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Serious Frolicking posted:Once Reiner realized that there was a human titan in the area, he immediately took steps to make sure it survived. Even if capturing a human titan wasn't their original goal, it very clearly is now. You know, I keep going back over the opening segment of chapter 44. Just about every line in it seems to have a double meaning, and one of the things it's got me wondering about is when, exactly, they realised who and what Eren is. I'm thinking of two lines in particular:  "I need you to learn how to use your strength..." and  "Which one would you pick, Eren?" To the former: does she, indeed? What does that gain her, if she's a titan planning to kill them all in the near future? If she were thinking of Eren as a future ally it might make more sense. And framing it as a "need" is interesting, though I don't know if I want to place too much weight on the exact phrasing of a translation. As to the latter, we have Reiner prompting Eren to make a choice between Mikasa and Annie. Essentially, to choose between human and titan, and it's doubly interesting, because the other main thing this segment seems to be doing, after prompting Eren to broaden his moveset a little, is foregrounding this Eren/Mikasa/Annie love triangle. I say "seems to be", because I've never been entirely sure if that's actually a thing or if it's something I made up in my own head. So, is there room for the possibility that Team Titan knew what Eren was all along, and the original plan was to seduce him to their side, before his awakening forced them to accelerate their schedule? And if they did know, how did they know? Could they smell it on him? Is there some sort of identifying mark that's inconspicuous to human eyes? Or were they briefed to expect one "Eren Jaeger", a titan ignorant of who he was? It seems fairly certain that they didn't know what Ymir was, before she, uh, veered, but it could be something that's easily hidden if you know it's there to hide. Of course, Annie could easily just be saying, "You need to stop hitting so hard, because it hurts and I'd rather you didn't, thanks," or just saying whatever she thinks is necessary to maintain her cover. Ditto Reiner. And I find it difficult to believe that anyone could spend more than three seconds in the company of Eren Jaeger and think that he could be peacefully talked into joining the titans. I'd like to see the argument that could make that happen. And it could just be that Annie and Reiner are being bad soldiers here, forming attachments to the enemy and failing to hold themselves apart. But I am finding it very difficult to read anything they say innocently, now that we know that they're titans. My current working theory on why Team Titan are here and what they're about is that what we have here, basically, is a power struggle between "inner" titans (the king, the nobility and the church/wall titans), and "outer" titans. From that perspective, the wall-breaking is a "look what we can do" ploy by the outer titans, an attempt to apply pressure to gain concessions from the inner titans. If their intent was simply to wipe out humans, I don't see anything that could have stopped them from following through. Unless Bert has to wait multiple years between transformations. But that would be a silly plot twist, so I'm going to ignore it. Or there's this:  "The weak have to resort to using self-protection techniques against those who're stronger than them," indeed. That's a pretty bizarre stance for Annie to take on human/titan power dynamics, but we have no idea what the world looks like from the titans' perspective. Maybe those Scouting Legion expeditions were having an effect after all. The possibility is here that the titans wanted to contain humanity, but had no desire to go further than that.
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May 4, 2013 00:34
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Autumncomet posted:I don't think there's anything to suggest trying to force a love triangle; Eren and Mikasa are strictly siblings and I think Jean is just easily wound up. And Eren never really seemed to be interested in Annie beyond "you're a drat good fighter, teach me!" Yeah, half the time I think I'm just seeing things. I'll run through my evidence for this; you can tell me where you think I'm over-interpreting. First, we have this, from the end of chapter 16:  In the GWR translation, this looks like she's inuiting Eren's real feelings based on a superior understanding of his mind and is devastated by it. [gg]'s translation of the same scene in the anime, which I'm told is the more accurate version, looks like this:  ...which is more like a radical misinterpretation of Eren's feelings. Based on a desire to see Eren as more invested in their relationship than he actually is, perhaps? Later on (at least, chronologically), there's this. Nothing that would be out of place in a purely familial bond, but I find it interesting that Mikasa sees an exchange between what is, as far as I know, the only explicitly romantic couple in the entire manga, and then immediately attempts to replicate that exchange with Eren. (...alright, I'm reaching here.) Then, in chapter 30, we have Annie crying. She's crying? Why is she crying? Because she failed to complete her mission? Doesn't seem strong enough. Because she has a personal stake in carrying off Eren? (Other possibilities: because she just had her eyes carved out, doofus. But then why is Rivaille as confused as I am? Or: she's upset because she couldn't save her bestie from the humans.) The best piece of evidence is probably when Mikasa actually asks Eren if he has special feelings for Annie in chapter 32.  Eren seems to be bemused by this. Why'd she take it there? Now we come back to chapter 44. Annie and Eren's opening conversation goes a little something like this: Annie: I am a weak and frail woman and you are a big strong man. Can't you go any gentler on me? Eren: That is ridiculous you could break me into tiny pieces. Annie: YOU WILL TREAT ME LIKE A LADY OR I WILL BREAK YOU INTO TINY PIECES. ...which is a pattern manga has trained me to interpret as a girl expressing her displeasure that the guy she's interested in does not appear to be all that interested in her, or at least not presenting his interest in a particularly refined manner. It's at this point that Mikasa throws a person at them (note: at this precise moment in time they are rather intimately entwined on the ground), and then challenges Annie to a fight. That's a little extreme, Mikasa! (Okay, so, we don't actually know that it was Mikasa that threw Reiner. But how he got there is unexplained, she appears directly after him, and she's clearly been listening to the conversation. I think a causal link is implied.) And suddenly things are really intense, too. Annie starts calling Mikasa a "beast". There's this hardcore eye poo poo going down.  And whoa hey, things are really tense between these two! Where did that come from? Did I miss something? Maybe it's competition for top rank, but neither of them seem like the type to care much. And the way it's framed... So, there's nothing here that explicitly indicates any sort of romantic attachment between the three of them. But I think there's a sufficient preponderance of evidence to suggest that Mikasa's love for Eren, be it storge, philia or eros, pushes her to be jealously possessive of him to a degree which would be unusual for a purely non-romantic love. Specifically, she sees Annie as a threat, and Annie returns her animosity at least in part. Eren, meanwhile, is oblivious, either because he's obsessed with killing titans to the exclusion of all else, or because he has a bad case of Oblivious Shounen Protagonist Syndrome.
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May 4, 2013 02:29
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Pyromancer posted:I think that dream of his father giving him shots couple of episodes ago has something to do with what'll happen next. My guess is he gets regeneration like giants, and maybe gets super-sized too Oh me oh my, someone give this man a prize. 
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May 5, 2013 15:53
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http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2013-05-08/japanese-comic-ranking-april-28-may-4 Anime appears to be reaping huge dividends; the manga has sold 612,234 copies in the space of a week. That's roughly one fifth of what it sold last year (2,682,504 copies), a little less than one sixth of what it sold in 2011 (3,766,194 copies), and about 6% of its all time sales (9,969,327 copies).  So, uh, I don't really know what to say about that. At what point can we start calling it "a wild, runaway success"? EDIT: In other news, /a/ has a rough translation of 45 out and up on mediafire. So, uh, what's the etiquette for this? Do I post the link or what? KOGAHAZAN!! fucked around with this message at 15:02 on May 9, 2013 |
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May 9, 2013 14:36
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http://www.mediafire.com/?v47wwv1b2p1ku9xEiba posted:Why wouldn't you? I just wasn't sure if rough/early scans were kosher here and didn't want to step on any toes.
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May 9, 2013 19:20
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c45 chat: Focus on Mikasa and Armin's relationship was nice. It's not something the manga touches on often and it's quite sweet, really. Mikasa crying into her scarf was...  I just want to give her a hug and tell her everything's going to be alright. And to stop just shutting down whenever she thinks she's lost Eren, good God woman.Hannes' "I've never seen [Eren] win [a fight]" amused me more than it probably should've. Oh Eren. Though I'm willing to give him the victory over Reiner, he earnt it. Speaking of that, Hannes is in this chapter! And Pixis! And Jean!  One of the things I was worried about, after the spoilers, was that this would be spun out into a fullblown rescue arc and it'd be half a year before we saw any plot progression. But no, it looks like this should be wrapped up pretty quickly.
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May 9, 2013 19:37
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AnonSpore posted:Hannes is such a dead man. Seriously the only thing that could make him deader is if he commented that he was gonna retire in a week. This manga's never had any problem offing characters without death flags before, so I'm hoping that all these flags now mean he's actually going to survive. Hah, who am I kidding? He hasn't got a prayer.
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May 9, 2013 19:47
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lil baby anime posted:Since we ended with "yo eren" I'm half expecting the first panel of the next chapter to have Eren transforming right back into a titan in a fit of rage. I doubt he's got it left in him. He's just woken up after the last fight, and he was still shaky from the fight(s) with Annie when he started that one. I wouldn't be at all surprised if he has trouble standing.
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May 9, 2013 21:37
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Captain Invictus posted:Hey man, she's seen some serious poo poo. It's not really surprising that she breaks down whenever she thinks she's lost the one constant in her life, it's the only thing she's got keeping her going. It just shows her significant flaws as a character, she may be a military force, but she's still extremely frail and it only takes a well-placed blow to topple her emotionally. Until Hannes made his rousing speech she was just content to literally curl up in a ball and cry. Sure! It's a perfectly reasonable response for her to have, given her past. It's also the least useful/most dangerous response she could possibly have. If she carries on like this, then somewhere down the line it's going to get her munched.
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May 10, 2013 10:23
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Dr_Amazing posted:I don't really remember what Ymirs whole backstory is, but could there be a chance she was a wall Titan that escaped in the initial attack? Like a small one for the gate. I don't really have anything backing this up, bit I like the idea. Ymir's backstory is still an open question at this point. We know she ate one of Reiner and Bert's friends when they were young, and we know she joined the army after she heard about Christa, but apart from that I think we know nothing about her beyond the fact that she could read the labels on those tins of herring. EDIT: What Argas said.
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May 12, 2013 01:52
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Autumncomet posted:Is it a spoiler to mention Ymir's name in the anime thread? I mean, if they animate the flashback with Ilse, it's a huge giveaway but in the other hand I really don't want to say "Krista's freckled friend" and variations for another twenty episodes. I think I'm just going to going with "Freckles", if it ever comes up. Ymir gets almost no screentime until volume 9, and the anime's not likely to get that far.
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May 13, 2013 21:41
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Breaky posted:Connie seems a lot cooler in the anime than I would have expected. Maybe it's because he only is just now getting time in chapters again. A lot of it's the voice, I think. He looks about twelve and when you're reading the manga it's easy to assume he's got a voice to match. In the anime, he's second only to Eren for BURNING SHOUNEN SPIRIT.
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May 19, 2013 19:01
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RyuujinBlueZ posted:Just before Jean and Eren's first bar fight (which is actually the first time we see Eren's fighting style and it's mentioned he was tops at hand-to-hand, well before we see his titan form) Jean asks Bert and Annie where they're going. Bert notes to the royal guard, and Annie responds that she is too. Then she shoots Bert a dirty look and adds "That doesn't mean I'm anything like you", which in hindsight is mighty interesting. Given the way it's framed, it's impossible to say whether she's addressing that to Jean or Bert or both. Interesting, though. On a similar note, there's this exchange during the HtH portion of the training arc:  Which seems like it's directed to Eren, but Reiner is right there. And it comes right after this:    I cannot wait for the next chapter. Answers ho! (Please. For the love of God.  )
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May 20, 2013 10:54
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Nice to see Eren's finally learnt to use his head.
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May 21, 2013 14:02
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Spoilers for Chapter 46 have appeared on 2ch. I have ten pages, of varying size and quality. They even come with (terrible) translations. http://imgur.com/a/H6kWN pg838 Eren: Nothing's gonna come out of this... I... I need a weapon... What's happened to everyone... What happened to the Recon Corps!? After that happened... They... They couldn't be heading here, could they? They'd be taking a huge risk... if they were... Ymir: Oh right, those titans at the castle could move about just fine at night, couldn't they? What about the titans here? Reiner: The titans here can't move at night. You know that already, don't you? Ymir. pg842/843 Reiner: On the bright side, the wall's still in one piece. We can rest up for now. I'll talk about promotion later... Bert: Reiner. Reiner: Nah... I think we did a good job all things considered. Reiner: We moved along great in all that chaos. As soldiers, I think we deserve merit and recognition for that alone... Ymir: Hey, Reiner... What are you even talking about...? Reiner: Huh? What? I told you, we don't have to talk to the commander about promotion right away. Ymir: That's... not what I mean. Reiner: Oh, right... You guys brought that cannon outta somewhere, didn't you? You really saved our asses. And then, Christa, well... No matter how you slice it, you know she's into me, right? In fact, she's especially nice to me all the time, but- Eren: Oi... pg844 Eren: Are you loving with us? Reiner: W... Why are you mad, Eren? Did I... say something wrong? pg845 Eren: If you want to get killed just say so goddammit!! Ymir: Wait, Eren. No matter how you look at it, there's something we're missing here. Isn't that right, Mr. Bert? If you know something, don't keep mum and just tell him. Reiner: Huh? Bert: Reiner ... you're- pg850 Eren: Just how big of a victim complex do you have... what was the point? Just why/how were you listening to our stories that day... Hey Bert? Yeah, you loving sycophant. I told you about ourselves, didn't I? Right in front of you fuckers. pg851 Eren: I told you about how my mom got eaten by a Titan, didn't I? About how a chunk of the gate you kicked hit our house, and my mother couldn't get away... You know, right? Because I told you. HOW DID YOU FEEL? That time... how did you feel after hearing that? pg852 Bert: That time... I felt sorry for you. pg856 Reiner: What are you expecting from that murderer!? D'you want him to reflect!? Would you want him to apologize!? Do you want to lecture him that "killing is bad"!? Are you satisfied with that!? The me that you know is no longer here, you know!? If you're going to end with crying and raging, then loving keep raging!! pg??? Ymir: But you know, Eren... You're making a big mistake if you think just killing those two would end everything. Eren: Who's the enemy!? Ymir: Enemy? Well, they'd be the sei- Reiner/Bert: YMIR! Highlights: Reiner has lost his entire mind.  Eren is a runaway nuclear rage furnace, all day every day. Ymir gives no fucks, ever. Bert makes the best faces. Looks like a promising chapter.
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Jun 5, 2013 20:13
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genericnick posted:I started doubting once I tried figuring out what name Hanji was supposed to be. Hans was the only one that came to mind. Kodansha localised it as "Hange". That's her last name, in any case; her first name is Zoë.
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Jun 5, 2013 20:31
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AnonSpore posted:What? No it's not. Even Mikasa's name is written given first, family second, in the western way, and she's *~the last Asian alive~*. There's no reason Hanji alone would buck that trend. Really? I didn't know that. Nevertheless, "Zoë Hange" is Kondansha's official romanisation:  
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Jun 6, 2013 01:54
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DrSunshine posted:Which chapter has Sasha doing the "Potato Girl" routine? I've been trying to find it, without much success. This bit?  It's chapter 15. First chapter of the training arc.
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Jun 12, 2013 00:14
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Superstring posted:I interpreted it as a "We cool right?" to the drill sergeant. Me too. A "situation successfully defused" sort of face. But then, I never noticed it wasn't a full half.
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Jun 12, 2013 13:34
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Flavahbeast posted:well they certainly could be an item I haven't seen the raw, personally, but if I recall correctly this is a mistranslation, and the line should be attributed to Ymir. The bubble has no little flicky bit pointing at Reiner.
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Jun 13, 2013 02:27
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That was my first thought, too; "a bit of ooh-arr country". But that's not actually the Osakan stereotype, is it? It's more of the "fast-talking, rude, money-canny" sort than "bumpkin", right? So, Cockney, or Scottish? I am now imagining Connie referring to Sasha as "tha' tattie wifey".
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Jun 27, 2013 14:34
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Veskit posted:New Chapter is up God drat, far too many answers in this chapter. I don't know if I have any questions left. And HOLY poo poo YMIR
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Jul 5, 2013 21:40
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QuasiQuack posted:Did Christa lose a leg there? Leg's clearly stuck outside the mouth when it closes. We don't see it actually severed, though, and I think Ymir would want to avoid that if at all possible. So. Broken, at least.
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Jul 5, 2013 21:54
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Gyges posted:Seriously, are Reiner and Bert ever going to figure out that Eren will fight them until every molecule of his being is gone? I think they know, but I'm getting the impression that it's not actually relevant to whatever their mission is. Laying hands on him is enough, they don't need to turn him. Speaking of that mission, it looks like they were sent to retrieve something. This "coordinate". So they knocked down the walls... just to stir poo poo up? See what came loose? Just to get inside the walls? I think the last one was brought up as a theory before.
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Jul 5, 2013 22:04
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Nelson Mandingo posted:but on the other hand it's a fact that devouring humans does do something for Titans in particular. Not necessarily. If titans were engineered to be a bioweapon, the devouring might be the end in itself.
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Jul 7, 2013 12:58
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Soulcleaver posted:It's a horrible thing to send so many people to their deaths but the alternative was having them and more die of starvation. I refuse to believe that an area the size of Germany was anywhere even close to maxed out, supporting a population of a million. I mean, carrying capacity depends a lot on the specifics of climate, soil types, staple crops and agricultural techniques, but a modestly fertile area with a warm continental climate growing wheat should be able to support something between ten and thirty million. And probably towards the upper end, if they're growing the almighty potato. Germany hasn't had less than a million people in it since before people invented ploughs. Kassad posted:Eren's burning rage eventually grows so intense he turns into a God Warrior and he wipes out all the titans in an orgy of nuclear fire. But Mikasa dies of radiation poisoning. Pfft. The Last Ninja™ could never be taken out by anything so inglorious. 
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Jul 10, 2013 12:50
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Pensive posted:Regardless of how much space you have, dumping 200,000 extra people into a place intended to support 400,000 is not going to end well. Oh, sure. It's just that I seem to spend half my time these days pouring over mediaeval demographics and potential food yield algorithms, so whenever I see the Titan numbers my eyes cross over and I start foaming at the mouth and shouting "bullshit!" Though, you would have thought a society with that much land to spare and that sort of external threat would have concentrated as much of its population in the centre as possible.
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Jul 10, 2013 13:49
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JosephWongKS posted:They are comparing Episodes 10 onwards (where the pacing and action did slow a little and there was a marked increase in the use of still shots) to Episodes 1 to 9 (which contained the bulk of the dramatic / iconic moments in the series so far, including the first appearance of the Titans, the devouring of Eren's mother, Eren getting swallowed down the gullet of a Titan, the appearance of Rage-Titan, and the revelation that Rage-Titan = Eren). Titan Annie soon, though. And Hammer. :frogin: I'd say that's up there with anything in Trost. Flavahbeast posted:have they seriously not reached elf island yet jesus They got on that boat in 2007. I have been waiting for them to arrive for a fifth of my entire life. 
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Jul 31, 2013 02:00
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JosephWongKS posted:I still can't get over the fact that the most powerful and iconic Titan in the series, the wall-breaker, the one that literally kick-started the final destruction of human-kind, is Bertholdt "Sweaty McSweatdrop" Fubar. Bertholdt. Ymir calls him Bertles. 
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Aug 2, 2013 20:44
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Pensive posted:Using I'd give you good odds that those other translations are translations of the English script, not the raw. But, anyway, this is the page in question:  Kind of a lovely raw, but that looks like "驚いたな... 女に興味があるようには見えなかつたんだが......" Which, uh, I think is more or less what it's been translated as, but doesn't have anything that would indicate who's speaking it to who. Note also that the other bubble on the page without a flicky bit is definitely Reiner's, speaking from off-panel.
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Aug 6, 2013 22:55
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Nelson Mandingo posted:The raw chapter 48 is out. No translation yet. Hot drat, that is a fine crazy eyed rage Mikasa has got going on there. And, reading this, I've realised that I don't even care what Bert and Ernie are about anymore. I just want them to die.
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Aug 7, 2013 15:38
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Flavahbeast posted:Sasquatch Titan is the inventor of titan technology and Eren's father, he created titanforms using Atlantean technology because he wanted to live forever, his real name before the collapse of human civilization was Sir Isaac Newton Schwarzwald posted:This is still my favorite anime reveal ever. ...I suggest that anyone who doesn't already know what this is referencing not Google it. You guys are lucky that I'm immune to spoilers.
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Aug 11, 2013 03:01
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Myurton posted:Oh that! I completely forgot about that thing and all the craziness surrounding it. I thought Zorak was making hints at Ymir. How can you forget about Monkey Trouble? He speaks! 
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Sep 15, 2013 11:06
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Neo_Crimson posted:It's hard to tell exactly what he's feeling there. It doesn't help that Isayama really likes drawing Yeah, that's pretty much your standard issue Isayama "poo poo's going down" face. So, is this the first time that Eren's Burning Shounen Spirit has paid off? That seems like it would be a pretty major shift in the tone of the manga, to me.
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Oct 6, 2013 12:12
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faces either.
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Elotana posted:Waiting on a proper translation, but unless there's a special trigger I'm missing it kinda smacks of a typical shonen rear end-pull to have this ability first manifest in chapter 50. Bert and Ernie weren't dragging Eren's sorry rear end back to their hometown for the good of their health. We knew there was something going on that made him valuable to Team Titan, so I'd say that this latest revelation is a pretty organic development of that. The specific nature of the power is a surprise, but we've seen Monkey Trouble commanding them before and there was Annie in the forest, so it's not unprecedented. I'd say, actually, that the fact that this was could in no way be predicted from previous events, but then re-contextualised those events so that they become clues in hindsight, makes this a good twist. If it was an asspull, it would be a pretty gratuitous one- there's no reason that Isayama couldn't have had Eren fully recovered and ready to shift by this chapter, he had by no means written himself into a corner. I think it's a lot more interesting that the alternative, too, as much as I like to watch Titan-Eren kicking rear end. I think the main thing that's causing you to view this negatively (not trying to put words in your mouth, just interpret) is that this is a very "shounen-y" sort of twist- the MC getting an eleventh-hour powerup and saving the day- that has a history of being handled badly. But, unless you were expecting the series to end with the defeat of the protagonists or a stalemate, and given the implausibility of the protagonists gradually building up the resources necessary to win in this scenario, a large, game-changing twist had to occur at some point- the problem is simply too vast for them to solve. The half-way mark is a pretty good point for that to happen, too. Plus, the reasons that make it a bad twist in your average shounen don't really apply here. In your ideal shonan fightan mango, the protagonist is faced with problems that are significant to their character, which they overcome through character development, which is actualised in the form of badassery, explosions, new supermoves etc. Powerups via authorial fiat are bad because they negate that, cutting out the most interesting part of the manga. In Shingeki, that's not a problem because it's more of a mystery manga (not to say that Eren's character development isn't interesting, necessarily, just that the mystery is front and centre- and in anycase, his character development is facilitated more through solving the mystery than punching things)- and this development doesn't negate the mystery, it actually serves to deepen it. Similarly, in Utena, the fact that every fight is decided by the ghost of God descending into Utena and granting her all-powerful sword skills is not a problem, because fights and sword skills are not the point. The fights are all metaphors for her opponents' internal problems, and she wins because the transcendent principle beats endlessly-turning-inward introspection. Oh man, that was a lot of  about anime dudes punching each other.
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Oct 6, 2013 19:54
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Jackard posted:Have this instead. That is by far the most composed and dangerous-looking Bertles has ever been.
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Oct 14, 2013 13:36
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