Attack on Titan – 37 (Fin, For Now)

Erwin manages to tie off his arm stump and stay conscious enough to witness a lot more of his scouts get eaten by the swarming Titans, but Eren and Mikasa are rescued from “Momeater” by Hannes, looking to settle a score from the very beginning.

Historia, who is now correcting people who call her Krista, tells Ymir it’s time for them to live for themselves, and when Ymir is around, no matter how messed up things get, Historia isn’t scared. Seeing her brandishing a sword and a confident smirk is a great way to close this chapter on the character.

Hannes lasts about as long as one would expect, but Momeater ends up eating him in much the same way, as Eren and the injured Mikasa can only watch. Eren tries to transform before his hand is fully healed, resulting in failure and an emotional breakdown.

But Mikasa is there to pull him out of it, bringing out the Full Adorable Mikasa routine and essentially charming Eren into calming the eff down, which still leaves the matter of Momeater starting to finish up with Hannes.

When it reaches out to grab another snack, Eren stops its hand with his fist, and something happens: Eren gains a new power. That power transforms his ravings into orders for all the rank-and-file Titans to follow, making them his minions.

They surround and tear Momeater apart, then aid the scouts’ retreat by swarming Reiner, forcing him to give up on grabbing Eren. Seeing that Reiner and Bertholdt are in deep trouble, Ymir runs to their aid, leaving Historia behind with a simple “I’m sorry” and tender caress of her hair.

Reiner and Bertholdt survive the day, and that night, Ymir tells them why she helped: because the day they brought Wall Maria down was the day she was freed from her nightmare of a life, into a life that’s, if we’re honest, still a nightmare, but maybe not quite as bad because she does have a measure of freedom.

As for Eren, he has no idea what happened, so Armin has to put two and two together for him, having talked it over with Jean. That Eren now knows he can control Titans without becoming one (he’s the “coordinate”, as Reiner says), is huge. It means civilization behind the wall isn’t as imminently doomed as everyone thought the previous day.

Not that there’s going to be smooth sailing ahead. As the scouts look out, the camera speeds past the horizon and beyond any point the humans we’ve been following have ever reached…all the way to another wall; another civilization, where a shirtless man with glasses sits atop the Beast Titan…whom I’m guessing is Eren’s dad.

That’s an effective, world-expanding teaser for a continuation of the story…whenever it happens to come around. While I’m not greatly informed of the particulars, it seemed like a huge effort just to get these twelve new episodes produced and aired, so I’m not holding my breath for episodes 38-50.

However, for all the questions from the first season the second failed to answer, I still feel it did the job most people expect of Titan: to entertain. I can’t say I wasn’t, or that I don’t look forward to the next chapters.

Attack on Titan – 36

This week is a non-stop, bloody, gory, slimy, and above all mobile episode. With only the occasional momentary flashback rather than an episode dominated by one, we stay in the present, where there is quite a bit going on. Sure, the background sounds are reduced and time seems suspended at times, but everyone’s minds are still racing, wondering what the heck to do and who the hell to trust.

When Krista pops out of Ymir’s mouth, Ymir emerges from her Titan’s neck to tell her she’s using her as a chip with which to bargain for her life, putting Ymir #1 as always (only now with no more self-lying). Krista, er, Historia, wants Ymir to come back with her, but when it’s clear she won’t, she doesn’t give up her friendship, saying Ymir will always have her as an ally, no matter what.

As their lover’s quarrel goes on, Erwin and the scouts catch up, heading Reiner off with a huge horde of Titans right on their tail, and the commander launches a crazy charge that immediately claims his right arm. But rather than scream and ask for mommy as some scouts have done in their final moments, Erwin surprises by continuing to order the charge, and, indeed, charge himself, arm or no arm. We’ve got ourselves a badass here.

When Reiner finally has to move his arms to defend against the Titan scrum, Mikasa makes her first attempt to snatch Eren, but misses Bertholdt by a hair and gets nabbed by another Titan she didn’t see, who crushes her midsection. Jean saves her, but Eren remains in Bertholdt and Reiner’s clutches…

…That is until everyone’s favorite dramatic preview narrator Armin shows up next to Bert and Eren, and after thinking about what he can give up, what he can sacrifice to assure a future, he decides to give up any semblance of diplomacy with the traitors, and brings up their comrade Annie, taking care to go into great detail about the constant agony she’s in as a result of torture.

That gets Bertholdt to lose it and draw his swords to answer Armin’s insults, but Erwin leaps into the frame and relieves Reiner of a digit, sending Eren falling into a waiting Mikasa’s arms. After scoring her first Titan kill protecting Ymir, Historia is snatched up by Connie and Sasha, but demands they let her go lest Ymir be killed. They think Ymir’s just lying again.

In an effort to wrest himself free, Reiner decides to perform the shot put on numerous Titans, launching them into the sky. One such ground-to-ground missiles knocks Mikasa and Eren of their horse, who runs off, leaving them alone, on foot, on the ground with not just any Titan approaching their location, but the Titan that ate Eren’s Mom back in the first attack.

Is Eren healed enough to transform and get some payback? Will Mikasa’s internal injuries keep her from fighting 100%? Can help arrive in time? Will anybody get back to the wall? What will become of Ymir and Historia? So much to be resolved with just one episode remaining…

Attack on Titan – 35

Episode 35 starts by checking in on the mystery in Connie’s village, which was devastated but where there are no human remains, and where every horse is still in the stables. So what the hell happened? We don’t learn the answer to that, only that the sole Titan in the village—the one that looks like it’s fallen and can’t get up—is indeed Connie’s mother.

Moving on, we return to Reiner, Bertholdt. With scouts approaching, they have no choice but to get moving before nightfall. Eren pretends to cooperate—for all of five seconds—only to struggle in vain; he’s still too messed up to transform.

Reiner takes Eren and Bertholdt takes Ymir, who is still not sure who to trust. Reiner likes Christa too, and she factors into their “plans” (whatever they are), so Ymir goes along, until she senses Christa is among the pursuing scouts, and decides she’s going to do things her way.

That decision comes after a lifetime far longer than the age Ymir appears, in which lies she told herself and others temporarily placed her in places of comfort and purpose, only for everything to turn to shit.

In the earliest instance, cultists pick her up off the street and make her their icon, claiming she has the blood of the king. When troops raid the cult, she lies about deceiving them to save lives, only for all of them to share the same fate.

That fate involves some kind of sentencing that involves turning the condemned into a Titan and shoving them off the wall. On the other side, Titan Ymir wandered, suffered, and ultimately fell dormant and became buried by the earth.

When she finally wakes up, instinct leads her to eat Reiner and Bertholdt’s comrade Marcel…but doesn’t remember doing so. When she returns to human form, she’s greeted by a gorgeous starry sky, and makes it her new purpose in life to stop dealing in lies and live the way she wants, leading her to Christa, whom she considers a kindred spirit.

It’s a bold, engrossing tale that further fleshes out Ymir the person, made more intriguing by all the questions and lines of thinking that it raises during the flashback—questions a non-source-reader like me has no knowledge of—questions about the nature of humans and Titans; whether everyone has a Titan within them; even whether the state of human civilization within the walls is the true aberration in this strange world.

Back in the present, rather than simply going along with whatever plan (or lack thereof) Reiner and Bert have, Ymir flips the script. She wrenches herself loose from Bertholdt  and demands they let her bring Christa with them, or else she’ll take Eren and escape on her own using her superior speed and agility.

The lads seem to agree, because when Mikasa, Armin & Co. arrive at Ymir’s position, she’s become a Titan, and when Christa arrives, she swallows her whole (for ease of transport, not to eat her) and rejoins Reiner (in Armored Titan form), Bert and Eren, running off into the sunset, having thoroughly outwitted the scouts.

Of course, the scouts aren’t done chasing them. Erwin, as well as Mikasa and Armin, have come this far; they’re not returning home without Eren or Christa. And so the pursuit continues.

Attack on Titan – 34

While I’m all for hanging out in the branches of giant trees on a gorgeous sunny afternoon, I was hoping for a little more substance. Instead, it’s a time-marking episode, with Reiner and Bertholdt waiting for a sunset that never comes while Ymir and Eren poke and prod them with questions, none of which are actually answered except one: they’re ultimately headed for the traitor’s hometown.

Just as Mikasa has to keep calm and watch her pace so as not to break the rescue party formation, Eren has to keep calm and not do anything stupid by transforming back into a titan before he’s healed and in the middle of enemy territory. But while his eyes bulge and his teeth grind, Eren’s struggle is pretty moot: Reiner says he and Ymir are too weak to transform anyway.

Then Reiner goes off, talking as if he wasn’t the armored titan, but just another soldier in the scouts who should probably get a reward, if not a promotion, for all his good work. Ymir surmises, and is probably correct, that after spending so long pretending to be a regular human soldier, he no longer knows who he is, or at least forgets sometimes.

However, he’s lucid enough to know he can flip Ymir if he can convince her it’s in her best interest, or more importantly, in Christa, AKA Historia’s. Ymir is at least willing to listen, adding another slice to Eren’s shit sandwich. But as the sun sets, their limbs start to regenerate, and the smoke flares in the distance indicate the scouts are further along in their pursuit than Bertholdt calculated.

I was expecting a quiet episode in the trees, but rather disappointed in the lack of answers, especially when it comes to the Beast Titan. Eren also seems to know, and accepts, less than we do, and it’s always frustrating to wait for a character to catch up to you.

Attack on Titan – 33

Thanks to Bertholdt’s colossal smoldering husk falling off the wall, he and Reiner are able to make off with both Ymir and an incapacitated Eren in a literal cloud of smoke. All the scouts present end up injured and burned in some way, and Mikasa, who is knocked out, isn’t able to immediately give chase, like she did when Annie took Eren. No one is.

It’s a good a time as any, then, for another flashback to the “good old days” when Eren, Mikasa and Armin played out the very same dynamic: Eren would bite off more than he could chew in fights with bullies, Armin would run to Mikasa, and Mikasa would unleash hell on those who hurt Eren. But because she’s almost always just a bit late, she’s rarely able to get Eren out of a fight before he gets beaten up.

EAT ANGRY.

Hannes, who remembers this (and misses being a ‘useless drunk soldier’), reassures the two that Eren won’t give up just because he’s been taken away. There’s no evidence of him ever giving up throughout the years they’ve known him. So the best thing for Mikasa and Armin to do is not to stew in their own present helplessness, but rest, heal, and eat food, so they can give their best when it’s time.

That time comes sooner than expected, as Erwin arrives with the military police and join forces with the scouts to go across the wall. Hange believes the two traitors are likely tired after their ordeal and will hole up in the nearby giant forest until nightfall, when (most) other Titans don’t move.

She turns out to be correct, as Eren wakes up, still steaming and missing his arms, beside Ymir, who is looking much better than a couple episodes ago (in that she’s up, about, and talking). Reiner and Bertholdt are both back to their human forms. They should have a lot to talk about before the cavalry appears, and before the sun goes down.

Attack on Titan – 32

Those who had a hankering for a knock-down drag-out Titan brawl were treated to one this week, with the added gravity of the Titan combatants being Bertholdt, Reiner, and Eren. As the latter two go at at the base of the wall, Bertholdt swallows Ymir (and someone else) and gives the soldiers atop it a big hit of burning steam, making attacking him impossible until he wishes it. It’s a stalemate, with Krista holding out hope Ymir is alive, and Connie, the poor bastard, hoping Bertholdt and Reiner are okay.

With the top of the wall stalemated for the time being, both Eren and Mikasa learn their usual attacks are worthless against Reiner’s armor. Eren, flat on his back, suddenly recalls his first martial arts lesson with Annie, who showed him for the first time that someone who isn’t Mikasa can be far stronger and effective in combat than they look, due to using their opponent’s size and strength as weapons against them.

The flashbacks mostly made me miss Annie dearly, wish she was still around, and wonder when if ever her story will be continued and/or resolved, what with all this other stuff going on taking precedence so far this season. I also dearly wanted to see her fight Mikasa, even if I was pretty sure Mikasa would win such a fight (considering what she did to Reiner).

Ripped from that happier past into a far more morose present, Eren finds his feet and the proper technique against Reiner, and a titan MMA match ensues, with Eren ripping Reiner’s limb off and the armor gradually flaking off in enough places that Mikasa can finally cut him.

I was a little irked why none of the other armed soldiers were going at Reiner’s obvious weak spots, rather than just Mikasa, but then it did take a while for her to fly over there, and more importantly, Reiner and Eren’s mutual hold is to Reiner’s advantage, as he drags Eren with him to a place directly below the simmering, deteriorating Bertholdt, whose smoldering colossal skull falls off and threatens to crush Eren.

Head’s up!

Attack on Titan – 31

Last week was a barn-burner (or rather castle-toppler) that put everyone through the ringer, revealing Ymir’s true form and Krista’s real name, so you’d expect a quieter “breather” of an episode, and that’s mostly what we get, right up until the cliffhanger ending. And what a cliffhanger.

But again, things start out quietly, with a comatose Ymir being lifted to the top of the wall for eventual transport to Trost. No one seems to be in a particular hurry to get her medical attention, but then again, she’s proven to be far tougher than a normal human.

The delayed removal of Ymir from the vicinity can’t help but feel like stalling as Eren puts two and two together after a very out-of-it Reiner oh-so-casually informs him he is the Armored Titan and Bertholdt is the Colossal Titan, and their mission is to destroy humanity.

Reiner also wants Eren to come with them back “home”, wherever that is, and if he does, they might just forego destroying humanity. Reiner’s sudden openness leaves Eren a bit dazed, and he tries to chalk it up to Reiner starting to lose it after going through so much.

12 hours before, before bailing out the scouts at Utgard, Hange reports that she’s finally received documents on Annie, and has learned she came from the same place as Reiner and Bertholdt. Furthermore, Reiner’s unit was given false information that would seem to incriminate him as working with the female Titan/Annie.

Armin also remembers Reiner demanding to know Eren’s location. Considering all this was swishing around Eren’s head, yet he held out a sliver of hope that they were just wrong, and his comrades Reiner and Bertholdt are innocent, made Reiner’s casual confessions that much more deflating.

In his discussion with Eren, Reiner eventually “snaps out of it” and decides that after three years, it’s time for him and Bertholdt to get back to their original mission, as they’re both warriors and the mission is the most important thing.

But just as he’s about to grab Eren, Mikasa appears from behind and slashes at him, acting when Eren cannot. I did originally think it odd Mikasa was walking away with the others, leaving Eren behind, but she turned back in short order, and could tell there was something rotten about the nature of the talk.

Mikasa is not quick enough to kill Reiner or Bertholdt, and they transform into Titans in a huge cloud of dust, grab Ymir and Eren, and make their escape down the side of the wall. Eren, remembering all the good times he had with his now-former comrades, isn’t having it, and finally transforms himself into a Titan, in order to dole out punishment on the two traitors. So much for rest for the weary.

Attack on Titan – 30

In true Attack on Titan momentum-killing fashion, we cut away from Titan-Ymir’s impending brawl with the other Titans to the fateful night Krista and Ymir shared back during Winter Training. There, it wasn’t Titans that threatened their lives, but the freezing cold of the blizzard they found themselves caught in.

Krista is determined to drag their injured comrade Daz back with them, but he’s half-dead already, and he’s slowing them down so much they may all freeze before returning to base. No, Ymir doesn’t think Krista is trying to save Daz. She thinks she’s trying to end her own life and pass it off as heroism.

In a flashback within the flashback, we learn why, and the root of Ymir’s interest in Krista: she learned that Krista was the illegitimate child of a noble, and thus ineligible to succeed him. Rather than just killing her, they changed her name and forced her into the cadets. Considering Krista a kind of kindred spirit, Ymir doesn’t think Krista should make the people who cast her aside happy by dying just yet.

As the flash indicates, Ymir transforms into a Titan to carry Daz back to base, having conveniently buried Krista in the snow. By the time Krista returns to base on her own, she’s stunned to find Ymir and an alive Daz beat her there. She asks Ymir how the hell it’s possible, and Ymir tells her…but only if she keeps an important promise.

Back in the present, it would seem that Krista either Ymir’s secret, after being plied with wine by Ymir shortly after learning the news. As it happens, Reiner and Bertholdt’s friend was killed by Titan-Ymir, so for a moment Reiner takes his blind rage out on Krista’s slender leg, before pleading ignorance of Ymir’s secret form.

Meanwhile, Titan-Ymir is kicking ass, but in her efforts to keep the tower from falling, is at a distinct disadvantage. You can’t play offense and defense at the same time, and noticing Ymir’s attempted heroics, insists that Ymir not die here, and instead tear the dang tower down, which she does. After that, everyone grabs Ymir’s hair and she flies them to safety.

“Safety” being out of range of the crumbling tower, but once all the stunned Titans get back up, they find themselves sitting ducks. There’s a horrifying oment when a Titan confronts Krista and goes for her head, but just then, Mikasa blazes in to take the beast down.

The cavalry has arrived, and their arrival brings a huge jolt of adrenaline to what had become an increasingly hopeless scenario. Eren even manages to sneak in “his first kill”, though I assume he’s talking “as a scout”, as he’s killed plenty as a Titan.

Once the remaining Titans are mopped up, everyone turns to Ymir, who has returned to human form, but is in rough shape. Krista talks hold of her and fulfills her promise, telling Ymir her true name: Historia. Then Ymir closes her eyes and smiles.

While I’m not left 100% sure this means Ymir is dead, with missing limbs, and a chest wound, she’s certainly not fighting anytime soon. Still, it was another emotional journey that deepens two more scouts, even as it seemingly takes one of them away.

Ymir clearly isn’t a saint (from the looks of what she did to Reiner’s village) but she’s not quite the devil, either. She decided long ago she’d go her own way, and that way included supporting Krista whenever she could, even at the cost of her life.

And Krista, who never made that deep of an impression in the first season (though I briefly mistook her, not Annie, being the Female Titan) really comes to life, both through her backstory and the passion she exudes. That character work makes this a solid outing, despite not touching on any of the show’s other, arguably larger extant mysteries.

Attack on Titan – 29

Titan, you can only zoom in on the pained-looking eyes at some one so many times before I start thinking to my self well, she’s definitely hiding something, and in this show, ‘hiding something’ usually means ‘they’re a Titan’.

And so it’s the case with Ymir, who laughs about Conny’s report on his village a bit too much; specifically the part where the fallen Titan on his house reminded him of his mom.

But before her Ymir’s big telegraphed reveal, she, Krista, and the other gear-less rookies play a tense waiting game once the Titans show up.

The elite scouts show off their stuff, but considering the Beast Titan is arranging this siege, watching them exert so much steel, gas, and energy to what will likely be the first of many waves was a bit disheartening.

Not that the scouts have any choice but to fight, mind you—A., it’s their duty; B., they’re totally surrounded.

Inevitably, the Titans get in the castle, and the few moments before Reiner opens a cellar door to reveal a particularly creepy one are absolutely dripping with tension and dread. It’s so quiet down there, but as most Titans don’t speak, silence doesn’t mean safety.

The rookies make use of what they have—a pitchfork, an old cannon, scrap wood—to kill this Titan, but a second one shows up, one that gives Reiner a vicious arm wound before he picks him up and places him in a window so Ymir can kick him out.

Krista rips up her skirt to make Reiner bandages and a sling, and he contradicts Ymir’s claim he’s not interested in girls when he thinks “gotta marry her” (Krista, not Ymir).

But more distressingly, they’re just about out of effective makeshift weapons, and the barricade for the door into the castle seems laughably flimsy against the onslaught of Titans outside.

Those Titans just keep coming, and when the Beast tosses some horses and rocks at the castle towers, two of the four scouts are killed instantly. It turns out they were the very, very lucky ones. Titan goes Full Sadist in depicting the visceral demise of the final two elite scouts, both of them, by the end, reduced to crying and screaming like young children before being disembowled and devoured.

All the one poor guy hopes for before the end is to have a drink from the bottle of booze he found, but to add insult to fatal injury, Krista used it all up disinfecting Reiner’s wound. Titan doesn’t just drive the knife in and twist it, it pulls the knife back out, then drives it back in, twists again, then drops an anvil on you for good measure. Brutal.

In the face of all that casual brutality, the arrival of dozens more Titans, and the fact the tower they’re standing on will certainly crumble and fall within minutes it’s kind of amazing that none of the rookies want to give up yet, although Krista specifically wants weapons so she can die in battle like the four scouts. Ymir doesn’t like that attitude, so she decides: she’ll be the weapon.

She takes Conny’s dagger and leaps off the tower, confusing everyone (except Reiner, who found it odd Ymir could read the language on the canned herring label), then transforming into a wild-looking Titan. The cavalry didn’t come from without for this group of rookies, but from within. But will she be enough?

It’s another strong outing from Attack on Titan to close out its first quarter, and it’s a close call between this and the Sasha episode for best episode so far. This week the claustrophobic pressure was kept up by remaining at the castle and only at the castle for the entire duration; no cuts to see what was going on elsewhere.

That extra focus, and the increased horror elements made this a must-watch, even if there were times when it was hard to watch.

Attack on Titan – 28

Conny’s village is full of questions. If the Titans attacked, why is there no blood? If the villagers evacuated, why did they leave all their horses? And what’s with the emaciated Titan on top of Conny’s house? Why did he hear it say “Welcome home?” There are all intriguing mysteries on top of the ones we already have, but the squad has to keep moving, and Conny has to forget about what may or may not have happened to his family and continue his duty.

Krista and Ymir, like Conny, must feel pretty vulnerable without their battle gear, but they’ll simply have to trust that the soldiers around them will keep them safe. Instead of fighting, Krista & Co. will be called upon to bear witness and send reports. Krista is fine with staying, and feels bad that she’s made Ymir join the scouts, but Ymir insists she’s here “for herself and nothing else.” Another Titan in hiding, perhaps?

This is often a creepy show, what with all the bizarre-looking naked humanoids running around eating people, but Titan manages to up that creep-factor not with Titans, but with a lack of them, or anything at all. Two units travel in the pitch black darkness, not knowing what could be just out of range of their light. Turns out, it’s another unit also looking for the gap in Wall Rose…but neither unit actually found one. What exactly is going on here?

Eren & Co. finally reach Ehrmich District, and Levi makes sure Pastor Nick gets a good long look at the faces of the masses of people and families being displaced due to the wall falling. It seems to work, at least a little, as after being harangued again by Hange, he finally gives up one name: Krista Lenz—who he and his order were instructed to monitor, and who may “know the truths which even we cannot perceive.”

Hange believes that Eren may be able to repair the wall breaches…with hardened Titan skin, of the same type that didn’t evaporate after Annie returned to human form. Sasha also re-joins her comrades.

Krista, Ymir, & Co. end up spending the night in an abandoned castle none of them knew about until the moon came out. To their misfortune, a hoard of Titans besieges them, the first instance of Titan night-fighting. It may well have something to do with the fact this is the same group that hangs around the Beast Titan…maybe he trained them?

In any case, Ymir looks shiftier than ever, but she and Krista can only sit back with the other rookies and hope the pros get the job done. Meanwhile, Hange mentions an abandoned castle which I assume is the same one here, and heads there with Eren & Co.

Attack on Titan – 27

After a quick check in with Eren, Mikasa, Armin, and Zoe as they prepare to head to Ehrmich District—during which Zoe hopes her new buddy Pastor Nick will be more forthcoming regarding Wall Titans—the story jumps to Sasha Blouse, and it’s her story that dominates the episode.

A flashback shows she was always ravenous about sneaking food, and was at the time totally against abandoning her huntress lifestyle for the greater good, as her father was contemplating doing. He told her to suit herself, but to be forewarned: If you’re not there for people when they need you, they won’t be there for you.

Arriving at her home to find an unfamiliar new village, she finds only two people still alive: a paralyzed mother being slowly eaten by a small Titan, and the woman’s daughter, who can only sit by, watch, and become profoundly traumitized. Good lord do the kids witness some hellish things in this show.

Sasha is there for the girl and her mother, but the Titan’s nape is too tough for the axe she wields. Her only option is to leave the mother behind to buy time for her and the kid to get away. The girl later says the rest of the village left her and her mother behind (Not cool, villagers. Not cool). Things get even more tense when Sasha’s horse runs off, and you can hear her struggling to keep the panic in her voice, lest she scar this kid eve more (too late for that, I think).

In the flashback with her dad, Sasha spoke in her country bumpkin accent. While running from the Titan with the girl, she remembers a random little interaction with Ymir and Krista, who argued about whether Sasha is kind and polite because she’s scared of people and ashamed of her backwater upbringing, while Krista likes Sasha is just fine, however she wants to be.

Kobayashi Yuu has always been such a great choice for Sasha, because there’s both a gentle and an intense side (usually hangry, but in this case because of the situation) and she nails both perfectly. It’s time to be not-nice when she tells the kid to “Get Runnin’!” Then blinds the Titan to disorient it; ditching the bow to make sure the last arrow finds its mark, and slipping out of the Titan’s grasp thanks to the great deal of blood spilled by its wounds.

Meeting back up with the girl, they soon hear horse hooves: her father and others from her village. It’s the first time in three years she’s seen her dad. He knows what she did for the little girl, and when he tells her “Sasha…Yer all I hoped for,” its a lovely, warm moment of reconciliation.

Sasha didn’t quite get it before she left home, but she does now. Livin’ in the woods alone just ain’t gonna cut it no more; people gotta be non-awful-like if they’re to be survivin’.

Sasha may have found her dad and a little girl in her village, but when Connie arrives in his home village, it doesn’t look good at all…particularly the horrifying Titan with emaciated limbs lying face up on top of his family’s house.

Since we don’t see any bodies, there’s hope some or even all of Connie’s family got out, but more importantly, how did a Titan that can no longer move end up there? It looks like it could have been dropped down there like a giant sack of potatoes.

Keeping Eren and Mikasa on the sidelines hasn’t hurt the show two episodes in a row now thanks to a smidge more backstory on Sasha, whose gluttony shtick used to annoy me, but has become a much more sympathetic character…someone I definitely don’t want eaten.

Attack on Titan – 26 (Start of Season 2)

The Gist: A Titan is discovered inside Wall Sina. Pastor nick warns the scouts to cover it in sheets. Even when Zoe threatens to kill him, he won’t tell her anything he knows.

Wall Rose is breached and Titans are roaming. 12 hours earlier, the 104th Trainees are on standby in plainclothes when Mike mobilizes them to warn the villages of the attacking Titans while he buys time.

Mike encounters a furry beast-like Titan who can speak. It asks Mike about his gear, but Mike is too frightened to respond, and the beast-Titan snatches up Mike’s gear and lets the other Titans eat him.

After four years of waiting—less for me because I retro reviewed it on a lark—and many delays, Attack on Titan is finally back, and the hype surrounding it is inevitable. Titan has a huge and passionate fanbase that has been very patient, and I would say that those who who wanted more of season one’s intense action-packed horror-drama got what they wanted.

I for one found Titan’s first season quite entertaining and addictive, so I count myself among that group. No boats were rocked here. Bringing down Annie may have been a small victory, but humans are still fighting for their lives, and not at all helped out by the bureaucracies that run things, who are intentionally (and very suspiciously) keeping the people who fight on the front lines in the dark.

My only main gripe with this abrupt return to the Titan storyline is that the main triad of Eren, Mikasa, and Armin were sidelined except for a small scene where Eren wakes up and talks with Mikasa about her scarf before Armin bursts in to tell them about the Titans in the wall.

That means the episode is largely about the secondary and tertiary casts, including Mike, who goes off on his own to serve as a decoy to enable Connie, Sasha, Reiner and Bertholt and other 104s to spread out and get word to the villages that the Titans Are Coming (not that there’s much to be done). And for Mike’s trouble, he has his own poor horse thrown at him by the apparent leader of a pack of roaming Titans.

This isn’t just any Titan, though: it’s an “abnormal”, Sasquatch-Like Titan with an intelligent glint in its eye and, most importantly, the ability to speak in the human tongue. When I first heard him, I wasn’t sure who was talking, and was taken just as aback as Mike and could totally understand why even someone second in skill only to Levi was absolutely paralyzed with fear by this Titan frikkin’ talking to him like it’s nothing.

Alas, as well-spoken as Beast Titan is, he shows no mercy once he has what he’s interested in—Mike’s gear—and sics the other Titans on Mike in a horrifying display that closes the episode, seemingly showing a lot more gore than it really is in typical Titan fashion. R.I.P. Sniffy.

Between Beast Titan, Wall Titan, and a tight-lipped clergy, there looks to be plenty of problems for Eren, Mikasa, and whoever else manages to stay alive, to deal with in this long-awaited 12-episode second season of Attack on Titan, a show that never ceases to demonstrate just how much better your life is than the poor bastards who live in its world.

Not being chased and eaten by goofy-yet-terrifying Titans = #Winning.