Sunday 2 June 2013

Attack on Titan - Episode 9

After the shocking (well, somewhat shocking) revelation at the end of last week's Attack on Titan, this ninth episode of the series serves up something of a distraction to kick things off, as we join the Recon Corps as they hack and slash at the Titans within Wall Maria just before the start of the latest Titan assault on humanity.

Once we've had our fill of the slick action and coolness which ooze from this group as they go about their business, our focus naturally returns to Eren, as we accompany him through the nightmare which followed his "death" at the jaws of a Titan.  As Eren finally comes around (while unhelpfully commenting "I'll kill you" as he awakens), it's rather a shock to find himself surrounded by former comrades as they point all manner of weapons at him.


It quickly becomes clear that Eren has no concrete memory of his time as a Titan or anything that happened subsequent to his "death", and despite having seen a lot of went on even Mikasa and Armin can't really make an argument for Eren's humanity at this point in time.  With terror in their eyes, it seems as if the only answer to assuage this fear is to terminate Eren's life before he comes a Titan once again - a prospect that Mikasa simply won't stand for, of course.  Even she doesn't have what it takes to tackle a collection of artillery however, so fortuitously the pressure of the moment has awakened some deep-seated memories within Eren's mind which might just be the key to their short-term survival...

Having landed such a moment of insanity upon us last week, Attack on Titan really has no choice but to go full-on down that path now, and thus this week's episode serves up some reasoning for Eren's survival and transformation that feels... well, a little flimsy, if we're being honest.  Set against this, the military's decision to eliminate Eren feels far more believable, if a little too much of a knee-jerk reaction for my liking.  Still, as I mentioned last time out my suspension of disbelief is already turned up to 11 for this series, so I'm more than willing to go along for the ride no matter what ludicrous places it might take us; even if this isn't one of the show's stronger episodes, I'm still happily on board.

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