Black Cat (manga)/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Adaptation Expansion: At the cost of cutting out certain aspects of the manga plot, the anime added an entire arc towards the end of its run that sought to tie together the significance of Eve's origins and the work Dr. Tearju did, along with providing some background on The Doctor. Add to that several of the Chrono Numbers who appear in the anime only and it's kind of sad that they had to sacrifice much of the manga's character development. It truly could have been awesome.
    • On the other hand, Train and Saya's relationship was much more developed in the anime, making Train's motivation more moving.
  • Angst? What Angst?: Train in the later half of the manga. He gets shot by a bullet that is known to transform people into monsters, yet just shrugs it off (despite everyone else including the Big Bad panicking). When he turns into a kid, his first thoughts are that it'll make meals and bus tickets cheaper. When asked if he's concerned that Creed is trying to bring about The End of the World as We Know It, he answers no, and that he's mainly concerned with what's for lunch.
  • Compressed Adaptation: The anime, which removes whole arcs, completely rearranges the whole start of the series, and cuts a lot of character development for everyone but Train and Eve, or distilled in a very awkward way. Which is strange considering that the anime is also an example of Adaptation Expansion.
  • Complete Monster: The Doctor is more twisted than Creed and doesn't have the excuse of being clearly insane. Pick one of his experiments at random, just one of them, and you'll likely agree that it's enough to warrant the most cruel and unusual death available. He even tells Eve at one point while trying to vivisect her that empathy is a truly pointless emotion.
    • While Creed himself is redeemed in the anime, in the manga he's a solid example of a "99% monster": he hits off the criteria for Complete Monster except that there are characters who view him positively (namely Echidna) and the possibility of redemption is left open to him in the end if ever he were to get his mind working again. And, as stated above, his heinous actions are done mostly out of insanity rather than pure amorality like the Doctor's.
  • Draco in Leather Pants: Many fangirls excuse Creed's sociopathic tendencies because of his Dark and Troubled Past, despite the fact that Train's had it even worse.
    • Tendencies? The man has exactly zero qualms about killing you if you "stand between me and Train." Given his obvious propensity for seeing things obsessively... does anyone here have a mathematical formula for how long it would take for Creed to end up killing the entire world's population out of jealousy?
      • His lack of eyebrows cannot be excused.
    • Some Apostles naturally get this treatment. Shiki's nearly morally bankrupt, but s/he's beautiful. Charden has done terrible things on a vengeful crusade, but he's such a gentleman. Kyoko's an obsessive, psychotic pyromaniac, but she's so funny and adorable. Echidna's a conniving bitch, but she's sexy. Durham's a Trigger Happy psycho, but he's so cool. Leon's a budding psychopath himself, but he's such a cute little kid. And the Doctor...wait, even fans know there are no excuses for that asshole.
    • Also Shaolee, who spends his time deceiving people, is actually one of the cruelest Numbers and is quite creepy when you think about it, but looks just so pretty.
  • Evil Is Sexy: Echidna, although she oddly never makes use of it. Kyoko too to a lesser extent. As for male villains, Creed, Shiki, Charden, and even the Doctor are very attractive.
  • Fan-Preferred Couple: The majority of Black Cat fans ships Train/Eve, in fact it has it's own fansite.
    • While Train/Kyoko has it's own following, Charden/Kyoko seems to be even more vocal.
  • Fashion Victim Villain: Nice jumpsuit, Creed. Did it come with the open chest, or did you cut it out yourself?
  • Foe Yay / Ho Yay - The romantic / sexual tension between Creed and Train. Though it's rather one-sided, as Train clearly has zero intention of returning Creed's affections.
    • Also Played For Laughs with Kyoko and Train. Kyoko's head-over-heals crushing on Train, but Train wants no part of it, having already given his heart to Saya.
  • Moral Event Horizon:
    • Creed murders Saya simply for the humanizing influence she has on Train. And after suffering a nasty injury that might have made people sympathize with him, he then tries to turn Sven into a mindless monster.
    • When facing down Sven, Torneo is all ready to use a nanotech drug on Eve to force her to become a mindless killing machine. Train shoots it out of his hand to stop him.
    • All of the Doctor's experiments put him far over the line.
  • Straw Man Has a Point: Baldor isn't always wrong. A telling example is when one of Creed's Mooks blows himself up when Eve tries to help him, right after Baldor talked about how mercy is useless.
  • Toy Ship - Eve and Leon.
  • Unfortunate Implications: The only obviously gay or bisexual character in this series is The Big Bad, something that can be easily taken the wrong way. That said, there are a few upsides to Creed' portrayal: he nicely subverts the "gay men are wimps" stereotype despite being extremely campy, is not a pedophile (he and Train are actually around the same age, Creed actually being younger than Train by a few months), and in his own warped way, is very loyal to the person he's interested in. He's depraved in the sense of "gay and evil", not "evil because he's gay."
    • As an aside, it's also worth noting that his Mad Love for Train actually becomes one of his only redeeming qualities. The only time he ever cries is actually over Train, and the only possibility of a Heel Face Turn for him was because of his admiration and weighing of Train's words.
  • Viewer Gender Confusion: Deak Slakthy is considered so Bishounen that it's hard to tell he's male until he starts ranting about how much he hates women.
    • Lin Shao lee and Shiki get some of this, too. The latter actually WAS a lady in the original manga, so...

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