets behind his birth, about the Order, the Illuminati and as Mephisto once said…
So in my opinion Yukio needs the few people who know “the real him” to tell him that they would never despise him and that they want him back. It’s not even about the Order or being a talented exorcist, it’s about Yukio as his own person and thus the ones who can help him are Rin, Shiemi and Shura.
Besides Rin and Shiemi having feelings for each other, they can only provide comfort and confidence as brother and friend respectively (remember Yukio saying he doesn’t have a decent family or friend?), but where Shura is concerned, depending on if Sensei is serious about the Yukio/Shura hints here and there, it could be as friend, sister-figure, colleague or… as more than that?
At the very least, Shura may just be about providing reassurance towards the topic of Shiro, since she’s the last link between the boys and their adoptive father.
After all she knew him for an even longer time than Yukio and Rin but mostly she knows that he loved them as his sons and wished for them to be safe and happy (and Yukio will need to hear it at some point).
As of right now, Rin/Shiemi is the only confirmed ship because we know about their feelings for each other. When it comes to Yukio/Shura, in my opinion there is some potential, but in comparison to Rin/Shiemi, we don’t know how Yukio and Shura feel towards each other. The Aomori arc may have ignited something between them but maybe Sensei doesn’t want to expand more than that at the moment because Yukio is still a minor (not that it stopped Shura’s crush on Shiro), so… to be continued. x)
Finally, to tackle on the absolutely adorable Rin/Shiemi: in my opinion, it’s 100% happening even if Rin thinks he was rejected and Shiemi that it’s too late (but if they were already going out we wouldn’t be angsting about their separation or the slow burning feels that they’re going to worry so much about each other).
I think Rin’s true infatuation for Shiemi started with the Kyoto arc. It was the moment Yukio’s façade started to crumble because of Toudou, while Rin was losing all confidence about ever belonging due to his origins.
Meanwhile Shiemi also had her own issues to confront because, after getting through the trouble of making friends, she felt extremely useless and had to find a way to be more confident about what she could do for them.
Moving on, as I said in the first part of this post, it’s because Yukio/Shiemi kept on failing, so to speak (since Shiemi was never in love with Yukio), that Rin/Shiemi managed to get its own chance and ended up becoming more likely. One example of what I mean would be the True Cross’ festival:
Rin wanted to invite Shiemi to the dance party
however she had already decided to invite Yukio to cheer him up and as thanks for helping her study
this depressed Rin despite mah cute boy saying that it was better not to fight about love between brothers
on his own end, Yukio was sure that Rin would be the one asking her and had made himself unavailable previously when Shiemi asked him
it ended up with Rin asking Shiemi anyway, but him thinking she liked Yukio led to Rin dancing with both her and Yukio
the conclusion was Shiemi thinking sweetly of Rin
And there are plenty of other examples throughout the story, because of Yukio’s many issues and tendency to face them alone.
In general though, the background for the Rin/Shiemi romance is that Shiemi is Rin’s very first friend and source of support. I mean, not that Shura or Mephisto didn’t always believe in him, but Rin used to feel like an outcast who could never fit in anywhere, especially not with people his own age, so Shiemi acknowledging that she was wrong and showing him just how much she trusted him was totally
what
he needed at his darkest hour.
Similarly for Shiemi, Rin is the one who gave her the opportunity and strength to discover the outside world & want to be a part of it.
Yukio was her first friend and always impressed her because he was like an ideal to work for, but Rin is the one who made it all happen…
…which in both cases is why this ship had a strong basis since very early on and the narrative slowly led it
Now it’s almost as if we’ve gone backwards though: Shiemi was robbed of the future she worked so hard for because of a part of the Grigori, having to keep her secrets to herself, while Rin is struggling because he’s almost all alone again, after Shiemi not becoming an exorcist, after losing Yukio to the Illuminati and almost losing himself to his true power.
This time though, unlike the Kyoto arc where Shiemi gave Rin confidence, maybe this trip in the past will give Rin the answers he needs to understand Shiemi’s predicament, why Yukio left and ultimately who he is, so that he may go rescue the two of them.
The Rin/Shiemi romance will never be a thing as long as Shiemi doesn’t think freely about her future again: she fell for Rin partly because he helped her overcoming her fears, so she needs to think once more about what she truly wants for herself, including if she wants to act on her feelings for him or not. It may also not happen until they’ve rescued Yukio since I don’t doubt that they’re both super worried for him.
Ultimately I regard Rin’s and Shiemi’s feelings for each other as hope for themselves:
Shiemi is like a prisoner to the Vatican for reasons we have yet to find out, but her feelings for Rin may help her remember why she really wanted to be an exorcist, why she fought against being useless, why she wanted to catch up to everyone and be strong for the ones she loves in the first place.
As for Rin, he’s currently on a trip through the past that he knows will end tragically and that he never wanted to learn about. But the thing is, despite the horrible circumstances of his birth and of Shiro’s death, he made friends and even found a girl he loves (unlike what Yukio feels), so he can rely on these feelings to think it’s worth it for him to be alive now.
I even find the little additional twist that Rin only knows he loves Shiemi and thinks she doesn’t, when Shiemi realized that she loves Rin back, to probably be meaningful to whatever will happen to both of them during this arc. 🙂
Sensei is quite astute: whatever she introduced in her story is probably supposed to be narratively meaningful. What’s left is to see how exactly.
This post was super long, so thanks for reading! I hope it made a few points. :3
What if Shiro is really the twins’ father?
I’ve seen the theory going around before, so it shouldn’t be a new idea at all, but frankly the more we get into the flashbacks the more I wonder about how likely it could be.
So here’s my take on it: it was said in the story before that Yuri became pregnant with the twins because she was impregnated by Satan’s host, which means that the male human who Satan possessed could also be called the twins’ father.
Thanks to Lightning’s recent investigation, we were kinda pushed to believe that
Azazel’s clone #5 Goro was The One, but who knows for sure, especially since looking at Yuri…
…there definitely was a thing between her and Shiro.
Furthermore, the newest chapter told us that Shiro was the only one who made it Exwire amongst the Azazel clones and we know it was also the case for Yuri since she eventually became an exorcist.
So I just wonder how Yuri would have come to meet with Goro who was probably a permanent resident of Section 13 in the first place, unlike Shiro with whom there definitely was a closeness for years because they were both trained to become exorcists.
Then again, you could argue that Yuri didn’t have to know or love Goro for the twins to be conceived: I mean, there is the horrible eventuality that she was raped by Satan possessing Goro or even the anime’s take on it (especially if Shiro never gave into his feelings for her and kept pushing her away).
It’s just…I think that the idea that Shiro could be the twins’ biological father is interesting because he is similar on different aspects to both Rin and Yukio, as Rin himself mentioned in the newest chapter.
At the same time, the idea that he raised the twins simply because of his love for Yuri is absolutely beautiful too, but it can still work because Shiro wouldn’t even have to know/believe that he’s actually the twins’ biological father in this theory. I mean, look…
when he possessed Shiro in the very first chapter, Satan was the one in control of Shiro’s body, until Shiro managed to overcome him at the very end.
My point is that the same could have happened in the past: maybe Satan possessed Shiro for a very short while, had sex with Yuri (who was in love with Shiro for a long time and didn’t notice anything?) and that’s how the twins were conceived, with Rin inheriting Satan’s powers.
And when it comes to Goro, either Goro was the first human ever possessed by Satan, which is how he gained an ego and started possessing other humans, leading to the twins’ conception (through possessing Shiro) and eventually to the Blue Night as we all know, or Goro’s possession was simply the start of the Blue Night and that’s why his file is gone.
EDIT: btw about the blue night I still think that Mephy managed to save the day by promising Satan to give him Rin’s body once Rin would be old enough. Not only did Satan imply so but Lucifer wouldn’t kill Rin also for this reason.
It’s just a theory obviously, but I really hope the flashback will tell us how Yuri could even know Goro since she probably never found out about Section 13.
If we know that, then I guess we can rule out Shiro from being the twins’ biological father, but not before.
Last point, but Mephy once mentioned that if Yukio was the one finding out about the past the way Rin is doing right now, it wouldn’t bring good results…
…and since Yukio already believes that Shiro was just raising them as weapons to take down Satan, I can’t even begin to imagine what’s really the twist behind the twins’ existence that finding out about the truth (which is what Yukio wanted for so long) would make Yukio feel even more horrible…
EDIT: I guess that if the Grigori have it wrong and Satan didn’t possess any guy (Shiro or other) who then had intercourse with Yuri, resulting in the twins’ conception, the other possibilities are that:
Satan possessed Yuri herself and that’s when the boys were conceived (kind of similar to the Virgin Mary)
or that Yuri was already pregnant (because of Shiro? or another guy?) and Satan possessed her during the pregnancy, leading to the twins getting powers and becoming interesting vessels.
BTW I know people have been joking around about Kaneki looking younger than ever in the very last TG chapter…
but anyone remembers this?
I mean, we all know that Kaneki did eat a lot of people during the Dragon arc…
so maybe this is a last nasty reminder by Sensei and Kaneki looking younger is actually meant to be x))
Soooo… Time for a recap post? Here’s what we know:
the moonlight child only appears during the full moon => it’s implied that he can only materialize the night magic is at its strongest
Considering that his OD never led to the brand reacting, I doubt he comes from “the Underworld”
(and btw)
Griffith 2.0 does not disappear during the full moon, so it can’t be the demon infant getting his body back just for one night
Casca’s attraction to the moonlight child is very reminiscent of how she used to react when the demon infant was nearby
Femto commented on feeling the demon infant’s fear for his parents, so we know the infant always seeked to protect them and that’s also exactly what the moonlight child did with Guts and Casca every time he appeared
(the demon infant also knew that Guts loved Casca dearly, that’s why he warned him about going to save Casca, and so does the moonlight child, since that’s she he used to bring Guts back from the berserk mode twice)
he’s notan envoy of Danan, Gedfryn confirmed as much in ch344
bonus: like mother, like son?
(Side note but whenever he materialized, Casca acted more rational and like an adult than when he wasn’t around: she would feed him or be scared of him climbing up, when usually she couldn’t even eat by herself or realize whenever she did something dangerous)
So anyway, it’s nothing new that there are too many similarities between the demon infant and the moonlight child, which is why a lot of readers (not everyone, I’m aware of that) think the two are the Gutsca baby.
Previously I proposed that the moonlight child could be some kind of ‘incarnated dream’ of the demon infant, but it’s not certain that it would make sense with the child disappearing inside of the World Tree, which is a “dragon’s road” between different realms? At the same time, in vol28, the World Tree wasn’t a thing yet either so…¯_(ツ)_/¯
These days now though I’m wondering more generally about what if the moonlight child is the demon infant’s ego?
Because this would solve why he can only materialize corporeally during the full moon, “the nights magical forces are at their strongest”, while the demon infant remains Femto’s vessel at any given time.
In other words, Femto possesses the body of the demon infant in order to exist in the corporeal world, but the child’s ego disappears/disappeared:
either after what happened in vol22 (because Femto found him to be a liability after baby literally influenced him to go save Casca for example)
or only when the full moon comes because strong magical forces give him the chance to materialize elsewhere to see his parents.
That could explain why he appears/disappears randomly exactly where Guts and Casca are, as well as why he’d be naked when showing up. What I mean is that I doubt the moonlight child exists corporeally elsewhere aside from the full moon where he is with Casca and Guts.
Besides, I find the way the moonlight child appears to Guts when in Berserk mode is quite similar to what Schierke saw the first time Guts used the armor:
And so I’m wondering if the similarities aren’t on purpose.
It’s also obvious that the moonlight child is related to Light in general, if just as the light bringing Guts back when he lost himself to the armor’s power, which is why I also proposed previously that he may be the real hawk of light that everyone sees in Griffith 2.0.
Another important point to mention is that the moonlight child apparently grew up in just one lunar cycle and there again, I wonder if this isn’t related to how Femto’s power is rapidly expanding, like with the World Tree for example.
The more Femto achieves victory, the more his influence and thus probably his power grow (and the more chaos grows closer), so if the moonlight child is linked to the demon infant who himself is Femto’s vessel, then this might explain why he’s visibly growing up along with Femto’s influence over the human world.
I guess this point might also explain why the second time the moonlight child
could remind us of Griffith 2.0 (if just with the hair), which is in my opinion one way that Sensei has to hint that the moonlight child is related to Griffith 2.0…
who, again, is the result of Femto fusing with the demon infant’s flesh.
Finally, Sensei creating two entities for just one character (demon infant + moonlight child = Gutsca baby) would make sense considering certain… upcoming problematics, like, when Femto does get married to Charlotte for example which should probably be soon in the narrative.
I mean, the body Femto is inhabiting is the demon infant’s, the body of Guts and Casca’s child who should be like… 3 years old???
So in case something like a wedding night happens, well, I’d rather Sensei found a way to make it clear that Femto is 100% the one who has sex with Charlotte instead of the child himself, if you know what I mean? The moonlight child being everything that used to be the demon infant (so his ego), besides his own flesh that now belongs to Femto, could solve this.
Same for when Guts and Casca will ultimately face Femto in order to kill him. That way there could be hope left for their child’s survival.
An ego represents a person fully enough in any case, as we could see with Guts’ when he used the armor for the very first time:
That’s why I’d enjoy the idea!
I hope it was clear enough considering how complex the universe of Berserk is. Thanks for reading!
midnight-in-town 