NS: How Black Butler got rebranded four times

[leahandillyana]

Halloween is a perfect opportunity to discuss gothic comics alongside horror ones. And perhaps the most-known gothic manga worldwide is Black Butler. I find the series interesting because of how its different adaptations have varied wildly to appeal to different audiences. I’ll discuss the original story and its recursive versions with little to no spoilers below.

What it is about: The original manga and its animated adaptations follow the adventures of earl Ciel Phantomhive, a preteen orphan in Victorian Britain, and Sebastian Michaelis, a demon the boy made a pact with. They solve a variety of mysteries, often involving supernatural forces, in a bizzare nineteenth century where people’s attitudes and technology resembles the 60s more than the era the story is set in. And that’s about as much as all adaptations share.
Some context: Black Butler is serialized in Gangan Fantasy, a fantasy manga magazine that is listed as shounen (manga for boys), but actually for years have been publishing mixed content appealing to readers regardless of gender or age. Some of its publications, like Pandora Hearts, Black Butler, or more recently Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun, are actually shoujo (girl’s) manga. They have beautiful, detailed art (which is a selling point of all the manga in the magazine), with special attention paid to character and clothes’ designs, as well as strong psychological and emotional focus.
First anime: Unfortunately, the wisdom goes that shoujo sells worse than shounen, so when Black Butler was picked for anime adaptation, the creators decided to change the genre of the story. When the first anime premiered, after the source material was fully adapted (given that at that point source material was only three volumes long, six episodes were enough), the anime moved into a mystery of the week format, with plot being story-driven rather than character-driven – actually, the characters in the first season of the anime are rather stiff and much less complex.
Second season of the first anime: The anime was successful when it aired, however in a way different than anticipated – instead of gathering boy fans, the series gained following among female audience, especially adult women. To bank on this audience, second season was greenlit, this time shorter, airing late at night, and focused towards adult women (josei). The second season highlights the elements female fans liked in the first season: female gaze fanservice, gorgeous clothes worn by the characters, and psychological depth, particularly regarding trauma (episode eight was among the most moving and downright tragic anime episodes I’ve ever watched). This, however, turned off male fans of the first season, and the season remains controversial.
Live action movie: This a very much in name only adaptation. It removes all the manga characters save for titular butler and moving the setting into an alternate history version of Japan. I especially disliked the film’s unsubtle straightwashing of the complex relationship between main characters. As far as I know, it went and was forgotten, but spurred enough interest for the second anime adaptation to be greenlit.
The second anime: Thus far consisting of an anime series, an OVA series and an anime movie, this anime is faithful to the plot of the manga and thus can once again be categorized as shoujo. Compared to the original anime, it has much higher budget, allowing for better and more complex animation. The psychological complexity coupled with sheer absurdity and pitch black humour of the series caused it to obtain surprisingly high reviews among critics.
In the end, the rebranding of Black Butler franchise went full circle, going from shoujo manga through shounen anime, then josei anime, then a general audience mystery/detective movie, back to shoujo anime. Interesting road for such a weird gothic story, huh?

Comments

[donnblake]

Interesting breakdown. Thank you!

I'm curious- do you think that the female audience for the first season of the first anime was a legacy from the manga, or, despite trying to aim for the boy's audience, the women were just digging the shonen tropes?

[leahandillyana]

I think the premise of the story is particularly attractive to female audiences, the character of Sebastian Michaelis in particular - when the anime was originally airing, Sebastian was named "the fictional man I want to marry most" in a large poll.

[donnblake]

He is a rather dapper chap, come to look at him.

[icon_uk]

I watched "Black Butler: Book of Circus" when it came on Netflix, and though it looked impressive, I found the relationship between Sebastian and Ciel to be a bit too unsettling for my tastes, veering into "grooming" a little much, which I appreciate was probably the point, but still. (That and I wasn't particularly enamoured of the "comedy" servants schtick)

[toaster_hacker]

This was a *fantastic* look at the manga adaptions and the history of the franchise's marketing! I'd never taken the time to seek explanation for why exactly the animated media has three very distinct tones/eras, besides the obvious divergence from story due to lack of original source material, and then rolling with having their own sandbox to play in for the second season. That's so fascinating, how its adaption history has been so chaotic! I also never took the time to break down the genre changes, most sites simply list all the seasons of the anime as shounen, but this really opened my eyes to what a facade that is for at least most of the adaptions.

I really need to learn more about the background and production behind the live action Kuroshitsuji movie, because they truly scratched everything besides Sebastian and tried to spin something vaguely, distantly relating to Ciel and the actual series. xD A Bold choice, for sure, and I'm almost curious to watch it.

Book of Circus, Book of Murder, and Book of the Atlantic were all very good, and I appreciated seeing those corresponding manga arcs adapted. ^^ Do you think they've found their stride and will continue along with faithful adaptions of the shoujo source material? Or do you suppose they'll try to venture into other genres again, between the temptation of the ever-popular shounen and the current surge in mainstream western interest in anime/manga?

[leahandillyana]

I am honestly not sure if there will be more anime, unfortunately. We haven't seen any projects since 2018, and the School Arc following the Luxury Line Arc was universally disliked - however, it introduced characters who played crucial roles in later Blue Cult Arc. If there is more of the anime, I suppose the best take would be to go straight to Green Witch Arc and then loosely adapt Blue Cult Arc to remove the battle of boy bands nonsense going for three first volumes of it.