Board Thread:Manga/@comment-5774380-20190308225839/@comment-35822279-20190309001549

I really don't know how to feel about this chapter as it had lots of good scenes and some disappointing ones.

Pros:

- The ending was pretty neat with Pieck doing her best Solid Snake impression and I'm definitely looking forward to her and Eren's conversation. Hopefully it fleshes both of their characters out.

- The drawing was probably my favourite thing in this chapter. This might be Isayama's best work to date with impressive panelling, crisp quality, and expressive characters bringing the chapter to life. Serious props to the man for continuously improving his craft when others wouldn't.

- Pixis countinues to be the lowkey MVP of this arc for me as his talk with Yelena was a real winner. I loved their back and forth and how Pixis threw shade at her for using the tactics of her people's opressor to win. So good dialogue, characterization, and thematic backbone = highly enjoyable in my book

Cons:

- Levi and Zeke surviving. Unfortunately this confirmed that Octorift was right in the last thread, Isayama has no balls when it comes to offing characters that matter. Unfortunately moments like this have completely drained the tension for me as its just weak as it shows that even a regular human like Levi is practically invincible as long as they are a primary character. The one thing I miss from early AOT is the feeling that anyone can bite it but it feels like that hasn't been true since the Female Titan arc as its only gotten progressively worse. The manga is close to the breaking point for me when it comes to its stakes right now and Isayama needs to pull the trigger on someone that matters (Ex. not a character like Pieck as she's the least developed shifter).

- I'm just not buying Eren's turn towards the dark side as it just feels obvious at this point that he is playing Zeke and even his flashback talk with Zeke came across as incredibly disingenous. Like honestly I get Isayama's intentions but I just feel like he isn't sticking the landing here.

Mixed:

- Zekes revival scene: On the one hand this was a massive asspull but on the other hand it was undeniably interesting because of the odd metaphysical nature of it (reminded me of one of my fav movies from last year in a good way) and I feel like a dash of weirdness might be good for a arc that has been pulling its punches and following the script a little too closely. Also incredibly interesting how it called back to earlier scenes and seemed to eliminate some theories on the nature of the titans (more supernatural than scientific). I Can't wait to see the discussion on this little slice of weirdness.