Thoughts & Feelings Column: Attack on Titan Season Two – Episode Twenty-Eight

We pick up right where we left off with Conny visiting his now flattened home. One of the soldiers notices something I picked up on last episode: the lack of blood and bodies in the town. Another person states that it’s because the town evacuated, but they agree that the titan on Conny’s house would have no way of locomoting itself with its deformed appendages. Furthermore, just before the squad leaves the town, the titan says “Welcome Home.” It is unable to repeat itself when Conny asks what it said, but the titan did in fact speak.

Here’s what I think:

The titans are mutated humans- I don’t know how, but they are. Maybe something is in their water to turn them into titans- I really don’t know. But. Titans are mutated humans, and the titan on the top of Conny’s house is either a sibling or his mother. Later, we learn that no squad was able to find a hole in wall where the titan breach occurred, which means that the titans didn’t break the wall to get it- they were already there. The townspeople either all fled, or some of them became titans.

There’s a great bit of suspense and true terror before the squads meet up in the darkness which really helps you understand how terrifying titans can be. It’s sometimes hard to cognize the fear since the titans often look hilarious, and our story’s hero is a titan which in turn makes him cool.

After the squads confirm that neither one of them could have possibly missed the breach in Wall Rose, the decide to rest in some old castle ruins. Their rest is interrupted by a titan attack. At night. When titans are supposed to be unable to move. However, in the distance you see the aberrant Sasquatch titan lumbering, so I have to assume
 that he has the ability to control the titans at night, too. If all titans are human, I do have to wonder why/how the Squatch is able to control them in the first place. Titans aren’t a hive mind, at least they don’t behave as such, so what power does he have to control these things?

We get some more information about Hange’s plans when she confirms that the walls are made of hardened titan skin. Since Eren is able to transform, they are hoping to use him to patch the hole in Wall Rose (they have yet to learn that there is no hole). I’m not sure how the skin crystallization works, though. If Eren does patch the wall, would they have to cut him out of the titan body and leave the rest of the body there? Or would Eren be able to walk away after they his melted skin from his body? These are questions we may never know the answer to since there wasn’t a wall breach.

The Wall Priest that came with Levi’s squad sees the despair-ridden people, but still refuses to speak about any specifics; however, he does give up some key info. Apparently, the Wall Priests have been charged with protecting and watching Christa aka Historia Reiss.

This was a truly great episode of AOT, and I think that the this show has gotten better over the years. The suspense and dread you feel during these events feels real and feels like it all actually matters which is something I don’t believe came across well in the first season. Now that the second season of AOT has begun it’s first big fight, it’s finally come into its own. I’m hoping for some great Squatch action this next round.

Read about episode twenty-nine!