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The Bee
Nov 25, 2012

Making his way to the ring . . .
from Deep in the Jungle . . .

The Big Monkey!
I think the ending we got was the ending Martin wrote, and both him and D+D are struggling massively with the question of "how do we get there." D+D phoned it in. There is 0 doubt about it. Martin, meanwhile, seems scared to try and even more scared of admitting it. Martin dedicated way too much authorial time to an ill advised timeskip and wasted a ton of mojo on the equivalent of an anime filler arc that, instead of getting the cast where they needed to be, opened way more plot points than it closed. He now has way too many loose ends to trim in any narratively satisfying question with the 1-2 more books he promised it'd take. D+D's response was to just clumsily bash everything out as quickly as possible, leading to Westeros' global brain drain, time and place becoming malleable to credibility annihilating degrees, and several characters turning into see-and-says.

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Szmitten
Apr 26, 2008
The last episode is one of those things where Helms Deep is just a skirmish in the book but is elevated to a major thing in the movie, and because this port fight represents the final action scene of the season (and potentially all of televised AoT as we knew it) so it got a bit more.

Wonder what's going down 4th April.

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN
there are a distressing amount of people talking about AoT that seem to think the rumbling is a reasonable idea, predicated on the idea that "the world declared war on paradis". nevermind that this declaration was literally one guy giving a speech and that before anything even happened, like 90% of the poeple even at that speech were killed. it's honestly a little frightening how easily people seem to rationalize this

Ccs
Feb 25, 2011


I think I'm one of the people for whom the AoT ending retroactively ruined the series. It's no longer something I would ever recommend to people. I continue to watch it for the stellar animation, I even like the cg titans because Mappa has a solid CG department. But I no longer really care about these characters. Which is probably why recent episodes which are low on the animation and high on the character angst don't do anything for me.

uPen
Jan 25, 2010

Zu Rodina!

tbp posted:

there are a distressing amount of people talking about AoT that seem to think the rumbling is a reasonable idea, predicated on the idea that "the world declared war on paradis". nevermind that this declaration was literally one guy giving a speech and that before anything even happened, like 90% of the poeple even at that speech were killed. it's honestly a little frightening how easily people seem to rationalize this

The declaration of war was knocking down the walls and you know, killing half the people on the island.

Not saying Eren is justified, just that there's been more provocation than a speech.

Monaghan
Dec 29, 2006

The cop out of Eren being able to see the future was the absolute loving worst and by far the worst part of the series for me. It ruins any question about Eren's plan because, after all, he could see the future and knew it would work. Genocide was really the only option! Any issuses about dumb or immoral choices get instantly hand waived away.

Crespolini
Mar 9, 2014

tbp posted:

there are a distressing amount of people talking about AoT that seem to think the rumbling is a reasonable idea, predicated on the idea that "the world declared war on paradis". nevermind that this declaration was literally one guy giving a speech and that before anything even happened, like 90% of the poeple even at that speech were killed. it's honestly a little frightening how easily people seem to rationalize this

A whole nation even allied with paradis, and as a reward they're getting trampled along with the rest, lol.

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN

uPen posted:

The declaration of war was knocking down the walls and you know, killing half the people on the island.

Not saying Eren is justified, just that there's been more provocation than a speech.

That's Marley, not all the other nations of the world. Unless I'm completely mistaken, non-Marley nations did basically nothing to Paradis at all from a military POV. All they did was have some dignitaries and leaders attend Willy's speech and then they were killed immediately afterward anyway.

hatty
Feb 28, 2011

Pork Pro

Crespolini posted:

A whole nation even allied with paradis, and as a reward they're getting trampled along with the rest, lol.

That nation just wanted the unobtanium from under the island so they deserved to die too I guess

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN

Monaghan posted:

The cop out of Eren being able to see the future was the absolute loving worst and by far the worst part of the series for me. It ruins any question about Eren's plan because, after all, he could see the future and knew it would work. Genocide was really the only option! Any issuses about dumb or immoral choices get instantly hand waived away.

See I'm now reading that aspect a lot differently. Eren could NOT have seen a future with another option because it was locked in the moment he kissed Historia's hand. It was all set in stone from that point. So it isn't quite "nothing else would work" and more "nothing else could possibly happen" the way I understood it.

The ending reads like a tragedy to me - Eren seems to very clearly not want to do any of the things he does, and the whole bit of him "wanting" to in his confession to Armin honestly feels forced. The kid is horrified the second he kisses that hand, and basically does not show a single ounce of joy in the story from that moment onward. He seems to have no ability to change anything, but he knows it will happens, there's no moral question from his end because he literally cannot stop it, so "it was our only choice" becomes a rationalization more than an excuse, the only way to keep his sanity knowing what he will end up doing.

hatty
Feb 28, 2011

Pork Pro
The whole Armin confession section in the last chapter sucked poo poo and should be completely rewritten in the Anime

Elias_Maluco
Aug 23, 2007
I need to sleep

Monaghan posted:

The cop out of Eren being able to see the future was the absolute loving worst and by far the worst part of the series for me. It ruins any question about Eren's plan because, after all, he could see the future and knew it would work. Genocide was really the only option! Any issuses about dumb or immoral choices get instantly hand waived away.

I dont think thats true

The way I understand, is not like he could see every possible future. He could see the future he set in motion and the result of his plan, and he was okay with that result. Because he is a broken psychopath whose motivation was always "Im going to kill all the enemies and protect my friends". And he saw that his plan did ensure that his friends would mostly survive and the enemies of Paradis would be too broken to threaten them

One could argue that killing 80% of all people outside of the island instead of 100% was a compromise on Eren's part, a compromise imposed by his last figment of humanity or something, and thats what I think the ending was going for. The fact that his friends (and maybe the author) seemed to think that was reasonable enough is what felt so wrong for me on the ending

Elias_Maluco fucked around with this message at 18:02 on Mar 21, 2022

Super Rad
Feb 15, 2003
Sir Loin of Beef
Not trying to justify the genocide option or anything but the suggestion to declare global war on Paradis was met with a standing ovation from the dignitaries present. Sure, they never got an opportunity to act on it, but I think the dramatic effect of Eren showing up in Liberio and loving everyone up was just too juicy to turn down.

uPen
Jan 25, 2010

Zu Rodina!

tbp posted:

That's Marley, not all the other nations of the world. Unless I'm completely mistaken, non-Marley nations did basically nothing to Paradis at all from a military POV. All they did was have some dignitaries and leaders attend Willy's speech and then they were killed immediately afterward anyway.

Exactly, the other nations did nothing while Marley was trying to kill everyone on the island. There's a whole planet full of people and about 2 dozen of them are all that came to help when the people living on the island said we're not interested in being murdered anymore.

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN

Super Rad posted:

Not trying to justify the genocide option or anything but the suggestion to declare global war on Paradis was met with a standing ovation from the dignitaries present. Sure, they never got an opportunity to act on it, but I think the dramatic effect of Eren showing up in Liberio and loving everyone up was just too juicy to turn down.

i mean if i saw biden clapping at some NATO conference about declaring war on russia, i'd contend that putin's not justified sending some bombs over this way 10 seconds later. basing a world genocide/omnicide on a handful of now-dead military leaders clapping at the end of a speech which very bluntly told an edited history feels just absurd to me (which i think is what isayama wants me to feel at least anyway).

probably the best way to put it is that ramzi had no fuckin idea who was at that speech, he had no idea who helos or whoever was, he doesn't know nor care about any of that, and even likes eren well enough. and yet his head ends up crushed under the foot of a titan all the same, and no amount of clapping on the part of a politician that may or may not have represented him can make me cede an inch on this topic. a better option was available and should have been taken, every additional step after the first for this wave of titans is, itself, an unspeakable atrocity the likes of which eren himself didn't even have to conted with

Monaghan
Dec 29, 2006

Even if it was the only option and Eren had no choice, you had the author write a scenario where the character initiating a genocide would know that it would result in world peace, which just... sucks. Isayama was the author and had a choice of whether he could make Eren see the future. It's not like he couldn't have set the rules differently.

There's just a whole host of problems. If removes all agency from characters if there's literally no other choices. Again, other than the future "Being set" why couldn't Eren just not do the rumbling? He had to command the walled titans to move after all.

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN

Monaghan posted:

Even if it was the only option and Eren had no choice, you had the author write a scenario where the character initiating a genocide would know that it would result in world peace, which just... sucks. Isayama was the author and had a choice of whether he could make Eren see the future. It's not like he couldn't have set the rules differently.

There's just a whole host of problems. If removes all agency from characters if there's literally no other choices. Again, other than the future "Being set" why couldn't Eren just not do the rumbling? He had to command the walled titans to move after all.

oh for sure, but i thought the audience was meant to read it as a tragedy, too. that eren didn't want this at all, he could genuinely not control himself (particularly once he ended up in the coordinate), things were moving without his direct input. and we're supposed to understand this as the good in the world losing. the cycle of hatred was too bad and created a monster that couldn't be caged back in. at no real point in the story did i come away thinking "isayama wants me to think that there are some positives from the rumbling", i sincerely took it as being a complete failure on every character's part to prevent this.

i thought this was sorta reinforced too by having the only big cheerleaders of it all be people that are like, snivelling little cowards interested only in power. when all the Worst Guys like an idea, i presume i'm supposed to not like it (from an authorial POV). so i guess i dont have a big problem with the morality of the ending because my current read really does begin and end with "even eren is tragically depressed that this happened, but he genuinely could do nothing to stop it"

i dont quite know if that's the "right" reading though, because the metaphysical time travel stuff does sincerely confuse me

Elias_Maluco
Aug 23, 2007
I need to sleep

tbp posted:

oh for sure, but i thought the audience was meant to read it as a tragedy, too. that eren didn't want this at all, he could genuinely not control himself (particularly once he ended up in the coordinate), things were moving without his direct input. and we're supposed to understand this as the good in the world losing. the cycle of hatred was too bad and created a monster that couldn't be caged back in. at no real point in the story did i come away thinking "isayama wants me to think that there are some positives from the rumbling", i sincerely took it as being a complete failure on every character's part to prevent this.

i thought this was sorta reinforced too by having the only big cheerleaders of it all be people that are like, snivelling little cowards interested only in power. when all the Worst Guys like an idea, i presume i'm supposed to not like it (from an authorial POV). so i guess i dont have a big problem with the morality of the ending because my current read really does begin and end with "even eren is tragically depressed that this happened, but he genuinely could do nothing to stop it"

i dont quite know if that's the "right" reading though, because the metaphysical time travel stuff does sincerely confuse me

Except we have the good guys, like Armin, also apparently approving this solution, after the fact, which seems to me to indicate the author expects the readers to feel the same (but who knows)

Super Rad
Feb 15, 2003
Sir Loin of Beef

tbp posted:

i mean if i saw biden clapping at some NATO conference about declaring war on russia, i'd contend that putin's not justified sending some bombs over this way 10 seconds later. basing a world genocide/omnicide on a handful of now-dead military leaders clapping at the end of a speech which very bluntly told an edited history feels just absurd to me (which i think is what isayama wants me to feel at least anyway).

probably the best way to put it is that ramzi had no fuckin idea who was at that speech, he had no idea who helos or whoever was, he doesn't know nor care about any of that, and even likes eren well enough. and yet his head ends up crushed under the foot of a titan all the same, and no amount of clapping on the part of a politician that may or may not have represented him can make me cede an inch on this topic. a better option was available and should have been taken, every additional step after the first for this wave of titans is, itself, an unspeakable atrocity the likes of which eren himself didn't even have to conted with

I agree with you but I do think you're being a bit overly realistic with the interpretation of the events in Liberio, especially considering politics in AoT have never been realistic. I feel that between the "pro-Eldian" conference that the gang secretly attended which devolved in Paradis-bashing and the Tybur's big speech, Isayama was trying to convey that, at the very least, Eren is right about the whole world turning on Paradis. I also don't think that AoT would have been improved in any fashion by drawing that part of the story out by having the dignitaries return to their home countries and stoking the flames of war. It would have been a lot of pages to accomplish much the same as the ovation did.

All that said, even with this pessimistic interpretation I'm on your side that there's no justifying Eren's actions, I just feel that focusing on the aspect that no stone had yet been officially thrown by any of these nations is splitting hairs in a way Isayama never bothered with himself. Whether AoT in its entirety supports or condemns fascism will be debated ad nauseam but he does repeatedly paint in the same brushstrokes as fascists and a recurring occurrence in AoT is that catching your "enemies" with their pants down / acting in a depraved manner is justification for their execution.

MagicBoots
Mar 29, 2010

How about we pump the atmosphere full of methane?
You put me on Cargo handling optimization?! I am the premier defense specialist in the entirety of the UN!
Don't you dare pull my funding!
You can't cut back on funding!
You will regret this!

tbp posted:

oh for sure, but i thought the audience was meant to read it as a tragedy, too. that eren didn't want this at all, he could genuinely not control himself (particularly once he ended up in the coordinate), things were moving without his direct input. and we're supposed to understand this as the good in the world losing. the cycle of hatred was too bad and created a monster that couldn't be caged back in. at no real point in the story did i come away thinking "isayama wants me to think that there are some positives from the rumbling", i sincerely took it as being a complete failure on every character's part to prevent this.

i thought this was sorta reinforced too by having the only big cheerleaders of it all be people that are like, snivelling little cowards interested only in power. when all the Worst Guys like an idea, i presume i'm supposed to not like it (from an authorial POV). so i guess i dont have a big problem with the morality of the ending because my current read really does begin and end with "even eren is tragically depressed that this happened, but he genuinely could do nothing to stop it"

i dont quite know if that's the "right" reading though, because the metaphysical time travel stuff does sincerely confuse me

It's not that he couldn't do anything to stop it, it's that he doesn't want to. Eren can live amongst a people, acknowledge their humanity, then kill them anyway because he is incapable of envisioning any other solution. He's not happy about this, it's not what he would have liked but he can't think of anything else because he's a broken human being who always chooses violence and assumes his opponents will as well.

In It For The Tank
Feb 17, 2011

But I've yet to figure out a better way to spend my time.
So many of the problems with the ending arise from ideas introduced in 139. I have my problems with preceding chapters but 139 muddies the waters for what was already well established for seemingly no reason* to the point where it feels (to me) incongruent with the rest of the story.

Eren's motivations for Rumbling were clearly laid out in 130/131. Eren is motivated by three things:
- The safety of Paradis and its people
- The safety of his friends and family
- The selfish desire to see the world portrayed in Armin's book (i.e. empty)

1 and 2 could theoretically be achieved by peace (albeit it is incredibly unlikely), but 3 is only possible through the eradication of every person outside of Paradis. Eren knows this, and recognizes it is monstrous, but commits to the Rumbling - not because he is controlled by his future or whatever but because he wants to. This is why he breaks down while talking to Ramzi and apologizes; Eren knows he is killing him by choice.

* Well, really, the reason is to exonerate Eren. Maybe it's because of editor meddling, maybe Isayama got cold feet, maybe it was marketing concerns about selling merch of unrepentent genocider, but so much of 139 is about absolving Eren of what he did and making his actions more palatable. "He planned to lose... He only killed 80%... He wasn't really in control (the Founder messed with his head!)... Look, Armin is thanking him... Wow, so are the rest of the cast..."

Elias_Maluco
Aug 23, 2007
I need to sleep

In It For The Tank posted:

So many of the problems with the ending arise from ideas introduced in 139. I have my problems with preceding chapters but 139 muddies the waters for what was already well established for seemingly no reason* to the point where it feels (to me) incongruent with the rest of the story.

Eren's motivations for Rumbling were clearly laid out in 130/131. Eren is motivated by three things:
- The safety of Paradis and its people
- The safety of his friends and family
- The selfish desire to see the world portrayed in Armin's book (i.e. empty)

1 and 2 could theoretically be achieved by peace (albeit it is incredibly unlikely), but 3 is only possible through the eradication of every person outside of Paradis. Eren knows this, and recognizes it is monstrous, but commits to the Rumbling - not because he is controlled by his future or whatever but because he wants to. This is why he breaks down while talking to Ramzi and apologizes; Eren knows he is killing him by choice.

* Well, really, the reason is to exonerate Eren. Maybe it's because of editor meddling, maybe Isayama got cold feet, maybe it was marketing concerns about selling merch of unrepentent genocider, but so much of 139 is about absolving Eren of what he did and making his actions more palatable. "He planned to lose... He only killed 80%... He wasn't really in control (the Founder messed with his head!)... Look, Armin is thanking him... Wow, so are the rest of the cast..."

Thats a pretty good post and I mostly agree with it

Except I dont think achieving peace without a full rumbling was that unlikely.

For example Eren could have done a partial rumbling just to wipe the armies around Paradis and than kept the wall titans as deterrent against further attacks on the island, while they use diplomacy to try to defuse the situation. I think Armin himself suggested something like this

The only downside here is that titans would still exist and, more importantly for Eren, probably, his titan friends would still die after their time limit. Still, a better outcome for the whole world

chiasaur11
Oct 22, 2012



Elias_Maluco posted:

Thats a pretty good post and I mostly agree with it

Except I dont think achieving peace without a full rumbling was that unlikely.

For example Eren could have done a partial rumbling just to wipe the armies around Paradis and than kept the wall titans as deterrent against further attacks on the island, while they use diplomacy to try to defuse the situation. I think Armin himself suggested something like this

The only downside here is that titans would still exist and, more importantly for Eren, probably, his titan friends would still die after their time limit. Still, a better outcome for the whole world

The thing that was the dealbreaker for Eren was Historia being turned into a Titan. He specifically calls it out as his one big line. Which is one of the things that makes me entirely convinced that Isayama was planning to have him be the father.

Conspiratiorist
Nov 12, 2015

17th Separate Kryvyi Rih Tank Brigade named after Konstantin Pestushko
Look to my coming on the first light of the fifth sixth some day

Szmitten posted:

The last episode is one of those things where Helms Deep is just a skirmish in the book but is elevated to a major thing in the movie, and because this port fight represents the final action scene of the season (and potentially all of televised AoT as we knew it) so it got a bit more.

Wonder what's going down 4th April.

They've been sticking to 1-chapter 1-episode since Final Season Part 2 started, and the port assault took 2 chapters hence 2 episodes.

chiasaur11 posted:

The thing that was the dealbreaker for Eren was Historia being turned into a Titan. He specifically calls it out as his one big line. Which is one of the things that makes me entirely convinced that Isayama was planning to have him be the father.

This is an element that while I don't believe was necessary for Eren's motivations to work, would certainly have made them concise to the point people would altogether stop speculating on what drove him even if they failed to catch the nuances.

Conspiratiorist fucked around with this message at 22:37 on Mar 21, 2022

Mirello
Jan 29, 2006

by Fluffdaddy

tbp posted:

there are a distressing amount of people talking about AoT that seem to think the rumbling is a reasonable idea, predicated on the idea that "the world declared war on paradis". nevermind that this declaration was literally one guy giving a speech and that before anything even happened, like 90% of the poeple even at that speech were killed. it's honestly a little frightening how easily people seem to rationalize this

rofl dude, did you read the extra pages in the end? eren/floch literally are right. Paradis is destroyed, they are genocided. This is within the logic of the story. it was kill or be killed. Marley already unprovoked killed half the people on the island, demonized them, and attempted to kill all of them. it's not a hypothetical. I can't post in the other thread anymore without saying any spoilers, but at least here I can say it.

Elias_Maluco
Aug 23, 2007
I need to sleep

chiasaur11 posted:

The thing that was the dealbreaker for Eren was Historia being turned into a Titan. He specifically calls it out as his one big line. Which is one of the things that makes me entirely convinced that Isayama was planning to have him be the father.

I completely forgot that


Mirello posted:

rofl dude, did you read the extra pages in the end? eren/floch literally are right. Paradis is destroyed, they are genocided. This is within the logic of the story. it was kill or be killed. Marley already unprovoked killed half the people on the island, demonized them, and attempted to kill all of them. it's not a hypothetical. I can't post in the other thread anymore without saying any spoilers, but at least here I can say it.

Eren genocided the whole world, not only Marley.

And yeah, no. They werent right

chiasaur11
Oct 22, 2012



Mirello posted:

rofl dude, did you read the extra pages in the end? eren/floch literally are right. Paradis is destroyed, they are genocided. This is within the logic of the story. it was kill or be killed. Marley already unprovoked killed half the people on the island, demonized them, and attempted to kill all of them. it's not a hypothetical. I can't post in the other thread anymore without saying any spoilers, but at least here I can say it.

No, they were bombed. There's a difference, and you're an idiot.

From what we get in the limited context from the bonus pages, it was a conventional war. Paradis's government pissed people off, for one reason or another, a century plus down the line, and it ended up with war that wiped out at least one major city. Unlike earlier campaigns, we know that there wasn't a focus on complete extermination, because we see a survivor, and from how he's outfitted, he's from a surviving patch of civilization on the island rather than being a lone scavenger.

It's not an us-or-them genocide. (and the timegap suggests it didn't have much to do with any previous war in the series in terms of cause) It's war coming around again, because people are people, and people can be nasty, titans or no.

Also, Marley 'only' killed about a fifth of the island's population, directly or indirectly. But being bad at math is a rather small problem with this post, on the net.

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN

Mirello posted:

rofl dude, did you read the extra pages in the end? eren/floch literally are right. Paradis is destroyed, they are genocided. This is within the logic of the story. it was kill or be killed. Marley already unprovoked killed half the people on the island, demonized them, and attempted to kill all of them. it's not a hypothetical. I can't post in the other thread anymore without saying any spoilers, but at least here I can say it.

wasn't that meant to be like centuries later? and considering they did unleash the apocalypse, it's somewhat impossible to disentangle if that was the motivation or not?

Beefstew
Oct 30, 2010

I told you that story so I could tell you this one...

tbp posted:

wasn't that meant to be like centuries later? and considering they did unleash the apocalypse, it's somewhat impossible to disentangle if that was the motivation or not?

It could be yet another self-fulfilling prophecy, provoked in response to the Rumbling. Or it could even be a civil war. Who perpetrated it and why is less important than the idea that Eren's solution was not a solution and could have never been a solution - it either caused their destruction later, or his genocide failed to establish the peace he imagined he could create (especially since a fascist regime arose that probably used him as a martyr), or that little island devolved into infighting for whatever reason. The point is that one of Eren's goals was lasting peace - not one that would last a few decades, but a permanent one, and he resorted to monstrous methods to accommodate that. And with the extra pages, he fails. Game over, try a harder difficulty next time.

iamsosmrt
Jun 14, 2008

Eren was explicitly written with a mess of emotional and mental trauma coupled with an overtly cynical and bleak portrait of the world that in his eyes has been trying to wipe his people out for a century. The Rumbling was telegraphed since he spent time in Marley, observing and making his final judgment on human nature and what measures he'd have to take to follow-through on his earlier promises.

Like yeah, in the framework of our world or clear headed thinking, his wiping the world is wrong and hosed up, but that's separate from understanding and his logic within the context of the story. He's a teenager who's basically been killed multiple times (surviving only due to being a titan), killed others, witnessed countless deaths, all with minimal counseling. On the flip side, he's been demonized and heralded as a savior, experiences crazy visions from his powers and transforms into a giant monster.

So it's not that I'm on team Rumbling, but I get why it happened. I understand disliking it, but I do believe the story was barreling toward some version of it for a long time. Would it have worked better if the world was a more explicit threat? Sure, in some emotionally comfortable way, but the story was dark and bleak from the start.

There're a lot of issues with the ending for sure, it didn't stick the landing very well and got sloppy with wrapping up its character arcs.

iamsosmrt fucked around with this message at 15:26 on Mar 22, 2022

Elias_Maluco
Aug 23, 2007
I need to sleep
I can understand why Eren did it alright. And I was telling that it was going to happen like 20 chapters before the ending because it was the only thing that made sense for Eren as a character (only I thought he would be stopped somehow and never expected his friends thanking him for it)

But thats not the same as "lol Eren was right " though

iamsosmrt
Jun 14, 2008

I guess I'm not caught up on the greater internet zeitgeist on AoT, are people straight up glorifying the global genocide?

I wasn't super happy with the ending but it gave me enough to feel satisfied enough with the time I spent reading the series. Just enough that I haven't felt like following the show or coming back to it outside of occasionally checking this thread.

I guess the GoT talk got to me a bit because that ending just felt like WTF through and through, but AoT's failure was less about random bullshit story choices and more about rushed sloppiness and questionable tone.

iamsosmrt fucked around with this message at 16:49 on Mar 22, 2022

In It For The Tank
Feb 17, 2011

But I've yet to figure out a better way to spend my time.

iamsosmrt posted:

I guess I'm not caught up on the greater internet zeitgeist on AoT, are people straight up glorifying the global genocide?

Yes, but most of it is ironic (e.g. "Let's get ready to Rumble!") or only endorsed within in the context of the story. I haven't seen anyone try and advocate Eren's solution to real life if that's what you're asking (although I'm sure someone somewhere at some point has because the internet is a big place), which means it's harmless.

I supported the Rumbling insofar that I enjoyed it as a spectacle and felt it was a logical endpoint for a story about the dangers of dehumanization and racial conflict, and I would have preferred if it had been completed because that would have been a more coherent ending. Although, admittedly, given how bad Isayama whiffed the ending, maybe it is too much to hope that he would have written an ending where Eren wins any better.

Schubalts
Nov 26, 2007

People say bigger is better.

But for the first time in my life, I think I've gone too far.

Elias_Maluco posted:

I dont think thats true

The way I understand, is not like he could see every possible future. He could see the future he set in motion and the result of his plan, and he was okay with that result. Because he is a broken psychopath whose motivation was always "Im going to kill all the enemies and protect my friends". And he saw that his plan did ensure that his friends would mostly survive and the enemies of Paradis would be too broken to threaten them

Eren was very much not ok with the future he saw. He did everything he could think of to change it, only to see every vision come to pass. All of his attempts to go down a different path were shown to actually result in what he saw, because the same people will make the same choices in the same situations. This wore him down to the point that he saw no option but to embrace it, and even then he was still sabotaging himself through his friends.

The big turning point in his attempts to change the future was when he was debating whether to save that kid from getting beaten or killed in an alley. "If I save him, it will be pointless because I'll end up killing him. If I leave him to his fate, then my vision of me saving him will be proven wrong. But I can not sit silently and allow his present suffering no matter how I try to justify it in terms of possible futures, because I am Eren Jaeger and who I am will allow me to make no other choice right now."

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN
if eren was that concerned with all of this maybe he should have killed himself. not that much of a tragedy compared to several billion dead, but instead, he's a coward.

chiasaur11
Oct 22, 2012



tbp posted:

if eren was that concerned with all of this maybe he should have killed himself. not that much of a tragedy compared to several billion dead, but instead, he's a coward.

But then Historia gets enslaved and dies young.

Again, that's Eren's big red line, something he brings up on multiple occasions as the Least Acceptable Outcome. She saved him, and he's going to repay the favor, no matter how many innocent people die in the process. (This is wrong. He knows it, and hates himself for it, and does it anyway.)

If Eren just wanted to minimize deaths, he could run away with Mikasa, like in the version of things Mikasa sees in 138. But to quote the song, "Spill a whole lot of blood if that's what it takes to saves lives, take lives. Simply prioritize."

Eren's priorities, in order:

1) Historia and her daughter. (Non-negotiable.)
2) Mikasa and Armin
3) Other remaining members of the 104th.
4) Paradis in general

Everybody else, well, someone who can't sacrifice anything, can't ever change anything. And one of the acceptable sacrifices for him was Eren Jeager. Just... not Historia. Never Historia.

tbp
Mar 1, 2008

DU WIRST NIEMALS ALLEINE MARSCHIEREN

chiasaur11 posted:

But then Historia gets enslaved and dies young.

Again, that's Eren's big red line, something he brings up on multiple occasions as the Least Acceptable Outcome. She saved him, and he's going to repay the favor, no matter how many innocent people die in the process. (This is wrong. He knows it, and hates himself for it, and does it anyway.)

If Eren just wanted to minimize deaths, he could run away with Mikasa, like in the version of things Mikasa sees in 138. But to quote the song, "Spill a whole lot of blood if that's what it takes to saves lives, take lives. Simply prioritize."

Eren's priorities, in order:

1) Historia and her daughter. (Non-negotiable.)
2) Mikasa and Armin
3) Other remaining members of the 104th.
4) Paradis in general

Everybody else, well, someone who can't sacrifice anything, can't ever change anything. And one of the acceptable sacrifices for him was Eren Jeager. Just... not Historia. Never Historia.

was historia being the line played up more in the manga? my reading history is all off with this series, i only watched the anime up until like... two episodes ago, got antsy and just read ahead. they had some interactions for sure during s3, but it all seemed mostly dropped come s4 once she assumed the royalty

Schubalts
Nov 26, 2007

People say bigger is better.

But for the first time in my life, I think I've gone too far.
Historia was a clear line drawn in the manga, the anime has shown less of her. Eren absolutely refused to put her into the same horrific situation that Ymir's daughters were put into.

chiasaur11
Oct 22, 2012



Schubalts posted:

Historia was a clear line drawn in the manga, the anime has shown less of her. Eren absolutely refused to put her into the same horrific situation that Ymir's daughters were put into.

Yeah, he still had the line that he'd be willing to sacrifice himself, but not Historia, but the biggest moment is maybe coming in the next episode that covers 130 and/or 131, where he goes to Historia and tells her how things are going to go, making her the only person he told the full story. I'm curious how that all's going to be handled in the anime.

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bees x1000
Jun 11, 2020

stuff like this is still in the anime

bees x1000 posted:

this means nothing


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