If we take "because I'm an idiot" as a meta critique, like most of the conversation in the blood they have, that line is perfect. Eren saw violence as the definitive solution because he's an idiot, but he's not the only one. The world has no titans now, so that "excuse" to wage war is gone, but Marley fought with other countries (mid eastern alliance) even if neither considered each other devils, because they are controlled by idiots with too much power. The collective choices of idiots who kept the cycle of hatred going brought this world upon us, and they were just looking for excuses and followed sick jokes of mindsets like "if there are no enemies, wars stop", but enemies are made by themselves, no one is born an enemy, they brought it upon themselves to think the world is "kill or be killed" In the end, the titans never were the real problem, humans were, more specifically idiots. It's a great meta comparison
Armin's break down to seeing Eren dead made me tear up in the anime. His voice actor really did a great job of depicting the pain Armin went through of losing the most important friend to him.
Or when the scouts start telling Armin it’s time to go colossal and you can hear tears in Armin’s voice when he replies, “I know.” Oh my god Jesse James is a phenomenal VA
@@rocknatex5013dosent change the fact that Eren was only thinking and simping for Mikasa while whailing, all this when he's in the process of killing billions of people including kids and women. What a lovely smart MC that died with 0 dignity while his step siblings mikasa got her cheeks clapped by jean after his death lmao
@@livetochange974isn't that the dilemma of which who will you choose between the lives of the people you don't know or the lives of the people that matter to you. If anyone answers this dilemma, I'm sure they would look evil to anyone
it feel like that since you are a manga reader and you had a specific image in mind that it will look bad in anime aswell. I personally hated it in manga, but this conversation in anime along with the soundtrack saved this scene for me. Although some facial expression shots of eren are wierd, (maybe mappa fix them in bluray)
I wouldn't say "saved". The ideas from the manga ending were still there but not fleshed out thoroughly. A lot of people still loved and understood the message and so the manga ending itself. What the anime did was it gave it a solid standing and polished it so people can't get confused and pivot into a misunderstanding.
Me as a anime only liked this scene a lot. For the whole 4th season eren was basically a mystery too me. I really wanted to see whats going on in his mind and how hes handling so much weight. This scene answered all my answers
Eren before season 4 , is my favorite character of the show,not a surprise since I like battle shonen,I never really tried to understand his mentality after season 4 because of the unnatural reality of the attack on titan world,and the extreme situation eren was put in as well (knowing past and future events) , trying to understand him sounds tiring and unnecessary for me,I enjoyed the show a lot regardless.
I'm happy you got the better version right away. Just don't think badly of the people who were saying the ending sucked before the anime came out and have now changed their minds. As you can see in the video, we were given the lesser version with pretty crappy dialogue. And this wasn't the only scene to get expanded on. Historia's speech at the end was expanded in the anime too, along with other scenes. I, for one, am satisfied now despite having been a harsh critic of the manga's original final chapter. It's no secret that the final chapter was rushed, and it makes a hell of a difference to see the actual finished product that they took so much time on.
But the interesting thing there it's that the 4th season didn't show a different Eren at all. It was always the same one that was MANDATED to fight, but deep down, also WANTED to fight for his freedom. Therefore, making it exactly a tool of destiny. In the 4th season, what changed is the perspective we had on this situation, since we now knew the geopolitical context of it all. And then, the studio wanted to show a disconnection between the endless fighting spirit Eren had in his lockroom ("Tatakae" "Tatakae" like a typical shonen hero), and the depressed and confused feeling Armin&all had now that their history had been revealed. They are not seeing a dichotomic world anymore, where Titans are bad and their people good. Things had changed since they knew that their own population had to fight other humans for their survival, but all beceause of their sins. It's grim and the morality of it is completely fucked. There was no place for a totally blinded fighting spirit there.... But, It seems like the emotional Eren was still there deep down, naïve and still fighting for his own sake. We know he had a burden on his shoulder in this time, but he even said it himself: he still wanted to eradicate the world. That is still his feelings until the very end even tho he knew what would be the outcome. He can't help it, it's his very own nature. So it wasn' so much the burden to end all that for his friends, it was a burden that the destiny itself weigh on him and that forged him. The fuel for his motivation being his own survival and Mikasa. the burden was not bigger during this season, it always has been the same from the day he was born : A slave to freedom
@@rocknatex5013nah, in essence it is all the same thing. If you watch S4 and the specials then you will a big contradiction and issues with the plot. AOT was always trash after all.
@@asuraspath2262 You're free to have that opinion. But if you hate the whole series so much, leave the AoT community alone. Go do something else with your life and let the fans of the series enjoy it in peace.
oh no. well, i am judging everything on my subjective opinions. so if i liked this version of the ending thats it, i dont have to stay disliking the ending for the rest of my life.
The greatest irony is that for all the suffering Eren went through, it was only after gaining ultimate power and knowledge that he truly lost his freedom.
I am not sure what he ever had was freedom to begin with. He was an incompetent soldier in a suicide force, he was so obsessed with the idea of claiming the world beyond the walls without the titans that he would have died for sure if he didn't get the power. At the turning point where the outside world becomes known, even the future becomes known, he accepts his fate, which was consistent from episode 1. The question here is if the future that he saw was pre determined or not, because if it was not pre determined - he had no freedom from the start.
@@richhaaaaardimo it’s a pretty solid fact that what Eren sees in the future is pre-determined. The attack titan’s ability only works through memory, allowing Eren to see his own memories from the future. If he’s seeing a *memory*, then by definition it has to happen for Eren to remember it happening
That's probably why he's the only one who understands Ymir. When Ymir was set free by Fritz, she was hunted by people who wanted to kill her. Similar to how all of the people of Paradis were hunted by the Titans when they ventured outside the walls. They we're experiencing hell, but they were still free. When Ymir got the power of the Titans, she totally lost all her freedom and submitted to Fritz. When Eren got the Attack Titan and the Founding Titan, he lost all his freedom. He was a slave to Ymir just like she was to Fritz.
Did anyone notice both eren and zeke lost their heads and both were killed by ackermans Edit : i just saw vid . When eren and zeke are talking in marley ( the ⚾ scene ) thier shadows dont have heads
The scene of king fritz being struck by the spear, is a parallel to what mikasa had to do to Eren. Her choice was what set Ymir free and ended the titan power for good. That was what Ymir would've chosen. To be with her kids. To have peace by sacrificing the one she loved. You can't change anything if you're not willing to leave something behind.
I think it was more so that we will never know what really happened with Ymir. Maybe instead of killing herself, she let the king die but the guilt caused her to be bound to the family until let free. Because it's extremely stupid saying "Ymir loved Fritz." Even Eren said he couldn't understand her full but that's what he felt.
@@SODA63 not for 2000 eternities. Even someone as crazy as Harley Quinn was able to realize her bad relationship. Are you telling me ymir was crazier than her?
@@capybara8477 Doesn't seem like it. Unless you want to tell me that she didn't choose to die from that spear even though it shouldn't have been fatal. Plus she couldn't get closure in trillion eternities?
The episode explained that Yrmir was the one that created the titans. Maybe the kid in the post credits scene will create something different with the source of all life. He could probably become a water bender or something
Writing is hard, man. I feel for Isayama. I'm sure he was so tired and overworked and always wanted to express this in the best way. I'm guessing he just didn't realise he hadn't properly expressed his feelings till after publication.
He could have just stretched out the final arc and stick to the same ending. Inserting the "love" as a release to the curse was the laziest conclusion he could come up, when the entire series never really focused nor showcase any importance of romantic love from most characters, even Mikasa's one-sided affection was never that impacting, other than her being too overprotective and doting towards Eren. In fact if it was all about Love, then shouldnt that have been Historia and not Mikasa to break Ymir's curse? Historia is literally almost a copy pasta of Ymir with a slight alternatiion due to Eren's influence and interventions. But eh, whats done is done.
Definetly this, when reading I could understand the intent behind and dislike the concept but I was hoping the anime improved it so that we could fully see his vision
I was wondering why so many hated this convo as I was watching it. Never read the Manga so I wasn't aware it was changed. Good changes for sure. That manga convo was rough
Dude i hate the manga ending and have tried for 2 years to try and be convinced its decent, but the anime ending is actually fine lol im glad they improved certain scenes. Still disagree with eren breaking down wailing in the water crying tears over mikasa lol. Man literally never showed any affection for mikasa. Furthermore he came close to dying like 10 times and not ONCE did he think of Mikasa, yet im supposed to believe he would simp this hard?
Yeah. You can see why we were upset, right? The anime fixed the biggest issues from the manga, but it *used* to be much worse. The whole blood river scene in the anime literally addressed most of the criticism from manga readers.
@@Wilkin-vd5wxit is, Eren showed more emotion to historia and they're connection felt natural, it would've been reasonable for Eren to cry about historia since he actually looked like he was interested, but with Mikasa, he never showed or even hinted at he was interested in Mikasa, until S4 when Eren asked how she felt about him but even then that was only relevant for the end to show that marley wouldve been the one to commit genocide. And he obviously wasn't gon let Mikasa die by doing nothing
there were many moments eren subtly shows his feels towards Mikasa like when he first gave her the scarf he was blushing, the Dina scene "ill wrap this scarf around you as much as you want) when they were on the wagon and he said I care about you guys more than anything he was blushing again and it showed both eren and Mikasa and obviously the what am I to you. They were in the trenches daily fighting for their lives they didn't have time to focus on romance and even Mikasa tried to act like she didn't like Eren it's mutual I mean damn they both grew up without parents or normal circumstances
Mikasa was never about to be used as a titan breeding ground so of course he'd show emotion for her because of stuff like that and you literally saw Erens bottled up emotions for Mikasa that he finally let out
This was the anime equivalent of Breaking Bad’s “I liked it. I was good at it…” the protagonist owns up to the fact that they really did their evil for themselves foremost
It makes more sense for Walter White because in the first seasons we learn he's incredibly smart yet he's been stuck doing high school chemistry and working at a car wash to make ends meet. And then told he has terminal cancer. Life just kicked him while he's down so the whole series about a dude who's had enough and finally taking control of his life, be his own boss. Anyone could've figured out his motivation from the first episode. It wasn't some mystery.
@@gezenewsEren definitely had a more fucked up life than Walt, and he is younger. So he should do stupid things, he also has some kind of heroic complex with founding titan powers he was drowned with it. Walt is consistently egoistic the first episode to last, Eren is consistently stupid from first episode to last both of the characters portrayed it pretty great and the author hide those facts by misdirecting our focus to things they do to look cool
@@gezenewseren literally says he didn’t know whether his friends would die, and from s1-3 eren always discredited the whole “common enemy” idea, him trying to unite the world against himself is either 1 shitty writing or 2 him just using it as an excuse to mask his true urge to just flatten the world
Personally I love that they expanded on Ymir and Mikasa's connection. They added a scene I really needed - of Ymir, realizing finally she should've let Fritz die to the spear. She should've let her irrational love die like Mikasa coupd.
I dont fully get why Ymir was causing Mikasa those headaches she get through the series,like what is the reason ? Why she was in her head ? it was because her love to Eren ?
@@MaceToYourFacebecause she wanted to peak-in in Mikasa's mind to understand her feelings because mikasa was the person ymir was finding for a long time. Because Mikasa was Ackerman, it was not easy for ymir to just peak in Mikasa's mind that's why that resulted in headaches
I remember that in an interview, Isayama had talked about that the only part where he struggled to write properly in the entire manga was the dialogue between Armin and Eren after Eren told how he always wanted to flatten the earth. Especially that "Thank you for being a Mass Murderer." So, I was pretty sure that if given a chance, he will definitely make an attempt to fix that and I am so glad he did so. The overall context and the content and the underlying message of the conversation, as well as the flow in the anime version is so much more superior compared to the Manga version which felt rushed and clunky for the most part.
I think at one point, Isayama even said that he considers the anime in general to be the finalized version of the story, so this really was a second chance for him.
@@jibsonmadisonthat crap was terrible The thing was that ymir slavery was freed by eren quest of freedom and fight Now its about mikasa freed her from love by killing eren while she loved fritz and coudnt leave Which is dumb and stupid
I like how in the end of the conversation, Eren was holding the sea shell (Armin‘s innocent dream) together with the blood, hair, and teeth of humans Eren flattened (Eren‘s gruesome dream) their dreams and goal intertwined is what kicked off the events in AOT and eventually caused the rumbling. Even if Armin never intended for the rumbling to happen and even tried to stop it, he realized that it was him who inspired Eren to achieve his version of freedom. That is why Armin absolved Eren of some of his sins. And also because their are friends. Till the bitter end.
The line of Armin saying They'll be in Hell together for sharing the responsibility of what Eren did was pretty huge then. That and clearly making Eldia look like it took over hundreds of years for Eldia for finally fall for some kind of conflict so Eren's Rumbling is seen as a him succeeding saving his friends and making sure they lived in peace and died in peace
@@Roihclem871 not weird for you to marry the guy who gouged out your eye? Also, didn't she already defy the king when she chose to die from the spear even though the spear wasn't fatal clearly ? Even the king himself said to get up but she chose to die. So why did she continue serving him in afterlife?
@@gurnoorsekhon6402 just give up. You don't have sensibility or maturity enough to understand this kind of thing. You argue like you haven't lived enough, that's why you can't grasp what love can do to people or what people in love do.
@@gurnoorsekhon6402Stockholm syndrome is a real thing. I don’t mind the whole theme about love but it just felt too rushed to me, like the whole ending in general. Like Ymir loving Fritz was literally only introduced in the very last chapter and we didn’t even get time to process that.
As a manga reader, the manga conversation made Eren seem mental and like a big baby but the anime felt heartfelt and vulnerable. Them in the blood was visually spectacular and the timing was exceptional. I knew this part of the manga seemed off in some way and now this all makes sense. This conversation in the manga made me hate Eren but the anime made me appreciate Eren and actually understand him. Admin picking up the seashell gave me chills. Thank you for breaking this down.
@@gezenewsWell yeah, I hated the manga ending, because I didn't understand it. This scene read to me like Eren's a deranged child, with no value of human life that isn't one of his friends. The animes ending finally made it click for me. And it wasn't just me, just read the discussions on the manga ending and you'll see so many different interpretations.
@@jakubkucera1973 It didn't change anything for me, he is still a crybaby and an idiot claimed by himself as well. It would be so much better if he made some development over the years and accept his fate, Also if Isayama didn't put the past manipulation paradox just to make him the prime reason for his own fate.... With that a good person who had character development accepted his fate and did the unimaginable to save his friends turned out to be just a bad person who can thank himself his own suffering and did no development at all nor accept his own fabricated fate.
@@itsaxel8088 Weird. We talk from viewpoints bro about an existing manga, tihs is like ,, He has a point so i just put the if you dont like it then... bullshit quote. Because i can't say anything that makes sense." If u have nothing to say then say nothing, it's that simple. U don't have to try to piss off someone because u have different points about something. Jesus...
Eren always craved freedom beyond the walls and once he realised how cruel the world was he realised he could never achieve his dream of being truly free and decided to destroy it out of spite while convincing himself it was the right thing to do. He was a slave to an unattainable idea of freedom. that was my interpretation, his love for mikasa was the only thing that could have stopped that but she didn’t tell him how she felt
That's what Eren exactly said. He is a slave to freedom. Even though he questioned himself a lot of times, he was not able to be completely free and was not able to control what his future behold. He tried a lot of times, and it all still went down the exact path he did not want to.
@@ronakkhunti6782hoenstlt i feel like the ending ruins eren for me, He comes from someone who would do whatever it takes to do the justice or save People He loves and be free, to sociopath who puts freedom above humanity, pathethic, and also it doenst rrally feels like the caracther i watches till that very moment
I often got the feeling that Eren seemed to be looking for any hint that the future the founding power gave him was not set in stone. Like asking Mikasa how she feels about him maybe hoping something might turn out differently. Or his fights against Reiner. But probably with the death of Sascha it went the "Guess the future can't be changed" route. Also Attack on Titan feels in some way like Code Geas where the MC also attains absolute power only to have himself get killed to create world peace
The "you were always looking to the distance instead of noticing the sea shell in front of you" line is such a simple yet perfect and profound way of wrapping it all up and making it all feel meaningful, especially Armin accepting Eren's sins and vowing to correct them. It's what sets the AOT finale apart from the GOT finale, even though the plots were nearly identical (hero goes dark side and has to be killed while rampaging and burning the world, etc.) because GOT didn't have this very crucial conversation.
The GOT ending was horrendous for more than just that. The problem is that several character arcs were basically tossed in the trash. Even if, say, Tyrion or Jon had this conversation with Daenerys, it would still be too abrupt of a character change for her to just turn evil like that. Proper buildup is the only way to make that ending work, which GOT didn’t do.
Def want to see a video about Ymir loving King Fritz being such a pivotal plot point. That's my main issue. Makes the whole story really seem to be about one girl needing to learn how to walk away from an abusive relationship by watching another girl chop a dudes head off.
It’s even better when you realize she decided to be a slave for 2,000 years even though she could see into the future and see that she wanted to be free all along, like she should have just killed the Titan curse when she died, but I guess then we wouldn’t have AOT
@@collateral8920I wonder how these future visions work in paths, because it exists in every moment between Ymir death and Eren death. There’s an paradox, if Ymir sees Mikasa in visions, and ends the Titan curse, there would not exist Paths in the first place that could connect to that point in the future. Maybe because time in paths is self contained, she did in fact break the Titan curse as soon as she entered paths, the Start and End both happened at the same time, even thought they’re 2000 years apart.
Or maybe an actually good explanation should have been provided for why ymir stayed by king fritz. Or maybe king fritz as a whole should have been entirely re written because clearly making ymir love him was not at all planned
She couldn't have broken the curse as soon as she had entered the paths, because we know she's been building the titans the entire time she was there. It is a paradox, good catch.
Yams going for this stockholm syndrome route is disgusting & gross, despite whatever he's written with ymir-karl fritz I choose to interpret it differently: Ymir being unable to let go of future Eldians as they are all her progenies & she can't let go of the motherly love so she keeps bestowing titan powers to safeguard them with rumbling as the ultimate option coz Eldian empire's war crimes were huge & she knew there was no way anyone was going to forgive Eldians despite being born innocent. In this intepretation of mine Ymir in a way like Eren was continuing to fight for her progeny's survival being chained to this repetive duty for 2000 yrs just like Eren who wanted to keep flattening for the sake of his people & loved ones in addition to the Walter White moment. She had to let it go just like Mikasa had to let go of Eren as an amicable solution led by peace not genocide can only work.
remember watching episode 1 season 1 in 2013. it was HYPE. the apocalyptic, world building and ahead of its time animation was really something else. At the end of the day, it's simple a fictional piece that has bought us all peak anime. let's just thank Isayama for taking us along this journey. I am sure we've all grown in many good ways.
2:35 I don't see that as a contradiction because what Eren and Mikasa did are two different things, Eren showed Ymir that she could make her own decisions and because of that Ymir decided to help with the rumbling as a way of revenge for all she suffered. Mikasa on the other hand showed Ymir that you can let go of someone you love and with that releasing Ymir from the pain, removing her desire for revenge so that she could rest in peace, stopping the rumbling and removing the titan powers.
Eren's will to rumble the world could be somewhat analog to the Vow of Renouncing War. When Eren saw the future at the cerimony he just changed and had to fulfill it. The same happened to the Kings of the Wall when they inherited the Founding Titan and acquired the will to "atone for Eldia sins". Maybe it is all Ymir exercising some sort of control, as she did try to keep the rumbling going. But if someone wants to go a bit more off, could be that one is free as long as the future is unknown. If it is known it becomes deterministic.
Thats what they dont get. Eren clearly explain inside the path there is no past present future everything happened all at once. During thatt ceremony eren suffered already. His sense of time is messed up and just had to do things according to ymir. Armin understood that weight that eren just followed orders, eren had no choice, but eren is the one who suffered the most since the ceremony, eren had to suffer the rumbling, and the fact that mikasa will end him. At the end his actikn was to make the survey corp the heroes and save the eldians. The only thing armin can do is say thank you to eren and make him feel that his suffering ismt worthless. Eren suffered the most and have to live the fututre that is already written for him. Armin understood that, the only thing he could do is not to make eren sufferjng be taken for granted. Hence he tgave thanks.
@@rainierterucha8907 But it wasn't Ymir who decided those things it was Eren himself, he set himself on the same path from the beginning because he's an "idiot." The reason he can't find a way after getting the founders power is a paradox, he wouldn't be able to have the power without following his original plan.
I interpret Eren saying that "this was the only possible outcome because he is an idiot" this way. Eren does not want to leave Eldia or his friends fate to chance. He also believes that he is free to choose whatever he wants, but this freedom applies to his friends as well. These are the things he doesn't want to compromise on. Eren sees the past, present and future simultaneously, in other words he can see what his choices will lead to 4 years down his remaining life. The reason that Eren doesn't want to leave the future to a partial rumbling or diplomacy is since it leaves the future uncertain, things might turn different beyond 4 years and badly so. Which is why Erens ideal future for the safety of his friends and Eldia is a Full scale rumbling. But didn't he compromise to an 80%. Yes and No. In Eren’s and Armin’s conversation, Eren makes it clear to Armin that he always had the intention to do a full-scale rumbling, but he cant since Armin and others came to stop him. Eren can crush the freedom of others to ensure his but, the exception to this is his friends. Eren can easily make it so they don't go far by his powers, but that would be compromising his ideal "that his friends are also free". Which bring me back to Erens ability to the see the past, present and future, simply put this power puts him in a path, dictated by his own ideals, choices and compromises he makes. Which is why it is fixed. It is already the most optimal path he can take. The ideals he have are clashing with each other. His freedom and that of his friends. Which is why Eren goes for the compromise of having an 80% Rumbling, enough so that neither side can engage the other in war, in front of an allied military base that can witness the fact that Armin and others fought Eren, with Mikasa killing Eren that makes Ymir move on, breaking the curse of the titans from the Eldian race. In other words not an Ideal ending but an Ideal compromise on his part. Isn't this an uncertain future though. Yes but him saying that they wont be one sided war from either side due to the humanity outside being leveled is not something Eren pulled out of his ass. He can see the 4 years into the future and has a vague idea of how an 80% will play out. Vague because he cant see past the timeline he chose since he got killed by Mikasa and cant see further. But this vague future is the information he shares to Historia. Who after 3 years after these events writes that while Eren told her how the future will play out, beyond that they have to make their own choices. This being Three years, near the limits of what Eren can see into. So why did Eren say that he committed mass genocide because he is an idiot. Eren believes that if he were smarter he could have found an ideal path with the a partial rumbling, or with diplomacy. Eren believes that if he was able to be mature enough to leave things to chance they could have been a way brighter future than what he did. That 80%of humanity didnt have to die, If he was more intelligent and mature. And there really is indeed a case to be made there. He had the power of all titans with the ability to see 4 years into the future. He was able to steamroll all other nations in a matter of days, Ymir was said to build bridges and even the 50M walls that surrounded him were build with this power. Imagine the possibilities presented there, even with the limitations of 4 years. But all this is wasted on him since he is too simple minded to be creative and too immature to compromise his ideals, to leave things to chance. Which is why he did the rumbling, with the only reason that it was 80% being because, one ideal of his "that his friends are free" clashed with his freedom. Eren Truly is a Slave to Freedom.
It just seems too many contrivances were made making sure the characters would be interpreted as overall sympathetic that it makes the rest of the world seem uncannily villainous. It's a pretty similar discomfort to when one feels the protagonist is the only character able of feeling hope in more traditional shounen. It's just a a preference some people will not enjoy if they finish the manga and it's weird that some fans are angry that it affects some peoples ranking of the series overall. As if people cant retroactively change their opinions after being presented with more information. Also doesn't explain why some fans ignore the rest of the shows context and actively argue that Erens story isn't a cautionary tale at all and that genocide was actually the mature and smart thing to do. There's obviously something about all the writing together that is causing a not insignificant portion of readers to extract a completely opposite moral lesson the mangaka was trying to convey.
@@burnyourhabitatYep, I really like the ending in the way I understood it, but almost no two people agree on what the correct interpretation is. Being it so easy to come to radically different interpretations is something I'd fault the author for.
@@jakubkucera1973 thats my main point. It's not like pointing out how uncanny it is means everyone will hate it, but acting as if the anime is perfect is unnecessary.
@@burnyourhabitatI'm surprised more people aren't pointing this out. This is a very similar issue to Breaking Bad where a large chunk of the fanbase saw Walter White as a badass sigma chad hero rather than the piece of garbage that the writing team and Bryan Cranston were clearly trying to portray him as. From what I've noticed, most of the people who are really vocal about the ending tend to lean toward the teen demographic of the fanbase from both series. Where these two cases differ is who they cater to. Breaking Bad was always meant for an adult audience while Attack on Titan is a Shounen Anime that's targeted at younger teens. The series is practically catered to an audience that's bound to not understand it
@@longerhandleisntavailable it's probably because the stories rely on the audience having more empathy than the characters. Out right saying if your protagonist applied themselves to any selfless act it would mean more to the people they care about instead of selfishly thinking hurting others will somehow make those close feel safe scares people who cant self reflect. Empathetic people don't want to assume the worst in others so people who mask their cruelty fly under the radar until they don't realize how cold hearted some of their takes are. That demographic of pessimists wants life to suck so their worst actions are excused as a product of their upbringing and not an opportunity to take responsibility.
I have to admit, I was nervous about watching the ending with all the talk I’ve heard about how people hated it. Me personally… I actually liked the ending. I wasn’t expecting something like Lord of the Rings where mostly everything is super happy. Things weren’t perfect, but things still felt hopeful. That things could be better, and that there were still many bright spots in this new world. It was the credits that made me shocked and pissed at first, like the whole thing was pointless. I thought that was what people were mad about. But thinking it over, I think I understand what the author is trying to convey. Everything ends. But everything will always begin again.
You know, in a near future, the world might fall into WWIII. If that happens, and it won't end in annihilation later students would think that people who lived between 1945 and 202X were very naive to assume that era of wars ended. Like when you first found out that people thought that the Great War would end wars. Life in itself is kinda pointless, if it ends with death. Period of piece is pointless, if it ends with war. Period of freedom is pointless, if it ends with tyranny. With that kind of logic, yeah the whole thing was pointless. People, who saw stoik, "cool", Eren as a real thing and not just a mask - hated the manga ending. People who weren't able to retrive information if it not spelled out for them - hated the ending cause they thought, somehow, that Armin approved of Eren's actions, that author wanted us to be on Eren's side... that's why literature and history classes are important, kids. I prefer manga version of conversation. It's more inline with lost character doesn't suddenly have epiphone on why he did what he did (but composition of the scenes, order and Armin's questions painted the picture of why he might did it, how sincere his "friends" excuse, how maximalistic he always was). But hey, I liked how manga ended in the first place, I just don't understand the need to pretend that something key was changed. It was rephrased in definitive terms, that's true.
I'll say it again: for us manga readers, we were working with a rushed chapter with crappy dialogue. You can see some of it in the video (like Armin being fine with genocide), but there were more changes to the original ending as well (some small, but still important). I used to hate the ending, but the anime fixed most of my gripes, so I've grown to accept it. Just be glad you got the finished product on first viewing. I, and others, had to sit through the original ending, then the additional pages in the physical copy, just to get to this point. It's been a long road, but the ending is finally fixed.
The credits arent pointless. It showed the raw nature of the never ending cycle of hatred. Besides, even great empires fall at some point. Did you expect paradis to remain a superpower for hundreds of years?
Isayama is the one who added the script, a day before the episode came out a leaker on Twitter mentioned that Isayama had an additional new script which had ppl assuming am AOE was happening
@@sdog1234 You should try reading the manga if you have the time lol. There are parts in the ending that are memed to hell and back just for how dogshit it was
it wasnt that bad at the time either, manga dorks are just a whole other breed of crazy dweebs. these are the same people that sent death threats to mappa for not playing u see big girl during the declaration of war, just a bunch of socially maladjusted weirdos living cushy lives making mountains out of molehills @@lizardwithabranch
For the technology we see in the scenes, Eren's choice brought peace for thousands of years (we see a city more advanced than ours when war starts). You can't stop the cycle, but you can keep it at bay.
Eren did achieve his goals for his friends and especially Mikasa by giving them a long, peaceful and happy life. After that war resumed when the rest of the world finally caught up to Eldia and the cycle of violence and suffering continued, the world destroyed itself and finally the kid walked into the tree, the same way that Ymir did…
The manga portrayed the architecture in the "future" Paradis as much more similar to ours (e.g., typical rectangular skyscrapers) rather than the more "sci-fi" buildings we see in the anime. For some, like myself, the Rumbling felt a bit inconsequential since the world somehow managed to recoup its numbers and strength enough to enact revenge on Paradis, seemingly only a generation after Eren's friends had died. I honestly have no qualms with the ending's portrayal of how war is an endless cycle of vengeance. Still, for it to happen again so quickly in that timeline is unrealistic and off-putting to me.
@@lizardwithabranch"seemingly only a generation after his friends die" I keep saying lots of manga readers say that but... 80% of the world was wiped out. Tech levels reset to Paradis all around the world. In no way does that take only a generation or two even to get to modern blocky cities and stealth-bomber looking planes. That alone is going to require hundreds of years of rebuilding and advancement to pull off. If making the buildings sci-fi ones helped make the original point, then I'm glad they adjusted it. But it's also addressing a complaint that, while common enough it seems, shouldn't really be a complaint if people think more than like two seconds about what they're looking at.
@handandless7115 I dunno Paradis by the end of the series was lookin like mid 19th century tech but they also have the advantage of knowledge on what can be made and what is possible and without the constant threat of titans galting their progress they could realistically get back up to that speed in maybe 100-150 years
I felt the exchange between Eren and Armin was a lot more emotional. I liked how Armin chose to take responsibility for what happened as well. A real bromance.
In season 1 episode 1, Eren‘s mom told them to run without her and live, but she cried „don‘t leave me“. In the final, Eren wants Mikasa to live happily and be free, but he also also cried that he didn‘t want Mikasa to forget him and be with other man. I can understand that perfectly. Because they love them, they want their loved ones to live and be happy. On the other hand, because they love them, they didn‘t want to be seperated. They are just humans afterall.
The true meaning is supposed to be a message of human nature as a whole, aside from is it good or bad, this is a reflection of humans and its extremely visible today
I forgot the details of the conversation in the manga, but this video helped me clearly see how the anime made it much better. A few personal notes. I don’t think the reveal that Mikasa releasing Ymir goes against Eren also releasing her in episode 80. I like to imagine Ymir had three locks on herself that prevented her from moving on. Eren, Armin, and Mikasa each had a role to play in releasing one of her locks. For Eren, it was helping Ymir see that she is free to make her own choices and not follow King Fritz’s orders. For Armin, he showed Ymir what life is really about in his conversation with Zeke. For Mikasa, she gave Ymir the strength to let go of the bind her unhealthy love for King Fritz that held her from moving on from the Paths by leading by example when she finally decided to put humanity ahead of her love for Eren. With these three things Eren, Armin, and Mikasa gave to Ymir, she was finally able to depart from the Paths and thus erasing Titans from the world. The final lesson of the show I think is that while the cycle of conflict will renew, we must always continue seeking understanding of one another.
Unhealthy love? What level of nonsense? I don't believe even slightly that she was in love. Perhaps if she was mentally disabled, then I'll understand. Because otherwise, they have somehow created the worst relationship in all of fiction, even worse than Harley Quinn and Joker.
@@ejz93 bruh Stockholm is for kidnappers. Not for people WHO GOUGE OUT YOUR EYE. Also, in that case, the person is weaker than the abuser. She was literally God
Wow. Never thought about Armin's involvement, but that makes sense. The E-M-A trio were all necessary for Ymir to be set free. That was probably why she sent Armin into the Paths then. If only it was explained this way in the episode, it might've actually made it that much better (not saying it wasn't good, just to clarify).
I loved every season and watch ONLY the anime, everyone was telling me the end was gonna disappoint and i after seeing it i couldn't disagree more, now i understand. The change to this scene in particular is huge and thank god Isayama did it, he is super talented i really hope we get to see another history from him.
Basically, I am not comparing the 2 or saying that the other one is better but, They really went the Lelouch and Suzaku realization in the C's World route with realization of what they are fighting for. Lelouch and Suzaku realized that there is more than what they wanted and considered that the people will keep finding happiness and that people are also involved in what they want to achieve which is to create a world of peace while Armin and Eren both saw that there is more to Paradis and Eldians, that freedom isn't achieve by one side being above from the other but, have to live their lives in a positive side (Armin's Perspective of Freedom).
yeah 'lives their lifz in a positive side' in a world surrended by walls you can't go behing, with monster to the gate to come to eat, with a people in a extermination process because they have no food.. so cute !
I definitely agree that this conversation change made the ending so much better, after I read the manga I was just shocked and confused with the ending and how it went. But the anime change up is amazing and bittersweet as you said and I was sobbing through it. 😭This scene really showcases Eren and Armins friendship and gives much better closure than the manga version.
I really don't like when people say it accomplished nothing; As far as I can see, Titans don't exist anymore. That is massive. Sure, conflicts will go on, but never in such a world-ending manner
The Titans were never the problem It's like saying nuclear energy is the problem when humans are the ones making bombs. The whole season 4 was garbage, Erwin fought for nothing, Floch was the only thru Eldian. Cringe avengers Levi, Mikasa, Armin and Conie didn't save Eldia only lost the advantage they had. S1-3 Was just wasted time
I think that what makes this ending so good is that it is able to illustrate the ugly reality we live in. Oppressed people can only be oppressed for so long before they fight back. When fighting back, moral and ethical lines can blur and those who were once the victims can become the aggressors. Many lessons can be learned from this, but for me, the lesson is to not lose sight of your humanity. Perhaps we will one day learn to solve conflicts with words and prevent individuals in power from making mistakes that will harm others and further divide.
this scene was the most important one. they both believed in eachother, their friendship, their faith, their bond. even if the only conclusion was linear. they tried to break the mold as they've done before.
As a manga reader (which didn't remember much how the dialogues were in the manga) when I saw the episode it definitely felt way better. I noticed that it was pretty different but couldn't tell how different it was. When i finished the episode It really felt right and I was wondering why it made so much sense whereas when I finished the manga I kinda liked the ending but I wasn't too pleased by it. Now I see why and it's a really good change.
Anime-only watcher here. I was pretty disappointed in the finale _until_ this scene which largely saved it in my eyes. Good to hear what changes were made and that it was significantly improved.
What we learned is that, in conversation, the timing of a single line changes everything. Spooky! Glad best boi Armin got to be the little ray of sunshine he is in the anime version.
What I like about the cycle of violence repeating is that it tells us to find peace and life in it. Everything will come to an end some day, but it's still beautiful today, and the world will keep spinning long after us.
Thank you so much for making this video! I had the exact same thoughts on the ending, but people kept downplaying the significance of these changes and attacking manga readers that vehemently disliked the original ending. I hope that Anime Only’s and Manga Readers can use this video as a bridge for common ground. 🙏
Eren sacrificing himself ultimately was for the greater good because it ended the 2000 year Titan war. The wars it shows in credits is just human nature
@@moh8b74 no, the power of titan is always exist, you see the boy with a dog in the end? He was entering the tree hole and will be just like Ymir, fall down and combine with the bug, then transform and the whole shit will happen again, the boy is definitely the next Ymir. The power of titans is not an event, it is the nature of that world, it is an endless loop.
If you remember the large tree with a hole Ymir found, the ending shows the same thing happening with a new generation under a new tree grown from his corpse. Here is something to note, the war between Eldia and Marley was ALREADY UNDERWAY when Ymir got the powers, it's been going as far back as we can see and continues as far forward as we can see. The titan-aspect comes and goes in cycles, the war rages with titans, then without, and back and forth forever. I think it's incredibly powerful that by using violence to stop the cycle of violence, Eren only perpetuated it further in the grand scheme of things.
2:28 What if Eren didn't free Ymir, but instead told her something along the lines of "Give me a chance to prove it to you." Since he had already seen the future where Mikasa was the one to free Ymir, and knew what it would take.
You're right. Armin always saw the world for how it was in the present, Mikasa saw the world for how to was in the past hoping she could go back to those days with Eren or get to run off with him and be together. And lastly Eren was a slave to how he saw the world because he was both looking at the past and the future but never realized the present or current situation like Armin or rather couldn't. He was really a slave for freedom and never got to enjoy that freedom he searched for. In a sense if that the case then the dream Eren and Armin shared one can say that if Armin had the power Eren had we would had a similar situation.
"freedom is slavery, war is peace." - INSOC from the book 1984 by George Orwell. Having a goal or motivation doesn't make you a slave. the writers of the show clearly haven't given much thought to that idea and ended up insulting oppressed people everywhere but idiots like you will eat it up and think its genius just because you never heard the idea before.
honestly i love the ending with how emotional it was to another message being war always has a price Eren wanted the world to be in his vision as he had the power to do so aswell as accepting the fact he was an idiot at the start of it all i think is very fitting for Eren as the character he is Armin accepting Eren and understanding him was very emotional and just shows how deep their friendship goes even when Eren wipes out 80% of humanity Armin takes part of the blame and expects to see Eren in hell showing how much he still cared for Eren till the end Mikasa i think had it the worst but it was heart warming and heart wrenching she always loved Eren but the way she was it was hard for her to really express it like a normal person Eren knew she did but He didnt want her to be any closer to him than she needed to be for the sake of what he was after eventually to what he foresaw which was Mikasa taking his life but we also seen a alternate reality Eren WANTED to happen and it was if Eren and Mikasa went off when they were at Marley and lived out the rest of his life in solitude just the 2 of them so its clearly obvious how badly they wanted to be with each other especially when Mikasa never moved on and kept the scarf then dying being buried along side Eren which is (sorta) what Eren wanted he wanted himself to be the only one for Mikasa realized how pathetic it was but Mikasa not even knowing this done it anyway staying by his side till her last breath Say what you will but i think this was perfect for attack on titan's ending no war has a happy ending "bittersweet" is a word for it the end of the pain for our beloved characters and a tragic outcome and death for others but the end of a story feel free to correct me on any parts of my take on the main 3 characters here
According to me the anime did provided a better ending than the manga, however based on reading the manga and now seeing the anime, I feel the ending would have been more justified if explained in the following way :- 1. Instead of ymir love with the king angle, it would have better shown that she was a slave to the king and does not have the courage to betray him. Thats why even after ymir death she was not free and was forced to make different kind of titans for around 2000 years. 2. Further why Mikasa was the symbol of freedom for her because in the end she actually countered her will to protect Eren and was the one to take Eren's life. This goes against her Ackerman blood heritage and moreover this will connect with the conversation that Eren had with her earlier in the series. When Erwn called Mikasa a slave to her blood line. 3. Why Eren had to destroy 80% humanity - In this Eren part was halfly shown correctly in the anime that he actually feels that was the right thing to do. Moreover they should have added that Eren wants to end the curse of titan, so that Armin could live beyond just the 13 years and so that no can distinguish b/w Eldians and rest of the people. Further seen the future memories Eren knew this was the only way. 4. Now why Ymir sided with Eren? - cause she believed Eren could provide her the freedom she was seeking. For 2000 years she saw that the eldians have been used by the rest of people as means of war, similar to what she was to King Fritz. One has to understand that all eldians were her children and hence she wanted to protect them as well, that's why she sided with Eren as he wanted to kill everyone outside the walls. This goes with the story as well as she was the one who was fighting with scouts at the end with different titans. This gives meaning to Eren character also as he cannot avoid the will of Ymir when she sends the past titans to ensure that the rumbling continues. Further she was still a slave to the king as by protecting the eldians she was still ensuring the survival of the kingdom that was established by the King Fritz. Finally seeing Mikasa going against her blood bound and killing Eren gave her the true meaning of freedom, saving the 20% humanity(other than the eldians) and ending her curse on the eldians. Thus ensuring peace. Maybe Ishiyama wanted to convey this only however was not able to guide this properly. In the end you have to give credit to his writing. Not many people talks about this but at the end Eren was able to do what he had promised earlier in the series that was to destroy each and every Titan. Further though the scouts went against Eren in the end they never deviated from there objective to protect the humanity from the titans.
I wish your comment is seen by the entire community and used as an example to critique a show's ending. Not only are you providing clear reasons, you explained your comments in a non-ignorant manner while being respectful to Isayama 👏
I’ve read the last few chapters right after finishing the last episode and I agree with the manga ending being rather unsatisfying. People already talked about how the changes improved it a lot but I thought the pacing was also a bit off. Everything happened so fast. Characters deaths felt like something you see in one panel and then move on like Hanjis for example. I feel like in the anime they turned each page into 5-10 minutes of animation to really empathize what’s going on.
Not gonna lie, I laughed and cried when Armin I said "If it's real, I guess I'll be seeing you in hell." It was a real friendship moment and I don't know why I laughed, but tears definitely followed. Edit: As for the ending, to me if felt like they were saying history repeats itself. And with a random boy walking up to that tree, who knows what power is there to possibly flatten the world again.
As the universe is deterministic, everything had to happen the way it did - as bleak as that was. Kind of like Paul's prescience in Dune - all the power, no control, a slave to freedom. Sending that titan away from Bertholt and towards his mother so that things happened in a set way shows this. Although it could be argued whether the extent of his genocide could be lessened if he didn't care for his friends to come out on top. Eren also mentions all that power went to someone dumb like him. Everything maybe could've gone better if it went to someone else, but everything that happened was just meant to be - so there was no changing that either. I think Mikasa loving Eren unconditionally but stopping him is why Ymir could stop the titans after loving King Fritz unconditionally - she just needed someone to show it could be done. That you can go against the one you love for the greater good. One can only hope that the cycle of hatred eventually ends one day, and maybe it will. But it will likely continue for thousands of years. There is nothing that could've truly stopped that cycle. Again, it could be argued that things could've been more peaceful globally if an outcome was chosen where Eren's friends didn't come out on top. And maybe that's a route he didn't take due to his selfishness/stupidity - and why Armin feels the need to share the burden for being chosen instead of a large portion of humanity.
knowledge of your own deterministic behavior is a paradox every time you are made aware of what you're going to do next you're actively changing the premise example : "you're going say dog next" "I know that now so I'll say cat" go back in time "you were going to say dog next but then you opted for cat" "I know that now so I'll say bird" and so on so forth
@@melkormedia7413 right so I fail to see how Eren was anything but an idiot, unless we assume this ending was the absolute best case scenario possible considering Eren's requirements
@@NienteFantasia Yeah, well maybe it was. Maybe he saw it was the best and only path available to him (where he could save his friends). Maybe he realised how he was stupid because if someone else took his place in history, things might have turned out better
I think you're mostly on point, but there's one thing I feel people get wrong about isayamas message. He clearly expresses that the ideal of a hateless world is impossible, it's utopic, people will always fight. It's not about breaking the cycle, but skipping it. Even though eventually, war will happen again, as we see in the credits, it's worth fighting for the short term peace. You fight to prevent war in your lifetime, and trust that your descendents will in theirs. This goes in theme with Erwin's speech, and it goes in theme with Armin's speech about appreciating the little things. You do not need to solve war, to find grand peace for the world; just find peace for the day. It's further cemented by the idiocy of eren's plan, sacrificing many lives for an unattainable, grand peace, instead of retreating with mikasa and finding his own peace.
It must been really hard to come to a closure to such a story. In the end I knew it was not going to be a "good" or "bad" ending for anyone. just an end to a circle and the beggining to another. But I realy liked it, cried a lot. I felt it was saddening realistic the circle of hate. But I would like to know more of their after war life though!
thanks to you i realized when armin said he wanted to have a free world too that he meant it free from titans (peaceful one too probably in that sense, but back then he didnt know there were humans outside) outside the walls back then as a kid. first time i actually thought he also wanted to kill all the humans outside the walls when he said it to eren maybe because he wanted to make eren not feel as bad, i was kinda overwhelmed with all this so that was the first impression i got. knowing there was truth behind armins words definitely feels better, even if he meant it differently to erens freedom
Eren`s head is screwed up not only from the nonlinear time, he is also connected to every eldian. So every single person he kills, he is accualy experiencing it. I cannot even comprehend how strong of a mentality you need, in order to bear this. And next is hell...
After watching like 3 video explanations on the series something finally clicked. I don't know how I missed this my first time watching the series. I didn't understand what Eren's main goal was in killing everyone else besides the Eldians, aside from a base level. Obviously he hates the Marleyans because of what grief they caused, but on a deeper level he wanted to see what Armin showed him, but after Eren escaped the walls he could only see more anger, and couldn't look past the people, at the world surrounding those people. Armin looked past, but Eren couldn't do that. Thanks for making things make sense, Collateral!
I didn't know they stretched it out! I thought everything is the same, I was unfamiliar with it for a sec when I watched it Thank you for pointing it out!
I read the manga a few years back because I was impatient to know what happens. Unfortunately, when I'm invested in a story, I tend to simply rush forward like a bull in a china shop to find out what happens next in the plot, without really stopping to appreciate the finer details. The audacity of the scene in the manga went completely over my head when I read it - but maybe that's a good thing, since that meant I could enjoy the scene in the anime both untainted by its initial depiction and unplagued by the impatience to find out what happens next. Glad to have content like this that breaks it all down, really helps appreciate the material and the decision-making behind it more.
Still didn't fix everything. there is the "I had to kill my mother to give myself the drive" bit which fell completely flat, and the retcon of Eren seeing Mikasa as a lover rather than a sibling, despite the buildup between Eren and Historia in both anime and Manga.
2:07, The king Ymir loved is not Karl Fritz, Karl Fritz was the 145th king who made the vow of renouncing war, (he has a good intention to break the cycle, but it likely won't work since not all Eldians would die). The ancestor Fritz doesn't have a first name, IIRC. Great video BTW!
I always liked the manga ending, partly because I could see the intention behind it. I always thought that they needed to flesh this out more but I was happy with what I got, now I’m glad that this convo finally got fleshed out.
This, and the added line from Historia in her ending speech that “This wasn’t entirely Eren’s fault… this outcome was brought about by all of our actions” is what really sells me on the ending and really puts into perspective Armin’s desire to shoulder Eren’s sin as well. They’re not just being good friends trying to bail out Eren, they’re taking accountability which I might argue is the best path to learning from their mistakes, and ensuring that the truth isn’t lost to history as ‘Eren Jaeger killed everyone because he was innately bad… and perhaps because the eldians are innately bad.’ Seasons 1-3 are essentially his villain backstory, and perhaps he wouldn’t have committed such an atrocity if any people were a little more accountable.
One thing I really want answered, is whether or not Eren could see a future Attack Titan. His ability allows him to access memories of future titans in his lineage... So, did Eren experience the memories of another, or did he know that it dies with him? Curious.
One thing I'm slightly confused by, did Eren go Doctor Strange on this situation? I can't tell if he's played out this scenario multiple times trying to find a way to make the ending better, but every time at least 80% of humanity was wiped out no matter what he tried. The timeline is fuzzy for me in regards to the "time travel" in the series. I also don't really understand Ymir's motivations. I agree that her having Stockholme is a pretty stupid reason for all this happening, but I don't understand anything regarding what Mikasa did and her importance.
AOT is in a deterministic timeline meaning if you see the future it’s truly set in stone. The implications of this is that every action every character takes is pre determined, all thanks to yimr wanting to test mikasa for some reason
I think he kept trying to do things that contradicted his memories of the future and always failed. I think that was the point in the event where he tried not to save Ramzi, and then ended up breaking down after he did. For the most part I think Eren interpreted his future memories as necessarily unavoidable, in part because he’s an idiot, in part because on top of being an idiot he is now permanently unable to think clearly due to having his entire lifetime and beyond happen all the time.
Mikasa was what Ymir could have been had she simply let the spear hit King Fritz. Mikasa knew her love for Eren was dangerous and was able to do the right thing regardless. Ymir knew the same thing but instead needlessly sacrificed herself when she could have set herself free.
@@waves2378i think another layer is that Mikasa is not a slave to freedom since she is just "normal", and not a godlike being like eren and ymir. She cant do "anything" so she can still make choices. Gods are like billionaires, their only limit is their emotional stability, and normal people have to constantly condition their emotional stability because they constantly face limits.
@@gezenewsHe had to be showed the same future, otherwise it wasn't his future. Him seeing the future was in part a reason why it really was his future. This is a perk of the predetermination.
I was so confused before why some fans thought the story was pro-genocide/fascism. But indeed, these changes are huge. The final season of the anime felt like a metaphor for losing a friend to mental illness, and how Armin behaved when finally getting to talk to Eren was so touching. Joining him in hell… is like admitting that even though your friend is awful and you cannot agree with them, you can’t help but still love them. I really hope this was the true intention of the author, because it is why this series had much more emotional depth than I was expecting.
I like how you pointed out how Armin's present-focussed perspective differs from that of Eren's future-focussed perspective during that 'seeing the ocean' scene. Armin was fascinated by the shell and the water. He was in the present and appreciated what was in front of him. His dream was fulfilled right then and there. But Eren was cursed with what he thought was knowledge and kept looking into the distance, failing to see what was in front of him. In this sense, you can argue that being too long-sighted is just as harmful as being short-sighted. Sometimes people go so far to achieve a 'greater good' or an idealised future that they neglect what the people around them feel at the present moment. Armin and Zeke realized in the Paths that people fought to survive not because they wanted eternal peace or an idealised version of freedom. They did it (most of them unknowingly so) so that they can experience the present if not just one more time. The thing that they wanted the most was right in front of them. Zeke wanted to keep playing catch. Eren, Armin and Mikasa just wanted to be together again. There were even constant flashbacks to when they were kids running towards that tree. It wasn't until the end that they all realised just how precious those moments were. Despite the fact that they were stuck behind the walls, despite the idea that 'humanity' was constantly being threathened by titans, those fleeting moments remained precious. These present moments are just as precious, but most don't realise it.
In episode 80 eren said Ymir was waiting for someone but he never said waiting for me. Eren understood that Ymir was looking for/needed somebody to free her and we know it couldn’t have been Eren because she wasn’t yet free but that doesn’t mean Eren isn’t a large piece in her being freed because without him mikasa couldn’t do what she did to free her. Eren also touched Ymir and saw her entire story also most likely feeling her emotions so he gained an understanding Zeke couldn’t.
Everyone be talkin about the conversation between Armin and Eren while I be like "So Levi gets to butcher Annie for his squad right? He's not just gonna let her walk away after all the shit she pulled and enjoyed it right?", yeah big sadge for me man... T-T
yeah the whole story treats their past losses as just…collateral damage 💀 eren completely forgot about his mom apparently, jean forgot marco, levi…only connie had some human feelings but he was treated like HE was the crazy person
@@immkk1125 THANK YOU! Glad to see someone else could see it, peep just forgot everyone else that died BRUTALLY for them to get where they are, they also seem to conveniently forget some of the disgusting people that DID those things, like I get they usually had bigger issues but when shit settled down there was no reason NOT to tie up loose ends, people like Levi an others who lost so much deserved at LEAST that much, the fact the disgusting people like Annie just get to walk away an be happy like churns my damn stomach man...
@@platinum5807 true true, even if they weren’t killed, prosecuted or even just screamed at, the least we could have was levi remembering people (other than erwin) and have the others just express their grief, anything to show us that they didn’t just forget. Annie and the others, they were just kids and i can really understand the emphasis that the story had on that. they were kids who were brainwashed into believing they had the right to just do that. that doesn’t mean that brainwashing takes away your empathy and feelings of regret. but other than reiner, who was clearly a self deprecating pos once he became an adult (yet funnily enough he never did anything to rebel or change the way mahr treated eldiens from what i remember) annie and the others just didn’t seem to show remorse in the extras. and again, i dont even want revenge since that wouldn’t solve anything, but ending the story on the importance of « true love » or whatever while obviously neglecting all the other emotions…yuckkkkk so yeah ofc they’re be another war 😩 you guys never solved shit and didn’t even heal your traumas
@@immkk1125 Did you guys not watch episode 84? There is a whole chapter in the manga before they try to steal the plane where they argue with each other about who did what and Reiner & Annie reveal they killed Marco and they conclude that they're all really fucked up and responsible for people dying but they just need to stop Eren.
ye i defiantly felt like eren was made out to be some kind of hero at the end of the manga while the anime kind of gave you a "what would it be like if your childhood friend was the devil?"
everyone says the cycle will occur, but my (potential) copium is that the boy to start the next cycle seems innocent, and lives in "freedom" (or, moreso than Eren... no walls, etc) and is not a "slave" like Ymir was. So, maybe the cycle does repeat, but the next cycle could be drastically different or peaceful because the next person to find the power of the titans is innocent. Also the boy has a scarf and kind of looks like a small Eren so maybe its a mix between the motherly instinct of Mikasa & the real freedom Eren always wanted as a child imbued into this figure that makes the next titan cycle "different" ... or at least, end differently. In that sense, Eren said screw humanity; I just want my friends to live and die of old age. After that, Eren knows all of humanity will doom itself, bombings will happen, and the titans will be awoken again, but his friends lived long lives. The titans come back, but this time the founder of titans is one of (assumed) innocence and purity, that would cause a different, positive, cycle to start.
I’m anime only. When the manga end came out, i wondered why people hated it so much. When the Anime ending came out, and was absolutely beautiful and cathartic, I was REALLY confused why manga readers hated it so much. This video clears that confusion. “Thank you for being a mass murderer for us” is a wild sentence. Talking about Mikasa’s feelings after Eren says he’ll kill 80% of humanity, is even worse. Armin killed hella people too. The “i’ll see you in hell, friend” is so much better. u the goat for clearing that up
The nuke in the end credits takes place 2 thousand years later as you can tell by the buildings and how far technology had advanced so it was more pointing to how war will always be a thing as long as there is more than 1 person in the world.
2:30 Eren was the one to make her realize she wasn't a slave, that she could make her own choices, leading to her choosing to side with Eren's plan and start the Rumbling. However, Mikasa being "the one to release her" might mean that was the one that truly freed her when she killed Eren, erasing the Power of the Titans from the world and letting Ymir finally rest in peace.
Well, i think eren just want to see outside the world to be empty without people. Eren wish is that outside the world is the world that so vast without the touch of human/titan. That's the reason eren want to kill all titan in the first place, so that eren could travel world freely and then eren realize that outside the island is just more human. That's why he just want to erase everything outside. It's just like kid ranting that everything he hoped for just different. That's why Armin accepted that it was his fault to give eren the idea of empty outside world.
Waiting for hentai of Eren and Armin in hell.
Dawg
Wtf
What💀
bro wtf
WTF?!
Armin: "Did you do it for us?"
Eren: "No. I did it for me. I liked it. I was good at it. I was really... I was alive.
Bro thought he was Walter white 💀
i strongly believe this was the inspiration
@@Ares-jj2gv Well, one of Isayama's favourite TV show IS Breaking Bad.
No way hahaha
Bro that was exactly what came to my mind after that convo ended ..hahaa
If we take "because I'm an idiot" as a meta critique, like most of the conversation in the blood they have, that line is perfect. Eren saw violence as the definitive solution because he's an idiot, but he's not the only one.
The world has no titans now, so that "excuse" to wage war is gone, but Marley fought with other countries (mid eastern alliance) even if neither considered each other devils, because they are controlled by idiots with too much power. The collective choices of idiots who kept the cycle of hatred going brought this world upon us, and they were just looking for excuses and followed sick jokes of mindsets like "if there are no enemies, wars stop", but enemies are made by themselves, no one is born an enemy, they brought it upon themselves to think the world is "kill or be killed"
In the end, the titans never were the real problem, humans were, more specifically idiots.
It's a great meta comparison
Exactly I’ve heard people say that’s why the episode was trash obviously don’t know how to read in between the lines
This was my interpretation of the ending as well.
I love this take. So many people don’t understand what that meant.
Damn you killed that.
instead of ending the conflict
you decide to let it continue
hell yeah for realism
peace suck anyway
Armin's break down to seeing Eren dead made me tear up in the anime. His voice actor really did a great job of depicting the pain Armin went through of losing the most important friend to him.
Or when the scouts start telling Armin it’s time to go colossal and you can hear tears in Armin’s voice when he replies, “I know.” Oh my god Jesse James is a phenomenal VA
That's the cry of someone losing their lover 😂
Have u seen the video of the VA in the studio? Heartbreaking 😭
@@fashiongg89 Just did now. Wow, she's amazing. :o
i had never cried to any emotional scene in a movie, book or manga ....but miraculously this scene made me cry so much
Crazy how much better the scene is just by rearranging and adding new lines
Exactly. Now Armin no longer puts Mikasa's feelings over billions of lives. His reaction to the 80% reveal was much better too.
Yet eren still admits to being stuck in a predertermined time paradox, hence taking all accountability from his actions and agency from his character.
@@rocknatex5013dosent change the fact that Eren was only thinking and simping for Mikasa while whailing, all this when he's in the process of killing billions of people including kids and women. What a lovely smart MC that died with 0 dignity while his step siblings mikasa got her cheeks clapped by jean after his death lmao
@@livetochange974isn't that the dilemma of which who will you choose between the lives of the people you don't know or the lives of the people that matter to you.
If anyone answers this dilemma, I'm sure they would look evil to anyone
@@shinobu5742a lot of people do not understand that because they are not in that position. 🙃🙃
People downplay it, but the changes made to Eren and Armins conversation saved the ending tbh
Glad he didn’t say thanks for commiting genocide for us. Because Armin would legit never say that
Ehhh I disagree. The scene still felt weird and out of pocket to me.
@@davidmitchell3247why?
it feel like that since you are a manga reader and you had a specific image in mind that it will look bad in anime aswell. I personally hated it in manga, but this conversation in anime along with the soundtrack saved this scene for me. Although some facial expression shots of eren are wierd, (maybe mappa fix them in bluray)
I wouldn't say "saved". The ideas from the manga ending were still there but not fleshed out thoroughly. A lot of people still loved and understood the message and so the manga ending itself. What the anime did was it gave it a solid standing and polished it so people can't get confused and pivot into a misunderstanding.
"A slave to freedom" is such a beautiful line. And a perfect explanation of the events of the show.
hell no
What does it mean to you?
Fax
More like a slave to fate, considering he just accepted the outcome and played along.
@paledrake he didn't have to accept his fate, he could have ignored it. Which is why slave to freedom is more fitting and more poetic anyway.
Me as a anime only liked this scene a lot. For the whole 4th season eren was basically a mystery too me. I really wanted to see whats going on in his mind and how hes handling so much weight. This scene answered all my answers
Eren before season 4 , is my favorite character of the show,not a surprise since I like battle shonen,I never really tried to understand his mentality after season 4 because of the unnatural reality of the attack on titan world,and the extreme situation eren was put in as well (knowing past and future events) , trying to understand him sounds tiring and unnecessary for me,I enjoyed the show a lot regardless.
I'm happy you got the better version right away. Just don't think badly of the people who were saying the ending sucked before the anime came out and have now changed their minds. As you can see in the video, we were given the lesser version with pretty crappy dialogue. And this wasn't the only scene to get expanded on. Historia's speech at the end was expanded in the anime too, along with other scenes. I, for one, am satisfied now despite having been a harsh critic of the manga's original final chapter. It's no secret that the final chapter was rushed, and it makes a hell of a difference to see the actual finished product that they took so much time on.
But the interesting thing there it's that the 4th season didn't show a different Eren at all. It was always the same one that was MANDATED to fight, but deep down, also WANTED to fight for his freedom. Therefore, making it exactly a tool of destiny. In the 4th season, what changed is the perspective we had on this situation, since we now knew the geopolitical context of it all. And then, the studio wanted to show a disconnection between the endless fighting spirit Eren had in his lockroom ("Tatakae" "Tatakae" like a typical shonen hero), and the depressed and confused feeling Armin&all had now that their history had been revealed. They are not seeing a dichotomic world anymore, where Titans are bad and their people good. Things had changed since they knew that their own population had to fight other humans for their survival, but all beceause of their sins. It's grim and the morality of it is completely fucked. There was no place for a totally blinded fighting spirit there....
But, It seems like the emotional Eren was still there deep down, naïve and still fighting for his own sake. We know he had a burden on his shoulder in this time, but he even said it himself: he still wanted to eradicate the world. That is still his feelings until the very end even tho he knew what would be the outcome. He can't help it, it's his very own nature.
So it wasn' so much the burden to end all that for his friends, it was a burden that the destiny itself weigh on him and that forged him. The fuel for his motivation being his own survival and Mikasa. the burden was not bigger during this season, it always has been the same from the day he was born : A slave to freedom
@@rocknatex5013nah, in essence it is all the same thing. If you watch S4 and the specials then you will a big contradiction and issues with the plot. AOT was always trash after all.
@@asuraspath2262 You're free to have that opinion. But if you hate the whole series so much, leave the AoT community alone. Go do something else with your life and let the fans of the series enjoy it in peace.
that change for Armin's dialogue really saved the ending for me and gave it such a beautiful and tragic meaning. it finally clicked for me.
lol it's the same with more 'soft' words, you are hypocrite
oh no. well, i am judging everything on my subjective opinions. so if i liked this version of the ending thats it, i dont have to stay disliking the ending for the rest of my life.
@@Player_468 "soft words" more in character for armin. thats all. the meaning its the same, thw writing is better.
I haven't read the manga, and it looks like i shouldn't
@@Player_468how does that make him a hypocrite. Do you even know what that word means
The greatest irony is that for all the suffering Eren went through, it was only after gaining ultimate power and knowledge that he truly lost his freedom.
I am not sure what he ever had was freedom to begin with. He was an incompetent soldier in a suicide force, he was so obsessed with the idea of claiming the world beyond the walls without the titans that he would have died for sure if he didn't get the power. At the turning point where the outside world becomes known, even the future becomes known, he accepts his fate, which was consistent from episode 1. The question here is if the future that he saw was pre determined or not, because if it was not pre determined - he had no freedom from the start.
@@richhaaaaardimo it’s a pretty solid fact that what Eren sees in the future is pre-determined. The attack titan’s ability only works through memory, allowing Eren to see his own memories from the future. If he’s seeing a *memory*, then by definition it has to happen for Eren to remember it happening
That's probably why he's the only one who understands Ymir. When Ymir was set free by Fritz, she was hunted by people who wanted to kill her. Similar to how all of the people of Paradis were hunted by the Titans when they ventured outside the walls. They we're experiencing hell, but they were still free. When Ymir got the power of the Titans, she totally lost all her freedom and submitted to Fritz. When Eren got the Attack Titan and the Founding Titan, he lost all his freedom. He was a slave to Ymir just like she was to Fritz.
Did anyone notice both eren and zeke lost their heads and both were killed by ackermans
Edit : i just saw vid . When eren and zeke are talking in marley ( the ⚾ scene ) thier shadows dont have heads
💀 lmao
A family tradition
God I wish Levi would decapitate me 😩
I love zeke
Hard to miss.
The scene of king fritz being struck by the spear, is a parallel to what mikasa had to do to Eren. Her choice was what set Ymir free and ended the titan power for good. That was what Ymir would've chosen. To be with her kids. To have peace by sacrificing the one she loved. You can't change anything if you're not willing to leave something behind.
I think it was more so that we will never know what really happened with Ymir. Maybe instead of killing herself, she let the king die but the guilt caused her to be bound to the family until let free. Because it's extremely stupid saying "Ymir loved Fritz." Even Eren said he couldn't understand her full but that's what he felt.
@@gurnoorsekhon6402love makes people do dumb and crazy things
@@SODA63 not for 2000 eternities. Even someone as crazy as Harley Quinn was able to realize her bad relationship. Are you telling me ymir was crazier than her?
@@gurnoorsekhon6402 she was stuck in an abusive relationship, and had no closure for her emotions. Mikasa finally gave her catharsis
@@capybara8477 Doesn't seem like it. Unless you want to tell me that she didn't choose to die from that spear even though it shouldn't have been fatal. Plus she couldn't get closure in trillion eternities?
The episode explained that Yrmir was the one that created the titans. Maybe the kid in the post credits scene will create something different with the source of all life. He could probably become a water bender or something
Let’s hope so😂
My money is on healing powers. The source is *reaaaally* good at that.
@@gezenewsthere actually already was a dog titan during the battle between past dead pure titans
Could have a "Hachicō" inspired story element that could be pretty cool
OMG prequel to the avatar!!!!!!!!!!
Writing is hard, man. I feel for Isayama. I'm sure he was so tired and overworked and always wanted to express this in the best way. I'm guessing he just didn't realise he hadn't properly expressed his feelings till after publication.
THIS.
Atleast he did right in this second chance. So its not all bad in the end! 😊
He could have just stretched out the final arc and stick to the same ending. Inserting the "love" as a release to the curse was the laziest conclusion he could come up, when the entire series never really focused nor showcase any importance of romantic love from most characters, even Mikasa's one-sided affection was never that impacting, other than her being too overprotective and doting towards Eren. In fact if it was all about Love, then shouldnt that have been Historia and not Mikasa to break Ymir's curse? Historia is literally almost a copy pasta of Ymir with a slight alternatiion due to Eren's influence and interventions. But eh, whats done is done.
Lol, Isayama would have gone down in history as a hack if not Mappa's animators.
Definetly this, when reading I could understand the intent behind and dislike the concept but I was hoping the anime improved it so that we could fully see his vision
I was wondering why so many hated this convo as I was watching it. Never read the Manga so I wasn't aware it was changed. Good changes for sure. That manga convo was rough
Dude i hate the manga ending and have tried for 2 years to try and be convinced its decent, but the anime ending is actually fine lol im glad they improved certain scenes. Still disagree with eren breaking down wailing in the water crying tears over mikasa lol. Man literally never showed any affection for mikasa. Furthermore he came close to dying like 10 times and not ONCE did he think of Mikasa, yet im supposed to believe he would simp this hard?
Yeah. You can see why we were upset, right? The anime fixed the biggest issues from the manga, but it *used* to be much worse. The whole blood river scene in the anime literally addressed most of the criticism from manga readers.
@@Wilkin-vd5wxit is, Eren showed more emotion to historia and they're connection felt natural, it would've been reasonable for Eren to cry about historia since he actually looked like he was interested, but with Mikasa, he never showed or even hinted at he was interested in Mikasa, until S4 when Eren asked how she felt about him but even then that was only relevant for the end to show that marley wouldve been the one to commit genocide. And he obviously wasn't gon let Mikasa die by doing nothing
there were many moments eren subtly shows his feels towards Mikasa like when he first gave her the scarf he was blushing, the Dina scene "ill wrap this scarf around you as much as you want) when they were on the wagon and he said I care about you guys more than anything he was blushing again and it showed both eren and Mikasa and obviously the what am I to you. They were in the trenches daily fighting for their lives they didn't have time to focus on romance and even Mikasa tried to act like she didn't like Eren it's mutual I mean damn they both grew up without parents or normal circumstances
Mikasa was never about to be used as a titan breeding ground so of course he'd show emotion for her because of stuff like that and you literally saw Erens bottled up emotions for Mikasa that he finally let out
This was the anime equivalent of Breaking Bad’s “I liked it. I was good at it…” the protagonist owns up to the fact that they really did their evil for themselves foremost
never compare this hack's fake ass sellout ending to the peak fiction that is breaking bad ever again
It makes more sense for Walter White because in the first seasons we learn he's incredibly smart yet he's been stuck doing high school chemistry and working at a car wash to make ends meet. And then told he has terminal cancer. Life just kicked him while he's down so the whole series about a dude who's had enough and finally taking control of his life, be his own boss. Anyone could've figured out his motivation from the first episode. It wasn't some mystery.
agreed. It was about the main character coming to terms with their personal motivation though @@sor3999
@@gezenewsEren definitely had a more fucked up life than Walt, and he is younger. So he should do stupid things, he also has some kind of heroic complex with founding titan powers he was drowned with it. Walt is consistently egoistic the first episode to last, Eren is consistently stupid from first episode to last both of the characters portrayed it pretty great and the author hide those facts by misdirecting our focus to things they do to look cool
@@gezenewseren literally says he didn’t know whether his friends would die, and from s1-3 eren always discredited the whole “common enemy” idea, him trying to unite the world against himself is either 1 shitty writing or 2 him just using it as an excuse to mask his true urge to just flatten the world
Personally I love that they expanded on Ymir and Mikasa's connection. They added a scene I really needed - of Ymir, realizing finally she should've let Fritz die to the spear. She should've let her irrational love die like Mikasa coupd.
Exactly!
But it's in the manga too
I dont fully get why Ymir was causing Mikasa those headaches she get through the series,like what is the reason ? Why she was in her head ? it was because her love to Eren ?
@@MaceToYourFacebecause she wanted to peak-in in Mikasa's mind to understand her feelings because mikasa was the person ymir was finding for a long time. Because Mikasa was Ackerman, it was not easy for ymir to just peak in Mikasa's mind that's why that resulted in headaches
Iike mikasa could, by kissing his decapitated head ...
I remember that in an interview, Isayama had talked about that the only part where he struggled to write properly in the entire manga was the dialogue between Armin and Eren after Eren told how he always wanted to flatten the earth. Especially that "Thank you for being a Mass Murderer." So, I was pretty sure that if given a chance, he will definitely make an attempt to fix that and I am so glad he did so. The overall context and the content and the underlying message of the conversation, as well as the flow in the anime version is so much more superior compared to the Manga version which felt rushed and clunky for the most part.
I think at one point, Isayama even said that he considers the anime in general to be the finalized version of the story, so this really was a second chance for him.
Talking no jutsu all over again
@@KABLAMMATSyou’re a child
He should have taken this second chance to remove the entire ymir romance plotline. THAT would have fixed the story.
@@jibsonmadisonthat crap was terrible
The thing was that ymir slavery was freed by eren quest of freedom and fight
Now its about mikasa freed her from love by killing eren while she loved fritz and coudnt leave
Which is dumb and stupid
I like how in the end of the conversation, Eren was holding the sea shell (Armin‘s innocent dream) together with the blood, hair, and teeth of humans Eren flattened (Eren‘s gruesome dream) their dreams and goal intertwined is what kicked off the events in AOT and eventually caused the rumbling. Even if Armin never intended for the rumbling to happen and even tried to stop it, he realized that it was him who inspired Eren to achieve his version of freedom. That is why Armin absolved Eren of some of his sins.
And also because their are friends. Till the bitter end.
The line of Armin saying They'll be in Hell together for sharing the responsibility of what Eren did was pretty huge then. That and clearly making Eldia look like it took over hundreds of years for Eldia for finally fall for some kind of conflict so Eren's Rumbling is seen as a him succeeding saving his friends and making sure they lived in peace and died in peace
Well yeah, Armin had a huge part in it. He should've feel sorry for let him down.
I think isayama wanted to make sure love was lopped in with the rest of their emotions in this cruel world. Even love can be twisted and evil
Yeah sure but it doesn't make much sense unless Ymir was literally mentally disabled and she was completely brain-dead in the Paths.
@@gurnoorsekhon6402 she would have to be pretty damaged and by our sensibility now seems weird but 2000 years ago? Not weird at all
@@Roihclem871 not weird for you to marry the guy who gouged out your eye? Also, didn't she already defy the king when she chose to die from the spear even though the spear wasn't fatal clearly ? Even the king himself said to get up but she chose to die. So why did she continue serving him in afterlife?
@@gurnoorsekhon6402 just give up. You don't have sensibility or maturity enough to understand this kind of thing. You argue like you haven't lived enough, that's why you can't grasp what love can do to people or what people in love do.
@@gurnoorsekhon6402Stockholm syndrome is a real thing. I don’t mind the whole theme about love but it just felt too rushed to me, like the whole ending in general. Like Ymir loving Fritz was literally only introduced in the very last chapter and we didn’t even get time to process that.
As a manga reader, the manga conversation made Eren seem mental and like a big baby but the anime felt heartfelt and vulnerable. Them in the blood was visually spectacular and the timing was exceptional. I knew this part of the manga seemed off in some way and now this all makes sense. This conversation in the manga made me hate Eren but the anime made me appreciate Eren and actually understand him. Admin picking up the seashell gave me chills. Thank you for breaking this down.
@@gezenewsWell yeah, I hated the manga ending, because I didn't understand it. This scene read to me like Eren's a deranged child, with no value of human life that isn't one of his friends. The animes ending finally made it click for me.
And it wasn't just me, just read the discussions on the manga ending and you'll see so many different interpretations.
@@jakubkucera1973 Exactly. Thank you for understanding.
@@jakubkucera1973 It didn't change anything for me, he is still a crybaby and an idiot claimed by himself as well. It would be so much better if he made some development over the years and accept his fate, Also if Isayama didn't put the past manipulation paradox just to make him the prime reason for his own fate.... With that a good person who had character development accepted his fate and did the unimaginable to save his friends turned out to be just a bad person who can thank himself his own suffering and did no development at all nor accept his own fabricated fate.
@@chibifox7543you're free to create your own manga
@@itsaxel8088 Weird. We talk from viewpoints bro about an existing manga, tihs is like ,, He has a point so i just put the if you dont like it then... bullshit quote. Because i can't say anything that makes sense." If u have nothing to say then say nothing, it's that simple. U don't have to try to piss off someone because u have different points about something. Jesus...
Eren always craved freedom beyond the walls and once he realised how cruel the world was he realised he could never achieve his dream of being truly free and decided to destroy it out of spite while convincing himself it was the right thing to do. He was a slave to an unattainable idea of freedom. that was my interpretation, his love for mikasa was the only thing that could have stopped that but she didn’t tell him how she felt
I like this interpretation 👍
That's what Eren exactly said. He is a slave to freedom. Even though he questioned himself a lot of times, he was not able to be completely free and was not able to control what his future behold. He tried a lot of times, and it all still went down the exact path he did not want to.
And that's what said in anime ending but missing in manga ending
@@ronakkhunti6782hoenstlt i feel like the ending ruins eren for me, He comes from someone who would do whatever it takes to do the justice or save People He loves and be free, to sociopath who puts freedom above humanity, pathethic, and also it doenst rrally feels like the caracther i watches till that very moment
I often got the feeling that Eren seemed to be looking for any hint that the future the founding power gave him was not set in stone. Like asking Mikasa how she feels about him maybe hoping something might turn out differently. Or his fights against Reiner. But probably with the death of Sascha it went the "Guess the future can't be changed" route. Also Attack on Titan feels in some way like Code Geas where the MC also attains absolute power only to have himself get killed to create world peace
The "you were always looking to the distance instead of noticing the sea shell in front of you" line is such a simple yet perfect and profound way of wrapping it all up and making it all feel meaningful, especially Armin accepting Eren's sins and vowing to correct them. It's what sets the AOT finale apart from the GOT finale, even though the plots were nearly identical (hero goes dark side and has to be killed while rampaging and burning the world, etc.) because GOT didn't have this very crucial conversation.
The GOT ending was horrendous for more than just that. The problem is that several character arcs were basically tossed in the trash. Even if, say, Tyrion or Jon had this conversation with Daenerys, it would still be too abrupt of a character change for her to just turn evil like that. Proper buildup is the only way to make that ending work, which GOT didn’t do.
Def want to see a video about Ymir loving King Fritz being such a pivotal plot point. That's my main issue. Makes the whole story really seem to be about one girl needing to learn how to walk away from an abusive relationship by watching another girl chop a dudes head off.
It’s even better when you realize she decided to be a slave for 2,000 years even though she could see into the future and see that she wanted to be free all along, like she should have just killed the Titan curse when she died, but I guess then we wouldn’t have AOT
@@collateral8920I wonder how these future visions work in paths, because it exists in every moment between Ymir death and Eren death.
There’s an paradox, if Ymir sees Mikasa in visions, and ends the Titan curse, there would not exist Paths in the first place that could connect to that point in the future.
Maybe because time in paths is self contained, she did in fact break the Titan curse as soon as she entered paths, the Start and End both happened at the same time, even thought they’re 2000 years apart.
Or maybe an actually good explanation should have been provided for why ymir stayed by king fritz. Or maybe king fritz as a whole should have been entirely re written because clearly making ymir love him was not at all planned
She couldn't have broken the curse as soon as she had entered the paths, because we know she's been building the titans the entire time she was there. It is a paradox, good catch.
Yams going for this stockholm syndrome route is disgusting & gross, despite whatever he's written with ymir-karl fritz I choose to interpret it differently:
Ymir being unable to let go of future Eldians as they are all her progenies & she can't let go of the motherly love so she keeps bestowing titan powers to safeguard them with rumbling as the ultimate option coz Eldian empire's war crimes were huge & she knew there was no way anyone was going to forgive Eldians despite being born innocent.
In this intepretation of mine Ymir in a way like Eren was continuing to fight for her progeny's survival being chained to this repetive duty for 2000 yrs just like Eren who wanted to keep flattening for the sake of his people & loved ones in addition to the Walter White moment. She had to let it go just like Mikasa had to let go of Eren as an amicable solution led by peace not genocide can only work.
remember watching episode 1 season 1 in 2013. it was HYPE. the apocalyptic, world building and ahead of its time animation was really something else. At the end of the day, it's simple a fictional piece that has bought us all peak anime. let's just thank Isayama for taking us along this journey. I am sure we've all grown in many good ways.
You could also say that this show is Pieck anime
@@iantaakalla8180loooooool
2:35 I don't see that as a contradiction because what Eren and Mikasa did are two different things, Eren showed Ymir that she could make her own decisions and because of that Ymir decided to help with the rumbling as a way of revenge for all she suffered. Mikasa on the other hand showed Ymir that you can let go of someone you love and with that releasing Ymir from the pain, removing her desire for revenge so that she could rest in peace, stopping the rumbling and removing the titan powers.
Eren's will to rumble the world could be somewhat analog to the Vow of Renouncing War. When Eren saw the future at the cerimony he just changed and had to fulfill it. The same happened to the Kings of the Wall when they inherited the Founding Titan and acquired the will to "atone for Eldia sins". Maybe it is all Ymir exercising some sort of control, as she did try to keep the rumbling going.
But if someone wants to go a bit more off, could be that one is free as long as the future is unknown. If it is known it becomes deterministic.
Exactly, currently working on a video explaining this!
Thats what they dont get. Eren clearly explain inside the path there is no past present future everything happened all at once. During thatt ceremony eren suffered already. His sense of time is messed up and just had to do things according to ymir. Armin understood that weight that eren just followed orders, eren had no choice, but eren is the one who suffered the most since the ceremony, eren had to suffer the rumbling, and the fact that mikasa will end him. At the end his actikn was to make the survey corp the heroes and save the eldians. The only thing armin can do is say thank you to eren and make him feel that his suffering ismt worthless. Eren suffered the most and have to live the fututre that is already written for him. Armin understood that, the only thing he could do is not to make eren sufferjng be taken for granted. Hence he tgave thanks.
@@rainierterucha8907 But it wasn't Ymir who decided those things it was Eren himself, he set himself on the same path from the beginning because he's an "idiot." The reason he can't find a way after getting the founders power is a paradox, he wouldn't be able to have the power without following his original plan.
I interpret Eren saying that "this was the only possible outcome because he is an idiot" this way.
Eren does not want to leave Eldia or his friends fate to chance. He also believes that he is free to choose whatever he wants, but this freedom applies to his friends as well. These are the things he doesn't want to compromise on.
Eren sees the past, present and future simultaneously, in other words he can see what his choices will lead to 4 years down his remaining life. The reason that Eren doesn't want to leave the future to a partial rumbling or diplomacy is since it leaves the future uncertain, things might turn different beyond 4 years and badly so. Which is why Erens ideal future for the safety of his friends and Eldia is a Full scale rumbling.
But didn't he compromise to an 80%.
Yes and No.
In Eren’s and Armin’s conversation, Eren makes it clear to Armin that he always had the intention to do a full-scale rumbling, but he cant since Armin and others came to stop him. Eren can crush the freedom of others to ensure his but, the exception to this is his friends. Eren can easily make it so they don't go far by his powers, but that would be compromising his ideal "that his friends are also free".
Which bring me back to Erens ability to the see the past, present and future, simply put this power puts him in a path, dictated by his own ideals, choices and compromises he makes. Which is why it is fixed. It is already the most optimal path he can take.
The ideals he have are clashing with each other. His freedom and that of his friends. Which is why Eren goes for the compromise of having an 80% Rumbling, enough so that neither side can engage the other in war, in front of an allied military base that can witness the fact that Armin and others fought Eren, with Mikasa killing Eren that makes Ymir move on, breaking the curse of the titans from the Eldian race. In other words not an Ideal ending but an Ideal compromise on his part.
Isn't this an uncertain future though. Yes but him saying that they wont be one sided war from either side due to the humanity outside being leveled is not something Eren pulled out of his ass. He can see the 4 years into the future and has a vague idea of how an 80% will play out. Vague because he cant see past the timeline he chose since he got killed by Mikasa and cant see further. But this vague future is the information he shares to Historia. Who after 3 years after these events writes that while Eren told her how the future will play out, beyond that they have to make their own choices. This being Three years, near the limits of what Eren can see into.
So why did Eren say that he committed mass genocide because he is an idiot. Eren believes that if he were smarter he could have found an ideal path with the a partial rumbling, or with diplomacy. Eren believes that if he was able to be mature enough to leave things to chance they could have been a way brighter future than what he did. That 80%of humanity didnt have to die, If he was more intelligent and mature.
And there really is indeed a case to be made there. He had the power of all titans with the ability to see 4 years into the future. He was able to steamroll all other nations in a matter of days, Ymir was said to build bridges and even the 50M walls that surrounded him were build with this power. Imagine the possibilities presented there, even with the limitations of 4 years. But all this is wasted on him since he is too simple minded to be creative and too immature to compromise his ideals, to leave things to chance. Which is why he did the rumbling, with the only reason that it was 80% being because, one ideal of his "that his friends are free" clashed with his freedom.
Eren Truly is a Slave to Freedom.
It just seems too many contrivances were made making sure the characters would be interpreted as overall sympathetic that it makes the rest of the world seem uncannily villainous. It's a pretty similar discomfort to when one feels the protagonist is the only character able of feeling hope in more traditional shounen. It's just a a preference some people will not enjoy if they finish the manga and it's weird that some fans are angry that it affects some peoples ranking of the series overall. As if people cant retroactively change their opinions after being presented with more information.
Also doesn't explain why some fans ignore the rest of the shows context and actively argue that Erens story isn't a cautionary tale at all and that genocide was actually the mature and smart thing to do. There's obviously something about all the writing together that is causing a not insignificant portion of readers to extract a completely opposite moral lesson the mangaka was trying to convey.
@@burnyourhabitatYep, I really like the ending in the way I understood it, but almost no two people agree on what the correct interpretation is. Being it so easy to come to radically different interpretations is something I'd fault the author for.
@@jakubkucera1973 thats my main point. It's not like pointing out how uncanny it is means everyone will hate it, but acting as if the anime is perfect is unnecessary.
@@burnyourhabitatI'm surprised more people aren't pointing this out. This is a very similar issue to Breaking Bad where a large chunk of the fanbase saw Walter White as a badass sigma chad hero rather than the piece of garbage that the writing team and Bryan Cranston were clearly trying to portray him as. From what I've noticed, most of the people who are really vocal about the ending tend to lean toward the teen demographic of the fanbase from both series.
Where these two cases differ is who they cater to. Breaking Bad was always meant for an adult audience while Attack on Titan is a Shounen Anime that's targeted at younger teens. The series is practically catered to an audience that's bound to not understand it
@@longerhandleisntavailable it's probably because the stories rely on the audience having more empathy than the characters. Out right saying if your protagonist applied themselves to any selfless act it would mean more to the people they care about instead of selfishly thinking hurting others will somehow make those close feel safe scares people who cant self reflect. Empathetic people don't want to assume the worst in others so people who mask their cruelty fly under the radar until they don't realize how cold hearted some of their takes are. That demographic of pessimists wants life to suck so their worst actions are excused as a product of their upbringing and not an opportunity to take responsibility.
If you look at Armin as the main character the story feels a bit different.. I love these changes
I have to admit, I was nervous about watching the ending with all the talk I’ve heard about how people hated it. Me personally… I actually liked the ending. I wasn’t expecting something like Lord of the Rings where mostly everything is super happy. Things weren’t perfect, but things still felt hopeful. That things could be better, and that there were still many bright spots in this new world. It was the credits that made me shocked and pissed at first, like the whole thing was pointless. I thought that was what people were mad about. But thinking it over, I think I understand what the author is trying to convey. Everything ends. But everything will always begin again.
Lesson: war isn't caused by monsters or titans. It's the human condition.
You know, in a near future, the world might fall into WWIII. If that happens, and it won't end in annihilation later students would think that people who lived between 1945 and 202X were very naive to assume that era of wars ended. Like when you first found out that people thought that the Great War would end wars.
Life in itself is kinda pointless, if it ends with death. Period of piece is pointless, if it ends with war. Period of freedom is pointless, if it ends with tyranny.
With that kind of logic, yeah the whole thing was pointless.
People, who saw stoik, "cool", Eren as a real thing and not just a mask - hated the manga ending. People who weren't able to retrive information if it not spelled out for them - hated the ending cause they thought, somehow, that Armin approved of Eren's actions, that author wanted us to be on Eren's side... that's why literature and history classes are important, kids.
I prefer manga version of conversation. It's more inline with lost character doesn't suddenly have epiphone on why he did what he did (but composition of the scenes, order and Armin's questions painted the picture of why he might did it, how sincere his "friends" excuse, how maximalistic he always was).
But hey, I liked how manga ended in the first place, I just don't understand the need to pretend that something key was changed. It was rephrased in definitive terms, that's true.
I'll say it again: for us manga readers, we were working with a rushed chapter with crappy dialogue. You can see some of it in the video (like Armin being fine with genocide), but there were more changes to the original ending as well (some small, but still important). I used to hate the ending, but the anime fixed most of my gripes, so I've grown to accept it. Just be glad you got the finished product on first viewing. I, and others, had to sit through the original ending, then the additional pages in the physical copy, just to get to this point. It's been a long road, but the ending is finally fixed.
@@rocknatex5013 where did the notion of Armin being fine with genocide even came from? Why did he called it terrible mistake, than?!
The credits arent pointless. It showed the raw nature of the never ending cycle of hatred. Besides, even great empires fall at some point. Did you expect paradis to remain a superpower for hundreds of years?
Props to the team of writers who decided to and did change the conversation between Armin and Eren
Isayama is the one who added the script, a day before the episode came out a leaker on Twitter mentioned that Isayama had an additional new script which had ppl assuming am AOE was happening
It was even worse at one point!? Damn didn't think that was possible
@@sdog1234 You should try reading the manga if you have the time lol. There are parts in the ending that are memed to hell and back just for how dogshit it was
it wasnt that bad at the time either, manga dorks are just a whole other breed of crazy dweebs. these are the same people that sent death threats to mappa for not playing u see big girl during the declaration of war, just a bunch of socially maladjusted weirdos living cushy lives making mountains out of molehills @@lizardwithabranch
@@lizardwithabranchIt's still dog shit but less stinky then. :D
For the technology we see in the scenes, Eren's choice brought peace for thousands of years (we see a city more advanced than ours when war starts). You can't stop the cycle, but you can keep it at bay.
Eren did achieve his goals for his friends and especially Mikasa by giving them a long, peaceful and happy life. After that war resumed when the rest of the world finally caught up to Eldia and the cycle of violence and suffering continued, the world destroyed itself and finally the kid walked into the tree, the same way that Ymir did…
The manga portrayed the architecture in the "future" Paradis as much more similar to ours (e.g., typical rectangular skyscrapers) rather than the more "sci-fi" buildings we see in the anime.
For some, like myself, the Rumbling felt a bit inconsequential since the world somehow managed to recoup its numbers and strength enough to enact revenge on Paradis, seemingly only a generation after Eren's friends had died.
I honestly have no qualms with the ending's portrayal of how war is an endless cycle of vengeance. Still, for it to happen again so quickly in that timeline is unrealistic and off-putting to me.
@@lizardwithabranch"seemingly only a generation after his friends die"
I keep saying lots of manga readers say that but... 80% of the world was wiped out. Tech levels reset to Paradis all around the world.
In no way does that take only a generation or two even to get to modern blocky cities and stealth-bomber looking planes. That alone is going to require hundreds of years of rebuilding and advancement to pull off.
If making the buildings sci-fi ones helped make the original point, then I'm glad they adjusted it. But it's also addressing a complaint that, while common enough it seems, shouldn't really be a complaint if people think more than like two seconds about what they're looking at.
@handandless7115 I dunno Paradis by the end of the series was lookin like mid 19th century tech but they also have the advantage of knowledge on what can be made and what is possible and without the constant threat of titans galting their progress they could realistically get back up to that speed in maybe 100-150 years
I felt the exchange between Eren and Armin was a lot more emotional. I liked how Armin chose to take responsibility for what happened as well. A real bromance.
In season 1 episode 1, Eren‘s mom told them to run without her and live, but she cried „don‘t leave me“.
In the final, Eren wants Mikasa to live happily and be free, but he also also cried that he didn‘t want Mikasa to forget him and be with other man.
I can understand that perfectly. Because they love them, they want their loved ones to live and be happy. On the other hand, because they love them, they didn‘t want to be seperated. They are just humans afterall.
The true meaning is supposed to be a message of human nature as a whole, aside from is it good or bad, this is a reflection of humans and its extremely visible today
I forgot the details of the conversation in the manga, but this video helped me clearly see how the anime made it much better.
A few personal notes. I don’t think the reveal that Mikasa releasing Ymir goes against Eren also releasing her in episode 80. I like to imagine Ymir had three locks on herself that prevented her from moving on. Eren, Armin, and Mikasa each had a role to play in releasing one of her locks. For Eren, it was helping Ymir see that she is free to make her own choices and not follow King Fritz’s orders. For Armin, he showed Ymir what life is really about in his conversation with Zeke. For Mikasa, she gave Ymir the strength to let go of the bind her unhealthy love for King Fritz that held her from moving on from the Paths by leading by example when she finally decided to put humanity ahead of her love for Eren.
With these three things Eren, Armin, and Mikasa gave to Ymir, she was finally able to depart from the Paths and thus erasing Titans from the world.
The final lesson of the show I think is that while the cycle of conflict will renew, we must always continue seeking understanding of one another.
this three lock thing is so well said damn
Unhealthy love? What level of nonsense? I don't believe even slightly that she was in love. Perhaps if she was mentally disabled, then I'll understand. Because otherwise, they have somehow created the worst relationship in all of fiction, even worse than Harley Quinn and Joker.
@@gurnoorsekhon6402 Stockholm syndrome maybe
@@ejz93 bruh Stockholm is for kidnappers. Not for people WHO GOUGE OUT YOUR EYE. Also, in that case, the person is weaker than the abuser. She was literally God
Wow. Never thought about Armin's involvement, but that makes sense. The E-M-A trio were all necessary for Ymir to be set free. That was probably why she sent Armin into the Paths then. If only it was explained this way in the episode, it might've actually made it that much better (not saying it wasn't good, just to clarify).
I loved every season and watch ONLY the anime, everyone was telling me the end was gonna disappoint and i after seeing it i couldn't disagree more, now i understand.
The change to this scene in particular is huge and thank god Isayama did it, he is super talented i really hope we get to see another history from him.
I had heard about the "thank you for being a mass murderer" scene and was *dreading* it, so glad they changed it.
I hope not. Because he always sell his masterpiece for fanservice..the ending is pure garbage even fixed
Basically, I am not comparing the 2 or saying that the other one is better but, They really went the Lelouch and Suzaku realization in the C's World route with realization of what they are fighting for. Lelouch and Suzaku realized that there is more than what they wanted and considered that the people will keep finding happiness and that people are also involved in what they want to achieve which is to create a world of peace while Armin and Eren both saw that there is more to Paradis and Eldians, that freedom isn't achieve by one side being above from the other but, have to live their lives in a positive side (Armin's Perspective of Freedom).
yeah 'lives their lifz in a positive side' in a world surrended by walls you can't go behing, with monster to the gate to come to eat, with a people in a extermination process because they have no food.. so cute !
Code Geass definitly did it better I'd say.
Gosh, sad code Geass gets compared to this
Eren didn't create heroes out of his friends for the sake of world peace. That was never even part of the equation.
@@gezenews help yourself make sense, take your medicine please
Armin saying that they’ll be together in hell is probably my favorite part of the whole ending and it’s crazy that it’s not even in the manga
I definitely agree that this conversation change made the ending so much better, after I read the manga I was just shocked and confused with the ending and how it went.
But the anime change up is amazing and bittersweet as you said and I was sobbing through it. 😭This scene really showcases Eren and Armins friendship and gives much better closure than the manga version.
What I don’t understand is how eren could make the smiling titan leave berthdolt alone before he got the founder
Holy shit. I never outright hated the manga ending, but it was rushed and sloppy. This really was a huge ass improvement.
I really don't like when people say it accomplished nothing; As far as I can see, Titans don't exist anymore. That is massive. Sure, conflicts will go on, but never in such a world-ending manner
The Titans were never the problem
It's like saying nuclear energy is the problem when humans are the ones making bombs. The whole season 4 was garbage, Erwin fought for nothing, Floch was the only thru Eldian. Cringe avengers Levi, Mikasa, Armin and Conie didn't save Eldia only lost the advantage they had. S1-3 Was just wasted time
The suspiciously Hallucigenia shaped tree in the distance: 😅🌳
I think that what makes this ending so good is that it is able to illustrate the ugly reality we live in. Oppressed people can only be oppressed for so long before they fight back. When fighting back, moral and ethical lines can blur and those who were once the victims can become the aggressors. Many lessons can be learned from this, but for me, the lesson is to not lose sight of your humanity. Perhaps we will one day learn to solve conflicts with words and prevent individuals in power from making mistakes that will harm others and further divide.
Yeah, makes me see strong parallels in history. Ukraine and Finland fighting alongside Nazis would be a good example.
@@jakubkucera1973 Do you want to see an even better example of this? Look up the history that lead to the Rwandan Genocide.
@Erick-tv8oq Israel and Palestine too. The cycle of oppressed to oppressors, the sins of the fathers, and generational hate.
For me it's don't be stupid. And how to write a shitty ending for your own protagonist.
really reminds me of the current situation going on in gaza
this scene was the most important one. they both believed in eachother, their friendship, their faith, their bond. even if the only conclusion was linear. they tried to break the mold as they've done before.
Armin: *If I have to hear one more time… that you did this… for our people…*
Eren: *I did it for me.*
As a manga reader (which didn't remember much how the dialogues were in the manga) when I saw the episode it definitely felt way better. I noticed that it was pretty different but couldn't tell how different it was. When i finished the episode It really felt right and I was wondering why it made so much sense whereas when I finished the manga I kinda liked the ending but I wasn't too pleased by it. Now I see why and it's a really good change.
Anime-only watcher here. I was pretty disappointed in the finale _until_ this scene which largely saved it in my eyes. Good to hear what changes were made and that it was significantly improved.
What we learned is that, in conversation, the timing of a single line changes everything. Spooky!
Glad best boi Armin got to be the little ray of sunshine he is in the anime version.
I was hoping they'd fix y Ymir was waiting all this time for Mikasa instead of Ymir cos it was never foreshadowed. And how Mikasa got back to Paradis.
Stockholm Syndrome lmao, Yams what a writer you are😂
I love how armin tries to comfort eren in someway, by telling him he is not the only one responsible
What I like about the cycle of violence repeating is that it tells us to find peace and life in it. Everything will come to an end some day, but it's still beautiful today, and the world will keep spinning long after us.
No cap, when watching this scene in the anime, I got up and lost my shit. Because THANK GOD they changed this conversation. Saved the ending for me
It's cool they fixed the scene. Too bad they didn't fix the ending, though.
Well it shows how isayama is the Eren of our world.
Have to say, Reiner called it. Eren was the worst possible person to hold the founder titan
Thank you so much for making this video! I had the exact same thoughts on the ending, but people kept downplaying the significance of these changes and attacking manga readers that vehemently disliked the original ending. I hope that Anime Only’s and Manga Readers can use this video as a bridge for common ground. 🙏
Eren sacrificing himself ultimately was for the greater good because it ended the 2000 year Titan war. The wars it shows in credits is just human nature
Until the titans come back lol
@@collateral8920 but wasnt the power of titans eradicated?
@@moh8b74it was until that kid at the end goes into the tree. Who knows maybe it’ll be a new type of creature
@@moh8b74 no, the power of titan is always exist, you see the boy with a dog in the end? He was entering the tree hole and will be just like Ymir, fall down and combine with the bug, then transform and the whole shit will happen again, the boy is definitely the next Ymir. The power of titans is not an event, it is the nature of that world, it is an endless loop.
If you remember the large tree with a hole Ymir found, the ending shows the same thing happening with a new generation under a new tree grown from his corpse.
Here is something to note, the war between Eldia and Marley was ALREADY UNDERWAY when Ymir got the powers, it's been going as far back as we can see and continues as far forward as we can see. The titan-aspect comes and goes in cycles, the war rages with titans, then without, and back and forth forever.
I think it's incredibly powerful that by using violence to stop the cycle of violence, Eren only perpetuated it further in the grand scheme of things.
A detail I love from this scene is how Armin has his sleeves stained with blood
That's an amazing visual representation of the whole convo
I love when people bring up the time where they talk about their dream and how subtly they differ but align
Bruh Yeahh, love to hear your opinion on Ymir's love, honestly that's the only part for me that's hard to wrap my head around
2:28 What if Eren didn't free Ymir, but instead told her something along the lines of "Give me a chance to prove it to you." Since he had already seen the future where Mikasa was the one to free Ymir, and knew what it would take.
i like to think of it as eren gave ymir the choice to be free, while mikasa gave ymir the courage to choose to be free.
You're right. Armin always saw the world for how it was in the present, Mikasa saw the world for how to was in the past hoping she could go back to those days with Eren or get to run off with him and be together. And lastly Eren was a slave to how he saw the world because he was both looking at the past and the future but never realized the present or current situation like Armin or rather couldn't. He was really a slave for freedom and never got to enjoy that freedom he searched for. In a sense if that the case then the dream Eren and Armin shared one can say that if Armin had the power Eren had we would had a similar situation.
There’s something truly special about a story that could make someone who only wanted to be free, a slave to the very thing he wanted most.
Beautifully said
"freedom is slavery, war is peace." - INSOC from the book 1984 by George Orwell. Having a goal or motivation doesn't make you a slave. the writers of the show clearly haven't given much thought to that idea and ended up insulting oppressed people everywhere but idiots like you will eat it up and think its genius just because you never heard the idea before.
honestly i love the ending with how emotional it was to another message being war always has a price
Eren wanted the world to be in his vision as he had the power to do so aswell as accepting the fact he was an idiot at the start of it all i think is very fitting for Eren as the character he is
Armin accepting Eren and understanding him was very emotional and just shows how deep their friendship goes even when Eren wipes out 80% of humanity Armin takes part of the blame and expects to see Eren in hell showing how much he still cared for Eren till the end
Mikasa i think had it the worst but it was heart warming and heart wrenching she always loved Eren but the way she was it was hard for her to really express it like a normal person Eren knew she did but He didnt want her to be any closer to him than she needed to be for the sake of what he was after eventually to what he foresaw which was Mikasa taking his life but we also seen a alternate reality Eren WANTED to happen and it was if Eren and Mikasa went off when they were at Marley and lived out the rest of his life in solitude just the 2 of them
so its clearly obvious how badly they wanted to be with each other especially when Mikasa never moved on and kept the scarf then dying being buried along side Eren which is (sorta) what Eren wanted he wanted himself to be the only one for Mikasa realized how pathetic it was but Mikasa not even knowing this done it anyway staying by his side till her last breath
Say what you will but i think this was perfect for attack on titan's ending no war has a happy ending "bittersweet" is a word for it the end of the pain for our beloved characters and a tragic outcome and death for others but the end of a story feel free to correct me on any parts of my take on the main 3 characters here
According to me the anime did provided a better ending than the manga, however based on reading the manga and now seeing the anime, I feel the ending would have been more justified if explained in the following way :-
1. Instead of ymir love with the king angle, it would have better shown that she was a slave to the king and does not have the courage to betray him. Thats why even after ymir death she was not free and was forced to make different kind of titans for around 2000 years.
2. Further why Mikasa was the symbol of freedom for her because in the end she actually countered her will to protect Eren and was the one to take Eren's life. This goes against her Ackerman blood heritage and moreover this will connect with the conversation that Eren had with her earlier in the series. When Erwn called Mikasa a slave to her blood line.
3. Why Eren had to destroy 80% humanity - In this Eren part was halfly shown correctly in the anime that he actually feels that was the right thing to do. Moreover they should have added that Eren wants to end the curse of titan, so that Armin could live beyond just the 13 years and so that no can distinguish b/w Eldians and rest of the people. Further seen the future memories Eren knew this was the only way.
4. Now why Ymir sided with Eren? - cause she believed Eren could provide her the freedom she was seeking. For 2000 years she saw that the eldians have been used by the rest of people as means of war, similar to what she was to King Fritz. One has to understand that all eldians were her children and hence she wanted to protect them as well, that's why she sided with Eren as he wanted to kill everyone outside the walls. This goes with the story as well as she was the one who was fighting with scouts at the end with different titans. This gives meaning to Eren character also as he cannot avoid the will of Ymir when she sends the past titans to ensure that the rumbling continues.
Further she was still a slave to the king as by protecting the eldians she was still ensuring the survival of the kingdom that was established by the King Fritz. Finally seeing Mikasa going against her blood bound and killing Eren gave her the true meaning of freedom, saving the 20% humanity(other than the eldians) and ending her curse on the eldians. Thus ensuring peace.
Maybe Ishiyama wanted to convey this only however was not able to guide this properly. In the end you have to give credit to his writing.
Not many people talks about this but at the end Eren was able to do what he had promised earlier in the series that was to destroy each and every Titan. Further though the scouts went against Eren in the end they never deviated from there objective to protect the humanity from the titans.
I wish your comment is seen by the entire community and used as an example to critique a show's ending. Not only are you providing clear reasons, you explained your comments in a non-ignorant manner while being respectful to Isayama 👏
I’ve read the last few chapters right after finishing the last episode and I agree with the manga ending being rather unsatisfying. People already talked about how the changes improved it a lot but I thought the pacing was also a bit off. Everything happened so fast. Characters deaths felt like something you see in one panel and then move on like Hanjis for example. I feel like in the anime they turned each page into 5-10 minutes of animation to really empathize what’s going on.
"The last episode of AoT is finally here, and I wanted to break down..."
yeah me too bro me too
Real
Not gonna lie, I laughed and cried when Armin I said "If it's real, I guess I'll be seeing you in hell." It was a real friendship moment and I don't know why I laughed, but tears definitely followed. Edit: As for the ending, to me if felt like they were saying history repeats itself. And with a random boy walking up to that tree, who knows what power is there to possibly flatten the world again.
I just saw the episode yersterday and thought the ending was slightly different. Thank you for your video. I now know why it felt that way.
As the universe is deterministic, everything had to happen the way it did - as bleak as that was. Kind of like Paul's prescience in Dune - all the power, no control, a slave to freedom. Sending that titan away from Bertholt and towards his mother so that things happened in a set way shows this. Although it could be argued whether the extent of his genocide could be lessened if he didn't care for his friends to come out on top.
Eren also mentions all that power went to someone dumb like him. Everything maybe could've gone better if it went to someone else, but everything that happened was just meant to be - so there was no changing that either.
I think Mikasa loving Eren unconditionally but stopping him is why Ymir could stop the titans after loving King Fritz unconditionally - she just needed someone to show it could be done. That you can go against the one you love for the greater good.
One can only hope that the cycle of hatred eventually ends one day, and maybe it will. But it will likely continue for thousands of years. There is nothing that could've truly stopped that cycle. Again, it could be argued that things could've been more peaceful globally if an outcome was chosen where Eren's friends didn't come out on top. And maybe that's a route he didn't take due to his selfishness/stupidity - and why Armin feels the need to share the burden for being chosen instead of a large portion of humanity.
knowledge of your own deterministic behavior is a paradox
every time you are made aware of what you're going to do next you're actively changing the premise
example :
"you're going say dog next"
"I know that now so I'll say cat"
go back in time
"you were going to say dog next but then you opted for cat"
"I know that now so I'll say bird"
and so on so forth
@@NienteFantasia indeed
@@melkormedia7413 right so I fail to see how Eren was anything but an idiot, unless we assume this ending was the absolute best case scenario possible considering Eren's requirements
@@NienteFantasia Yeah, well maybe it was. Maybe he saw it was the best and only path available to him (where he could save his friends). Maybe he realised how he was stupid because if someone else took his place in history, things might have turned out better
I think you're mostly on point, but there's one thing I feel people get wrong about isayamas message. He clearly expresses that the ideal of a hateless world is impossible, it's utopic, people will always fight. It's not about breaking the cycle, but skipping it. Even though eventually, war will happen again, as we see in the credits, it's worth fighting for the short term peace. You fight to prevent war in your lifetime, and trust that your descendents will in theirs.
This goes in theme with Erwin's speech, and it goes in theme with Armin's speech about appreciating the little things. You do not need to solve war, to find grand peace for the world; just find peace for the day. It's further cemented by the idiocy of eren's plan, sacrificing many lives for an unattainable, grand peace, instead of retreating with mikasa and finding his own peace.
Man i miss you so much eren
It must been really hard to come to a closure to such a story.
In the end I knew it was not going to be a "good" or "bad" ending for anyone. just an end to a circle and the beggining to another. But I realy liked it, cried a lot.
I felt it was saddening realistic the circle of hate. But I would like to know more of their after war life though!
thanks to you i realized when armin said he wanted to have a free world too that he meant it free from titans (peaceful one too probably in that sense, but back then he didnt know there were humans outside) outside the walls back then as a kid. first time i actually thought he also wanted to kill all the humans outside the walls when he said it to eren maybe because he wanted to make eren not feel as bad, i was kinda overwhelmed with all this so that was the first impression i got. knowing there was truth behind armins words definitely feels better, even if he meant it differently to erens freedom
Eren`s head is screwed up not only from the nonlinear time, he is also connected to every eldian. So every single person he kills, he is accualy experiencing it. I cannot even comprehend how strong of a mentality you need, in order to bear this. And next is hell...
After watching like 3 video explanations on the series something finally clicked. I don't know how I missed this my first time watching the series. I didn't understand what Eren's main goal was in killing everyone else besides the Eldians, aside from a base level. Obviously he hates the Marleyans because of what grief they caused, but on a deeper level he wanted to see what Armin showed him, but after Eren escaped the walls he could only see more anger, and couldn't look past the people, at the world surrounding those people. Armin looked past, but Eren couldn't do that.
Thanks for making things make sense, Collateral!
I didn't know they stretched it out!
I thought everything is the same, I was unfamiliar with it for a sec when I watched it
Thank you for pointing it out!
I read the manga a few years back because I was impatient to know what happens. Unfortunately, when I'm invested in a story, I tend to simply rush forward like a bull in a china shop to find out what happens next in the plot, without really stopping to appreciate the finer details. The audacity of the scene in the manga went completely over my head when I read it - but maybe that's a good thing, since that meant I could enjoy the scene in the anime both untainted by its initial depiction and unplagued by the impatience to find out what happens next. Glad to have content like this that breaks it all down, really helps appreciate the material and the decision-making behind it more.
Havent read the manga yet, but i found the ending beautifull. It really hit me.
Still didn't fix everything. there is the "I had to kill my mother to give myself the drive" bit which fell completely flat, and the retcon of Eren seeing Mikasa as a lover rather than a sibling, despite the buildup between Eren and Historia in both anime and Manga.
2:07, The king Ymir loved is not Karl Fritz, Karl Fritz was the 145th king who made the vow of renouncing war, (he has a good intention to break the cycle, but it likely won't work since not all Eldians would die). The ancestor Fritz doesn't have a first name, IIRC. Great video BTW!
I always liked the manga ending, partly because I could see the intention behind it. I always thought that they needed to flesh this out more but I was happy with what I got, now I’m glad that this convo finally got fleshed out.
This, and the added line from Historia in her ending speech that “This wasn’t entirely Eren’s fault… this outcome was brought about by all of our actions” is what really sells me on the ending and really puts into perspective Armin’s desire to shoulder Eren’s sin as well. They’re not just being good friends trying to bail out Eren, they’re taking accountability which I might argue is the best path to learning from their mistakes, and ensuring that the truth isn’t lost to history as ‘Eren Jaeger killed everyone because he was innately bad… and perhaps because the eldians are innately bad.’ Seasons 1-3 are essentially his villain backstory, and perhaps he wouldn’t have committed such an atrocity if any people were a little more accountable.
I agree w this
One thing I really want answered, is whether or not Eren could see a future Attack Titan. His ability allows him to access memories of future titans in his lineage... So, did Eren experience the memories of another, or did he know that it dies with him? Curious.
He knew it died with him
I strongly agree. Conversation in the anoke felt good and the emotions hit right
One thing I'm slightly confused by, did Eren go Doctor Strange on this situation? I can't tell if he's played out this scenario multiple times trying to find a way to make the ending better, but every time at least 80% of humanity was wiped out no matter what he tried. The timeline is fuzzy for me in regards to the "time travel" in the series. I also don't really understand Ymir's motivations. I agree that her having Stockholme is a pretty stupid reason for all this happening, but I don't understand anything regarding what Mikasa did and her importance.
AOT is in a deterministic timeline meaning if you see the future it’s truly set in stone. The implications of this is that every action every character takes is pre determined, all thanks to yimr wanting to test mikasa for some reason
I think he kept trying to do things that contradicted his memories of the future and always failed. I think that was the point in the event where he tried not to save Ramzi, and then ended up breaking down after he did.
For the most part I think Eren interpreted his future memories as necessarily unavoidable, in part because he’s an idiot, in part because on top of being an idiot he is now permanently unable to think clearly due to having his entire lifetime and beyond happen all the time.
Mikasa was what Ymir could have been had she simply let the spear hit King Fritz. Mikasa knew her love for Eren was dangerous and was able to do the right thing regardless. Ymir knew the same thing but instead needlessly sacrificed herself when she could have set herself free.
@@waves2378i think another layer is that Mikasa is not a slave to freedom since she is just "normal", and not a godlike being like eren and ymir. She cant do "anything" so she can still make choices. Gods are like billionaires, their only limit is their emotional stability, and normal people have to constantly condition their emotional stability because they constantly face limits.
@@gezenewsHe had to be showed the same future, otherwise it wasn't his future. Him seeing the future was in part a reason why it really was his future. This is a perk of the predetermination.
I was so confused before why some fans thought the story was pro-genocide/fascism. But indeed, these changes are huge. The final season of the anime felt like a metaphor for losing a friend to mental illness, and how Armin behaved when finally getting to talk to Eren was so touching. Joining him in hell… is like admitting that even though your friend is awful and you cannot agree with them, you can’t help but still love them.
I really hope this was the true intention of the author, because it is why this series had much more emotional depth than I was expecting.
I like how you pointed out how Armin's present-focussed perspective differs from that of Eren's future-focussed perspective during that 'seeing the ocean' scene. Armin was fascinated by the shell and the water. He was in the present and appreciated what was in front of him. His dream was fulfilled right then and there. But Eren was cursed with what he thought was knowledge and kept looking into the distance, failing to see what was in front of him. In this sense, you can argue that being too long-sighted is just as harmful as being short-sighted. Sometimes people go so far to achieve a 'greater good' or an idealised future that they neglect what the people around them feel at the present moment. Armin and Zeke realized in the Paths that people fought to survive not because they wanted eternal peace or an idealised version of freedom. They did it (most of them unknowingly so) so that they can experience the present if not just one more time. The thing that they wanted the most was right in front of them. Zeke wanted to keep playing catch. Eren, Armin and Mikasa just wanted to be together again. There were even constant flashbacks to when they were kids running towards that tree. It wasn't until the end that they all realised just how precious those moments were. Despite the fact that they were stuck behind the walls, despite the idea that 'humanity' was constantly being threathened by titans, those fleeting moments remained precious. These present moments are just as precious, but most don't realise it.
Im so glad mappa took their sweet time with this final part, the end to a long series is one of the most important parts
In episode 80 eren said Ymir was waiting for someone but he never said waiting for me. Eren understood that Ymir was looking for/needed somebody to free her and we know it couldn’t have been Eren because she wasn’t yet free but that doesn’t mean Eren isn’t a large piece in her being freed because without him mikasa couldn’t do what she did to free her. Eren also touched Ymir and saw her entire story also most likely feeling her emotions so he gained an understanding Zeke couldn’t.
Everyone be talkin about the conversation between Armin and Eren while I be like "So Levi gets to butcher Annie for his squad right? He's not just gonna let her walk away after all the shit she pulled and enjoyed it right?", yeah big sadge for me man... T-T
yeah the whole story treats their past losses as just…collateral damage 💀 eren completely forgot about his mom apparently, jean forgot marco, levi…only connie had some human feelings but he was treated like HE was the crazy person
@@immkk1125
THANK YOU! Glad to see someone else could see it, peep just forgot everyone else that died BRUTALLY for them to get where they are, they also seem to conveniently forget some of the disgusting people that DID those things, like I get they usually had bigger issues but when shit settled down there was no reason NOT to tie up loose ends, people like Levi an others who lost so much deserved at LEAST that much, the fact the disgusting people like Annie just get to walk away an be happy like churns my damn stomach man...
@@platinum5807 true true, even if they weren’t killed, prosecuted or even just screamed at, the least we could have was levi remembering people (other than erwin) and have the others just express their grief, anything to show us that they didn’t just forget.
Annie and the others, they were just kids and i can really understand the emphasis that the story had on that. they were kids who were brainwashed into believing they had the right to just do that. that doesn’t mean that brainwashing takes away your empathy and feelings of regret.
but other than reiner, who was clearly a self deprecating pos once he became an adult (yet funnily enough he never did anything to rebel or change the way mahr treated eldiens from what i remember) annie and the others just didn’t seem to show remorse in the extras.
and again, i dont even want revenge since that wouldn’t solve anything, but ending the story on the importance of « true love » or whatever while obviously neglecting all the other emotions…yuckkkkk
so yeah ofc they’re be another war 😩 you guys never solved shit and didn’t even heal your traumas
@@immkk1125 Did you guys not watch episode 84? There is a whole chapter in the manga before they try to steal the plane where they argue with each other about who did what and Reiner & Annie reveal they killed Marco and they conclude that they're all really fucked up and responsible for people dying but they just need to stop Eren.
ye i defiantly felt like eren was made out to be some kind of hero at the end of the manga while the anime kind of gave you a "what would it be like if your childhood friend was the devil?"
everyone says the cycle will occur, but my (potential) copium is that the boy to start the next cycle seems innocent, and lives in "freedom" (or, moreso than Eren... no walls, etc) and is not a "slave" like Ymir was.
So, maybe the cycle does repeat, but the next cycle could be drastically different or peaceful because the next person to find the power of the titans is innocent. Also the boy has a scarf and kind of looks like a small Eren so maybe its a mix between the motherly instinct of Mikasa & the real freedom Eren always wanted as a child imbued into this figure that makes the next titan cycle "different" ... or at least, end differently.
In that sense, Eren said screw humanity; I just want my friends to live and die of old age. After that, Eren knows all of humanity will doom itself, bombings will happen, and the titans will be awoken again, but his friends lived long lives. The titans come back, but this time the founder of titans is one of (assumed) innocence and purity, that would cause a different, positive, cycle to start.
I’m anime only. When the manga end came out, i wondered why people hated it so much. When the Anime ending came out, and was absolutely beautiful and cathartic, I was REALLY confused why manga readers hated it so much. This video clears that confusion. “Thank you for being a mass murderer for us” is a wild sentence. Talking about Mikasa’s feelings after Eren says he’ll kill 80% of humanity, is even worse. Armin killed hella people too. The “i’ll see you in hell, friend” is so much better. u the goat for clearing that up
As an anime only, i feel like the ending could have been better. The last 2 episodes didn’t live up to the hype of the rest of the show imo.
As an anime watcher, thank god they fixed it.
The nuke in the end credits takes place 2 thousand years later as you can tell by the buildings and how far technology had advanced so it was more pointing to how war will always be a thing as long as there is more than 1 person in the world.
2:30 Eren was the one to make her realize she wasn't a slave, that she could make her own choices, leading to her choosing to side with Eren's plan and start the Rumbling. However, Mikasa being "the one to release her" might mean that was the one that truly freed her when she killed Eren, erasing the Power of the Titans from the world and letting Ymir finally rest in peace.
Well, i think eren just want to see outside the world to be empty without people. Eren wish is that outside the world is the world that so vast without the touch of human/titan. That's the reason eren want to kill all titan in the first place, so that eren could travel world freely and then eren realize that outside the island is just more human. That's why he just want to erase everything outside. It's just like kid ranting that everything he hoped for just different. That's why Armin accepted that it was his fault to give eren the idea of empty outside world.
To summarized it eren just a psycho
1million views yet only 11k subs is WILD, I look forward to the day your subs reflect what you actually deserve.