Black Butler: Emerald Witch Arc

Episode 13

Being presented to Queen Victoria, whether as part of an official social debut or otherwise, was governed by a strict and very specific set of rules, and whatever other historical issues Black Butler has, I am pleased to say that this is done beautifully. Sieglinde's gown fits the criteria laid out by the queen – white (for she is unmarried), with a train and a veil long enough to cover the train, and feathers in her headdress. To modern eyes, it looks a lot like a wedding dress, and indeed, many young women had a separate bodice made that they could swap out so that the expensive garment could serve both purposes while looking like two separate dresses. (Victoria popularized white for wedding dresses, although not for this reason.) And as easy-going as the queen has seemed in this show, Sebastian was right to drill proper etiquette into Sieglinde and Wolfram, because she really could be a stickler for such rules.

Still, this episode has Sebastian at his most devilish, and nothing says “I'm a demon masquerading as a butler” like those torture devices he crams in Sieglinde and Wolfram's mouths. They look like the dental appliances from hell, and they're the perfect way to show the escalation of his lessons. From snatching a cake out from under Sieglinde's nose to forcing Wolfram to complain in English, Sebastian starts out as a schoolmaster and ends up as a royal torturer. He's always been a martinet, but this is truly going above and beyond.

Thank goodness for Lizzie, which is, I must admit, not a sentence I ever thought I'd write. (Generally speaking, I find her annoying.) She's the honey to Sebastian's vinegar, and it's a sign of how she's matured that she gets over her jealousy of Sieglinde very quickly and devotes herself to helping her, which includes forcing Ciel out of his comfort zone. Soma, of course, is willing to play along, but the most important piece of Lizzie's plan is to get Ciel to relax. It may not look like it, but he's playing with his peers, interacting with others in a way more suited to his age than what he typically does. He's detoxing from his mission in Germany, and that's something he very badly needs.

This arc, among other things, showed the baggage that Ciel is carrying around with him. He's had small moments of breaking down before, of course, but the issues induced by his exposure to toxic gas speak of something much deeper and more traumatic than anything we've seen him experience – and this is a boy who lost his parents, discovered his aunt was a serial killer working with a reaper before she died, and then had a host of other terrible experiences beside, to say nothing of the fact that his closest confidant and companion is a literal demon. If there's something even worse in his past, it must be a doozy…and he's going to have to “wake up” sooner or later and deal with it.

Has Undertaker been protecting him from those traumatic memories? Possibly, and maybe not on purpose. His brief visit to Ciel here (technically part of the next arc) involves pouring a mysterious liquid in his mouth before telling him to go back to sleep, that the time hasn't come to wake yet. This is almost certainly a statement with two meanings, first that Ciel literally oughtn't to be awake yet, but more importantly, that it's not yet time for him to “wake up” in the sense of remembering that which he has forgotten or repressed. We know that Undertaker has a fondness for (or perhaps loyalty to) the Phantomhive line, so it seems possible that his intentions are good, just according to his definition of the word. It also doesn't look like Sebastian is at all aware of his visit or what he's made Ciel ingest, although Sebastian, being who he is, may just be holding his cards closely.

As the curtain comes down on the Emerald Witch arc, we can only hope that it won't be too long before it rises on the Blue Cult. Until then, I bid you adieu.

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Black Butler: Emerald Witch Arc is currently streaming on Crunchyroll on Saturdays.