Attack on Titan – 80 – When the Walls Fell

Eren thanks his older bother for taking him into their Dad’s memories…it’s how he was able to push Grisha into fighting the King of the Walls. Eren saw his future when he kissed Historia’s hand, but Zeke still thinks he has Eren in check. After all, Eren didn’t know he couldn’t use the Founder’s power in the Paths. What Zeke didn’t know is that Eren would rip off his own thumbs to escape his bonds and stop Ymir from obeying Zeke’s command.

What follows is the long, sad story of Founder Ymir, from back when she was just an ordinary girl delivering water to those who needed it. One day, her world was set ablaze by a raiding army, and her life of selfless service became one of brutal servitude. When a pig escapes the barn, all the other slaves point their finger at Ymir, as if confirming that she is the one to bear all of the pain and suffering of this world.

Ymir is “freed”, but only so her captors can hunt her. Run through by two arrows, she collapses at the foot of a massive tree, with a hollow that leads to a massive underground lake. There, she encounters…“something”. Be it an alien, parasite, or god, it imbues Ymir with the power to transform into the first Titan—the Founding Titan.

The King of Eldia uses Ymir as a weapon with which to create a massive empire and conquer Marley; he also claims her as his consort. She bears three daughters—Maria, Rose, and Sina—and when an assassin tries to kill the King, Ymir takes a staff through the chest. In one of the more graphic scenes of the whole show, he eventually chops Ymir up and forces his daughters to eat her so the Titan power can be carried on.

Ymir’s daughters procreate, then their offspring procreates, each time creating a new branch on the tree of life in the Paths. Meanwhile Ymir returns to the form of a young girl walking slowly across the endless sands, up and down ramps, building Titans one bucket at a time. Even after death, she could not escape servitude, nor the responsibility that came with her chance encounter with “something.”

That is, until 2,000 years later, when Eren arrives, and instead of ordering to end the Eldians forever, he gives her a hug and tells her she’s neither a slave nor a god, and never was. She’s just a person; a person who has been waiting for someone like him. For the first time, Ymir’s empty eyes come to life and shed tears, and she makes the same face Eren made when he saw his future four years ago.

I don’t know if it’s Ymir, the “something” within her, or both who decide to side with Eren, but it is the “something” we see connecting his head to his neck even though Gabi just blew it off. Thanks to them, Eren is still alive, and the Rumbling commences.

And let me tell you, it is something to see. The walls begin to crumble—not just Maria, but all three—and out of their ruins, a terrifying legion of Colossal Titans. But even they are dwarfed by Eren’s latest and possibly final form, an intricate construction of ribs and spines. There are now three different orders of scale—Mikasa and Armin, the Colossal Titans, and whatever Eren has become.

Fortunately for Mikasa and Armin, they are not crushed or obliterated in the clouds of debris the Rumbling creates. Armin is proven half-correct, in that Eren was their ally all along, and looking after the people behind the walls. I say only half-right because Armin did not imagine Eren would bring all three walls down. Doing so means he has far larger designs than merely crushing the Marley alliance.

Eren confirms those greater ambitions in a telepathic communication that reaches every single Subject of Ymir, both on Paradis Island and the rest of the world. He’s sick of the world trying to annihilate his people, so instead he and his army of Wall Titans will annihilate the rest of the world. He won’t stop until every enemy city, town, and village, and every non-Eldian life, is extinguished. I don’t see how anyone can stand in his way.

Attack on Titan – 79 – Days of Future Past

The Paths are a place where past, present, and future intersect, but Zeke is content to use a trip down memory lane to show his little brother how their father Grisha “brainwashed” him into becoming a Restorationist. But things don’t go how Zeke plans, as he ends up learning more about Grisha that complicates his long-standing feelings of resentment stemming from his dad abandoning him and starting a new family.

We learn that Grisha found the Reiss family’s underground chapel years earlier than we thought, but chose instead to delay his mission so Eren could have a normal childhood. It’s here, in Grisha’s basement, where Zeke learns his dad didn’t forget him, keeping a photo of him and his mother close by. It’s also where we learn Zeke and Eren aren’t merely invisible observers, as Grisha senses Zeke’s presence but assumes he’s only dreaming.

As Eren stands by patiently, Zeke learns that Eren was never actually brainwashed. When Eren saved Mikasa and killed the monsters in human skin, he was being the same Eren Yeager he always was: neither a weak nor convenient little brother Zeke could use to facilitate his plans or share his scars. Even so, Zeke is determined to “save” Eren (i.e. get him to come around to his thinking) before he saves the world, which he says he can do at any time.

The harrowing incident Eren experienced with Mikasa eventually led to him telling her he wanted to join the Scout Regiment, which Mikasa relays to their parents. Eren doesn’t just want to protect those he loves, but wants to know what lies beyond the walls. Carla pleads with Grisha to discourage their son from taking this path, but Grisha knows there’s no stopping “human curiosity.”

In a return to the truly creepy underground chapel, Zeke and Eren watch Grisha try to convince Frieda to let him use the power of the Founder to protect the people in the walls from the Titans beyond it. Grisha even tells Frieda something she doesn’t know: that the Attack Titan within him can see into the future by having access to the memories of its future inheritors. But when it’s time for Grisha to eat Frieda and kill her family, he can’t do it. At least not until Eren whispers into his ear, reminding him what he’s come to do … and why.

Zeke may have the Founder Titan, but like Frieda, he’s unable to see the future like Eren can. This is why Grisha, after he kills the Reisses and gains the Founder, warns Zeke that things are ultimately going to go Eren’s way, not Zeke’s. He knows this because he’s already seen Eren’s memories of that future. All he can offer Zeke is a hug, his tears, and the affirmation Zeke always sought deep down: that he was loved and not forgotten by Grisha.

Following that cathartic embrace, Eren and Zeke return to the uncanny land of the Paths, and while Eren is still chained to the ground, he doesn’t seem the least bit concerned. Why would he? He knows the future, and if Eren has anything to say about it, it won’t involve the euthanization of the Eldians.

Attack on Titan – 78 – Dropping the Ball

The incremental struggle of the two Yeager Brothers continues, with Eren stoving in Porco’s head before continuing to grapple with Reiner and Zeke finding himself wounded and on the ground. The two are so close and yet so far, and the Marleyan Eldians are doing everything they can to stop them from coming together.

But Pieck was right: they didn’t hit Zeke hard enough to keep him from letting out a roar if that’s what he wanted to do. Colt rushes to him with the news Falco had injested some of Zeke’s spinal fluid, asking for nothing more than to let Gabi take him and ride a horse far enough out that Falco won’t be affected by the roar. He has Zeke’s sympathies, saying it’s a “shame”, but Zeke lets out a roar anyway.

As a result, hundreds of soldiers who drank the wine with Zeke’s spinal fluid are transformed into pure Titans, including Falco. Colt holds him tight the whole time, and gets burned to death as a result, leaving Gabi all alone to watch in horror as the Falco Titan gnaws at Reiner’s nape. Pieck gets another shot off despite being harassed by Mikasa and Armin, but Zeke is only faking his death.

Eren senses this, crystalizes his Titan body to restrain Reiner, pops out, and continues to rush towards the still-alive Zeke hiding under the Beast’s skeleton. But what had been a short distance for a Titan to cover becomes a much farther distance for Eren on foot. Before he can close that distance, Gabi gets ahold of an anti-Titan rifle…and blows Eren’s head off.

That’s a hell of a midway point to an episode that already featured the deaths of a great many secondary and tertiary characters in short order, but it was clear this wasn’t the end for Eren. We’re taken back to when he was in the Marleyan hospital, where Zeke met with him and appears to agree to Zeke’s plan for euthanization. However, when Zeke tosses him the baseball, he fails to catch it; it lands on the ground behind him.

A 2001: A Space Odyssey-style trippy montage ensues, returning us to the present and then to a place outside of normal time and space altogether: the “Paths” of which Zeke reported dreaming in the first episode. There, Zeke is chained to the sand as a solitary figure approaches Eren, who can move freely. The figure is the founder Ymir, source of the power to achieve their dreams.

It’s only here, where he believes Zeke needs his cooperation in order to proceed and is thus at his mercy, where Eren finally tells us what Armin convinced himself into believing, and tried to convince Mikasa and the others as well: Eren was only going along with Zeke. He has no intention of carrying out the Eldian euthanization. But in revealing his true feelings, Eren screws himself over, because Ymir gives him the cold shoulder.

Eren may be free to move about this uncanny land of the Paths, but he has no authority or dominion over Ymir because he lacks the blood of the royal family whom she obeys. Zeke does, and over the “mind-numbing” time he spent in the paths, figured out a way to do away with his bloodline’s vow renouncing war. Zeke’s chains were only an illusion; they crumble at his command, and Eren is shackled by another.

Zeke doesn’t blame Eren for his Sudden But Inevitable Betrayal, but rather their horrible father for brainwashing him and involving the two brothers in this whole horrible business. But with involvement comes terrible purpose. Eren was the key to Zeke gaining the power of Ymir. He played himself into quite a predicament…but something tells me Zeke shouldn’t celebrate his victory quite yet…

Our Last Crusade or the Rise of a New World – 03 – Allies for an Afternoon

Iska and Alice can’t stop thinking about each other. It dawns on them both that their recent meet-cutes haven’t been a matter of mere coincidence. That’s further reinforced when Iska is offered his Saint Disciple status back in return for apprehending the Ice Witch.

Meanwhile, Rin and Alice learn that Iska was imprisoned for, of all things, freeing an astral witch from captivity, once again calling into question everything they think they know about their enemy. However bad the Empire might be, if there’s someone like Iska helping her kind, then perhaps there is a sliver of hope for the peace for which she yearns.

The two decide to test their propensity to run into reach other in the Neutral City. This time Captain Mismis accompanies Iska, while Rin sticks by Alice’s side. Both “chaperones” are well out of their comfort zone, but Iska and Alice want to learn more about each other.

In particular, Alice considers Iska’s past actions to contradict his current mission to capture her. Iska explains that nothing he’s done has been contradictory, but all in the greater service of peace. Ever since he freed that young, low-powered astral witch from a cruel fate, his overarching loyalty has been to the effort to end the war, not win it for the Empire.

Alas, Alice, who like Iska with the Imperial Senate is beholden to her set-in-her-ways mother, assures him capturing her won’t change the Sovereignty’s position. But perhaps, if he defects and serves under her, that position might soften.

Before he can respond to this shocking offer, the sky literally cracks and the Founder, Grand Witch Nebulis, emerges. Drawn to Iska’s location by Iska’s astral swords, Nebby is there to smite him, as well as any who “corrode the planet and its astral power”.

When Alice’s mom discovers the Founder has escaped, she’s happy, because it means the Empire’s defeat is all but certain due to her immense power. However, that belief lacks the nuance required of a leader carrying their people into the future, not just concerned with quarrels of the past.

The Founder doesn’t care about the future, only senseless wrath. When Alice tries to reason with her, she’s labeled a traitor and attacked along with Iska. It’s here when Alice is convinced the Founder cannot save her people; she is merely an uncontrollable relic of a bygone era. She can revere her for founding the Sovereignty, but her ancient grudge will only lead to further death and suffering for all.

On their own, neither Iska nor Alice are a match for the outdated agent of destruction, but when they stand back-to-back and combine their powers, Iska is able to climb Alice’s staircase of ice to literally clip the Founder’s wings and force her retreat. They also join their voices in telling the Founder to shut up and fuck off, cutting off her ponderous speechifying!

Before she returns to the cracks in the sky, Alice tells the Founder to go back to sleep for another hundred years. She’ll ensure that when she wakes up again the world will be a better place. That said, Iska rejects her offer to defect, so while the two exhausted fighters call a truce for the rest of the day, tomorrow they’ll be enemies again.

But Alice can’t deny that she and Iska want the same basic thing, and that her Founder can’t provide it. Saving the world is going to be up to the two of them, so they can’t remain enemies much longer.

Our Last Crusade or the Rise of a New World – 02 – Art Has No Borders

We learn how Iska ended up at the same opera as Alice: Mismis gave him her last ticket of the season. After his battle with Alice he couldn’t sleep, so she felt a hit of culture would do him some good. But once the lights go up in the opera house and Alice sees who lent her his handkerchief, she very nearly forgets they’re in a Neutral city, where conflict is forbidden.

Accepting this as a coincidence, the two go their separate ways, only to end up right back beside one another when they pick the same nearby restaurant for lunch. Alice and Rin can’t complain about sharing the table with Iska as he’s the one who reserved it. Iska and Alice end up ordering the exact same pasta dish, and even share the same culinary tastes.

It’s another night of little sleep for both Iska and Alice, but the former has a dream about a girl who looks an awful lot like Alice saving him during a monster attack on their train in the past, suggesting they have more history together than they thought.

Alice’s mom then summons her to show her that the founding witch, the twin of whom was Nebulis I, is beginning to awaken ever since her fight with Iska. Her mom warns her to refrain from battle until further notice.

When Mismis’ superior Risya hears of Iska’s troubles, she gives him a ticket for an art exhibition where—you guessed it—he and Alice cross paths again. She doesn’t go in the museum with him and gets lost, but later he tracks her down and they learn they share a similar love of art, whether the enemy made it or not.

As the sun sets, Alice buys them drinks, and Iska eventually succumbs to his fatigue by falling asleep on her shoulder. Blushing, Alice remarks that in his vulnerable state she could defeat him easily…but of course she doesn’t. On top of it not being honorable, there’s just something about this guy.

So this week we saw Alice and Iska end up in all kinds of pleasant non-battle situations together, and come out of it with an overall improved opinion of one another, and found they have a lot in common. Yes, much of it is superficial, but they’re good first steps towards mutual understanding and friendship.

However, they remain on opposite ends of a generations-long conflict. If they are to be ones to end that conflict and usher in a new world—not to mention become a romantic couple—they’ll likely have to forsake those old loyalties and forge their own path together, while dealing with the consequences that come their way.

The Misfit of Demon King Academy – 01 (First Impressions) – Three-Second Rule

Now that’s more like it! While Lapis Re:LiGHTS felt sterile and lacked oomph, The Misfit has style, passion, and confidence in the story being told, and manage to mix some appealing character moments in with the obligatory introductions. It also teaches an essential lesson about being kind to others, especially family, and not judging books by their covers.

Within two minutes of arriving at the titular academy, our initially nameless MC makes a new friend and gains an enemy. During the entrance trials, that enemy learns that despite looking like a normal new student without a drop of royal blood, the MC makes sport of their duel, killing and resurrecting him at will until he loses the will to go on.

Contrast that with his attitude toward his new friend Misha, whose letter he picks off the ground before they met, can sense his immense power, and whom he invites for dinner at his loving, doting, conclusion-jumping folks. Those folks, by the way, reveal that their son is only a month old.

It’s abundantly clear before he says his name or reveals his true self that the MC is the reincarnation of the Demon King of Tyranny, Anos Voldigoad, and to its credit the show doesn’t over-explain anything. Instead it lets the cozy chemistry and quiet friendship between Anos and Misha play out organically, with her patting his head unbidden when he lists all the horrible names he’s been called.

Their instant easy rapport contrasts nicely with Anos’ absolute ruthlessness in the arena, be it a school-sanctioned trial or in the case of his would-be rival’s brother’s case, a sudden ambush. Where Zepes Indu was a cocky little shit, his brother Leorg throws racism into the mix, deeming only those of pure blood to be worthy of the Demon King’s power.

Before telling Leorg who he is, Anos simply shows him, by letting the older brother’s origin magic bounce right off (since Anos is the origin) then zombifying Zepes and forcing Leorg to reconcile with his brother in order to face him together. It’s interesting that this reincarnated Demon King isn’t so much concerned with toying with far less powerful opponents (though he does) as much as he wants to make them stronger so they can give him a fight!

Anos sensed from the start that as his descendants, the apples have fallen very far from the tree, but perhaps the first step to making them stronger is by strengthening the bonds of family. After all, he’s got himself some very fine parents, while Misha’s guardian also adores her (though her folks are apparently busy, she also has an older sister whom we’re sure to meet soon).

As Anos strikes down all comers, Misha stays by his side, heartened by his kindness and his offer to be comrades and friends, and there to tell him when his two-millennia-old jokes won’t cut it—an amusing quirk of Anos’ that isn’t overused.

Misfit of Demon King Academy is fun to watch but also gratifying because it feels infused with the enthusiasm of its creators, rather than feeling like an exercise of efficiently going through the motions. Most importantly, Anos is one cool, sassy dude; a nice complement to Misha’s understated charm. I’m definitely down to watch more of this!