We take a step back and a whole mile to the front.
Somewhat caught up with this week….Well time to get everything else done.
The traumatized Armin is shaken up by Connie and his squad who bring him back to reality. Connie inquires why he’s alone but his squadmate more or less nails the fact that: EVERYONE DIED. Conne isn’t amused with such blunt answers but Armin retreats while Connie and his squad advances. Armin is distraught as he ponders his weakness that got his friend killed. He encounters more heart-rending sadness as he sees one of his friends helplessly try to resuscitate her friend. On the other side of the town, a businessman is trying to get his cargo through the gate while keeping a crowd of civilains behind him. He puts his wares on a higher field than the people and urges them to push so they can all survive. A derpish titan then comes charging toward the gate, but Mikasa shows up to slice the back of its neck off. The businessman tries to urge her to enlighten the people but she intimidates him enough to move his cart out of the way to help everyone evacuate.
We harken back to Mikasa’s past. Her family lived like any other healthy family until they were attacked by human traffickers. Eren and his dad would find the corpses of Mikasa’s parents but she was nowhere to be found. Eren’s father heeds him to go wait down at the mountain’s base for him but Eren does things different. In another location, two men discuss what they could get for selling Mikasa off, as her origins are Oriental. The door hinges open and the two men are taken by suprise…but they only find a young Eren. Eren says that he got lost in the woods and as the men plan something and reassure him, he stabs one of them with a knife. Eren then closes the door to lure out the other and once he opens the door, Eren drives a knife through him too. Mikasa watches in shock as a boy her age kills her parents’ murderers.
Eren unties Mikasa, who silently mentions that there were three intruders. On cue, the third man barges in and lifts Eren. Eren gets strangled and is able to say a few words to Mikasa that opens her eyes to the world’s cruelty. Mikasa’s experiences flash before her eyes as she realizes that the entire world is like this and with a surge of rage, she lunges toward the intruder. Once the ordeal is over, Eren’s father scolds what Eren has done. Well, more about concerns over his son’s safety and not the fact that his child has murdered 2 men before hitting his teen years. Mikasa is then invited to the Jaegar household and Eren wraps his scarf over her.
Mikasa hears the bells toll as the order to retreat resounds across the area. She zips across to inform the vanguard squad but notices how none of them are doing anything. Jean and the other top graduates along with some other soldiers are in a rut. They have run out of gas to manuever up the high walls and the support squads HQ has been taken down by the titans. As Connie tries to get them to take one last act of valor, no one heeds him. Sasha tries to cheer everyone up but even she fails to get any response. It takes the arrival of Mikasa to get everyone’s attention but she first attends to Armin who apologizes that he let Eren die and he could not do anything to save him. Mikasa however shows little sign of worry and prioritizes the squad’s survival and simply stating the fact that they’re going to die if they don’t do anything, she leaps to recover the supply HQ. Jean backs her up and with a few more morale raising retorts, the vanguard squad leaps into action.
Armin notices Mikasa’s lack of emotional/self preservation control and realizes that she’s venting out her stress over Eren’s death by mindlessly slaying any titan that gets in her way. Soon enough, the gas runs out of her gear and she falls. Armin goes to support her and Connie follows him. Jean is then put as temporary leader of the squad. However, things turn out for the worst as the low gas stock puts some of the troops in a helpless state against the titans. Jean can only watch as he sees the burden of command. Mikasa is attacked by a titan and finds the resolve to fight to the death. Befoe that however, another titan emerges from the wall behind her and instead of eating her, it punches the other titan and mercilessly beats the hell out of it.
Mikasa’s past is pretty sad and it kind of sickens me that humans still do this to one another when a common enemy is just outside the walls. Eren is pretty badass even before he had his mind set on murdering titans. We finally see why Mikasa is so devoted to our currently dead hero, saving her from certain doom by committing murder that early in life. Speaking of dead heroes, Armin goes off on survivor’s guilt but sadly for him, he sucks at fighting. Mikasa’s simplistic but riveting morale booster really got me pumped up to see some killing done, but that turns out for naught when gas is actually that low and Jean can’t lead for shit. Then everything flips upside down when a titan is seen destroying another. Since the description of the series already spoiled me what this means, I’ll let it sink in for everyone else. Amazing episodes, this and Oregairu never fail to impress me.
Lair of the Idle 