Isayama's Wild Ride

Laura | 29 | ♀ | US | I just collect things I like. Attack on Titan owns my life right now, and sometimes I share my thoughts about it here. I am an Eren Optimist! 

[aspoonofsugar]

Hi :) Considering Historia's letter to the crew she says "Eren entrusted us with the future of this world" like I don't understand what world is she talking about! Is it Paradis or the whole world? Doesn't she know the crew has been traveling the world trying to negotiate with with them and are visiting Paradis due to establish these displomatic relationships? Has she been supporting the Jaegerists all along? Her stance is quite vague for me. I'm sorry this turned out long.

Hello anon,

Historia is referring to the whole world, which is now without titans. She finds herself having to take care of a country where there is a very strong extremist faction that she has to slowly defuse.

She is not supporting them, but if anything she is trying to limit the damage they are doing. For example, she is protecting both Connie and Jean’s families.

Historia’s power on the island is not absolute and if she were to act carelessly she might very well end up killed herself. Still, she is working quietly and slowly to reach some kind of peace with the rest of the world.

The implication is that Historia and the Alliance have organized some kind of event, so that Armin and Co can reveal the truth of what happened to the people of Paradis.

Basically, it is the same and the opposite of what Tybur did in Liberio. His event started a war, while hopefully the one organized by Historia will lead to peace, even if the path is going to be very long.

Thank you for the ask!

[aotopmha-deactivated20260101]

I was hoping I could take Eren's last moments alive with Armin very seriously and just feel sad for him, but the comical stuff like his tantrum (which felt out of place) kind of hurt that image for me.

Send me asks about the story?

I actually really liked that.

I have had a bunch of difficulty putting a certain sentiment I really like about Attack on Titan into words that shows up in its characterisation.

There are points where the characters feel frustrating and annoying to a very extreme degree.

I think notable instances are early Eren talking about killing all of the Titans, Hange's love for Titans, Historia refusing to fight when Levi tells her to and defending Rod in the cave and Gabi's fierce hatred of the devils of Paradis.

It drives the flaws of the characters just a little bit over the threshold where they become frustrating and annoying (but also doesn't remove the empathy for them).

It illustrates a lot of awkward stuff between the characters, too.

Erwin yelling on the wall before the departure to Shiganshina, the scene on the train, the scene with the potato, Mikasa and Sasha and the bread. Eren punching himself in the face before the Orvud fight. Anything more light-hearted with Kenny and Zeke is awkward than necessarily funny. There are a bunch of "wierd", as opposed to strictly funny exchanges in AoT.

I love that because stories generally don't do that and a lot of interaction between people is actually like that.

We just don't like acknowledging the awkward, sometimes exaggerated and misspoken stuff. It gives a lot of second-hand embarrassment when looking at it from the side.

Which I think why a portion of people felt the way they did with this Eren moment. (You obviously just found it to be out of place and it took you out of the story.) It's not necessarily played for comedy, it's just really awkward and embarrassing.

In other words, I find that scene with Eren and Armin to be kind of liberating and humanising.

In this scene Eren is allowed to be awkward, confused and vurnable, just a loser, after a very long time (narratively too), so he unloads everything on Armin (and the audience) at once.

It's a lot.

But I think it's also rare to do this because it gives unapologetically unlikeable elements to a character. The actual flaws of the characters are designed to be unlikeable.

I think a lot of times this happens unintentionally and is a result of bad writing, but AoT makes all of that stuff delibrate and has self-awareness about it.

Most stories stop short of the annoyance threshold where they depict the flaws to be there, but just enough where the audience feels safe in those flaws.

In AoT, I think most prominently Jean has that safety in his flaws (which I think is one of the reasons why he was a lot of people's favourite back in season 1 material), but, for example, Gabi, Mikasa and Eren don't have that safety in their flaws.

I think it's an interesting element of the story.

Thank you for the ask!

[peachymess]

What he said: thank you for being the bad guy.

What he meant: thank you for caring so much about us that you’d be willing to doom yourself in every possible way in order to give our future hope… but I didn’t ask for this. Please keep trying to find another way. But if not, I will make the best of what your error left us.

[momtaku]

Peachy, I hope you don’t mind me reblogging this and word vomiting under it. I agree with what you say here. You spell out the most confusing part of the chapter with only a few words. Like many, I wish the text had been clearer. I wish it was spelled out as plainly as you’ve done. It would’ve gone a long way to making this chapter more palatable.

I read this chapter with friends and we then spent nearly the entire day discussing it. The panel with Armin thanking Eren was the one that upset me the most. Safflora was also on the livestream so I asked her to help make this panel less cringey. I asked her to explain it so I could understand it.

Her response was much like yours but she added that it’s important to remember the speaker. Armin is the character who very early in the series voiced that change required throwing away your humanity. Because of that, while Armin didn’t agree with Eren, Armin would be in the best position to understand the lengths Eren would go. That small adjustment really helped me.

“Throwing away your humanity” became a mantra to Armin. It was the ideal he tried to mold himself around. Accepting the depth of his own necessary evils quickly made Armin one of the least judgmental characters in the series. While the rest of the 104th was reeling over Erwin’s gamble in the female titan arc, Armin accepted it instantly. He was able to formulate a plan to entrap Annie while still considering her a friend. After destroying the port in Liberio and murdering tens of thousands, Armin thought back to Bertholt and identified the parallels in their actions.  When Eren later entered the plane, Armin was the only one who managed a weak smile.  When the SC and Warriors joined forces to defeat Eren, Armin expressed no blame or judgment for their former actions. To put it in terms of a simple idiom, Armin understood completely the hypocrisy of the pot calling the kettle black so he refused to do it.

Armin and Eren were on ideologically opposite sides, Armin prioritized the world of humanity. Eren prioritized a small group of friends. But the lengths that Eren would go, the lengths that either of them would go to achieve their goal was something Armin inherently understood. This uniquely positioned Armin as the character who could thank Eren while at the same time rejecting his action.

[safflora]

Thank you, peachymess, for this excellent, elegant explanation. And thank you to momtaku for fleshing out that thought so beautifully.

The type of understanding that Armin has consistently demonstrated is a prerequisite for diplomacy. It will serve him and the rest of humanity well in navigating the mess Eren left behind, and I choose to believe in the hope Isayama has offered us through that.

[safflora]

I’ve not been ready to write down my full thoughts on the end of the series, but I will put this out there:

I like the ending. With all the complaints I’m seeing, I feel very much like I’m in the lucky minority in that regard.

I would love to hear from others who feel the same. What did you like about the ending that Isayama gave us?

[safflora]

I have so much to say about Attack on Titan. As a whole, how it ended. I have so much to say about Eren Jaeger. Let’s see if I ever figure out how to say it.

[flourish-of-steel]

We Need To Talk About Eren (2021)

[youhearbiggirls]

Visit Original Link

It’s Attack on Titan Sunday, baby. Two new anime episodes and one brand spanking new podcast. Check out our  Ch. 138 discussion with guests Alooulla and @safflora​!

MP3: https://mcdn.podbean.com/mf/web/3sfvta/138-final.mp3

~~ TIMESTAMPS ~~

Keep reading

[safflora]

I haven’t been around here much, but I had the privilege and pleasure of guesting on YHBG again this month! Check it out!

[feffany]

here it is my favorite part of the series

[kyojuuros]

Eren || s4e5 preview

[safflora]

That right there is Eren’s eye glowing. Now let’s talk about Eren’s eye glowing. Can we talk about Eren’s eye glowing? I’ve been dying to talk about Eren’s eye glowing with you all day, ok?

[lordchainsaw-deactivated2022041]

1.01 // 3.22 // 4.01

[huchidori]

[safflora]

At the risk of getting too personal, I want to talk about one reason why I find Eren’s character so compelling and why the recent events of the story are so incredibly painful for me.

I have obsessive interests. I think that’s the case for many (if not most) people involved in fandom or on this website at all. They bring me a lot of joy. They give me something that I can focus on and engage with in a satisfying way when I can’t do that with anything else. But they also cause me a lot of pain. Sometimes I find myself unable to do other things that I need or want to do outside of the object of my fixation, and it starts to feel like I’m engaging more out of compulsion than enjoyment. I feel trapped. I feel out of control. I’ll look at all I have to do in the day and get genuinely distressed because I know all I’m going to do is play with the shiny thing instead, even though I wish I wouldn’t.

And all along I am wondering, “Why am I choosing this? Am I choosing this? Why am I this way? Could I just… not? If I were better. If I were stronger. I don’t want this, but there is obviously something in me that very much does, and to be honest I do enjoy it, and it feels like something inherent to me but also makes me a piece of shit.”

And I know I’m probably just projecting here, but when I read Eren, I feel that in him. The wanting to be free. The massive confusion over whether or not he is and what’s really within his control. His compulsion to keep moving forward and the tears we’ve now seen him shed over that. His distress over apparently not being able (willing?) to change course. His disgust with himself. The dejected resignation to who he apparently is.

It all gives rise to a painful mess of impossible questions and contradictions (regarding the nature of self and desire and will and freedom) that I wrestle with to some degree almost every day. And that’s part of why it hurts so much to see it illustrated. I’m seeing one of the central struggles of my life magnified to an extreme, causing this level of destruction. Eren’s arc appears to be about a person being overwhelmed by this aspect of their nature. It’s one of my biggest fears.

It makes me wonder if this is the thing Isayama mentioned in the Final Exhibit interview that he would prefer not to see within himself that Eren represents.

[hokusu]

Shingeki no Kyojin ✩ Countdown to S4 Finale

[kyojuuros]

I just want to say again that I genuinely believe that not everything is as it seems regarding Eren. That there is a reason we never saw why Grisha still gave him the serum despite being horrified by the Rumbling. That there is a reason why his eyes were clouded like Ymir’s in the paths realm. That there is a reason why he only sees himself flying above the clouds away from the carnage only to be depicted in a comatose state at the end of the same damn chapter. That there is a reason why Ymir chose to revive Zeke so Eren could still get to her.

There is a huge plot twist coming, and Armin in particular is getting closer and closer to figuring out the real truth. And so are we.

[momtaku]

Talking about all those deaths in pairs... Levi made a promise. Can we consider that Zeke also made a promise when he saw Grisha via paths? I mean, Grisha asked him to stop Eren, and if Hange's theory mentioned in c. 133 was right and stopping Zeke means stopping the rumbling... Maybe Zeke knows he must die. In that case, if Levi tries to kill Zeke is possible that Zeke allows him to do it. What do you think? Thanks!

Ohhhhh! That would be amazing. I hadn’t considered that possibility but Zeke willingly dying to stop Eren would fill my need to have something of a redemption for him, while also allowing him not to change who he is. It wouldn’t require him to become a fully repentant “good guy”, just a slightly better bad guy. If he takes Levi down with him I’d be ok with that too. They’d both get what they want.

[aot-squad]

Attack On Titan volume 33 cover!!