Shingeki no Kyojin – 07

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Peekaboo~

Unfortunately I’ll be a bit late posting for SnK and RDG next week because I’ll be spending all weekend at Anime North. I’ll be doing some coverage of the event when it’s over so stay tuned for tons of photos. If any of you guys happen to be going just drop me a line (twitter, e-mail, the comments section, whatever) and we can meet up!

Mikasa’s reaction to hearing about Eren’s death was a little bit surprising. I suppose I was expecting a more flashy breakdown from her instead of just shutting off her emotions and numbly pressing forward. I like how they drew out Armin’s confession about Eren’s death as long as possible and refused to show us Mikasa’s face as she reacted to the news. When we did get to see what face matched that calm voice, it became clear that something wasn’t quite right. She sounded like her usual level-headed self, but the spark in her eyes was extinguished. It still makes a lot of sense for her character, yet it caught me off guard.
This show is just too good at surprising me.

Without Eren, her life has essentially lost all meaning, and she needs to find another reason to live. Instead of finding a new source of hope, she decides to still cling to the image of Eren as what keeps her going. She could have decided to live for Armin, her squad mates, or even to get revenge – yet she chooses someone who is dead as her source of inspiration out of all of these options. Eren will always be her everything. I’m a bit hazy on exactly why her body sprung into action and saved her from the Titan though. Was it her memory of Eren pushing her body into fight or flight mode, or were the sudden shots of red cells hinting at something in her genes giving her impeccable battle instincts? The latter would explain why she’s so damn good at killing Titans. Perhaps it was something Eren’s dad injected in her as well.

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About to become Mikasandwich

For what it’s worth, I have a wild guess at what those injections Eren’s dad gave him were. I’m going to guess he gave that shot to Eren so that in the event of being eaten by a Titan, he would be able to take over that Titan. I think this new Titan-killing Titan might actually be Eren taking over the one that ate him. It looks nothing like the Santa-Titan, but I’m assuming that taking over a Titan could mean that your luscious hair could take over as well. Whatever this new beast is, it adds a whole new player to the game. There are endless possibilities! If more Titans like this show up, then the humans can be saved. This could be the ace up their sleeves!

…Unfortunately, this is Attack on Titan and things are rarely so simple. He seems like a great guy now, but it’s hard to trust a guy taller than your house with an extra set of teeth, isn’t it? I’m really excited about how this new Titan will spice up the story and help/hinder/confuse the soldiers. Aside from Mikasa and Armin wanting to kill themselves, this was one of the best parts of the episode. I’m all for character growth and drama (even Armin kinda had a spine this week!) but sometimes you just want two giant, muscular men to kill each other.

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The fact I think he’s kinda good-looking for a Titan worries me.

I was mostly stunned into silence this week so I don’t have a whole lot to add that wasn’t already there. It was yet another brilliant episode filled with drama, fighting, and Potato Girl being Potato Girl. My one complaint is that we didn’t need the extra sulking at the beginning. I think we get how demotivated everyone is just by looking at them, there’s no need to show us people killing themselves with guns and moping around rooftops for too long. As much I love watching people being tormented, after a while it can get excessive. Yes, even for me. Will next week be another lesson in “don’t get your hopes up because everyone you love will die” or will the soldiers make it out relatively unscathed? Only the pomegranate knows.

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Oh holy pomegranate, tell me your secrets

Preview: Time to break in and get some gas to recharge! This should be an intense battle where the humans will have to be wily little buggers to find a way around close-quarter combat. On the bright side, the Titans they’re facing are (relatively) short. That’s not to say they’ll get out scot free though…

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I hope she’s just crying because the meat’s gone.

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A neuroscience graduate, black belt, and all-around nerd. You'll either find me in my lab or curled up in my rilakkuma kigurumi watching anime.
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18 Responses to “Shingeki no Kyojin – 07”

  1. skylion says:

    I hope she’s just crying because the meat’s gone.

    Have faith in the meat!

    Yeah, I share your complaint about the mope fest at the beginning, and Mikasa’s speech was just the thing to kick them in the pants. This is deeply underscored in how half-heartedly she believed in it.

    I find it very positive that she affirmed her life in the moment that Eren encouraged her to fight for it. That is her fetter to everything. Like so much in this show, it puts me on my seat’s edge.

    Eren “took over” Santa-Titan (aka RMS-Titan, being a long time GNU/Linus user, I found his appperence to be rather funny)? Thaaaaaaat is a bit of a stretch at this point. So, unless the Holy Pomegranate speaks, we shall have to see the plot unfold…

    • BlackBriar says:

      Have faith in the meat!

      No, it’s over. Meat is forever lost to us. Now all there is to do is hope we don’t lose Sasha as well. Mikasa can hold her own without a doubt.

  2. Highway says:

    I don’t know if there’s actually much I can say about this show. It sure is exciting, if nothing else. It seems any time you want to step back and say “Why did that happen?” the answer is “F*** Yeah! That’s why!” It’s just so inconsistent. Sometimes the Titans can snatch someone out of the air with ease, other times they’re completely befuddled while humans zip around them (I would imagine that one’s degree of plot armor has to do with this). And let’s not go into the amazing personal gravity field they have (again)…

    I can go along with the gray haired bearded titan that ate Eren being transformed into Bishie-titan, I guess, since they’ve talked about them having a super fast regeneration. It’s not like that makes less sense than the rest of the show.

  3. Irenesharda says:

    “It’s hard to think when someone’s trying to kill you. We human beings aren’t wired to be rational and creative when we know our lives are in danger of a swift and violent end. The body has definite ideas of which survival strategies it prefers to embrace, and those are generally limited to “rip threat to pieces” or “run like hell.” No thinking need be involved, as far as our instincts are concerned.”
    -Jim Butcher, Small Favor

    “But in the end one needs more courage to live than to kill himself.”
    -Albert Camus

    “Somehow I have to hang on to the vision that first inspired me,
    To the hope that fired me, when the world admired me!

    …Somehow I’ve got to go on, till the evil has been defeated –
    Till my works completed –
    I will not be cheated!

    God, you must help me carry on!
    When it seems all hope has gone, I have got to carry on!”
    -Dr. Henry Jekyll, Jekyll & Hyde

    “Things are not always what they seem; the first appearance deceives many; the intelligence of a few perceives what has been carefully hidden.”
    -Phaedrus

    Another good episode, and things are getting curiouser and curiouser. I have not read any spoilers or the manga, but I’ve had my suspicions about what the Titans really are and why they do what they do and how they’ve survived, since this story began, and I have a feeling that I’m right. And it seems like I will be answered next episode.

    Very somber episode this time with much despair and horror for our young teens. I don’t have much to say about this episode, but it was very good. Mikasa almost loses her survival instinct and hope after hearing of Eren’s death. However, she does finally get snapped out of it by a very strange Titan…?

    I do love how it is all the ones who have never faced the Titans before are in despair, but all the other ones who have already stared death in the face, are regrouping and trying to plan. Sasha and Mikasa are wonderful here, and even Armin seems stronger. All of them are trying to spur them all to action. They really don’t have that much to go, they’ve already saved the populace, now all they need to do is get enough gas to get themselves over the wall. They really just need a little courage, hope, and perhaps a little devil-may-care attitude, and they might be able to pull this off. They’ll die anyway if they just sit there, so they might as well risk it. And it looks like they’re getting some help along the way from a very unexpected source.

    But I think a big shock might happen next episode, so I will be purposefully avoiding spoilers like crazy! (Believe me, it’s harder than it looks. You have to avoid comments, forums, everything for this show!)

    I give this episode a 8.75/10.

    • skylion says:

      I’ve been spoiled a bit, I just don’t know how accurate it is. So, yeah, just stay off leaky sites.

      Ah, a Jim Butcher quote. Excellent taste. Now that’s a novel series that would make an awesome anime.

      • Krono says:

        I would absolutely love if someone did that. If they did it right I would be a forever loyal fan

  4. Gecko says:

    (I found the OP with lyrics a week ago and decided to catch up, so yeah! I’m hooked now!)

    My guess is that Eren took over the Titan that ate him, as well. That might be the case with some of the “abnormals” athough I doubt it will be the case with all of them. Came up with a better idea. Titans eat the humans, but somehow split into the original and the human becomes an extra Titan. So Eren became a Titan, but a crazy one at that and was able to keep some skills/momentum to kill Titans. Other than that, Titans just chill and don’t need to eat??

    The mope fest was depressing, but I do think it underscored how they feel- super hopeless. I saw it more as a reality type of thing- they’re out of gas, they’ve lost all hope, it’s the end. And Mikasa tries to get them going, but even she didn’t have the energy at that moment to do the trick. Just one person alone going and doing his/her thing isn’t really ever enough- it took the first few to follow her to really get everyone going. And it was such a contrast in comparison to the energy they gathered.

    • BlackBriar says:

      I think what you said in the last paragraph is what makes soldiers develop PTSD over time. Walking a battlefield while watching your teammates die around you is enough to psychologically break you.

  5. BlackBriar says:

    Since her parents’ death, Mikasa became heavily emotionally reserved so her reaction to Eren’s death suited her well. A facade created over time and her acting emotionally detached is as much a part of her as it is for Koko Hekmatyar hiding herself behind a smile.

    I have to go with your idea on what Eren was injected with. To me, the Titan acted in a way I’d expect him to be once he got close enough to one, like he did with the Colossal Titan. And certain degree of intelligence or not, those things are not astute enough to know hand to hand combat. If it is true, his features are enveloping it as well.

    As much I love watching people being tormented, after a while it can get excessive.

    Wow, that’s a rare thing to hear coming from you. Yeah, it was depressing but realistic enough for me to believe. This is what I imagine people go through when they’re in the middle of a war zone with nowhere to turn. It’s on the edge you find out how people really are and those who take their own lives for an easy way out are truly cowards.

  6. HannoX says:

    If Eren took over the Titan that ate him and turned it into the Titan-killing Titan, this show has jumped the shark. Why would his father inject him with something that would allow him to take over a Titan? He expected Eren to be eaten? Titans hadn’t attacked for a hundred years! Why wouldn’t Eren’s father inject him with something that’d make him faster, stronger and tougher to go outside the walls to hunt and kill Titans?

    I’ll continue watching for now, but this show appears to have taken, for me, a ridiculous turn.

  7. belatkuro says:

    …he would be able to take over that Titan. I think this new Titan-killing Titan might actually be Eren taking over the one that ate him.

    How did that Titan go from this to this then?

    All will be revealed next episode. Though I think the internet is already crawling with spoilers since day 1 so you probably know the answer to this new Titan. I’m not gonna be the one to spoil though.

  8. Namika says:

    That titan is actually Eren, I’m so sure of that. Those eyes gave it away. But if it’s really him… I want him to be able to return to a bishie~ TT^TT
    And Mikasa… something’s up with her. I noticed, when she killed that man who kidnapped her, the moment she launched towards him the wooden floor broke and the tiles were flying everywhere. Also, I think the handle of the knife broke too. Smells fishy, Grisha. What was he doing with his children???

    According to my BFF, next episode must be epic. I don’t know in a good way or a bad way, but it will be. Oh god. Knowing SnK….. 80% it’ll be something bad TT^TT
    I want Eren back, SnK just isn’t fun without him 😀

    • BlackBriar says:

      Not just the eyes but there’s also the color of the hair even if it’s longer and it acts in a way I’m sure Eren would if he could take on a Titan with his bare hands.

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