Dedicating my heart…

…to Hajime Isayama-sensei. お疲れ様です and thank you for all these cruel, beautiful years.

As I listen to “Shinzou wo Sasageyou” on repeat, tears streaming down my face, heart crushed by the rumbling of a million Colossal Titans, I want to make just a few comments on chapter 138-139. I won’t go into a full-blown review / analysis here because there is just too much to dissect and I’m still not quite over the series ending. Overall, I was satisfied by it, and I respect Isayama-sensei’s vision as a creator.

I want to address the one topic I particularly liked, and the one that seems to be the most polarizing online.

On Eren and Mikasa

I am a sucker for tragic endings. The whole “actually he loved her secretly but had to hide it” trope. So I loved this. That kiss was unexpected, macabre and totally reciprocated because 1) people can move facial muscles in the moment before/right after their death and 2) contrast to his open-eyed, open-mouthed expression when Gabi blew his head off.

But what I liked more was the 138 dream sequence where, from my understanding, Eren and Mikasa got their whole “happily ever after for four years” just before he died. Given the sequencing, that was Eren’s last experience before his death. Finally escaping the horror to live four years with the love of his life. I think that’s sweet, and Mikasa got to experience it too, so their relationship did have a semblance of resolution and closure.

The part about Eren’s character choices being motivated by her confession (or lack thereof) is where it gets a bit iffy for me. I would have preferred him having stronger motivations. But let’s cut him some slack. Remember, he’s a 19-year-old boy who’s led a traumatizing life. He just wants an escape. And if some divine being offered you the following routes to live the remainder of your limited life A) run away and live peacefully with your crush in the mountains or B) alienate all your friends and kill 80% of the world’s population… which would you choose? (By you I mean all you judgemental fools who assassinate Eren’s character for being, basically, well, human. Because I will say it now, I would pick A. I would not have the mental or emotional fortitude to go with B. Hell, if I were Eren, I would have tried confessing to Mikasa myself, seen if I could make her go with A)

To those complaining about the lack of buildup and say Eren’s confession is too sudden… there were plenty of subtle hints throughout that showed Eren cared very deeply for Mikasa. I feel people simply chose to disregard them, because they wanted something more in-your-face. But this is, first and foremost, a Japanese manga. Japanese culture is not like American or European culture, so it’s unfair to judge a Japanese romance by the same standards you would judge an American one. People don’t say “I love you” outright very often, even to their parents or kids. People aren’t always that open with physical affection either. It’s a more reserved society, and romance can be a bit more reserved too. It’s all about subtlety and small actions, and yes, a lot of times people don’t confront their feelings, they don’t communicate in a straightforward manner due to the high-context culture. If they did, 99% of shoujo manga series would be resolved within 3 chapters.

So I think Eren and Mikasa’s relationship – where so much is at stake for them due to the closeness of their bond – will naturally tend to hover on the side of ‘let’s pretend to be platonic’ rather than ‘let’s confront this and go romantic’… especially given all the other titan-sized bullshit they have to deal with in the background. Hell, it’s not just Eren. Even Jean went years without confessing to Mikasa. Armin (go Armin!) was the only one of the main cast who had the guts to say anything direct to his crush. Love and relationships simply aren’t at the forefront of any of these characters’ minds. Except Franz and Hannah apparently, and look what happened to them. Oh, and Nicolo-Sasha. But some wounds are too recent to reopen.

I also think that Eren probably genuinely did not believe Mikasa could love him back romantically. We see when he’s younger he gets mad that Mikasa treats him like a ‘son’ or ‘younger brother’. After the near-kiss in chapter 50, he changes, but you still see a sense of self-loathing remaining. So when Mikasa called him family in chapter 122, it probably reiterated his own beliefs and insecurities, that someone like her could never see someone like him as a man.

And you know what? I think that’s fine for his character. At the heart of it, Eren is an over-emotional crybaby prone to insecurity, self-hate and angry outbursts. Cool, stoic, hands-on-the-table Eren with his man-bun was all bluster, all a facade, to do what he had to do. I actually appreciate that Eren is such a flawed and weak character. It makes him human. And the people who deny this and hate on him for it lack empathy, in my opinion.

I also do not think Eren is a ‘simp’ or any of those other derogatory terms being thrown around, with relation to his breakdown in front of Armin. I feel people miss the fact that 1) chronologically that conversation with Armin happened before his dream-life with Mikasa, in which he categorically goes against his selfish wishes and tells her to forget him 2) Armin is his best friend, the one person in the world he can be honest to, and 3) Armin totally egged him on to get a rise, and Eren – who was going through absurd amounts of stress at the time – gave in and had one moment of weakness, where he spilled his guts to his best friend. That’s what best friends are for.

That’s fine. Eren, you’re allowed to be weak and throw a tantrum and cry. Armin forgives you for it, and Mikasa would forgive you for it. And it is a perfectly reasonable, human response to not want your future wife (if the world went as Eren would have liked it to) to immediately move onto another horse man. It’s okay to feel a jealous and possessive, the important thing is that to Mikasa, Eren did tell her to move on. Despite his personal desires, he prioritized her happiness.

On the note of my beloved stallion, may I also make five points.

1) That scene with Connie. I had to take a break and bawl my eyes out for ten minutes. I was 90% convinced at the time he would revert back (my coping mechanism), but it was still heart-stopping to see that happen. Thank god (or rather, Eren) you’re back, Jean.

2) He got even hotter after the second time-skip, how is this possible, you go Jean, rocking that Willy Tybur hairstye!

3) I kind of liked him with Pieck but clearly he still has a thing for Mikasa given he’s obsessing over his hair on the way to visit her

4) It is now my personal headcanon that Eren knew Mikasa might end up with Jean eventually, and so – in a moment of childish jealousy – he told Mikasa to cut her hair. Because you know, if it was getting in the way of her 3DMG, a more practical suggestion would be to have her tie it up like Sasha or Historia.

5) He deserves all the happiness in the world. I hope his daydream comes true and Mikasa eventually gets over Eren and accepts his love. I think the manga was left deliberately open-ended but kind of pointed towards the possibility of this happening.

ANYWAYS. Coming back to Eren and Mikasa. Their relationship started and ended with violence and love, with beauty and cruelty. Those paradoxical themes have defined it throughout.

I also think the Eren-bird reincarnation was also a beautiful scene. I have seen way too many memes about this which I think are hilarious (e.g. bird!Eren shitting on Jean’s much-labored hairstyle the moment he meets Mikasa) but I personally believe that deceased souls can take on the form of small birds / animals / insects to visit and bless us during our lives. And that’s precisely what I think Eren did. I do not think he’s going to be flapping around, pecking out the guys of every guy who talks to Mikasa. But I think he visited her in this moment, to wrap the scarf around her one last time, as promised. And he’s going to show up again at Mikasa and Jean’s wedding day

Other random thoughts

• Ymir Fritz loved the King? I understand the theories around Stockholm’s Syndrome, but that type of abusive relationship is not love, nor can it be equated to what Eren and Mikasa had. How I analyze this is that Ymir only knew that type of twisted, one-sided, conditional love… but Mikasa showed her a purer, selfless, unconditional love, and it inspired her to break free of her own shackles, teaching her that her own self-perceived ‘love’ was actually very unhealthy and wrong.
• Reiner will just never die, lol. At least he seems happy in life now.
• Sashaaaaaa!!! Erwin!!!! Hange!!!!! Petra!!!!!!
• Okthnxbye Hallucigenia-chan you were kind of creepily cute I guess?
• Armin looking goooood rocking that Levi haircut.
• I kind of wished Levi had died to join all his friends and loved ones. But maybe he just opened a tea shop somewhere, and bros out with Mikasa occasionally
• I am actually happy for Historia. She seems to have gotten over her own toxic parental relationships and is enjoying family life, being a good mother to an adorable baby girl. I want to reiterate here that it is NOT a waste for a character to get pregnant and give birth a child. I believe that giving birth is an amazing and transformative experience, and being a mother is one of the noblest professions. Historia is a mother, and also an actual queen. You go Historia! I (like many) want to believe her baby is named Ymir, and is a reincarnation of Ymir Fritz.
• I don’t like the idea of Eren (even mistakenly) having led Dina to Carla. I prefer to think (as was implied in earlier chapters) that the inkling of humanity left in Dina is what directed her to Grisha’s house (“I will always find you”)
• At first I didn’t like the idea of Eren being eulogized by all his friends. Despite everything, he did wipe out 80% of humanity and that’s an unforgivable crime to say the least. But then I thought about it some more, and realized I can perhaps understand their reactions. It’s a hard and dark topic to think about, but: if in a group of 100 people, and you could kill the 80 strangers to save your 20 loved ones OR watch your 20 loved ones get murdered by the 80 strangers… which would you do? (Honestly, the Armin-Naruto option of ‘let’s sit down and talk guys’, i.e., open dialogue, is obviously the best choice by far, but assuming this is a binary choice). SO coming back to the main point, I am okay with certain characters having positive reactions towards Eren. However, I wished they were a bit more nuanced and less “Eren you are an amazing loyal hero”
• …I think I’ve actually overcome my initial abhorrence towards Gabi’s character? Like I am actually a bit happy to see her living a content, peaceful life with Falco? Hey, there’s some personal development for me (and an ode to Isayama-sensei that he could transform my perceptions, because I really, truly detested Gabi to a deep degree)
• I am relieved the whole “Eren woke up and it was all a dream because he wanted to escape his monotonous high school life” did not end up being the actual plot. There were some theorists out there who had me convinced for a split second it would be. That would have been… interesting, to say the least. And a true betrayal to us readers. But I’m glad it didn’t come to fruition. I can only hope that boring!Eren and goth!Mikasa are dating happily in their alternate universe.

That’s all I have for now! I may come back and edit this later.

To conclude, I am beyond grateful to Isayama-sensei for giving us this masterpiece, and super gutted that it’s over. Guess I’ll wait for season 4 part 2 of the anime, and the inevitable opening of his onsen!