Board Thread:Manga/@comment-27321453-20181008195355/@comment-35822279-20181009225122

Marco1995mega wrote: Freeman1378 wrote: Marco1995mega wrote: The "custom chair" was NOT a gag, nor an attempt at comedy, and I don't understand why some people here think it is. It's a damn torture machine. I'm not talking in general terms, either. In this chapter, if you hadn't noticed, Darius glanced at the chair after Mikasa had asked what was going to happen to Eren. Furthermore, he'd stayed silent shortly just before doing so, showing his unwillingness to answer.

In other words, Zackly was planning to use his chair on Eren.

P.S. Good to see that the story is picking up the pace. The sh*t machine is clearly not meant to be a gag in most of it's unfortunate appearances but it became a gag in the community because of how poorly written and laughable the scenario was as while it is connected to Zackley's hatred of nobility that he mentions in Uprising the problem is that this moment for me was not handled subtly but done in an over the top fashion that made it hard for me to ever take the character seriously again and the tone in general in both sh*t machine scenes is that they tonally clash with everything around them. This chapter in particular was trying (not very successfully) to be a subtle chapter about plots, interrogations, and the art of lying and then this scene comes along where Isayama again makes the boring point that Zackley is like some crappy Saturday morning cartoon villain that salivates at the thought of torturing those around him in the most cartoonish way possible and it clashes with the tone he is aiming for by reducing what should be grim and earth shattering moment in every sense of the word (like seriously Floch flat out admitted to plotting to assassinate their head of state and Eren was cool with that) to LOL the sh*t machine killed him like just put the bomb in his desk it does the same thing and keeps the spotlight on the assassination rather than trying to make the silly point that his obsession over cartoonish torture killed him. Also the death felt like a poorly written version of one of my all time favourite character deaths and it was an incredibly unflattering reference as one was masterfully built up while the other was handled with all the subtlety and grace of a bull in a china shop. Really? To me, the scene with the chubby noble in the chair was downright disturbing. I literally found nothing funny about it. Zackly was a bit over-the-top, maybe, but the maniacal grin on his face just went to show his psychotic side. Everybody's got a side to them they keep close to the vest; Darius' was merely... unexpected for a man of his station and normally composed demeanor. Nonetheless, in my view, it didn't take away anything at all from his capabilities as commander-in-chief. If anything, it just made him appear more dangerous. I mean, you know how Hange is, and yet, do you think her eccentricities make her less of a soldier or a commander? I don't.

Plus, I don't think the sh*t machine scenes clash with the tone at all; in fact, they just add onto it. The glance he sends to it in the meeting without verbally revealing anything to Mikasa, Armin, or the readers, but insinuating his thoughts still. That gave me chills, man. And the way it was used to kill him? Totally unexpected. Heck, some might find it as poetic justice; his 'bad habits' get him killed and all that jazz. Besides, not all death scenes ought to be super subtle and graceful (and I wouldn't necessarily agree with your assessment there). Some should come hard and strong. And the way the crowd reacted to his mangled corpse was priceless, deliciously horrifying, and convolutedly insightful. And Eren's 'totally cool' reaction is just adding another layer of mystery. Sure, we get that he's become more apathetic, but there are clearly details that we are still missing. Like, how he got that way, other than the military's snail-paced response time.

I can agree it's not the very best chapter on secret plots and lying, but it's FAR from bad, too. I quite liked this chapter. I rated it 9 out of 10. I don't know at this point it's just an agree to disagree situation as one note psychotic characters are not really my cup of tea and the thing with Zackley's torture habit is I find it a pretty bland way to show somebodys evil and the noble scene just felt weakly executed as it didn't scare me and felt like it was trying to hard to show Zackley's depravity and in the end felt more like a parody than something to be taken seriously (his facial reactions and dialogue were the main culprits for why this scene doesn't work). My beef with Zackley's death is that it could have toned down a bit as it is clearly a plot driven death more than a character one as Zackley is pretty thin as a character and I feel that the irony was lazy and unearned and cheapened the moment. Eren is pretty intriguing right now I'll agree with that and I think he's never been more exciting as a character due to the level of unpredictability in his actions and it feels to me like a natural progression for him to end up being a morally grey anti-hero. Ultimately I don't hate this chapter but this has been one of my last favourite stretches in the entire series as most of the recent chapters including this one would be 5's or 6's out of 10 (106 is a 3 as I truly disliked it and 108 is the highlight with an 8) but things do look to be better now and I have faith in WIT to do it better by making it 1 or 2 episodes.