History Manga / TheCaseStudyOfVanitas

* FormulaicMagic: The World Formula, a mathematical equation originally written by UsefulNotes/{{Paracelsus}} in the 16th Century, ''is'' reality, and any changes to the formula also changes reality. It's believed that vampires resulted from the formula for humans being changed, and Astermite resulted from the formula for coal being changed. Vampires are able to see the World Formula and change it on the fly, giving them magical powers like PlayingWithFire and so on. In turn, Chasseurs have developed technology to blind a vampire's ability to see the Formula, thus disorientated and weakening them.

** The anime's first opening sequence, played over the upbeat song "Sora to Utsuro," features the two protagonists, Noé and Vanitas, going on a tour around Paris where they visit the many attractions in the city and Vanitas plays babysitter for an excited Noé. This makes the show look like a happy-go-lucky BromanticComedy set in a mundane France. The series is actually a vampire story taking place in a {{Steampunk}} version of 1889 Paris, containing plenty of drama, action, horror, and tragedy that wouldn't be expected from that carefree opening.

* CastFullOfPrettyBoys: Most of the male characters are either very handsome or incredibly pretty. An omake kinda makes a joke about it by showing several of the guys working at a HostClub.

* CoolAirship: Noé and Vanitas first meet at La Baleine, a giant airship fueled by astermite. And how cool is it? The airship looks like a flying Gothic palace!

* DaywalkingVampire: None of the vampires in this setting have any problem with sunlight.

* POVBoyPosterGirl: A male-male variation; Noé is the POV boy while Vanitas is the Poster boy.
* PocketDimension: One of the effects of the Babel Incident was the creation of secluded dimensions, named "Altus," that are connected to the original world, but are only accessible to vampires and humans who cross the border while touching a vampire. After the war, most vampires are living at Altus, although there's still some vampires who live at the original world along with humans.

* ReluctantPsycho: Many curse bearers are unwillingly turned into feral animals due to having their true names tampered with. Only a handful trade their names willingly for power. Even then, eventually their curse will leave their control and devolve into violent rage. Even fully in control, Chloé had difficulty resisting Noé’s blood.

* ShipTease: The series has teasing moments for all the potential couples of the main cast, mainly [=VanitasxNoé=] (unusual partnership with lots of HomoeroticSubtext and Noé's strong interest for drinking Vanitas' blood), [=VanitasxJeanne=] (ForcefulKiss from Vanitas, ''very'' sexually-charged blood drinking scenes, and a persistent UnresolvedSexualTension), [=NoéxDominique=] (childhood friends who like drinking blood from each other and are very protective of each other), and [=DominiquexJeanne=] (PseudoRomanticFriendship where both are overly fond of each other).

* UnresolvedSexualTension: After a very weird and rough start, Vanitas and Jeanne have developed a very strong mutual attraction since the Gévaudan arc, with Vanitas having become increasingly flustered around her with their interactions. By the end of the arc, Jeanne admits to Dominique that she's fallen for Vanitas, but will try to pretend she still hates him because Vanitas claims to not want people who love him back. Meanwhile, Vanitas is ''very'' insecure at the idea of anyone ever loving him, making him a total mess when thinking about Jeanne.
* VoidBetweenTheWorlds: Between the human world and the vampire world, there's a void known as the "Border" that only vampires are able to cross. It's said that if a human were to step into the Border without touching a vampire, the human would fall into nothingness and be lost between worlds forever.

* WitchHunt: After the Babel Incident caused some humans to be transformed into vampires, they became hunted by regular humans who viewed them as unholy monsters. [[spoiler:The original Beast of Gévaudan incident happened because paranoid members of the church were hunting hidden vampires in Gévaudan and killed any woman and children they came across.]]

* MasqueradeBall: The teaser shows masked vampire nobles enjoying themselves at a masquerade ball.

* AdaptationExplanationExtrication: In the beginning of the Bal Masque arc in the manga, Dominique has her two attendants chain Vanitas to a giant wooden wheel so she can interrogate him about what he really wants with Noe and his Archiviste powers. For some reason, the anime adaptation cuts out her attendants, showing Vanitas still being chained to the wheel, but it creates some confusion as to how a girl of Dominique's stature and size could possibly be capable of putting him, a grown man, on there without help. It also creates some confusion as to why Vanitas would even let Dominique chain him to a giant wheel, since he doesn't seem like the type of person who would just let some girl do that to him.

* ReluctantPsycho: Many curse bearers are unwillingly turned into feral animals due to having their true names tampered with. Only a handful trade their names willingly for power. Even then, eventually their curse will leave their control and devolve into violent rage. Even fully in control, Cholé had difficulty resisting Noé’s blood.

* ReluctantPsycho: Many curse bearers are unwillingly turned into feral animals due to having their true names tampered with. Only a handful trade their names willingly for power. Even then, eventually their curse will leave their control and devolve into violent rage. Even fully in control, Choloé had difficulty resisting Noé’s blood.

!! ''The Case Study of Vanitas'' contains examples of:

* AlternateHistory: The series takes place in a world where the alchemist Paracelsus in the 16th century altered the World Formula with the TowerOfBabel and created those that are known as vampires. The manga starts around 300 years after the incident, in a version of 1889 Paris where the Tower of the Sun was built instead of the Eiffel Tower.

* MassSuperEmpoweringEvent: The renowned alchemist Paracelsus built the TowerOfBabel as part of an experiment to rewrite the World Formula, resulting in a disaster. The formula that constituted coal was altered to become the blue mineral, Astermite, from which power could be produced without almost any environmental pollution, a flora formula was altered to create bioluminescent flowers, and most importantly, the human formula had been altered and given way to the existence of vampires.

* TechnicallyLivingVampire: Vampires are an advanced HumanSubspecies that came into existence because the catastrophe of the TowerOfBabel caused some humans to gain a connection to the World Formula. Their powers come from using their eyes to rewrite the World Formula and they're LongLived, but are just like humans in every other aspect.

* WatchingTheSunset: A variation happens in the belltower scene at the end of Mémoire 11/Episode 6. Noé makes the declaration that he wants to understand Vanitas and has decided to stay by his side. Vanitas concedes and the two men watch the sunrise, a symbol of the true start of their partnership.

* BreatherEpisode: Episode 7, which adapts Mémoire 12 from the manga, is a much-needed break from all the action and angst from the episodes so far. Instead, it focuses on the main characters just eating and dancing together at a restaurant to have a good time for once. As well as a good delivery of ShipTease for all the potential couples, both the opposite-sex and same-sex ones.

* CastFullOfPrettyBoys: Most of the male characters are either very handsome or incredibly pretty. An omakes kinda makes a joke about it by showing several of the guys working at a HostClub.

* {{Bishonen}}: Most of the male characters introduced thus far. Not surprising, given the author's previous work.

* MasculineGirlFeminineBoy: Jeanne and Vanitas are turned into this in the HighSchoolAU where both go to the academy DisguisedInDrag. Jeanne also behaves like a prince and calls Vanitas her food property because of all the shoujo manga Dominique made her read.

* OhAndXDies: The first chapter ends with Noé's narration saying that he will kill Vanitas at the end of their journey.

* PinkGirlBlueBoy: There's the pink-haired Jeanne and Vanitas who is blue-eyed and dresses in blue clothes.

* TechnicallyLivingVampire: Vampires are an advanced HumanSubspecies that came into existence because of the catastrophe of the TowerOfBabel caused some humans to gain a connection to the World Formula. Their powers come from using their eyes to rewrite the World Formula and they're LongLived, but are just like humans in every other aspect.

* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Vampires are an advanced human subspecies that came into existence because of the catastrophe of the TowerOfBabel. Because of their direct connection to the World Formula, they have abilities similar to magic that allow them to increase their physical strength and stamina, and in the case of more powerful vampires, use ElementalPowers and such. They apparently won't die unless directly killed via decapitation and their bodies [[ReducedToDust instantly turn to dust]] after losing their head. Drinking blood is not a necessity for them and they can easily suppress their blood cravings unless they become Curse-Bearers, which are vampires that had their true name corrupted and made them go insane.

* CompressedAdaptation: The anime's first half was fairly faithful to the manga, only cutting some minor scenes for faster pacing. However, in the second half, the Gévaudan arc was significantly condensed in order to adapt three and a half manga volumes into a TwelveEpisodeAnime. As a result, it eliminated a chunk of Chloé's backstory that took up half of the arc as well as the scenes related to the vampire senate and the extremist faction of the church that set up future arcs.

* HalfIdenticalTwins: [[spoiler:Louis and Dominique de Sade are actually fraternal twins and they look very alike, especially after Dominique started dressing like a boy to cope with Louis' death.]]

* HighSchoolAU: The omake of Volume 7 is about an AU where the characters are high school students and teachers. The premise is Vanitas infiltrating the academy while DisguisedInDrag and gets found out by Jeanne who also [[SweetPollyOliver is disguised as a man]] to be Luca's bodyguard. The omake later got adapted into a Drama CD series for the anime's Blu-ray release.

* ImageSong: Two of the Blu-ray discs come with an additional disc of character songs performed by the voice actors, all coming in duets. "Le Formidable!" for Vanitas and Noé, "Blooming in the Sun～mon trésor～" for Jeanne and Luca, "Nameless Road" for Roland and Olivier, and "Snow Flower" for Chloé and Jean-Jacques.

* OverTheShoulderCarry: Jeanne carries Vanitas like this when she needs to take him away for a private conversation about her blood cravings.

* DarkSkinnedBlond: Noé, who is tan-skinned and white-haired.

* AdaptationExplanationExtrication: In the beginning of the Bal Masque arc in the manga, Dominique has her two attendants chain him to a giant wooden wheel so she can interrogate him about what he really wants with Noe and his Archiviste powers. For some reason, the anime adaptation cuts out her attendants, showing Vanitas still being chained to the wheel, but it creates some confusion as to how a girl of Dominique's stature and size could possibly be capable of putting him, a grown man, on there without help. It also creates some confusion as to why Vanitas would even let Dominique chain him to a giant wheel, since he doesn't seem like the type of person who would just let some girl do that to him.

* CompressedAdaptation: The anime's first half was fairly faithful to the manga, only cutting some minor scenes for faster pacing. However, in the second half, the Gévaudan arc was significantly condensed in order to adapt six manga volumes into a TwelveEpisodeAnime. As a result, it eliminated a chunk of Chloé's backstory that took up half of the arc as well as the scenes related to the vampire senate and the extremist faction of the church that set up future arcs.

* NiceHat: Both Noé and his Teacher wear a rather fetching [[NiceHat top hat]].