Attack on Titan Finale Review: It is Certainly a Difficult Farewell to Say to This Amazing Saga
Stars: Yûki Kaji, Yui Ishikawa, Marina Inoue
Director: Yûichirô Hayashi
Streaming Platform: Crunchyroll
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 4.5/5 (four and a half stars) [yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]
Attack on Titan Finale is the last episode of the anime series, produced by Mappa and taken from the manga created by Hajime Isayama. Attack on Titan is an anime based on Hajime Isayama ‘s manga which has been with us since 2013, produced until the third season by Wit Studio, and from the fourth season onwards, by Studio Mappa. Attack on Titan is available to stream on Crunchyroll. The arrival of this last episode concludes the long-running saga of one of the most exciting and significant anime of all time, which we will analyze in this review! Perhaps no one believed it anymore, but here we are. Ten years, two animation studios, and 3 “final season” announcements later, the final chapter of one of the most important contemporary phenomena in the world of anime has arrived. While understandably remaining at a sidereal distance from One Piece and, in general, from the trend of more pop-oriented operations, Hajime Isayama’s manga has marked an important page among the niche titles on the Japanese scene (more than 90 million volumes sold) and its animated counterpart could only have an equally important.
However, his ending was highly anticipated not only for the duration and importance of the journey that preceded it but also for the number of irons in the fire that he was called upon to manage. Such as making it impossible to find a solution capable of fully satisfying the public, but capable, at the same time, of creating a groove in their imagination. A title that has based much of its fortune sometimes on the overturning and sometimes on the outright denial of canonical points of the genre to which it belongs and has taken a lot not only from comics that have made the history of comics in the West, but also from films equally important, thus testifying to the wisdom and passions of its author. In the review of Attack on Titan Final available on Crunchyroll from 5 November 2023, we talk to you about the conclusion of an epic saga, capable of dealing with political and social themes that are unfortunately still very current, revitalizing and reshuffling historical memory and creating a dark epic with an international scope, despite having Japanese culture at its epicenter.
Attack on Titan Finale Review: The Story Plot
Eren, a boy who lives inside a city confined by impassable and very high walls, created to protect the population from the threat of the Giants, dreams of being able to join the Research force, as he wishes to see the outside world. But, one day, after years of not appearing to attack the city, the Giants reappear and the inhabitants are forced to flee; Eren, losing his mother, and accompanied by his adoptive sister Mikasa and best friend Armin, vows to exterminate every giant on earth. However, this is only the beginning of a long complication of military choices, which will change his destiny, discovering unexpected backstories that will make both the protagonist and the audience reflect on their moral beliefs.
Attack on Titan Finale Review and Analysis
Amid the Rumbling, the roar that eliminated 80% of the world’s population, we witness from the beginning the union of forces between the Research Corps Regiment, of the Marleyan Warriors, who, some for one reason and some for another, join forces to save what is dearest to each of them. Whether it is a person or an ideal, Eren’s motivation that drives him to “keep moving forward” remains shrouded in mystery almost until the end, and one of the few who constantly tries to understand him and find an alternative solution to his elimination is his best friend Armin. The boy, now Commander of the Search Corps, accompanied as always by Mikasa is almost immediately “kidnapped” by one of the “fake” giants created by Eren to prevent the group from advancing in his plan of destruction. While Armin suddenly disappears, Mikasa and the others remain above Eren’s Founding Giant to fight these Giants who prevent him from reaching his neck to kill him definitively, while they try to find an alternative way to avoid the elimination of their dear friend.
As the situation becomes more and more desperate, we are shown how even in such a situation, the hatred presents between the Marleyans and the Eldians, who seek help for the wounded at the small outpost created to try to stop Eren Jaeger, continues to exist. Only after a tense dialogue where they both threatened each other with death, do they agree on a sort of truce given the situation. Shortly after, Annie, Gabi, and Falco arrive to help the group, the latter in the form of a Giant complete with wings, and manage to support their companions’ operation; but everyone realizes that they have reached a point of no return, making an important decision… Above Falco, transformed into a Giant Beast from the Azumabito ship with Anni and Gabi on his back, reaching the other companions, everyone agrees that they can no longer seek a dialogue to make Eren think and stop his plan of destruction.
This choice makes Mikasa, who has always been faithful to him, shudder, but she too realizes that it is the most sensible choice to make, however dramatic it may be. Trying to recover Armin, Mikasa faces every giant in front of her, so much so that it is Levi who slows her down, calming her down from her ardor; she is willing to find Armin again, her precious friend and the only one capable of preventing (because Mikasa continues to hope to find an alternative solution) the rumbling. But following Armin, we see him having a monologue with himself, overwhelmed by desperation and guilt; and subsequently, when he realizes that he can still do something, he can try to change things, and that it is important to do so, realizing that he is still alive and that it is not a dream, we face a journey into the dimension suspended between life and the death in which all Eldians can find themselves.
The same one we saw in Attack on Titan – Special 1, or the “Paths of Ymir”. Here Armin meets Zeke and together with him manages to go off the beaten track, concluding with him that what is not purely essential can be highly valid and important for us, even if it may seem trivial. We are in the middle of the battle, and while many characters fight with all their strength, such as Mikasa, Levi, and Jean, and even those who possess the power of giants such as Reiner and Pieck, who we see continually transforming into giant to fight, others they finally manage to take revenge; and precisely in this last episode we witness some magnificent animations, both in the fight scenes and the more calm and relaxed ones, which force reflections, especially in the moving ending.
Mikasa, hunting the giant who trapped Armin, finally manages to eliminate him by recovering her friend, concentrating together with all her companions on killing Eren, the only possible solution now. Thus, aiming everyone at the back of the founding giant’s head, also using an explosive charge, a strange creature emerges that tries to reunite as soon as possible with Eren, who is not yet dead. So, they decide that it will be Armin, transforming into his Colossal Giant form, who will try to explode everything, trying to stop him. And while Armin tries to stop Eren, both in their giant forms, Mikasa and Armin remember having spoken with him before reaching this point, in dimensions, moments, specially created by him, or even going back to the past or in other areas of the world, regarding his true intentions. Eren confides in Mikasa above all about what he really wanted, creating for an instant the reality that they would have liked to live, that is, run away together and return home.
But the illusion lasts too short, and holding each other one last time, Eren recommends himself to Mikasa, telling her to forget about him and throw away the scarf, to be happy. A scene that we will not forget so easily, like many others. But all this is just a mere lie, because what he desires, he reveals to Armin, his best friend, confessing that he feels guilty and that he hasn’t been able to handle things better than this, overwhelmed by the events of the future and the future. past, still choosing to save his friends and his family. At the cost of other people’s lives. Eren is a true anti-hero who chooses to save his loved ones instead of the world, almost destroying it. So that Mikasa, Armin, and the others, once dead, can live in peace as well as on the island for years to come, feared and undisturbed by the rest of the surviving nations, in any case, outnumbered and powerless against Paradis.
Furthermore, he reveals to Armin that he regrets what he said to Mikasa, rejecting his feelings for him, the one who was closest to him; and also, having hit his best friend, the two things that he knew would hurt the two of them the most and that he could “win” on in order to make them move away from him. Armin, however, reassures him by telling him that he will bear his sins with him. This is what Mikasa thinks, which for her meant being together with Eren, Armin and his friends, perhaps under the tree where he always dozed. But her desire will never be satisfied, since it is she who, entering the mouth of the founding giant, cuts off Eren’s head, which is inside her, while the latter looks at her for the last time, while Mikasa has tears in her eyes. This takes place after Mikasa’s memories and before Armin begins to remember; after having remembered everything, he looks for Mikasa who has Eren’s head in her arms, and after a long cry between tears and screams, she leaves and goes to Paradis to bury him.
While Armin, as in the first season, finds himself having to distinguish himself again from being a human or a giant, when asked by the same commander at the time. The whole group is saved, being recognized as “saviors of humanity”, and everything goes as Eren planned. Shortly after, Armin and the others find themselves on a Ship heading to Paradis, each of them with a more serene state of mind and with some physical changes such as hairstyles, clothes, etc. But Mikasa? Well, towards the end of Attack on Titan she finds herself right next to the tree where Eren used to fall asleep, and while we see her remembering the past, crying, a bird (representing Eren, who is able to see both the future and the past sometimes manifesting itself in this way) which wraps the red scarf around her once again, cheering her up.
The Attack on Titan manga has always been adapted into anime very faithfully; the same thing goes for the ending, where: Paradis develops more and more and all Eren’s loved ones live in peace, some of them even creating families. Mikasa seems to remain faithful to him until the end, and when she too dies, she is seen still wearing the same scarf. The years pass, Paradis grows more and more, but wars begin to recur until they destroy it. Towards the end, we see a little boy with a dog, who arrives in front of the same tree where Eren slept, and where both he and Mikasa were buried. Where there is also an entrance, in front of which the boy stops. The only differences are that the wars that affect Paradis occur while Mikasa and the others are still alive, and the scene where Gabi and Falco plant seeds in the earth is totally absent from the manga.
Over the years, Attack on Titan has given us so much, so much. Emotions, values, teachings, and so on! It is certainly a difficult farewell to say to this amazing saga, where the flaws to be found are very few if not non-existent. The animations were created perfectly, both in the fight scenes and in the calmer and more relaxed ones, which require reflection, especially in the touching ending. The music is also spectacular, the opening “The Last Titan” performed by Linked Horizon is magnificent, but even more touching and exciting is the ending: “Itterashai” performed by Higuchiai. We have already said how difficult it was to complete a story like that of Attack on Titan, stitched onto a complex network even from the point of view of the logic of events, furthermore completely distorted by the cancellation of the chronological order as an index of their event, and home to a gallery of characters so multifaceted that for each of them, it was necessary to conceive a rather complex single solution. In fact, something got lost along the way.
What makes the most noise are the fates of Historia and Zeke, the former managed clumsily for some time and the latter brought to the last step with a tangible laziness, despite remaining fundamental to the outcome of the story. Much less fuss was made about the last steps of Levi, whose start to become the shadow of himself starts from afar and for whom only confirmation was needed (in any case one of the most beautiful and meaningful shots of the entire final episode), in the face of a wonderful redemption that the character of Reiner, the true hero of the saga, finally encounters. We say it here once again, as much as the ending wants to convince us otherwise. These fates take place within one of the best battles of Attack on Titan, where editing and music reign supreme, extraordinary agents at the service of a narrative that is always tense and ready to fall.
It is they who, together with Falco’s last sortie and the culmination of the goodness of the foundations that have always moved the Research Corps, brought to the extreme consequences by Jean’s actions, take center stage, revealing how everything else has gradually become an outline and that what matters is linked to Eren, Armin and Mikasa, the trio with which the story began. If you think about the conclusion of the episode not only from the point of view of the message, but precisely in terms of what happens at the end, the end of the other characters wouldn’t even matter anymore. They are the triangle that regulates the heart of Attack on Titan, since they represent all the facets of the logic that regulates the narrative, of which Eren ultimately becomes the perfect summary. All in their own way try to find a way to change the history of man despite the complexity they have to deal with, but only the first manages to obtain enough power to overturn this imprisoning order.
The ending wants to make the spectator feel all the weight that this objective entails, even questioning the validity of a result that cannot depend on the decisions of a single person, even when this person decides to return to the origin of the story to destroy everything from the foundations. Eren allies himself with Ymir to recreate that adamantine partnership that the latter had created with the first King Fritz, but to overturn its foundations, to destroy the consequences to which it had led. The boy thus becomes a slave to freedom, the symbolic image of everything that Attack on Titan represented. The pitiful confession that Eren makes to Armin is that of an Ozymandias who seeks comfort in a celestial God after having had to make a decision that no human should ever make, rightfully inserting Isayama’s work into the list of those who have dealt with of the dark side of super humanism, very delicate portraits of the figures that have bloodiest human history.
The work in images that the mangaka does, in this case, is extraordinary and certainly more efficient than the many speeches that fill (as they have always done for the entire series) the final chapter, giving, also thanks to the contribution of MAPPA, two key sequences. The first is that of the newborn crying while being passed from hand to hand so as not to fall into the sea and the other is that of the kiss between Mikasa and Eren. The latter brings us to the final, extremely bizarre disquisition. Mikasa is the expression of the “faint hope” mentioned above, which first moves Erwin, then Armin, and, finally, we discover, also Eren, who in his distorted and extremely condemnable form pursued her at the cost of his own life. The girl is given the task of definitively destroying the bond between Eren and Ymir, also putting an end to the one between the Founder and Fritz and thus closing the circle of the clash between two couples who are equal in solidity but poles apart in terms of purpose.
An act of total perforation, like a force that is first opposite and equal and then only opposite, but stronger. The last act of Attack on Titan tells us that hope must not only be achieved but continually nurtured. This is the decisive test of man and can only be achieved through a collective exercise, since only together can a new cycle be created, which in Isayama’s vision is still an impossible act. The final form of the saga is that of a testimony and a warning for the contemporary world, which becomes extraordinarily important given the poignant power with which his message screams. Change must start from the study of History and the memory of the suffering perpetrated and suffered. If we hurt others, we hurt ourselves.
Attack on Titan Finale Review: The Last Words
Over the years, Attack on Titan has given us so much, so much. Emotions, values, teachings, and so on! It is certainly a difficult farewell to say to this amazing saga, where the flaws to be found are very few if not non-existent. The animations were created perfectly, both in the fight scenes and in the calmer and more relaxed ones, which require reflection, especially in the touching ending. The music is also spectacular, the opening “The Last Titan” performed by Linked Horizon is magnificent, but even more touching and emotional is the ending: “Itterashai” performed by Higuchiai. We have a dramatic ending, it’s true, but suitable for the series, a fitting conclusion. All we can say is repeat Mikasa’s words: “See you later, Eren”.
Attack on Titan Finale Review: It is Certainly a Difficult Farewell to Say to This Amazing Saga - Filmyhype
Director: Yûichirô Hayashi
Date Created: 2023-11-05 19:58
4.5
Pros
- The tension, the drama, the poignant power of the ending.
- There are some images that are extraordinary in their beauty and significance.
- MAPPA does an excellent job from an animation perspective.
- The music and editing are extraordinary.
- The resolutions of some characters are more than satisfactory.
- The underlying message remains consistent until the end.
Cons
- Some characters are handled in a blatantly clumsy or lazy way.
- The final solution is rather bizarre and risks losing the viewer.
- The speed with which Mikasa and Eren's destinies are fulfilled risks penalizing them.
