Review of Attack on Titan: Final Season - The Final Chapters

Attack on Titan: Final Season - The Final Chapters is the grand finale of everything we've seen since the original Attack on Titan first aired. What an incredible journey from start to finish. There's certainly been ups and downs as the series went on, but just about everyone should mark this anime series as a success. So let's talk about it! Story: Attack on Titan: Final Season - The Final Chapters is split into two large episodes. It seems like a fitting ending to series, though it feels like the norm these days. The Rumbling has started and now our Scoutsmust find a way to regroup, and catch up to Eren before all of humanity is crushed to death. That's it. That's literally the story. But how do we fill two and a half hours of this?

The movies start out with a glimpse into the past at when Eren and the Scouts visited some areas on the island across from the sea, and this part was done reasonably well. This would have happened between the time skip and it's nice to see some material in between when things started going into hell (well... more hell anyway). I like what they did here from a perspective of, you're basically watching as a lot of these "kids" (ie: Eren and his generation of Scouts) see the outside world for the first time as, mostly, observers. It starts the movie on a lighter note than most probably predicted, and it starts as warm up to the loads of information they feed you as the runtime rolls through.

I think the question on a lot of people's mind is similar to mine - what on earth is Eren's goal in all of this? I gotta say, I'm really not a big fan of the everything that surrounds his decisions after all was said and done. There's a lot of historical stuff that was included in the series after the time skip and I could never get myself into this sort of thing. Attack on Titan certainly does it better than a lot of others because you're looking at material that's specific to the titans, which are interesting to me, but there's so much to take in after that that you almost want look things up again to get a simpler version. I don't know that audiences want to see this. Obviously Attack on Titan started out as a bit of a revenge tour as Eren wanted to eliminate all titans, but my guess is the author felt that he wanted to include deep explanations for how the past. I get it, and it's certainly deeper than "find the boss, kill titan, win war", but I wasn't fully on board with how they went about it.

That being said, if you want people vs Titans action, boy, are you getting it here. They made sure to cram in as many action sequences as they could, and the fights only got better as they got closer and closer to Eren. It ramps up really nicely. So while the story minus the flashback aren't just action, action and more action, they do a really good job at making sure things flow nicely, and the pacing stays evened out, for the most part.

My understanding is that the way they went about the ending was changed from the source material, and while I don't know offhand how it ended in the manga series, you can't really tell anything feels off here. Which usually means the ending was done justice. And yes, it does feel good. I do think the ending could have used another couple more minutes, as there's not a lot of stuff after the fights are completed, but only really to hammer out some of the minor details, at best. Seriously, the story was done well, outside of anything surrounding Eren's decisions. (9/10)

Characters: There's not really any one character you can hyper focus on as being the main character ever since the time skip, but Armin might be that person now. He is our guide through the final season here and his intelligence allows him to ask more questions than your average viewer. We view a lot through him as he seeks to find the answer to all our questions, including how and why Eren seeks to end the war that they are currently in. It's incredible to see where he started vs where he ended. Mikasa redeems herself slightly after being mostly a pedestrian for most of the time-skip, but she probably doesn't end up being as popular as she once was. She's just not as 'cool' anymore.

Many of the titan shifters play an important roll here and I love the way they let us see their abilities. Armin, Pieck, Annie, Reiner, Falco. They were all fantastic. My one minor qualm is that for being the Armoured Titan, Reiner sure doesn't hold up very well to a lot of things anymore. Levi is still a monster in combat, even with fighting at half strength. I found his conclusion to be one of the funniest. It just seems so random. Hange is still awesome, even if she's not the weird one that we met, back when we first met her. Gabi is still kind of "there". And then there's Eren and Zeke. I've already highlighted my disappointment with Eren's story above, but he really doesn't say much through the conclusion of this series. (8/10)

Art: MAPPA puts out some of their best work, that I've seen, in quite a long time. Attack on Titan deserves it. It looks smooth, steady and always puts the action at the forefront. This is definitely one of the best action series that I've seen in a quite a while. (10/10)

Sound: Equally up to the task, the sound is amazing here. Kohta Yamamoto has taken over the reins for the sound from Hiroyuki Sawano, for the most part here, and it still sounds like the original's work. Splinter Wolf is obviously the best track here. I'm glad they brought back Linked Horizon for the OP, The Last Titan, as Attack on Titan was probably my first exposure to them, outside of the game Bravely Default. The VO work is equally up to the task here. Jessie James Grelle (Armin) is probably the best here, but the cast top to bottom remains elite. (10/10)

Overall: Attack on Titan: Final Season - The Final Chapters is the ending to one of the more successful long-term titles in the anime world in recent history. What started out as pure desperation to fight the titans, until it transitioned slowly about us learning about these beasts, was a bit of a sight to behold. Lots of grueling action, and lots of deeper story for those that want it. If someone new to anime asked for a recommendation for a longer anime, would Attack on Titan come up? It would. Because it's still strong, despite the bumps along the way. (9/10)