[ contains major spoilers ]
[ if you're okay with that, you may scroll down to read the review ]
I've always had trouble figuring out which split personality of 100-years-ago Alice ended up as Black Rabbit ("Alice"), and which ended up as White Rabbit ("Alyss"/Will). A friend tells me that it's simple: one is tsundere, harsh on the outside and soft on the inside, like the Dark Alice from 100 years ago and Alice now; the other is yandere, sweet on the outside and insane on the inside, like the Light Alice from 100 years ago and Alyss now. The color scheme would also fit: the Dark Alice from 100 years ago became Black Rabbit, and the Light Alice from 100 years ago became White Rabbit.
But it doesn't appear that straightforward to me.
First of all, I present this picture as evidence:
 |
| click for full-view |
Much can be read into it. It's one of my favorite Pandora Hearts pictures and I've stared at it for ages, but somehow I always assumed that the Alice on top of Jack and the Alice in the mirror were just a decorative way to show her two aspects.
However, it can be read literally: the Alice in the mirror is a direct reflection of the Alice on top of Jack. This would mean that Dark Alice is White Rabbit. Perhaps through the opposite-magic of mirrors, White Rabbit appears Dark when she comes out of the Abyss into the human world.
It can also be red symbolically: something is a little off. Maybe the angle of the Alice in the mirror doesn't quite align with the perspective of the Alice on top of Jack. Perhaps White Alice is looking away, dejected. The crack in the mirror could represent a severance of the pathway through which she could come through and now Dark Alice dominates.
The Two Alices
Both Alice and Alyss have happy memories of being with Jack... meaning, they seem to both remember being Light Alice with him. Alyss had cute innocent doll/tea parties with Jack, as well as the flashback of Vincent being mean to her and hurting Cheshire. Also, Cheshire stuck around Alyss in the Abyss, though Jack said he was scared of Dark Alice. But Cheshire loves the current Black Rabbit Alice, too, so that's confusing (although can be explained by the fact that he's still scared of her despite caring so much about her). Alice has memories of Jack teaching her how to dance, braiding her hair, meeting her outside, visiting Lacie's grave, etc.
Dark Alice shares domineering mannerisms and facial expressions with Black Rabbit. But Jack asked Dark Alice "Who are you?" and it is White Rabbit who flipped out, her adoration turning to hatred, when Oz asked her same thing. White Rabbit repeats this pattern in chapter 8, most prominently
here + next page:
"I've been waiting for you for a long, long, long, long, long, long time, okay? So please hurry and come get me quickly."
"Please, my beloved."
"You don't know a thing about that girl, so why do you stay by her side?"
"She doesn't deserve you. Yet she managed to take you away from me." (Oz: "I have to stay with Alice.")
"...Why!? Why must you--"
"You will come to rue the day that you chose the B-Rabbit over me!"
Oz seems to be acting on his gut instinct and past memories when he chooses Black Rabbit in this scene and, likewise, White Rabbit seems to be projecting her feelings about Jack onto Oz, including her intene jealousy of Jack (probably) picking Light Alice over Dark Alice. If she had also been Light Alice, then why? And is the Alice we saw in chapter 1 and 8 even the same one that Break met in the Abyss?
Granted, a lot of time has passed since then (if time means anything in the Abyss)... Break met Alyss right as the Tragedy of Sabrie happened. Oz ran into the White Rabbit ~100 years later. She had plenty of time to dwell on her memories and perhaps whatever sense of betrayal she felt festered over the years and now she's something different from before.
Alice as the Mastermind
All we do know is that something terrible must've happened between Jack and Dark Alice. In the picture above, Dark Alice has black roses all around Jack. Jun loves the Victorian language of flowers, and black roses mean "death, hatred, and farewell". I think Jack being tied up, unaware, and at her mercy is significant, too. I'm starting to believe Vincent's idea that "Everyone became weird because of Alice.". Alice --The Will-- is the central issue in the story. She's the Goddess ho controls time and destiny, and she's twisting everything obsessive pursuit of Jack. If she got mad enough at him, then she could be the one who screwed him over and orchestrated all this... which would make a lot of sense.
We have pictures of Alice in dark clothing, with the Black Rabbit locked up in a birdcage, and with many skulls and death butterflies at her feet --victims of The Tragedy of Sabrie? The spider web could be symbolic of manipulation.
 |
| click for full-view |
We also have pictures of this same Alice tearing up her own memories:
 |
| click for full-view |
But Alice died. When did she tear up her memories? And which Alice did it, anyway? W-Rabbit Alyss seems to have all her memories, but B-Rabbit Alice does not. This once again points to B-Rabbit being Dark Alice, yet it is W-Rabbit who seems more in line with the "black rose" sentiments that Dark Alice felt toward Jack. And dropping so many people into the Abyss actually hurts Alyss, so it's strange for her to do it to herself, especially considering she was very surprised by it (but time flows weird in the Abyss, so maybe she didn't know yet, though she did tell Break that she wants to help to stop being the Will in that same scene).
The Lacie Factor
Maybe Lacie is involved somehow. The more Oz uses Black Rabbit, the farther the seal moves, the less powerful modern Alice becomes. She doesn't even turn Black Rabbit anymore because her power seems to be seeping into Oz. And now she's disappearing. Could this be the next stage of Black Rabbit power seeping into Oz? And, she disappeared now in a flurry of sparklies, from a similar flurry of sparklies Lacie appeared to Jack inside(?) of Oz. Maybe he's hallucinating, but if he's not, then Lacie might be part of Black Rabbit's power. This is where my head really starts to hurt. Because if Cheshire loves both current Alices, yer hates the Dark Alice from 100 years ago, she might not be either one of them. She might even be Lacie.
Jack did know of Black Rabbit 100 years ago. He might've even contracted with it, since he is well-versed in how to control her and appears (even possesses Oz) most frequently when Oz uses its power. What is Black Rabbit? Its power appears to be detachable from Alice herself, since Oz uses it independently from her.
Lacie, Glen, and Jack
Lacie can be linked to Alice in more ways than lookalike and anagram. The Alice twins were born into the Abyss from a human womb, and we know that Lacie was sacrificed to the Abyss.
I really hate to accuse Glen of something like this --and I'm really not, it's just a hypothesis --but it's possible that Glen might've used Lacie to gain control over the Will. That as his expressed intention all along, after all. By sacrificing a pregnant Lacie to the Abyss, and having her give birth to a child/twins infused with the Will, he could have then retrieved Alice (one to take with him, and one to stay in the Abyss to keep the connection) and kept her locked away in that tower. That is, until it came time to finalize this process and claim control of the Abyss from Alice for himself, perhaps by sacrificing her too (Leo explained that the Baskervilles wanted to obtain the Will in order to destroy her--to destroy Alice). Finding out something like this would horrify Jack, I hink. Hence "...you want to use Alice??"
It seems Glen wanted to shelter Alice from much external stimulation by isolating her in a tower, perhaps for fear that she may develop a personality and desires of her own and cease to be a neutral entity. Well, Jack royally messed that up, too (even though Glen seemed okay with Jack visiting her). Maybe Glen finding out that Alice develop a will of her own, or that Jack was planning to rescue her, could explain the suddenness of him(?) ordering the sacrifice of Sablier to rush the procedure (dumping that many sacrifices at once incapacitated Alyss, which might've helped Glen take control had Jack not interfered). If the twins are linked, maybe their mother is also connected to them in a significant way.
Attack of the Clones
It's always bothered me how Alice was attacked by a whole bunch of Alice clones in the Cheshire dimension. This could be explained by the idea that Alice fears herself the most, and that "the memories that are replayed here eliminate all intruders," but here are more sinister interpretations. Alice has always wanted to know why she was born and this could go towards explaining it. Why does she fear herself the most? Alice and Lacie look nearly identical --maybe they literally were clones. Maybe the "Glen"s had kept several generations of Alice clones --girl with a direct connection to the Will of the Abyss --in an attempt to keep control over the Abyss. Sacrificing Lacie, and later possibly wanting to sacrifice Alice, and who knows how many iterations before them, may have been part of the perfecting of a process to destroy the Will and claim its power for the Baskervilles. Far-fetched, I know.
Jack's Soul
And what of Jack? Earlier he explained that "I am a fragment. A remnant which resides within Alice's memories. A fragment of Jack Vessalius' soul.". Indeed, Oz only started sensing Jack when they recovered Alice's first memory. That was his way "in". By contracting with Black Rabbit, Oz has an intimate link with Alice, so maybe whatever she gains, he also gains. And so, as the pieces of Alice's memories are coming together, so is Jack's soul, and he is growing stronger. Does Jack somehow live in Alice's memory? Was her tearing up her memories also a way of sealing him?
But Oz was recognized as Jack's "container" even before he ever contracted with Black Rabbit, by both Zai and Alyss, so that can't be the whole explanation... and dropping him into the Abyss where he could contract with Black Rabbit and start restoring Jack's soul seems counter-productive. Jack also admits that "I'm no part of Alice's actual memories,".
Still, Jack seems to be very tied to the Black Rabbit. I actually think Jack contracted with Black Rabbit. Aside from the fact that he talked about Black Rabbit 100 years ago, he is also well versed in how to control it. It's during Oz's B-Rabbit high that Jack most frequently comes through and dominates. I'd think that Oz's homicidal tendencies in that state is Jack's influence. Pretty sure this is Jack's influence talking, since he shortly thereafter comes through to kill Yura. And Oz remembers this from Sablier too (is that Glen's sleeve in the bottom middle --right?), as does Alice. This happened back in Cheshire's dimension, too, where memories of Sablier triggered Oz to go on a destructive rampage, even to the point of being willing to destroy Alice herself if it would make her happy. I think that could be Jack's influence, too (or it's Cheshire's feelings there, unless Jack is influencing him too).
And here + 2 pages is another one of Jack's homicidal B-Rabbit escapades. Jack appears to be very destructive under B-Rabbit, and gets carried away or lost in its power.
The movement of Oz's B-Rabbit seal in the Cheshire dimension, the influx of Alice's memories he saw, and his craziness that followed was triggered by seeing Alice dead. Maybe Jack reacted similarly upon finding Alice dead (assuming he didn't kill her during a B-Rabbit high because she feared herself the most). Maybe when Alice died, she went to the Abyss, turned into Black Rabbit, and came to contract with Jack on the spot. But there's many problems with this theory, such as Alice being very mad at Jack for something (maybe even for failing to protect her, or for killing her, but this one is impossible), and the picture of Alice with Black Rabbit locked in a birdcage.
.jpg)
