Couples Themed Photoshoots And Old Romance Films Have Such A Grip On Me They're All So Destian And It

I hate hate HATE all those 2edgy 4me theories about kids shows. Like Angelica dreaming up the rugrats, or the ed, edd, and eddy children being ghosts, or literally anything that takes a lighthearted and fun kids show and has to turn it into some tragic take of rape or murder or misinformed mental illness. So you know what? From now on I’m gonna do the exact opposite. Every cool grim-dark show is now because of a bunch of children. To get us started: Game of Thrones: A middle-school DnD campaign with the most angry, vindictive DM who has promised to kill everyone’s player characters (and their family) by the end.

it really does only take one basket of laundry you procrastinate putting away before your whole life turns to shit huh

Hey there! hope you're doing well! So I've seen a few takes from people saying that Seb lacks character developement and I wanted to ask your opinion on this? I feel like some people just want him to have some kind of "redemption arc" which sounds weird to me because by now I'd guess people would understand his character and motivations?

Dear Anon,

I am doing great, thank you very much. I hope you too ^^

Sorry for the late reply! It was not for lack of interest because yours is a very interesting question to ask. Indeed, for any other character I would say that for a main character he lacks character development. However, with Sebastian Michaelis specifically I would disagree, because there are multiple factors that dramatically change matters for him. The most important one being Sebas’ age.

Four Years vs Centuries?

Sebas is a supernatural entity that has been around and for centuries if not millennia. We know next to nothing about this demon’s past, but one of the few things we do know is that he has been around and seen quite a lot of the world thanks to his old age.

The older one is, the more fixed their personality is, meaning the less malleable it becomes. Of course nobody is too old to grow or change, but it will ultimately require more time or effort to change such a person.

In our current story Sebas has been around for barely 4 years, which to him must be an equivalent of a few hours in human life. Let’s say you are 20 years old with a certain set of beliefs, principles, personality traits, etc. Now imagine going somewhere you probably have been to before for one hour, and that in that one hour you suddenly change entirely. Not impossible, but quite unlikely.

What must happen before a person would change in such a relative short time must be the occurrence of something either exceptionally shocking, or exceptionally inspiring. In Sebas’ case, at least one did happen, namely the former.

Exceptionally Shocking

As discussed in some detail in this post, the exceptionally shocking did in fact happen to Sebas in his current contract. Canonically Sebas said that he never fought reapers before he fought Grell, and therefore we also know that Undertaker is the second reaper he ever fought seriously. Judging from Sebas’ casual and confident reaction when Grell first invited him for a fight, we know Sebas never had any reason before that time to fear for his life. I mean, look at this confident bitch (Ô_ó)p.

Even after Sebas got really hurt by Grell, he still managed to say something as cocky as: “I have never fought [a reaper] before, so I cannot tell [whether I can beat one]. But if my master tells me to win, I shall.” That is certainly NOT the same Sebas as the one we know now.

After the Campania brawl, we see very clearly how Sebas’ attitude and confidence changed entirely, exactly because for the first time ever he experienced something exceptionally shocking; his life and death was outside his own control. The English translations I have seen are not bad, but they miss a bit of the nuance in the Japanese version. In the Japanese version when Sebas says that even a demon like him cannot withstand a blow from the death scythe, there was some eye-opening realisation in his tone. He learned something new there.

And indeed, most tellingly even at the mere mention of the Undertaker or the prospect of having to run into him again, even Sebas swallows his pride in front of his master, and admits he’d really rather not.

Much later in chapter 85 when they were investigating the mourning lockets, master and servant have a moment of silence thinking about the Undertaker. While to O!Ciel the important memory is Undertaker’s “it is my treasure,” Sebas thinks about the very first thing Undertaker said to him upon deciding to let him live: “I knew you would succeed at protecting the Earl.”

As explained in this post, Sebas has come to project condescension onto Undertaker. Sebas suspects Undertaker is looking down on him, and understandably so because he has no reason to believe otherwise. “I knew you would […]” is a phrase that reflects control in Undertaker’s hands, and Sebas really hates that. For once Sebas is the prey, and somebody else the predator.

Now here is the character development; Sebas went from over confident and cocky to a demon with PTSD.

(Exceptionally) Inspiring

Though less explicit and game-changing, I would argue that something inspiring also occurred in Sebas’ short time on Earth this time: his master. In this post I compared O!Ciel to a piece of unprocessed raw meat to Sebas, as opposed to other past masters probably being a microwave-meal equivalent. O!Ciel is young and started without power, so to Sebas one he started to see the potential of a fully self-customisable meal, he really started to feel the excitement.

Though, however excited, it would only be a small blip on Sebastian’s radar. In the same post just mentioned, I also discussed how it is very unlikely that eating O!Ciel will change Sebas’ view on humankind because it would need to alter someone’s view shaped through thousands of years.

In this same sense I also argue that though Sebas did change over the course of 4 years in the human world, he wouldn’t change dramatically. His experience in the past four years must be like one grain of sand on a banked scale.

Sebas and Redemption?

My short answer would just be: “Kuroshitsuji ain’t some religiously-laden morale story wherein even a demon must be redeemed,” but that would not be fair (and too short for my M.O.)

It’s an unpopular opinion, but a good character arc or story does not require a redemption arc to work. It just needs to work for any reason. A redemption arc in a character is not like meringue is essential in a macaron. It’s more like chocolate on bread. It can be very nice if it suits well, but please don’t put any chocolate on a salad sandwich please.

For Sebas, I would say that a redemption arc would be the chocolate on a salad sandwich. As discussed above, Sebas is VERY OLD. If he were to be “redeemed” because of 4 years, it’d be like redeeming a lifetime sinner in one hour of repentance. Imagine redeeming Hitler after he saved one puppy or said “I’m really sorry”. Yeah, no.

Besides, this then also begs the question: “does Sebastian need to be redeemed in the first place?” As discussed extensively in this post, most of Sebas’ “evils” are done under someone else’s bidding. And otherwise, because he is not human the way he is “evil” is only because he doesn’t care about human lives; much in the same way most humans don’t care about insects. “AAH a mosquito that might make me itch for a bit! SLAP IT DED!!!” Or if we step on ants while we walk, “oh well, too bad”. That’s Sebas with humans. Do most humans consider humans who eat meat or slap insects “evil that need redemption”? No.

So for Sebas’ or demon standards, he is probably not even that bad. He just wants his food and payment for his hard work.

I hope this had been interesting!

Related posts:

What is Evil in Kuroshitsuji? Philosophy

If humans are insects, then what to Sebas are “humans”?

O!Ciel being a game-changing meal?

PTSD Sebas I

PTSD Sebas II

This fit with 23

Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil.

Me: Did you know that medieval cathedrals weren't actually supposed to be dark and rundown places with only stained glass as color? They were bright places full of light... the reason they look like that now is because of the centuries of accumulated grime and dust, here look at this restoration of the Cathedral of Chartres in France:

It's based on actual paint from the times, and when you think about it, it makes a lot more sense, after all a church is supposed to be a bright place of hope. Yet when we think about the middle ages we think about grimy and dark cathedrals. I wonder how much of our conception of history is shaped by our current visions of historical buildings.

My Goth GF: listen, I don't think this thing between us is working,

making shitposts for a 25 year old show >>>>>