
a review by Calxylian

a review by Calxylian
Black Butler is full of supernatural characters in another context in a luxurious Victorian setting. However, it is very strange when the anime demographics its audience more like a shounen. To emphasize it even more, the series is better said to be shounen-ai than shounen itself. However, it is not important because that is not the main point of the series. The story of the series begins with a slight horror atmosphere. The first sequence shows a ten-year-old boy who trades his soul for a demonic butler to help take revenge against those responsible for his parents. Jumping to two or three years later, they are still together. Ciel Phantomhive is now 12 years old and head of the house company, accompanied by Sebastian Michaelis, a demon butler who can do anything. Together, they work for Queen Victoria in solving mysteries. At the same time, the audience is also trying to find out about Ciel's past.
At first glance, Black Butler becomes a good story the first impression. However, it is not because of the many filler episodes that have been injected. The most logical reason is the lack of material that comes out of the source, confusing certain episodes. For fans of the series, it leaves many questions and a lot of disappointment. When following the three-episode rule, the series is spectacular. Instantly, the mysterious aura became very good throughout the series as well. However, when it gets to the sixth episode and above, it starts to get a little tiring with all the goals the characters have to do.
To go through all that tediously honestly, how about the next half? The series is completely filler, not only ending up being a mysterious anime that is very ambiguous but also being a slice of life that didn't intend to be such a genre. Most of the second half's story doesn't make much sense when reviewing it through the source. For example, the audience never knew how Sebastian had suddenly disappeared, considering that in the first place, the audience knew he had made an unbreakable contract. It is unrealistic that he leaves Ciel, a not allowed personality, and commits such an act. The plot twists also come out of nowhere, from character motivations to antagonistic justifications. After all, the bad writing spoils half of the ending of the series.
Sebastian is one of the most admired characters throughout the series when it comes to characters. He is a great butler who acts as an anti-hero for Ciel. When Sebastian arrives just in time to save Ciel or even uses "sexual" tactics to get information to the nun, it's great to know how the audience never expected such a character. On the other hand, there's Ciel, who, of course (people prefer to call him the "spoiled kid") talks a lot of bullshit about why he does everything. The crew of the series practically used his character as a doll to model the century's fashions, of course, Victoria.
However, such factors do not save them from a highly biased two-dimensional character. Sebastian can be similar to Edward Cullen's vampire with good-looking guy trope or other supernatural vampire series. He is a perfect being with no flaws at all. His handsome face that is evil, cold, yet cunning is impossible. In essence, he does not contain such realism in himself as the fantasy of a perfect character trope. On the other hand, he also has a sense of humor, even though he doesn't seem to have any intention of being funny at all. Unfortunately, the fanservice of cross-dressing or mass production of childlike male character fans is suppressed so deeply that the audience sometimes can't take it seriously.
The animation flows beautifully where the production depicts a thick setting from the Victorian era. The mega houses and the clothes are all intricately designed. In fact, in some action scenes, the studio still has an animation that continues. It never lets choppy animations ruin the flow. Gothic is very thick here as a whole. Not only through design but through taboo themes that were thick in that era. However, as the audience has realized from the start, the nuances of fanservice are what causes the series to be so difficult to take seriously. Black Butler is not an anime where the audience is always looking at the clock and thinking whether this is over or not. However, the series is very good at responding to a feature with a fairly boring execution. The pandering of fan nonsense does not only sell the audience themselves through the source's main story. However, the audience, especially those who have never read the manga at all, is what happens in the final scene in the last episode.
13 out of 17 users liked this review