Black Butler 3

Yana Toboso – Yen Press – 2010 – 9+ volumes

I’ve had a bit of a chip on my shoulder about this series since the first volume. I love the art, I love the Victorian setting, and I love demons. I am not fond of its love for dumb gags, and I hate the other three servants, who serve no purpose aside from serving up predictable, un-funny jokes. They’re almost completely gone at this point, though they make a brief re-appearance in the last chapter of this volume, when Ciel’s stickler aunt comes to visit and of course those three make a mess of everything Sebastian’s done to meet her approval. Otherwise, that chapter was a nice, lighthearted break from the darker story this time around. I got a kick out of Ciel’s aunt, and luckily his fiancee kept her mouth shut for the most part (she was annoying when she was introduced, too). I loved the contest between the two of them, and I loved the dynamic between the aunt, Sebastian, and Ciel. She was great. She can come back to visit anytime she likes.

The story was a continuation of the Jack the Ripper story from last time, but this time we see all the emotional fallout. Saying too much about this will spoil it, but I would have been upset had there not been generous flashbacks that delved into Ciel’s family history and an awesome fight between Sebastian and a Grim Reaper, followed up by an even better Grim Reaper that steps in at the very end. He was the perfectly cool, level-headed executive type that let his disdain for Sebastian be known without actually changing his facial expression or saying more than about a sentence. The kind of stuck-up snob that this kind of series would have a lot of fun with. Plus, he caught a chainsaw between his index and middle finger from behind his back. AWESOME.

Oh man, I could not deal with the overwrought emotional garbage here, though. Ciel couldn’t shoot the killer, the killer couldn’t shoot Ciel, some lengthy reaffirmations between Ciel and Sebastian, and later, Sebastian calling Ciel out on the emotional garbage, which turns into even more emotional garbage. The action, the setting, and the premise are the best things about this series. Plus, Ciel and Sebastian are great characters with a great dynamic. I understand the dynamic between them, so there’s no need to go over and over the master/servant relationship if nothing new is going to be revealed. I love their personalities, but I did not love all the baggage that came out around Ciel this volume. To be fair, it wasn’t even Ciel’s garbage, and he didn’t even get really angsty about it, but it was still about him, and it didn’t really add anything interesting to his personality, nor any insight into how he became who he is. Bah.

Wow. I actually meant to compliment this volume for being better than the other two I read, but I don’t know how it turned into a complain-fest. I did think this was better for the action, and also because we get to see more of Ciel and Sebastian’s personalities, plus three more genuinely interesting and quirky characters (really, two, since we met the first grim reaper last volume). Again, there’s a lot of great stuff here, and it seems like the stuff I don’t like is falling away little by little with each volume. The annoying servants are almost gone, and to be fair, I didn’t hate all the talking this volume like I hated them. I’m well and truly interested now, and at this rate, even if it doesn’t get any better, I could see it holding my interest for at least two or three more volumes.