There was a lot I liked about this episode and one thing that was nagging at me, one thing that bugged me a lot and I wasn’t sure how to articulate it for about a day. I think i’ve finally figured it out, so let’s go over the things that really worked for me this episode first before we dig into the one thing that is bothering me.
We get some backstory on Eren’s Titan power, at long last. God, it only took what? Forty-Three episodes? We see Grisha Jaeger, Eren’s father as he launches an attack on the Reiss family. Why he would do it and how he knew about their powers to begin with is still up in the air, but he comes in and Titan shifts and engages in a fight with another Titan shifter. One Frieda Reiss, who was Historia’s half sister. She apparently had the same ability to control Titan’s that Eren has, but was unable to utilize it properly and lost against Grisha and met her end by being eaten by him. He then murdered the other Reiss children and Lord Reiss’s wife. At some point later, he forces a Titan shift from Eren and meets his end at the hands of his own son.
While this is all very interesting, and i’m glad to get some backstory on it at last. The part of the episode that really had my interest was the history of the Ackerman family. When Levi asked Mikasa if she was related to Kenny and she spoke about her parents, we know Miaka is one of the last Oriental people inside the wall if not the last. That came from her mothers side, her father was from the Ackerman family. They were both apparently outcast and that brought them together and allowed them to fall in love and have Mikasa.
Kenny’s flashback reveals a few things. That the Ackerman family used to be a guard for the king, but since the royal family could not control the Ackerman family. It came to fear them and saw them as outcast, same as the last or the Oriental tribe.
This interests me a lot because this means Mikasa’s existence is a giant threat to the crown. They also vaguely mention that Kenny’s sister is pregnant in the flashback and that she’s insisting on having the kid despite warnings from her brother. Coupling this with the fact that we know that Kenny raised Levi, we can only assume that Levi is Kenny’s sisters child. Something common among all of them though is a sudden surge of power seemingly out of nowhere, Kenny has felt it before. Mikasa has felt it before and Levi has felt it before. What this sudden surge of power means, we don’t know. How does any of this leave them related to Mikasa? Well, we don’t know. It’s honestly some of the most interesting stuff in the episode to me though strangely.
Though speaking of the stuff with the Ackerman family. That does tie in with my one issue with all of this. This ‘control’ I speak of when I talk about the crown controlling the people around it. Seems to be the ability to erase peoples memories, and not just on a small level. I’m talking about mass memory rewrites with the exception of a few noble bloodlines. I just, I don’t really know how to feel about this. I feel like there is a more realistic way they could of gone about how the family was controlling the history and the public’s opinions.
I know, asking for realism in a series where people transform into giants and eat one another is kind of absurd. It’s just, we see it every day in real life. The rewriting of history books, the mass change of opinion from event to event. Control through the spread of information and how that information is written. Media outlets skewing information to their own agenda. In previous episodes, we saw the Military Police bullying the papers in what they would publicize.
I just, I’m not sure. Something about this is eating away at me and it’s probably not even important in the long run since I know they aren’t going to get Eren to be eaten and get his ‘scream’ back on their side.
You know what I do know? Watching Levi and the Scouts fight Kenny’s team next episode as they drop down and try to rescue Eren from Lord Reiss is going to be AWESOME! So i’ll be looking forward to watching that next week.