What Might Have Been And What Has Been Point To One End, Which Is Always Present. Footfalls Echo In The

Incorrect AOT quotes

Shingeki no Kyojin: The Final Season Part 2 Official Trailer

Alright this is quite late, but I think the question was referring more to the nature of the freedom Eren seeks than the root of the desire. We know he wipes out the rest of the world for "freedom" but is it freedom in the sense that the world is hostile and he's trying to preserve himself through aggression or is it because the mere existence of humans "taints" the pure scenery he saw in Armin's book and imagined as freedom.

Of course, it could be more nuanced than that, but the words Eren says seem to give credence to the latter interpretation though it doesn't sit well with me.

What is your genuine interpretation of the type of freedom that Eren desires? Does he desire freedom because he was born into this world, or is it because of Armin’s book? 131 seems to establish that it was because of the book, but the paths chapters focus on Eren’s philosophy of “being born into this world.” Which do you believe he valued more?

Both. Eren is implied to have had a subconscious reaction to his father's sentiment at his birth, but it was only brought into consciousness when Armin showed him the book. That's why Eren was so listless beforehand: his primal life-urge was going unrecognised and unsatisfied.

There's also the factors of the Founding and Attack Titans working outside of time. Eren's future personality likely influenced his infant self, as well as the nature of the Attack Titan to always strive for freedom.

Commission for @neezuko - A fanart Eren and Historia .

Yes, Eren is much more cynical about the possibility of peace or getting the children out of the Forest, his solution is to wipe out that historical/generational hatred while the Alliance seeks to learn their mistakes from the past and work towards a better future.

I think the Alliance is too idealistic/naive and Eren is too pessimistic(he only has four years left so his perspective is shaped by what can and can't be done within that time-limit, this shuts down a lot of avenues) but Isayama seems to criticize Eren's self focused perspective, Eren ought to at least be able to put his hopes in others and he(Isayama) criticizes the Alliance/104th by saying that they're too open to possibilities and violence is a necessity sometimes, they're forced to confront the consequences of their idealism(both with Eren and diplomacy) in the Final arc.

All in all, I think Isayama agrees more with the Alliance on a thematic level, but thinks they should be more willing to get their hands dirty in order to achieve their ideals.

Do you believe the full rumbling goes against the theme of “getting kids out of the forest?”

No, because Armin & Co. represent that side of the argument.

Mr Braus says two things: 1) He laments the continuation of the cycle of violence, and 2) He argues that the most important thing is to keep children out of it. Eren acts in reaction to 1), and the 104th act in reaction to 2).

Rather than just having the main character straightforwardly represent the moral message of the series, it's more interesting to explore the unresolvable contradictions within that moral message - that's what would have been the case if Eren and the 104th had truly been opposed. Eren would have fought to end the cycle at the cost of children's lives, and the 104th would have fought to preserve children's lives even if meant that the cycle will continue.

Of course, Eren's capability of truly ending the cycle is often brought into question - but this only adds further nuance to the series.

There are some things that caught my attention more than others at the SnK final manga exhibition, and I want to write down my thoughts about them, in the hopes of making sense of it all. I’ll begin with what I dubbed as the “Paths Room” and probably write something about the others, too, in the near future.

The Paths Room is the last room before the Final Sounds Room, which should chronologically (in the manga’s story) be the last one. See, the exhibit is structured in a sort of chronological order, starting from the beginning of Eren/Reiner’s life, leading to the main events of the manga, the characters, this Paths Room and the Final sounds.

At the entrance of this room, there’s one of Kruger’s lines written in white on a black wall (top, left corner):

“Anyone can become a God or a Devil. All it takes is for someone to claim it for it to be true.”

After that, the room is organized this way: the wall on the opposite side has the “paths world” spread out. The one on the visitors’ immediate right has some lines and moments lined up in a very specific way, as if they want to tell us something important.

It’s like a sort of journey through some pivotal points of Eren’s story. It feels like an omniscient being is guiding Eren - and the visitor - to a final dilemma, which is also what the story is at, at this point, imo (it’s been there for some time, to be honest). I had the feeling that the “omniscient being” could be the girl in the Paths, but enough of my speculations. Let’s get into the room!

Keep reading

[“One of the very hardest things about preventing and ending violence is that most of our work isn’t really about getting someone to stop being violent. Most of the time, that’s not the heart of the thing. The even-more-rigorous struggle is to cultivate all of the awareness and skills that would have been necessary for the violence not to have happened in the first place.

Which is why, when we talk about violence, we always end up talking about everything: slavery, binary gender, the original disconnection of humans from the rest of life on this planet, and so on. Solving violence is rarely as much about the moment at hand as it is about everything else that preceded it.

Which is where shame comes in.

As a therapist who has spent the last decade working with movement folks who are survivors of intimate violence—as well as with many people who have caused harm—I see shame as one of the most pervasive, painful, and insidious barriers to our efforts to fulfill the aspirations of transformative justice.

In order to develop real responses to the myriad harms in our lives—or even the capacity to develop real responses—we need to understand shame and develop tools for working with it, individually and collectively.

(…) Shame is different than guilt. While guilt focuses on our behavior (“I did something bad”), shame creates an identity: “I am bad.” Shame keeps us stuck, isolated, and hiding. With no way to escape from the totality of our belief (“I just am wrong”), we may do some of the following:

hide what we feel is bad about ourselves and try hard to pass as “good.”

overcompensate in other parts of life through overwork, caretaking, or perfectionism to make up for whatever is “wrong” about us.

defend ourselves from any insinuation that we might have done wrong, attempt to rationalize, or justify our actions.

blame someone else, try to divert responsibility, or shift the focus onto another.

attack anyone who draws attention toward the source of our shame, try to have power by dominating or shaming others.

numb through self-harming use of alcohol, substances, food, sex, technology, and so on.

Most of us use all of these strategies in different moments. Overaccountability and underaccountability are two sides of the same coin: “I can’t stand how bad I feel and can’t imagine making it right (overaccountability) so I’m going to hide that it (whatever it is) even happened, or lie about it or blame someone else (underaccountability).”]

Nathan Shara, Facing Shame: From Saying Sorry to Doing Sorry, from Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories From The Transformative Justice Movement

final draft of ending critique is halfway done. normally i’d be able to finish it this week, but a heatwave has hit the uk and is sapping all my energy. please bear with me a little longer 🙏

a sweet scene (ॢ˘⌣˘ ॢ)