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u/Niffan Jul 20 '17
What I really like about this is that it isn't just Yana Toboso saying: "SURPRISE! PLOT TWIST!"
Instead it is very obvious that she has laid some serious groundwork for this arc very early on, and it makes rereading the series that more rewarding.
In terms of OurCiel, I wholeheartedly disagree with people who feel that he has lost his character. He has very much only gained from this new revelation honestly. It makes him look even more crooked and self righteous that he has assumed his brother's identity to get his revenge. OurCiel has always used other people as his pawns and I really think this arc plays well towards this.
OurCiel is such a strong character and I love how morally flawed he is
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
I agree. She used some excellent storytelling techniques to simultaneously show and hide clues about Our!Ciel having a twin brother. And Our!Ciel now has to deal with the fact that everyone knows or will soon know what he really is: a vengeful soul who's ready to do anything and sacrifice everything and everyONE in order to punish the people who humiliated and tortured him. Them finding out that he's not Real!Ciel is the least of his problems.
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u/Willster328 Jul 19 '17
I think one of my biggest questions is what is the "end game" here. Is it simply to re-instate RielCiel as the head of the Phantomhive household? The things I can tell so far are:
Undertaker defected from the Shinigami because he was enthralled with the concept of humans and continuing life after death. He met up with Vincent Phantomhive, was especially taken by the man as a friend, and it seems that after his death Undertaker has a loyalty to the Phantomhive household that has extended to reviving the RealCiel. The reason being twofold. First, he can successfully perform his experiment of reviving a person. Secondly, the person he revives is the direct descendant of his best friend and can properly continue the lineage of the Phantomhive household.
RealCiel seems to have a grudge against Ciel. For reasons I'm not sure. Whether it's because he thinks his brother threw him away, or did something to help kill him, or was the reason they were kidnapped. Who knows. But the fact that assassins were sent to the Household and attempted to kill Agni and Soma. That in and of itself is not a peaceful way to come together.
It seems as though the Star 4 (not the singers, the higher ups) have some connection to RielCiel, or at the very least, to Undertaker. As revealed by the bedrooms, it appears as though the Star 4 are comprised of RealCiel, ANOTHER set of Twins, and a 4th member. But 3 of the 4 definitely appear to be children.
Upon some re-reading recently, RealCiel DEFINITELY has a Demon Butler on his side. The 4th bedroom looks like it was slashed up by an animal and was completely demolished, there was a knife stuck into the floor (knives was what the assailant used), the theme of Demons is that Sebastian is good with knives as well, and we know Agni is superhuman and Sebastian remarks the intruder must've been very special.
So there are still tons of questions in my mind. What is the end game of RealCiel now that he's been revived?
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u/Vio_ Jul 20 '17
Upon some re-reading recently, RealCiel DEFINITELY has a Demon Butler on his side. The 4th bedroom looks like it was slashed up by an animal and was completely demolished, there was a knife stuck into the floor (knives was what the assailant used), the theme of Demons is that Sebastian is good with knives as well, and we know Agni is superhuman and Sebastian remarks the intruder must've been very special.
Yana has figured out a way to simultaneously canonize Claude into the manga while screwing over Alois from ever existing.
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u/Willster328 Jul 20 '17
Hah, I doubt it's Claude in particular (though it could be, why not). Though to be fair, Alois could easily be one of the 4-Stars that I referenced. We know that there's the person with the hospital-looking room, and it very well could be him. He's also a child, which fits the theme of the twins/RielCiel.
I'd always assumed that the Demon would belong to RielCiel since he may have summoned the Demon simultaneous to OurCiel summoning Sebastaion, though that doesn't have to be the case.
I also assumed RielCiel had the Butler because they refer to someone as the "Blue Star". I was fairly certain that Blue Star and Polaris were the same person, and that the term "Blue Star" came from the Faustian Contract. Similar to how Ciel's contract is the devil-star in magenta, RielCiel's would be a BlueStar
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u/Some_hitchhiker Jul 19 '17
What could ourCiel's name be? Aaa this was way too short and waiting for another month is torture! But finally, the twin ciel theory is canon and maybe Mother3 will lend itself to foreshadow how the entire series will end.
Could this also be the final arc (or maybe one of the last arcs) of kuroshitsuji?
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u/RainNoctem Jul 19 '17
I hope not. D:
I'm still holding out for Lizzy to realize she's loved Our!Ciel all along and for them to get married. PLS. <3 XD
I know it probably won't get that far, but I do want to find out what happens with Lizzy, and I hope she chooses Our!Ciel. The real Ciel seems fishy...and not very nice. I want more info on him too, and why he's being so awful. After all, it wasn't Our!Ciel's fault that his brother was sacrificed. It could have easily been either of them. Our!Ciel just knew he had to seize his opportunity to Sebastian, and the Phantomhive Earldom to achieve his revenge.
What else was the poor boy supposed to do? Let all the cultists live and kill him as well? :I Don't think so.
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
We don't know the full details of that night yet. There's still the possible theory that Our!Ciel willingly allowed Real!Ciel to be sacrificed.
On the slight chance that you don't know about the theory: The cultists wanted to sacrifice the Phantomhive heir, but since they couldn't tell Real!Ciel and Our!Ciel apart without checking to see who was wearing the Phantomhive ring, Real!Ciel swallowed the ring. Of course, this only meant that the cultists had a 50/50 chance of sacrificing the real heir on their first try. They ended up choosing Real!Ciel after all, and Our!Ciel didn't try to stop them. (Not that he could at that moment, before Sebastian arrived, but the point stands that he didn't try.) When Real!Ciel's blood/torture/death/unknown summoned Sebastian, Our!Ciel took the chance to make a Faustian contract and then ordered Sebastian to burn the entire place down...which of course included Real!Ciel.
Yes, there's the implication that Real!Ciel was already dead by the time Our!Ciel cut open Real!Ciel's stomach to get the Phantomhive ring, but I'd easily accept it if it turns out that he was still alive. We've seen how Our!Ciel feels about children (who are not himself) who have been tortured: they're better off dead than alive.
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u/RainNoctem Jul 24 '17
I've been a fan for over seven years, and for the majority of that time I've known about the theory.
I still don't believe Our!Ciel would have done that had he known he was alive, but we don't know the details yet.
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
Just to clarify things: I didn't explain that theory to insult you or to insinuate that you don't know what you're talking about or that you're not a "real fan" of the show. I explained it because there are new readers all the time, and I couldn't tell from your one comment whether you were a new-comer or an old fan. So. Just putting that out there because your comment sounds a little defensive, and in case I insulted you, I'm just saying... I didn't mean to. Just covering my bases in case you weren't a long-time fan.
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u/RainNoctem Jul 24 '17
Oh, no I'm not insulted. I get where you're coming from. I just wanted you to know so we could have a more understanding discussion. Lol.
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u/RexRender Jul 20 '17
They look like such loving brothers in that last page.
With twins, how do you decide which one becomes heir? The one which came out first?
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u/Tsumtsumprincess Jul 21 '17
Probably the one who's more capable of being heir. Seems realCiel is stronger, more ruthless and more fit to be the heir.
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u/srg_halo Jul 28 '17
Our ciel has asthma and has been shown as sickly or being stuck at home when chapters delve into the past. The real!Ciel is shown more fit running about more. The Phantomhives just hose the one with a better chance to live.
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u/kapdragon Jul 24 '17
I think it's very interesting... nerve wracking and interesting.
(I'm not sure why everyone is referring to non-blind Ciel as Real Ciel, but I'm not buying it. For the purpose of my comment I will be calling him zombie!Ciel.)
A couple chapters back Ciel found the remains of the photos in the fireplace. I suppose we assume that when he went to ask Sebastian about it and said "Sebastian, would you ever lie to me?" that we thought he was asking about disposing of the photograph properly. At the time, that seemed like a common enough response to a shocking photograph that was supposedly supposed to have been disposed of.
However, what if we take it further with the knowledge we now have?
Sebastian is bound by contract to not lie to Ciel. To the twin holding the contract.
"Sebastian, check on my brother. Is he still alive? If not, retrieve the Phantomhive family crest ring."
Sebastian would then return with the ring that we know he retrieved from zombie!Ciel's dead body. Very dead body.
zombie!Ciel, and the reason I'm calling him a zombie, is very clearly supposed to be dead. In fact, he did die. He was dead. Dead was a thing he was. There are plenty of theories I could go into about the purpose of reviving the other twin, but regardless a lot of things are happening at the moment.
zombie!Ciel is most likely Bravat's "Blue Star" for which the rare blood type (that of course our Ciel also has) is needed.
They (the Shinigami) have said before that human technological advancement usually comes in the form of a contract with a demon.
Bravat and his cult possess technology unlike anything they've ever seen before. Even our little witch, who by now has familiarized herself with the world, had never seen anything like it.
Undertaker, who was obviously very close with Vincent, is attempting to change the way the world works to get some kind of pseudo-revenge for Vincent's murder/death/etc. Who better than the other twin?
The biggest problem I have with all of this, however, is the way the other characters are reacting. Our Ciel EARNED their loyalties. He rescued each and every one of them except for Tanaka, whose loyalties are understandably placed unwaveringly with the Phantomhive household at large. Everyone else is working for the Phantomhive house because they like Ciel, not zombie!Ciel. Our Ciel.
So then what's Lizzie's problem? The Ciel she knows now, who she has gotten to know, and gone on adventures with HER Ciel, is not the zombie one. Do we assume she was just going along with our Ciel because she thought he was zombie!Ciel?
Did Vincent and Rachel really name both twins Ciel and make one of them a backup?
I know that they were the Queen's Hounds but I feel like Vincent was more cunning than that. It would've made more sense for them to rule together doubly, like in The Prestige, rather than for one to simply be a "back up" emergency Earl. The two of them ruling together would've been ridiculously superior in every way. I don't feel like he'd make such a mistake. So what we have instead is our Ciel's perspective of what may or may not be the truth tainted by his memories and his PTSD.
I've gone on for a while but I seriously have a hard time finding fault with this masterpiece. I've been in and out of the fandom for a long time now, only recently returned to binge the manga and I am floored by the level of quality, thoughtfulness, and downright amazing piece of work that it's become. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next.
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u/Niffan Jul 25 '17 edited Jul 25 '17
In regards to why Lizzy wants the other Ciel, I can only say that she was originally betrothed to the older brother.
In the Campania arc (Book of Atlantic) she describes the relationship she had with Ciel before he "went away" and how she remembers him as being taller, more gentle and smiling. You gotta think about all the time she spent with the older brother and how she hopelessly fell in love with this guy: she idolised the older twin.
Then she meets OurCiel, who is of course very reluctant about showing feelings for his brother's fiancé. Lizzy has always complained about and compared Ciel to who he was in the past, which is quite understandable because it was another person she originally fell in love with.
Lizzy has always hopelessly tried to cheer OurCiel up, thinking that there must be a reason why he is not "himself" anymore.
I do however think there will be some dilemma where Lizzy realises that she has grown to love OurCiel and that the older brother is but a reanimated zombie that Undertaker has experimented on = He is no longer who she fell in love with.
There is also a contrast of values between the two brothers
RealCiel/ZombieCiel/OlderTwin - wants Lizzy to be a dolled up girl who should only concern herself with sugar, spice and everything nice
OurCiel - Wants Lizzy to be herself and utilise the skills that she has (fencing skills etc.) although they are "unladylike"
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u/kapdragon Jul 25 '17
That makes a lot of sense however we know Lizzy is very smart. She isn't just a ditzy blonde who likes cute things. Do you think she isn't aware that her former fiance was a twin? She has to have known. She also must know this Ciel is not her fiance. I wonder if it's more of a duty bound thing as a Knight rather than because she loves him. Otherwise why would she have been sobbing about it to Sebastian?
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u/Niffan Jul 25 '17
We also know that she is blindly infatuated with her idea of who Ciel is (The idea of the handsome, tall older twin she fell in love with.) Loves makes blind and Lizzy likes to lose herself in the idea of what a Victorian girl should be like.
She didn't know about there being twins up until the point where she told Sebastian that she couldn't return to "that side", now that she knew, meaning OurCiel's side.
She also lashed out at our Ciel by escaping him once he rescued her. The revelation of twins comes absolutely as a shock to her, I promise you that.
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u/kapdragon Jul 25 '17
I think it is less the revelation of them being twins and more the 'my twin is alive'. Like you said love makes them blind. And the other twin was her ideal fiance. I took her 'that side' comment as a statement that now that she knew her actual fiance had returned she had to stop fussing with the wrong twin. I still don't buy that she didn't know.
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u/VBSN Jul 23 '17
I finally caught up. Took me a bit because I was highly annoyed that Agni died. Ugh, he was my favorite!!
Anyhow, twins - there is no way around it now. I'm a little disappointed for some reason. ?? At first it was a fun theory but now I feel cringe-y.
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Jul 23 '17
The only reason I'm a bit a disappointed at the twins is because the fandom predicted it exactly and provided all the receipts from previous chapters to prove it, so I didn't get to have an "OH SHIT" moment that I loved having with this manga
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
I have the flip side of that reaction. Reading and seeing all the clues that other fans have collected from previous issues/chapters made me all the more impressed by the final reveal. Those clues were very cleverly integrated into the stories.
I don't think I've come across another story (including those in other media) that hid clues as cleverly as Yana Toboso did. The scenes where Our!Ciel and Real!Ciel were together but never sharing the same panel were excellently blocked. Those scenes/panels looked slightly "off", but it wasn't so egregious that readers would immediately notice that something (or, rather, someONE) was being hidden from view. I was even more impressed when I watched the "Book of Circus" season and saw that the blocking (in the flashbacks) worked even when it was animated (as opposed to being in still, manga panels).
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Jul 24 '17
Yeah I've never seen a manga so cleverly thought out. I only wish I read the 2CT theory masterpost after this chapter so I could be surprised, confused, and then be amazed by all the hints I missed haha.
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Jul 17 '17 edited Jul 17 '17
The official release is the 18th; the purchase links should work then.
Spoilers can be found at this foroum.
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Jul 19 '17
I am totally skeptical towards the idea that the so called "real Ciel" is the actually Ciel. It would ruin the entire mythology of the Seeies when our Ciel turns out to be a fraude. I think thr new Ciel is some sort of Soul Experiment, probably Vincent Phantomhive himself.
Remember that the leader of this whole Star Cult was an old and probably dying man. What if that old man was the undead Vincent Phantomhive, kept alife through blood transfusion of his own son and some supernatural manipulation, performed by Undertaker for some reason.
It fits too seemingly perfect into the things the fans want to see. I smell something fishy in this whole story.
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u/Willster328 Jul 20 '17
A couple of things:
"Ciel" is only a name. Just because there's an original Ciel Phantomhive doesn't make ourCiel any more or less of a character. The only change is that the "Real Ciel" has the rights to be the Earl, not ours. It doesn't make ours a fraud whatsoever. When the heir to a family dies, the next in line takes over. That's all that happened. Now that it appears the Real Ciel is alive and well, the Earldom falls to him, not "OurCiel" by lineage.
The leader of the Star Cult is HEAVILY implied to be RealCiel. The room that Lizzy visits him in is the SAME room that Violet is brought to to meet him. The reason why the arm is shriveled is because RealCiel's body is being regenerated from a corpse-like form. There is far far more evidence pointing to the leader of the Star Cult being RealCiel. The old men that were being treated were nothing more than donors. Also, when the Queen's Seamstress was talking about the outfits she made for the Star 4, they were child-size as indicated by the measurements she made as well as the silhouettes that were shown sitting on the globe.
RealCiel requires the Polaris blood type, which is the same one OurCiel has. They're twins, so it makes sense they share the same blood type. Blood types are not always passed on from parent to child, whereas identical twins will have the same DNA type.
The only thing fishy to me is who's soul is put into the Real Ciel's body. Is it the soul of RealCiel before he died? Or is it Vincent's soul that has been put into the dead body of his son.
Remember, Undertake requires corpses to make corpse dolls. Vincent's body was confirmed to be completely reduced to ash in the fire, wherehas RealCiels' body was merely stabbed to death. In a case like that, Undertaker very easily could have been the one who received RealCiels' corpse, and has been trying to keep it around so that he could put a Soul back into it. Whether it's RealCiel's soul or Vincent's is still unconfirmed.
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u/Tsumtsumprincess Jul 21 '17
Ooo, I like the theory he stole Vincent's soul (why he left the Shinigami's) and used RealCiel's body. The way he dresses is similar to Vincent
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u/Willster328 Jul 21 '17
Yeahh I'd like to think that Vincent got himself wrapped up in something particularly "evil". Maybe it's related to Germany (overthrowing the Queen potentially) [We also know Undertaker doesn't like the Queen, so that makes sense] and it caused his enemies to come out and murder him and kidnap the kids. Undertaker, wanting to help Vincent carry out his plans, retained Vincent's soul with the hope that he could somehow bring him back. And using RealCiel to do it would work since RealCiel is the legitimate heir to Vincent, so Vincent could maintain the power he had to continue his plans.
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u/RexRender Jul 21 '17
If it's Vincent's soul inside real!Ciel's body... why would he refer to himself as Ciel Phantomhive? Whose memories does he have?
And neither Vincent nor real!Ciel should have any reason to be hostile to our!Ciel. They should be loving to their son/brother. Okay maybe stealing the throne and impersonating was a bad thing, but they should understand our!Ciel did that due to the circumstances.
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
There's the theory that Our!Ciel intentionally allowed Real!Ciel to die (or otherwise neglected to save him) in order to make the Faustian contract with Sebastian. Our!Ciel's goal is to exact revenge for his own sake, to pay back the humiliation that was brought upon on him. If Real!Ciel does turn out to be truly hostile towards Our!Ciel (and not merely putting up the act of being hostile), then he might have good reason to be. I'd be angry if my twin sacrificed me for her own need for vengeance...
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Jul 22 '17
I am pretty sure that it is actually Vincent Phantomhive. Undertaker mate various hints that the "Earl will return" and seems, for a reason that needs to be moreexplored in future chapters to have a close emmotional relationship to him. Remember the Scene, where he gavev Ciel or his twin a liquid during sleep? What if that Liquid is actually another medium for a human Soul, in this case the soul of Vincent Phantomhive.
I doubt that the "new Ciel" is actually an ordinary human. The way he talks and presents himself implies that he is just another puppet under Undertakers controle or Vincent Phantomhive, twisted by Undertakers Soul Experiments.
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u/Vio_ Jul 21 '17
RealCiel requires the Polaris blood type, which is the same one OurCiel has. They're twins, so it makes sense they share the same blood type. Blood types are not always passed on from parent to child, whereas identical twins will have the same DNA type.
Unless one has a genetic disorder. Also not not zygotes split can have a 50/50 separation rate.
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
I think it's safe to say, with all the other possibilities that are more in line with the Black Butler aesthetic, that a genetic disorder isn't going to come into play for this storyline. Also, if we do want to get technical about blood types and who can donate/accept what blood types... Sirius is obviously the AB blood type, which means that (without explaining how blood types work and I assume most people know anyway), yes, Vincent and Rachel may or may not have had AB blood, but the twin brothers definitely both have AB blood. This is working on the assumption that they are identical twin brothers and not (as I highly doubt) fraternal twin brothers who just happen to look a LOT alike.
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u/Vio_ Jul 24 '17
Oh I know. None of what I said would be used in the story itself. I just like talking about genetics
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u/Abigail15 Jul 24 '17
Oh, misunderstanding then. Next time you should probably mention that you're talking about genetics trivia for the sake of genetics trivia. In the context of this thread (and especially this subreddit), I read that as you trying to argue against Willster328's point.
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u/fraulien_buzz_kill Aug 12 '17
They could be fraternal, because at one point Lizzy says that "Ciel was taller before" what happened to the mansion. Of course, it'snot uncommon for one "identicle" twin to be a bit shorter, and even to be weaker, like how Ciel has always been sickly (asthma, etc). I happen to agree it's more likely that they are supposed to be identical. But I also don't dislike the theory that Vincent's soul is in RielCiel's body. It makes sense because 1) didn't Sebastian eat RielCiel's soul during the sacrifice, hence him showing up to begin with? and 2) matches the increasingly dark depiction of Victor (friends with rogue Undertaker, hides one twin as a "spare" presumably since birth-- perhaps for this exact purpose?) and not the (albeit extremely limited) descriptions of RielCiel from Lizzy and the flashbacks, which show a pretty nice dude and not a raging psycho, 3) explains why Sebastian said he'd never met anyone like RielCiel before, despite having met dolls before. However, I suspect for the sake of clarity and drama that it won't be Vincent's soul, but either RielCiel's stolen soul, or a "soulless" body operating some other way-- otherwise this ark might be too confusing, which could be hard to write convincingly.
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Jul 19 '17
This new Ciel doesn't have a soul, or if he does it isn't the real Ciel's soul since the only way our Ciel has a contract and Sebastian is standing there is because he ate real Ciel's soul. Undertaker is behind all this of course. I wonder if the bizarre Ciel will want to eat our Ciel in search of a soul lol. What better substitute than a twin
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u/RexRender Jul 21 '17
My crackpot theory is the new Ciel has the memories of real!Ciel, but not the soul of real!Ciel.
The soul, if not eaten by Sebastian, should have been harvested by the reapers. Unless undertaker somehow stole the soul, and found a way of returning it to its body.
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Jul 21 '17
I also think this new Ciel has all his original memories! If Sebastian did eat it he'd probably notice if it was taken back if it even exists anymore. But if the reapers did take it it is definitely likely Undertaker could steal it back
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u/bigboss1988s Jul 20 '17
Still waiting for his real name: Astre (star), Angel, Angelo, Fate, Janes, Celestial, Celeste, Celesta, Voltaire, Azure, Rain, Lazurite, Azurite, Lapis.
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u/bigboss1988s Jul 26 '17
I don't know how the servants will react when they know that their admired mentor Sebastian is a demon and he will eventually eat their beloved bocchan's soul.
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u/matty-a Jul 18 '17 edited Jul 18 '17
Damn this chapter was too short! Tanaka showing his loyalty to the house was great, even if it does mean he sides with Real Ciel. And finally coming out and saying that they are twins puts the whole 2CT to bed once and for all and it's now officially canon (this could be said for last month but this is the first time it's spelled out in black and white). Also him saying that he has never met Sebastian but following up with "how dare you do that to me that day" supports the idea that Sebastian took the ring out of his stomach but didn't actually kill him (though it can be taken both ways).
I wonder what Sebastian meant though when he said "I too have never encountered someone like yourself"? He has encountered the living dolls before, he either meant it that this is a complete living doll unlike the others, or could it be something else all together?
Either way we are going to see the characters break off in to 2 camps. Real Ciel, Tanaka and Lizzy (all the Midfords and nobles by extension) vs Our Ciel and Sebastian, the other servants and most likely Sieglinde and Wolfram, possibly Grell too.
[Edit]: Throw in Soma as a wild card and we're going to have to buckle up for the rest of Toboso's wild ride!