Manga Review: Attack on Titan Volume 3 by Hajime Isayama
Note: This review contains SPOILERS for the first two volumes.
Three children were in the village of Shigashina on that fateful day. Eren Yeager, an aggressive young fellow who chafed under the restrictions imposed by the fifty-meter walls that protected his village and by extension all other humans; Mikasa Ackerman, his quiet but much better at fighting adoptive sister (who may be the world’s last Asian); and bookish lad Armin Arlert, who had the best social skills of the lot. They’d been told by the soldiers that everything was safe, as long as they never went outside the walls.
The soldiers were wrong. Fifty-meter walls might protect against ordinary Titans, the human-eating giants that had driven humanity into their triple-walled city-state, but not against the sixty-meter tall Colossal Titan, which helps smash a hole in the gate that lets the other Titans in to feast. One of the Titans smashes Eren’s house and kills his mother (his father being elsewhere at the time, fate as of Volume 3 unknown.) Eren swears to destroy all Titans.
Five years later, the trio joins the Survey Corps, a highly trained group of elite soldiers who battle the Titans using specialized equipment. The Corps wants to retake the outermost part of the human enclave and repair the wall. but casualty rates are horrendous.
Despite an art style that is less than stellar, the unfolding mysteries of the plot and the sense that (almost) anyone can die made this manga a huge hit, and it’s gotten a well-received anime adaptation (among other things, the adaptation’s smoothing out of the art style helped make it watchable, and it had a kickass opening song.)
The volume I have to hand is #3. It opens with a “side story”, featuring Captain Levi, the current best fighter in the Survey Corps. He and his troops are out scouting the outer areas of the human lands to see if it might be possible to get the wall repaired. They suffer considerable losses, and Captain Levi reassures a dying soldier that this will all be worth it someday. But then he’s called back to the intact portion of the city, as something is drawing the Titans there.
That is a breach in the second wall, which Eren’s group has been battling. In the first of what will be many twists, Eren was swallowed by a Titan, then somehow transformed into a Titan himself, but still with a burning need to kill Titans–and they’re not keen on him either. He wakes from a dream recapping this bit, back in human form, to discover that he, Armin and Mikasa are surrounded by other soldiers who are understandably upset and fearful.
The other soldiers are more than ready to kill all three, but Eren is able to partially transform to protect the other two. This imperfect form doesn’t last long, and Armin has to try to persuade the now paranoid captain to desist. Fortunately, Commander Dot Pixis, an eccentric but reasonable leader, has arrived and takes responsibility for our protagonists.
Armin comes up with a plan. There’s a giant boulder fairly near the breach. If Eren transforms into Titan form, he’ll have the strength to move that boulder into the breach, sealing it until repairs can be made. Of course, this will require the majority of the Survey Corps members in the area to draw off the other Titans so that Eren won’t have to battle them while moving the boulder. Commander Pixis approves the plan. But can Eren truly control his new Titan form well enough to follow through?
Meanwhile, Eren suddenly remembers that his father said there was a secret in the basement of their house that has something to do with the Titans, so now he needs to somehow get to that location to find out if it’s actually relevant.
And various minor characters have epiphanies or moments of cowardice or dying words.
This is all exciting stuff. The humans are fighting a hopeless war against foes far more powerful than them. Yes, they can kill individual Titans, but the Titans come in endless numbers and can kill many more humans than vice versa. The entire scenario is horrific, with desperation and despair being common emotions felt by the humans. (And yet those inside still-intact walls often are foolishly complacent.)
It’s easy to root for our underdog protagonists. (Spoilers notwithstanding.) That said, Eren has an off-putting personality that rubs many people in-universe the wrong way and makes things harder than they have to be.
Content note: many, many people are gorily killed by Titans, and we see mutilated corpses often. Younger or more sensitive readers might want to skip this.
Overall: It’s difficult to recommend this without reservations, due to certain future events it would be spoilery even to hint at. Some of the politics, for example, go to places certain readers may feel uncomfortable with. But as an action series with an extreme premise, it’s pretty awesome.
