Attack on Titan: The Review

Just this week, the final chapter of the world-famous manga “Attack on Titan” was released, marking the end of this epic series. Even if you haven’t been keeping up to date with the manga, you have a high chance of knowing at least the basics of the plot, it simply became that popular in a very short period of time.

And if you’re new to the story, beware, spoilers abound in this article.

I got into the manga just a year or two ago, and I started watching the anime when it first launched a few more years ago. The story of Eren Jaeger, a boy who loses his family to the monstrous titans only to very soon realize that he can also become a titan himself, is already epic enough, but when you get into the details, you can get lost in the depth and social implications of the storyline. The series has been criticized for some of its implications, as the story goes into some parallelisms with Nazi Germany and the handling of Jewish people, but these are topics that need to be discussed in the media, and the boldness of the series to present such a ‘taboo’ topic as a giant part of the story should be appreciated.

In this article, you can read about some of the things that make “Attack on Titan” such a big influence in modern media, and a personal favorite of mine.

Diverse and Engaging Cast

The cast of the “Attack on Titan” series mainly consists of the 104th training squad for the Survey Corps, the series’ anti-Titan squad. Their fate is quite uncertain during the whole journey, since the risks presented in the plot are actually, well, risky, and there is no plot armour to save them in the last moment. Every “Attack on Titan” fan has seen their favourite character suffer immensely, get traumatised for life, or just get killed off without chance for survival, and this further makes the war scenes more realistic - there is no exception as to who can get the bullet next, and even if a character hasn’t been surrounded by flashbacks and death-flags, they’re in as much risk as the others.

When I say the cast is diverse, I really mean it. As any other series, the main trio gets the most screen time and development, but all the others from the supporting cast feel really true to themselves to the very end, as well. Characters like Connie and Sasha which are first introduced as mainly comic relief, get through traumatising events that have turned them into cold-hearted warriors, and they have personal agendas to commit to now. This is something extremely important to me as a whole, for characters to be determined and to have a reason for doing what they’re doing and being where they are, not only because the story makes them do so, but because they have a reason.

For example, Connie almost has a villain-esque arc nearing the end of the series, when he plots against his teammates to take Falco, a newly-made Titan Shifter, to his mother in order to save her from the fate of staying a Titan forever. This doesn’t feel out of character at all, since it was already established early on that his mother becoming a Titan was a giant turning point for his character development, as he became even more determined to find out what the truth of the Titan shifters and Marley is.

Such examples of extremely believable characterization are what makes “Attack on Titan” shine in the first place.

War against oneself

The main enemy of “Attack on Titan” is none other than the Titans. And as any person well-versed in the story will tell you, their story is not so simple. Titans aren’t just mindless killing machines with no agenda, or at least they weren’t from the very beginning. They all share the same fate, one way or another they got injected with Titan Serum and got turned into those monsters they are against their will. The fate of people turned into Titans is incredibly terrifying - in order for them to escape this cursed state, they need to devour other humans in search of a Titan Shifter, the powers of which would allow them to go back to human conscience.

Now that you know that the main enemies of the series are actually innocent victims altogether, it becomes a bit more unsettling (not like it already wasn’t), to watch the main characters slay them in order to survive. The struggle becomes from man VS monsters to man VS man, and it can be seen most vividly in one of the final Levi VS Zeke fights, where Levi’s comrades are turned into Titans, putting him in the situation where he either has to slay them or be eaten himself. The horrifying reality unveils at the very end - after Eren’s death and the end of the Rumbling apocalypse, all the remaining Titans are reverted back to humans. This sounds like great news, but that wouldn’t return to life all the already-killed people. The survivors just had the ultimate luck of staying alive so far in the series, and in most cases, it was more of a matter of circumstance than anything else that one character survived where others didn't.

The series makes this amazing twist with the revelation of the true story of the Titans more than halfway through the series, as it completely subverts the readers’ expectations. We all fell into the trap of thinking of the series as a black-and-white saga, when in reality it turns out to be much more layered and complex.

Eren: The Unsung Hero

Another point of characterization that makes “Attack on Titan” unique at least among the pieces of media I’ve consumed so far, is the final outcome for the main character. Yes, the trope of the MC getting all they dreamed of by the end of the series is indeed thrown out of the window, as Eren’s goals become more and more warped as the series progresses. As it was recently revealed, his power acquired through being the possessor of the Attack Titan makes his ideology less of a personal choice and more of a necessary duty. Since he received the gift of ‘future memories’ at one point in the story, he basically knew how his story would end, and how it would affect humanity. In order to salvage them from the destiny of possessing Titan powers and being known as enemies of humanity, Eren has no choice but to follow through with the terrible sequence of events that is the Rumbling, even if it means that his own life and the lives of 80% of humanity will have to be put out forever. Thus, he becomes a plot device in and of himself, and becomes an outsider to his own motivations. Even when, in the last chapter, it was revealed that he maybe possessed the power to prevent the death of his own mother, he didn’t prevent it, since it would make the desired outcome in the very end unachievable.

Even if in the end he was the main enemy and became responsible for literal genocide, he managed to find a perfect sense for himself in his actions. This doesn’t mean his actions were at all justified, it just serves as a good example of how well one’s ‘good’ intentions can become a literal calamity for other people. In his confused state of mind near the end of the series, the destruction of a large portion o the world would be justifiable if it meant a future without war, where kids who grew up like him, as orphans and in misery, would live peaceful lives. The great irony comes when his wish for peace actually leaves many others’ lives in pieces after his horrific deeds, thus creating a paradox. Maybe Historia’s child in the future would grow up in a healthy family without the burden of war around her, unlike any of the other characters, but how can you equal this child’s happiness to the millions of deaths that it took to ensure it? The path of Eren cements one of Isayama’s main points, and that is the faulty logic of the ‘peace is only achieved through war’ fallacy.

The world left in shambles after Eren’s apocalyptic deeds is still war-ridden, maybe even more than before, and Isayama doesn’t stray away from this topic. The world of “Attack on Titan” doesn’t magically restore itself after the final battle, and the remaining characters are left to deal with a mess even bigger than they had anticipated. The harsh and cynical realism is self-evident, and will definitely make this series something to remember for a long long while.

Overall, this manga itself will be remembered for long after its end, and even if Isayama disappears from the world and doesn’t do any sort of follow-up for the series, its effect on the readers would far outlast it. So again, kudos to Isayama! Give it a read/watch ^^

Another amazing part of the whole ‘Attack on Titan‘ experience is the soundtrack, so go have a blast with one of my favourite songs from the soundtrack down below ^^