This is a drama-free gathering place for fans of the Black Butler manga, anime, and musicals. All ships welcome.
Ch. 120 Discussion Post

Share your thoughts, your squee, your theories, or your favorite panels.

This is a drama-free gathering place for fans of the Black Butler manga, anime, and musicals. All ships welcome.

Share your thoughts, your squee, your theories, or your favorite panels.
This is a drama-free gathering place for fans of the Black Butler manga, anime, and musicals. All ships welcome.
I've been checking Amazon religiously for this and now it's here and it's in color!!!!
I'm almost too excited to read it.
Okay, only the first few pages are in color. But still, they're gorgeous.
My first reactions
Halloween!!!! I loved Sebastian's twitchy smile when Ciel ordered him to take care of the celebration.
No way can I buy that Bard is American. Maybe I'm biased because I really like his voice actor in the dubs. But still, can't buy it.
On the other hand, it's cool to have confirmation that Mey-Rin is Chinese.
OMG Ciel's Halloween costume! He's so cute with horns.
The artwork in this chapter is incredible. This panel hits me especially hard. I'm not sure if it's hinting at the Two Ciels theory or his lost innocence, but either way, wow!
Ok, I'll stop blathering. What do you guys think?
It wouldn't surprise me if Undertaker were trying to bring Vincent back, and has his soul stashed someplace. I almost hope so, because I have a strong, irrational aversion to the Two Ciels theory, and while I'm sure I'll reconcile myself to it if I have to, I really hope Undertaker isn't trying to bring Other Ciel back instead.
But what really struck me about this chapter are first, that it's so beautiful (the lanterns on the opening page! the ghosts from all the years the manga's been running!); second, Sebastian's uncharacteristic failure to limit the term of his promise to keep Ciel's flame burning (before it's always been along the lines of, "I'll be there until the end," or "I'll be there until you call checkmate," and now it's just, "I'll keep that flame from going out, okay?"); and third, the exchange between Ciel and Sebastian at the beginning of the chapter about who's going to take care of the Halloween preparations. You can't tell me that Sebastian didn't know how that was going to turn out. And given the way they were grinning at each other, you can't tell me he doesn't like it that way.
I had been planning to be moderately annoyed that we'd gotten a filler/side story this month rather than more plot, but now that I've seen it I take it all back. It's a great chapter, and I'm a very happy camper.
Wow, I didn't even notice that Sebastian didn't qualify his loyalty this time around! You're right, that's a huge deal for him. It's interesting, too, that Ciel didn't directly reference his revenge when handing the candle to Sebastian. "You should handle [humans] with the utmost caution." I love that, like so many of their exchanges, there's an ambiguous quality to his dialogue, both a warning for Sebastian not to underestimate him and an oblique request for Sebastian to be careful with him.
Personally, I'm guessing it was Vincent's hand the undertaker was holding. It looked too large to be Ciel's (unless Yana was going for an older brother, not a twin). Also, I keep thinking of this scene:
Yeah, I go back and forth on the Two Ciels theory. When I first heard it, I was very DNW. But then I re-read the manga, and all of the evidence suddenly looked so blatant once I knew what to look for. So I don't know. Either way, Ciel is still the fucked up bastard I adore, so there's that at least.
Oh, I'd forgotten that scene! And now I have to go back and reread everything all around it.
I honestly can't tell whether the Two Ciels theory doesn't hang together for me because I dislike it, or whether part of why I don't like it is that I can't get it to make sense in terms of what the manga has already told us. But either way, while I'm sure that YT could retcon the relevant scenes so that the obvious objections are answered, I'm less sure that there's a good workaround for the perhaps less obvious ones. And even some of the obvious issues with it seem hard to answer, at least to me.
It's like, okay, assume there are two Ciels. One of two things must be true: either Ciel 2 is Ciel 1's twin, or he is not. So let's start down track 1. Surely members of the family, at least, know there were two children. Angelina was there for their birth, and there'd have been no hiding the existence of a second child from Tanaka. Even if somehow the rest of the world doesn't know, and they're passed off as a single child, they know to look for both children after the attack on the manor, and they'd know after the bodies were recovered whether or not one or both bodies were there. If one body was there, they know only one brother survived, and the only question they'd have had when Ciel returned would have been which twin he was. If both bodies had been missing and Ciel returned alone, sooner or later the obvious question would have been asked: "Ciel, I know this is hard for you, but we need to know what happened to Cecil. Was he with you? Do you know?" and etc.
All of this could have easily taken place offstage, as it were. Nothing in the manga directly contradicts it, though the relationship between Lizzie and Ciel and his memories of her come close. (You'd think he would have memories of Lizzie with his brother, or with all three of them playing together. You'd think she would have the occasional question about whether this was the brother she was supposed to marry.) But here's the thing: if our Ciel was Ciel 1's brother, there was no need for him to take that Ciel's name. His brother's murder would have made him the heir to Earl Phantomhive in his own right. It would have been easier and safer to claim his own title, to which he has an unquestionable right, than to claim it in the name of someone he isn't, and who doesn't actually have a claim any more because of being dead. Another person might have kept the name because he felt himself to be acting to avenge his family, so that his brother would in a sense live on; but that's not our Ciel, who's only fully himself when he's fully owning the fact that he made that contract and lived on, and seeks revenge, for his own sake and no one else's.
So I have trouble with the idea that our Ciel is a younger twin of True Ciel. So all right, how about if he's a ringer, a stranger to the family who's taken Real Ciel's place?
If he is, we know he must have spent some years in the Phantomhive household, because he has memories of Vincent and Angelina and Tanaka and Rachel that aren't consistent with a Prince and Pauper lookalike scenario where the two boys are eerie lookalikes who met as captives of the cult. So again, Tanaka at least knows there were two children; Angelina, who treated our Ciel's childhood illnesses, must have known it too. But if the second child was an eerie lookalike for Ciel at age five or age eight, it's much less likely he would have been such a lookalike by age 10. Kids grow at different rates, their faces change differently, and so on.
Still, let's say that the rules are suspended, and somehow they continued to be identical as they grew older. It's still the case that at least two members of the family knew that there were two children, and if one of those children isn't actually Rachel and Vincent's son, there's that much more urgency in making sure that the person claiming the title and inheritance is the true heir. In this scenario, you'd expect lingering suspicion and some real resistance to simply accepting the returned Ciel as the legitimate heir and nephew, and we see zero sign of anything but instant, lasting acceptance and huge relief.
So it's easier for me to see Ciel's lacunae in memory as a symptom of some other, as-yet-unexplained trauma or supernatural interference that will eventually be relevant to the plot. (He doesn't know things he should know, like the fact that Lizzie's never decorated her own egg for past Easters; but the two-Ciels theory doesn't explain that, given that he must have been raised in the Phantomhive household regardless.) It's not that any of this stuff makes the Two Ciels theory impossible, just that the behavior of the family after his return, and even now, make no damned sense to me for a universe in which there had been two Ciels. (Is it remotely possible that Frances wouldn't have known, or guessed? That she'd leave the question alone if she had any suspicion whatsoever? That Lizzie wouldn't have known there were two boys at the Manor? It's possible, but I'd find an explanation that doesn't require a set of assumptions like that to be a lot more emotionally plausible.)
Unless, I suppose, Sebastian or Undertaker or someone somehow enchanted all the relevant characters so that they all forgot that there had ever been a second child in play? Everyone including, most of the time, Ciel himself? I don't know; maybe I too would suddenly see the sense in it if I were to read the whole thing from the beginning. But it feels clever yet wrong to me, more because of human beings and how they act than because it's disprovable or impossible that the story will turn out to go there.