In late-nineteenth-century England, the Noah's Ark Circus enlivens the city of London with their
grandeur and spectacular stunts. However, children are mysteriously disappearing from the town in a
manner correlating to the troupe's movement. The Queen, then, sends her notorious Watchdog, Ciel
Phantomhive, on an investigative mission to retrieve the missing children. Ciel and his demon butler,
Sebastian Michaelis, infiltrate the circus, disguised as team members, to study and possibly unearth
its ulterior motive.
This arc immediately follows the Curry Contest Arc in the manga, which ended at episode 15 in the
first season of the anime.
I had planned to watch Book of Circus for years but never really got around to it until I decided to rewatch season 1 and 2 a couple months ago, and god it completely exceeded my expectations. At first I didn't quite like the look of the new characters but came to love nearly all of them very quickly, especially Doll and Joker. However I was quite happy to see them die as well after finding out that their 'father' had been lying about the workhouse, they truly did deserve better but Ciel made a good point - there's no way they could have recovered from everything had they known the truth about the man they were helping. The end really resonated with me; humans are so foolish but it's in our nature and it's what makes us interesting. The only bad thing I have to say about this is that it's only 10 episodes long and those episodes go quick when you're really enjoying them. Also Ciel's laugh at the end was absolutely beautiful, music to my ears, free serotonin, 10/10 would hear a million more times. The opening is a banger as well, couldn't bring myself to skip it or any of the other openings, literally this whole series is so insanely cool and interesting to me. I'm pretty sure that Kuroshitsuji II isn't canon or whatever but the ending felt very...off, so it was nice watching such a well-written season after that. I said I didn't like the look of the characters at first but I have to admit, they were very well designed. Finding out that the freckled dude was actually Doll caught me so off guard and the interactions between her and Ciel were brilliant. As well as Joker's prosthetic hand that he loved, made by the doctor, only to find out it was made from the bones of those children he had helped to abduct. Seeing his reaction while he was on the floor helpless with his arm cut off, goddamn. They were all good guys fighting for the wrong cause, the cause being basically nothing because they blindly put their trust into a liar obsessed with a young boy. Although it kind of hurt seeing Ciel lie to Doll so much, it was completely necessary and says a lot about both of their characters - Ciel doing anything to get the information he needs and Doll believing people too easily. I feel like a lot of this season was based on trust and teaches a good lesson. No matter what someone does for you, you shouldn't support them or help them with highly immoral and illegal things and that's the mistake these kids made. I'm definitely going to rewatch this many times in the future. Finished 7 episodes in one day (which I rarely do anymore) because I couldn't stop watching. Can't wait to check out the other two seasons now :D Hopefully they are just as good