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Black Butler - Tropes H to K
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Tropes H
- Happiness in Slavery: Agni towards Soma.
- Ciel's household staff seem to be pretty happy living with him, even though they aren't good at their designated job.
- Hellish Pupils: Sebastian, occasionally.
- Heroic BSoD: While Ciel's intentions for the circus children back at the workhouse might not be described as "heroic" so much as "self-serving with a side of philanthropy", Ciel's reaction in chapter 36 upon realizing that the entire workhouse was empty and abandoned, and had been for what looked like years, meaning the circus children had fought—and died—in vain can be aptly described as a BSOD. A very, very frightening one.
- Ciel has one in Chapter 41, after finding Sebastian's body. It was an act, but he did seem genuinely pleased about being able to smack Sebastian around a little.
- Ciel has another one earlier in Chapter 34, when Baron Kelvin made an exact replica of where he was held when imprisoned, complete with an altar for sacrificing and even two cages full of children. This leads him to burn down the entire building... including the children (who were well past BSOD themselves, showing no reaction to the fire).
- Ciel gets another in Chapter 54, complete with flashbacks like the ones he had in Chapter 34.
- And another one in the Werewolf Arc. It wasn't due to a "curse" as it was previously assumed, but the inhalation of a toxic gas. And Sebastian accidentally made it even worse...
- Hidden Depths: Every recurring character, especially if they initially appear shallow and annoyingly cheerful.
- Historical Badass Upgrade: Queen Victoria. Here, she is Badass Horse Rider who somehow inspire a TV serial about a certain badass noble. In Real Life, she is griefly stricken with Prince Albert's death (in 1861) and become hard to work with for the rest of her reign.
- Historical In-Joke: In the manga, Queen Victoria has the occasional fit of tears that can be only alleviated by a servant (John Brown) with a Prince Albert puppet.
- Hollywood Atheist: Ciel, surprisingly, given his experiences with demons and other supernatural forces.
- Horror Hunger: Maggy in Chapter 52.
- How Dare You Die on Me!: Ciel causes quite the scene when Sebastian is found dead in Chapter 41. Ciel manhandles Sebastian's body while commanding him to get up and cursing him for leaving him behind. It's all subverted later on when we find out Sebastian was just playing dead again and Ciel knew all along.
- Human Sacrifice: Ciel was used for this, but ended up making a deal with Sebastian instead.
- Hypocritical Humor: Ciel chastises Cole for keeping secrets, lying, cheating, and manipulating others to do his work while flashbacks show Sebastian doing all the work of picking through the school's trash for Cole's notes to his underlings and taping the fragments together, not to mention setting up an elaborate tin-can-telephone and scattering hundreds of photos of Cole's makeup routine all over school. Lampshaded by Sebastian, and Ciel also seems fully aware of it.
Tropes I
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: "The/That Butler, ______."
- Changed in the second season to just "_______ Butler".
- Ignorance Is Bliss: Ciel tells Snake that his missing friends' whereabouts were unknown, that he is looking for them and that staying with Ciel will be the fastest way to see them again. The reader knows that they were all killed by Ciel's staff when they tried to ambush Ciel's mansion.
- Poor, poor Siegliende. If only she didn't learn her whole life was basically an enormous lie—her secluded village is actually a military area, the villages are all soldiers in really convincing werewolf costumes, and she isn't the descendant of the powerful "Green Witch", she's an ordinary girl with enormous talent for chemistry which was used to finish the previously-failed military project of making a stable mustard gas.
- Immune to Bullets: Sebastian can just spit them out.
- Important Haircut: Soma gives one of these to Agni in the flashback in Chapter 17.
- Madam Red had one, too.
- Improbable Age: Ciel, considering his ownership of the Phantomhive company and service to the Queen.
- Improvised Weapon: Sebastian uses cutlery and a serving tray to take out the mafia.
- In chapter 9 Ciel angrily tosses a pillow at Sebastian for withholding information from him.
- In Name Only: The anime diverged from the manga at Episode 7 (until the Indian Butler arc at Episode 13, before diverging when that finished again), making it essentially a completely different series. Besides just the setting and characters, there are many major plot points, such as the terms of the contract between Ciel and Sebastian, that are also changed. The anime returns to following the manga at the 3rd season.
- The characters are markedly different in personality between the two mediums. In the manga, Sebastian has a much wider range of emotions while he's always "cool" and rarely stressed in the anime. Anime Ciel is crueler, Soma is more childish. Grell is more competent, violent, serious, and less romantic in the manga. In the anime, Elizabeth has no dark side. Finally, the anime has far more ecchi humor and significantly larger bustlines than in the manga.
- Innocent Innuendo: The corset scene.
- I Owe You My Life: Ciel towards Sebastian in a very literal sense.
- Subverted in the anime, when Ciel becomes a demon and makes Sebastian serve him for eternity.
- The servant trio towards Ciel and Sebastian.
- Agni towards Soma.
Tropes J
- Jack the Ripper: The villain of one of the early arcs.
- Jade-Colored Glasses: Ciel.
- The Jeeves: Just as supernaturally competent, but whereas he was "heaven sent", Sebastian is "one hell of a butler".
- There's an interesting parallel in the respite chapter 37, when Sebastian has particularly strong views on a red tie.
- Jigsaw Puzzle Plot: Pieces of backstory are only revealed much later.
Tropes K
- Kid with the Leash: Ciel's relationship towards Sebastian. While largely true to the trope, it lacks the usual element of contrast in that, with a few exceptions, Ciel is just as amoral and ruthless as his servant.
- Kill the Cutie: All of the main circus crew (except for Snake) and the kidnapped children from the Circus arc, and Phelps from the murder mystery arc.
- Kissing Cousins: Ciel is engaged to Elizabeth, who is his cousin. This was rather common in the Victorian Era.
- The Klutz: The vice-principal of the boarding school Ciel goes to is very prone of falling down the stairs.
- This is given a Cerebus Retcon when it is revealed that the vice-principal was one of the Undertaker's Bizarre Dolls, and his poor coordination as well as his mild reactions to injuries are because he was Dead All Along.
- And Mey-Rin. ESPECIALLY when Sebastian is around.
- Kudzu Plot: The pieces have slowly been coming together, but every answer brings more questions.
