Black Butler, Vol. 1

You know it took me awhile to give this manga a try despite hearing about it several times before and all good things. I kept reading the premise and it didn't appeal to me all that much but I was looking for a shounen fix and thought why not just give it a try?

Set in an alternate 19th century England Black Butler begins with Sebastian (the butler) bringing Ciel Phantomhive a fancy breakfast in bed, or should I say two fancy breakfast's because an Earl should have choices.

The scene quickly moves from Sebastian telling Ciel his schedule for the day to a scene where Sebastian is fighting someone in the mansion's garden and kicking their um butt rather quickly and without messing up his uniform or breaking a sweat. Turns out Ciel went to go find a martial art's expert in China to beat Sebastian so he wouldn't have to do any school work. Unfortunately he lost and this doesn't look to be like the first time him and his butler has made this sort of deal.

Its shown very early that Sebastian can do no wrong and the other staff at the Phantomhive mansion are in great awe of him and seem to be his little cheer leading squad because I can't think of any other reason for them to be in the mansion because despite being a maid, gardener, and chef none of them can clean, nurture or cook worth a damn. They actually make things a lot worst forcing Sebastian to come to the rescue. Its quite impressive how he can turn a torched garden into an exotic landscape or a completely inedible meal into a delicious dish. And what's even more peculiar is when someone comments on how amazing he is he explains it away by saying he's a butler. Its obvious that Sebastian and Ciel are hiding something because the young master is the only person unfazed by Sebastian's great talents.

A good set up to series we get hints to Ciel and Sebastian's back story without really being told anything really which of course has me curious. I'm also wondering about the other staff in the household wondering how they all became associated with such a mysterious pair of fellows and how Sebastian who is most definitely not human came to work for Ciel.

I also love the art work, it reminds me of the detailed Gothic like style of Matsuri Hino (Vampire Knight) and Jun Mochizuki (Pandora Hearts) which just has me loving the fashion and detail of the drawings.

A nice refreshing read I will most definitely be picking up volume 2 of this series and am sorry it took me so long to give it a try.