 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
「その執事、不詳」 (Sono Shitsuji, Fushō)
“His Butler, Much Unknown”
Kuroshitsuji knows how to pull it’s punches. After a few okay weeks due to excessive recapping and slow-mo pacing, things are getting back in swing. Wolfram’s farewell scene definitely hit. As expected, he ended up defending Sullivan in the end, but it was no less moving- the way he desperately ran after the train to say a goodbye he never got to finish. Initially when he got shot I thought it was Sebby and Ciel’s doing, which would’ve pissed me off, even if it wouldn’t have been out of character for them. The real culprit it turns out is one of the “food ingredients” that escaped from the inferno- it doesn’t lessen the impact of the moment, and she does get her comeuppance courtesy of a dinner knife to the jugular. I wish Sullivan had heard Wolfram’s final words “You’re not a witch. You’re an ordinary girl”- that’s what she needs to hear most as she begins processing the hefty mental and emotional damage she took. Given the bond between them, I think she understood his meaning, even if she didn’t hear them out loud (unless she has super sonic hearing)- it certainly hurt seeing his dying figure reflected in her eyes as the train hurtled on- she who was raised to believe in her “magical power” is confronted with her powerlessness in the tides of fate and the decisions of adults that sweep her away.
As Wolfram’s life flashes before our eyes, we are treated to gorgeous greyscale art, though the story itself is anything but beautiful as we witness scenes of Wolfram’s perpetual dehumanization in the name of military training. To kill the person in front of you requires ignoring their personhood, the sanctity of life, and the only way that can be done is by first losing your own humanity. Coming after the slew of stunningly animated action scenes the past few weeks, it serves as a reminder of the stomach-turning realities of weaponry and warfare.
Intriguingly, Finny and Wolfram have a lot in common. Both former killing machines, tasked with caring for a young master/mistress. After being taught to embrace death, they learn the meaning of life through tending to one. The recurring theme here are that children are the light, salvation, whereas adults are the ones who crush it. In the past whenever Ciel has met a genuinely kind person who offers a tiny hope for goodness in the world, it has often been a child- Doll, Sullivan. Those adults wage war on the innocents’ souls, using and abusing them- Kelvin and his monstrous Noah’s Ark against Doll, the German army against Sullivan.
Master of tragedy that Kuroshitsuji is, it can still deliver a happy, or at the least, bittersweet ending. Much as it looked to be so, this was not, in fact, Wolfram’s farewell, final or otherwise, thanks to Ciel’s kindness in picking him up. And thank goodness for that- as Ciel notes, Sullivan very much needs Wolfram. It’s a harsh world out there, and a pure-hearted child such as her needs protection to not get crushed more than she already has been. No doubt Ciel was also thinking of his own situation with Sebby when he commented on Wolfie as Sullivan’s “guard dog”.
Ciel shows his tough love once again mincing no words when forcing Sullivan to shut up, stop crying, and face her duty in saving Wolfram. What that duty looks like is a hot knife to perform an emergency surgery- yikes, talk about painful, I’d be squeamish about it if I were Sullivan, but you gotta do what you gotta do to preserve a precious life. I thought it interesting that while Wolfram was gritting bracing himself for the impromptu surgery, the memory that flashed across his mind was breaking Sullivan’s feet. As if he were taking her pain as his, imagining, understanding the physical trauma he forced upon her, giving him the strength to bear it, a strength and a purpose which the soulless military experience never provided.
The final few minutes of the episode felt like an ending, but we still have the matter of what happens to Sullivan and Wolfram from here. I can’t imagine the German government giving them a pass to roam free there, so I assume they’ll immigrate to England. Then, we also have the long-awaited tea party with the Queen (if they get to that, but with 2 eps left to go, they’ve certainly got the time to throw it in). We’re pretty much at the end of the rope when it comes to material in this arc, which means the last two weeks will probably extended edition recaps and one off bonus content. While we have more time than is necessary to adapt this arc, I suppose it’s better than having the opposite complaint.
End Card
 |