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chiasaur11
Oct 22, 2012



Caros posted:


But then you have mikasa's vision of the two of them running away together, so it seems like he can see alternate futures, so who loving knows.

That one's Eren using PATHS to make a world for Mikasa where they ran away, so she gets a better goodbye than he gave her otherwise. Not a "real" alternate future. Just an elaborate fake.

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Teriyaki Koinku
Nov 25, 2008

Bread! Bread! Bread!

Bread! BREAD! BREAD!

KazigluBey posted:

If this is an intentional way to sneak a bleak as gently caress ending under editorial notice (which still feels a little like copium to me, but hey stranger things have happened) then you know what, it's still dumb but I can at least appreciate the attempt to salvage a different vision.

Release the Isayama Cut. :v:

I want to know what would have happened in the original Mist ending planned for AoT.

iamsosmrt
Jun 14, 2008

chiasaur11 posted:

That one's Eren using PATHS to make a world for Mikasa where they ran away, so she gets a better goodbye than he gave her otherwise. Not a "real" alternate future. Just an elaborate fake.

This is why I've been somewhat forgiving of the main cast feeling all grateful to Eren at the end, because there's a good chance they've been mind melding with him which could feel like years passing in a moment. Who knows how much sentimental mindfucking happened.

Turin Turambar
Jun 5, 2011



Dammit Japan don't enable him.
https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2021-04-13/attack-on-titan-finale-leads-to-magazine-issue-selling-out-and-getting-2nd-printing/.171689

Gantolandon
Aug 19, 2012

Tenkaris posted:

Edit: thinking about the Apple girl. It makes sense that they mythologized it as a deal with the devil for power when marley is writing the narrative. Then you see that the girl was abused and was desperately fleeing her imminent death and didn’t exactly consent to becoming host to the hallucigenia.

But then, we find out she loved Fritz. He seems pretty devilish. She gifted him the power to topple nations and ultimately doom the world 2,000 years down the line. She gained the powers of a god like magical creature and just handed it to the worst person she knew because she was that broken and never considered just harming him even though he did plenty of that to her. Ugh

Isayama’s intent is a bit of mystery to me with this one, though. It’s all pretty gross.

That's actually one of the few things in the ending that makes sense. Ymir's love for her abuser pretty much mirrors Reiner and Gabi's devotion to Marley. It's also a thing that frequently happens in real life.

Conspiratiorist
Nov 12, 2015

17th Separate Kryvyi Rih Tank Brigade named after Konstantin Pestushko
Look to my coming on the first light of the fifth sixth some day
I quite enjoyed the final twist of Ymir not simply having internalized being a slave, but that for all his flaws and poo poo he did she'd become genuinely, twistedly enamored with Karl Fritz, and the Power of the Titans had been all along her way of honoring his final wishes.

Wonder if this implies freeing the pigs was an attempt to get his attention.

CatstropheWaitress
Nov 26, 2017

truly, the real villain was how much a beefcake king fritz was.

Squack McQuack
Nov 20, 2013

by Modern Video Games
The ending was not good, but the Ymir/Fritz thing didn’t bother me. Stockholm Syndrome is real and it’s believable that a make believe slave would be in love with her make believe master.

But lol at Reiner saying, “drat, Eren, what a guy!”

mightygerm
Jun 29, 2002



For me the issue with Ymir was less about the Fritz thing and more about how her entire purpose in the story seemed super underwhelming. Did she really orchestrate all of this just to see Mikasa kill Eren then vanish into thin air? What the hell was the point of 120-122? Why even introduce the worm thing when its just going to be a meaningless mcguffin? I was hoping for there to be some conflict between, or some implicit cooperation/plan with Ymir, Eren and the worm but all the buildup was basically for nothing, Eren more or less was a puppet all along, and there was no greater 'plan'.

Elias_Maluco
Aug 23, 2007
I need to sleep

Squack McQuack posted:

The ending was not good, but the Ymir/Fritz thing didn’t bother me. Stockholm Syndrome is real and it’s believable that a make believe slave would be in love with her make believe master.

But lol at Reiner saying, “drat, Eren, what a guy!”

I have no problem with Ymir Stockholm Syndrome, but it was pretty dumb that she needed Mikasa to cut Eren's head off to finally be free of it

Ethiser
Dec 31, 2011

Elias_Maluco posted:

I have no problem with Ymir Stockholm Syndrome, but it was pretty dumb that she needed Mikasa to cut Eren's head off to finally be free of it

It seems even more pointless because she had all the Titan powers at one point which meant she could possibly see the future when she was alive. She and Eren could have both had a story about breaking free from what they thought was a predetermined fate, but I guess that would have been too interesting. It also would have explained her devotion to the king way better.

Relin
Oct 6, 2002

You have been a most worthy adversary, but in every game, there are winners and there are losers. And as you know, in this game, losers get robotizicized!

Elias_Maluco posted:



The result: 80% o the world was destroyed by the hand of a survey corps member (who than let himself be beaten before killing the other 20%), Paradis is fascist
i prefer to read this as somberly sarcastic, since it's levi

whalestory
Feb 9, 2004

hey ya'll!

Pillbug
Man, and I really hate the usage of stockholm syndrome in stories, especially when it's like an apparently supercharged version of stockholm syndrome in this case

Retcon
Jun 23, 2010

Squack McQuack posted:

The ending was not good, but the Ymir/Fritz thing didn’t bother me. Stockholm Syndrome is real and it’s believable that a make believe slave would be in love with her make believe master.

But lol at Reiner saying, “drat, Eren, what a guy!”
https://mobile.twitter.com/sezmohammed/status/1252500993972948992

Stockholm Syndrome has some very questionable and misogynistic origins. Really not a fan of the Ymir/Fritz reveal for that and other reasons, it feels very unneeded. Ymir being so broken down by King Fritz she could not imagine a life outside of slavery was a good enough explanation for her actions imo.

YF-23
Feb 17, 2011

My god, it's full of cat!


The Ymir/Fritz thing has lovely undertones but in isolation it's like whatever, Ymir could be a sicko who's all in on that. The problem is that it is a vital plotpoint to the story's resolution without receiving the proper amount of attention. Neither Ymir nor Fritz get any real characterisation, they are one-dimensional cardboard cutouts that we are just told at the end that they had more stuff going on but we do not get to see that. You shouldn't do "tell don't show" for your epic's conclusion.

Assepoester
Jul 18, 2004
Probation
Can't post for 11 years!
Melman v2

Retcon posted:

https://mobile.twitter.com/sezmohammed/status/1252500993972948992

Stockholm Syndrome has some very questionable and misogynistic origins. Really not a fan of the Ymir/Fritz reveal for that and other reasons, it feels very unneeded. Ymir being so broken down by King Fritz she could not imagine a life outside of slavery was a good enough explanation for her actions imo.
That doesn't really matter since like a lot of psychological terms it's taken on a pop culture meaning that transcends it's origins, much like how we still use terms like Id, Ego, and Oedipus Complex even though Freud is thoroughly discredited. In this case, we have a very real and observable phenomena that causes people to love and worship abusive father figures/authority figures even while said figures demonstrate their contempt by leaving them out in the cold to suffer...

https://twitter.com/Jeff_Paul/status/1321331610344656897
...and while we have other terms like "abusive relationship" to describe this sort of real life situation but nothing captures it quite like "Stockholm Syndrome" does.




YF-23 posted:

The Ymir/Fritz thing has lovely undertones but in isolation it's like whatever, Ymir could be a sicko who's all in on that.
Yeah no don't do that

Faustian Bargain
Apr 12, 2014


Ethiser posted:

It seems even more pointless because she had all the Titan powers at one point which meant she could possibly see the future when she was alive. She and Eren could have both had a story about breaking free from what they thought was a predetermined fate, but I guess that would have been too interesting. It also would have explained her devotion to the king way better.
I think the point is that the predetermined fate couldn’t be changed. Everyone is just along for the ride.

YF-23
Feb 17, 2011

My god, it's full of cat!


The United States posted:

Yeah no don't do that

You are right, and I realise I misspoke by being sort of dismissive about that kind of story beat in isolation. I do think that if you want to tell a dark story like that you should give proper characterisation and make sure your characters are fully realised. Otherwise you get lovely clichés, and I feel that it's significantly worse if you're having that lovely cliché be an important plot device to the conclusion of your story. It makes it from something that could've been a background element the author didn't really think about into something that the author clearly thought about and decided was not important enough to go into further. This wasn't meant to say that misogynistic clichés are fine otherwise, rather that this is worse to the point that it's worth distinguishing.

Vanderdeath
Oct 1, 2005

I will confess,
I love this cultured hell that tests my youth.



The Ymir and King Fritz thing is especially galling seeing as how this motherfucker -

* Killed and subjugated her village and family
* Cut out her tongue
* Gouged one of her eyes out
* [REDACTED] her and forced her to bear his children
* Made said children eat her corpse.

She had to have seen the latter through Paths and you mean to tell me that she would love the man that put her children through that? gently caress outta here with that, Yams.

chiasaur11
Oct 22, 2012



Vanderdeath posted:

The Ymir and King Fritz thing is especially galling seeing as how this motherfucker -

* Killed and subjugated her village and family
* Cut out her tongue
* Gouged one of her eyes out
* [REDACTED] her and forced her to bear his children
* Made said children eat her corpse.

She had to have seen the latter through Paths and you mean to tell me that she would love the man that put her children through that? gently caress outta here with that, Yams.

I'll stop saying it when the evidence stops supporting it, but nothing about this last chapter suggests this was all on Yams.

Someone who spends years talking in interviews about how he doesn't think Eren and Mikasa would work, someone who quite literally sinks the ship Mikasa in chapter 130, having the ending be Eren and Mikasa? That's suspicious.

Someone in that position adding a plot point of romantic love between Ymir and Fritz solely to parallel it with Mikasa's feelings for Eren?

That looks a lot like someone taking the piss.

No Wave
Sep 18, 2005

HA! HA! NICE! WHAT A TOOL!

chiasaur11 posted:

I'll stop saying it when the evidence stops supporting it, but nothing about this last chapter suggests this was all on Yams.

Someone who spends years talking in interviews about how he doesn't think Eren and Mikasa would work, someone who quite literally sinks the ship Mikasa in chapter 130, having the ending be Eren and Mikasa? That's suspicious.

Someone in that position adding a plot point of romantic love between Ymir and Fritz solely to parallel it with Mikasa's feelings for Eren?

That looks a lot like someone taking the piss.
Here's an interview from Isayama from a while back:



This is, in fact, exactly what Mikasa had to do.

bees x1000
Jun 11, 2020

Isayama is going to draw on the collective wills of disappointed fans the world over to deliver a spirit bomb anime ending

keep the delusion dream alive

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS

Vanderdeath posted:

The Ymir and King Fritz thing is especially galling seeing as how this motherfucker -

* Killed and subjugated her village and family
* Cut out her tongue
* Gouged one of her eyes out
* [REDACTED] her and forced her to bear his children
* Made said children eat her corpse.

She had to have seen the latter through Paths and you mean to tell me that she would love the man that put her children through that? gently caress outta here with that, Yams.

If only the woman had left her abuser, smh

The Notorious ZSB
Apr 19, 2004

I SAID WE'RE NOT GONNA BE FUCKING SUCK THIS YEAR!!!

Eej posted:

If only the woman had left her abuser, smh

Thats not the issue, folks understood and were fine with the dynamic when it was "abused person can't escape their abuser". it's way less palatable to make an 11th hour switch to "actually she just really loved him SOOOOO MUCH"

Eej
Jun 17, 2007

HEAVYARMS

The Notorious ZSB posted:

Thats not the issue, folks understood and were fine with the dynamic when it was "abused person can't escape their abuser". it's way less palatable to make an 11th hour switch to "actually she just really loved him SOOOOO MUCH"

Abuse victims often do love their abuser though so even if it was done in the last pages of the manga it's not exactly an illogical plot point

Frionnel
May 7, 2010

Friends are what make testing worth it.
Giving Ymir romantic feelings for Fritz:

1- Doesn't add anything to the story that their slave-master relationship doesn't do already.
2- Is kinda gross!

Asuron
Nov 27, 2012
I don’t have a big problem with the idea, but Ymir being a godlike figure who had completely internalised being a slave, only to then finally break her chains when she’s recognised as an actual human being was just so much better.

Having it revealed in the last chapter that she was actually in love despite abused and used Mikasa somehow to break it is just.... bad. That type of thing only works if we saw more instances of it being that type of love in her flashback. It would actually need a lot of buildup to make it work effectively

Plus why is Eren and Mikasa’s relationship of all things used to break it??? Mikasa didn’t even truly let go at the end, she still loved him and ran away with his body to bury him in their favourite spot.

If it was about breaking from love that hurts you to be truly free, that is one weird as hell way to show it.

Tenkaris
Feb 10, 2006

I would really prefer if you would be quiet.
I also felt like Ymir broke her chains when Eren showed her compassion, which is how he got her to start the rumbling.

I don’t know why she needed the Mikasa/Eren thing to happen at all. It also coincidentally killed the worm along with the host, which is what actually needed to happen to end the curse.

It’s almost like all the mental bullshit and memory fuckery is from all the years of the will of the first king influencing Eren‘s mind once he got Ymir to let him have access to the power.

Part of me wants to think it’s all some elaborate trick done by the hallucigenia to manipulate the host for survival, playing on their fears and dreams and making them do irrationally risky things. Maybe like cordyceps fungus controlling host brains.

But nah, none of that, just gross and uncomfortable narrative choices. 🤢

Strawberry Pyramid
Dec 12, 2020

by Pragmatica
The mental image of Mikasa carrying Eren's decaying decapitated head all the way back to Paradis just to tenderly bury it under a tree is very funny to me.

Conspiratiorist
Nov 12, 2015

17th Separate Kryvyi Rih Tank Brigade named after Konstantin Pestushko
Look to my coming on the first light of the fifth sixth some day

Squack McQuack posted:

But lol at Reiner saying, “drat, Eren, what a guy!”

That's a mistranslation from the speedscans.

Squack McQuack
Nov 20, 2013

by Modern Video Games
It’s my canon and you can’t take it from me.

Boofy
Sep 11, 2001

i dont want to monday morning quarterback things but if i was there i would have just dug a big hole in front of all the colossal titans.

bees x1000
Jun 11, 2020

maybe Eren should have, instead of telling Louise to throw the scarf away, taken it and burned it

Faustian Bargain
Apr 12, 2014


Should’ve turned all Eldians into intelligent titans and taken the world :hellyeah:

Strawberry Pyramid
Dec 12, 2020

by Pragmatica

bees x1000 posted:

maybe Eren should have, instead of telling Louise to throw the scarf away, taken it and burned it

Remember when Mikasa didn't comfort a kid dying of shrapnel wounds at all and just left her to die alone in horrible pain once she'd gotten what she wanted from her? Good times.

Thoren
May 28, 2008
Eren definitely ranks among the top 10 of anime & manga's Coolest Guys.

GimmickMan
Dec 27, 2011

I get the impression that Ymir's feelings for Fritz aren't really supposed to be about her (because it's true they don't add anything) and they're there to recontextualize Eren and Mikasa's relationship as having been abusive since childhood. I think it's intended to be another item on the pile of narrative elements that say "Eren sucks" but it's not super well done.

You know, much like the rest of the ending.

The Notorious ZSB
Apr 19, 2004

I SAID WE'RE NOT GONNA BE FUCKING SUCK THIS YEAR!!!

Eej posted:

Abuse victims often do love their abuser though so even if it was done in the last pages of the manga it's not exactly an illogical plot point

Im not saying it's illogical. I'm saying it sucks and detracts from the narrative he'd built dropping it in the final chapter.

Ccs
Feb 25, 2011


Boofy posted:

i dont want to monday morning quarterback things but if i was there i would have just dug a big hole in front of all the colossal titans.

Gotta have a Dig Titan for that.

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Wili
Apr 7, 2010

ppppbbbbtttthhhhhhttppp!
I am thinking back to Eren's trial near the beginning of the series, when the MP was talking about the kidnappers he killed as a child, and going on about how, even if it was self-defense, it showed that Eren was dangerous and couldn't be trusted with the fate of humanity. It seemed completely unfair bullshit at the time, but turns out he was totally right!

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