Hero (Episode)

"I'm... not losing. Because I don't run."

- Armin Arlelt as a child

Hero (勇者) is 17th episode of the 3rd season and the 54th episode overall of the Attack on Titan anime, produced by and.

Overview
Zeke finishes off the remainder of the Scout Regiment recruits and pities them for wasting their lives. However, he is startled by Levi Ackermann, whose arrival was hidden by the Scouts' diversionary charge. Levi soundly defeats Zeke's Beast Titan, but before he can use a Titan injection to feed Zeke to a surviving Scout, the Cart Titan attacks Levi and then runs away with Zeke. Zeke sends his remaining Titans to finish off Levi.

Meanwhile, Armin Arlelt splits his squad into two teams. Most of the squad leaves to holds off the Armored Titan and succeeds, thanks to the timely reappearance of Hange Zoë. Armin wakes up Eren Jaeger who is comatose in his Titan, and relays a plan that will allow them to defeat Bertholdt Hoover's Colossal Titan. Eren falls off the Wall and pretends to be unconscious while Armin distracts Bertholdt and goads him into using up all his energy to burn him alive. When Armin finally collapses, Bertholdt moves on to deal with Eren, who has secretly emerged from his Titan. Eren ambushes Bertholdt from behind and cuts him out of his Titan's nape, ending the battle.

Summary
Floch cries out when Erwin Smith falls from his horse, but Marlo Freudenberg urges him to continue the charge. Ahead of them, Zeke finds their efforts pitiful, and deems it a tragedy that King Reiss stole their memories of the world, since it is causing them to repeat mistakes of the past. In his frustration, Zeke's crushes the rocks in the Beast Titan's hand to dust, startling himself. He wonders what has gotten into him and reminds himself not to get worked up like his father as he prepares another set of rocks for bombardment.

As he prepares to throw, Marlo calls out the next volley and the remaining recruits in the Scout Regiment fire more signal flares to obscure the Beast Titan's vision. Marlo can see the arc of the Titan's arm though, and wonders if this is how he is going to die. He find himself wondering what Hitch Dreyse is doing at that moment, and why he would think her about at a time like this.

Zeke cheers as his volley kills Marlo and many of the remaining Scouts, but to his surprise, a few of them still survive and fire another round of signal flares. Irritated, he asks why they bother. His third barrage takes out the remainder, and he calls them "poor things" before noticing that the Titans on one side of him are now lying dead on the ground.

The grappling hook of an omni-directional mobility gear pierces his shoulder and Levi Ackermann bursts through the haze of signal flares that have formed around the Beast Titan. Zeke tries to stop him, but Levi dodges his thrust and cuts a long spiraling wound around the Beast Titan's arm, tearing it to pieces. Zeke then remembers that Reiner Braun had warned him to watch out for a single soldier; Captain Levi. Realizing who he is fighting, Zeke covers his nape with his Titan's hand, but Levi's next attack takes out the Beast Titan's eyes, followed by its legs and remaining arm, sending Zeke crashing to the ground.

Zeke tries to harden when he realizes Levi is going for his nape, but does not have enough time before Levi cuts him out of the Beast Titan. All four of his limbs have been severed to prevent him from easily transforming again, and Levi jams his blade into Zeke's mouth. Though he would like to kill Zeke, Levi first wonders if there could be anyone else left alive. Even if that person is dying, the Titan injection could save them and allow them to obtain Zeke's power.

However, before he can take things further, the Cart Titan charges in behind him. Levi jumps out of the way and the Cart Titan grabs Zeke in its mouth and carries him away. Zeke shouts for his remaining Titans to kill Levi, counting on the fact that Levi's weapons must be nearly used up. Frustrated that he was not able to kill the Beast Titan, as he had promised Erwin, Levi readies his last pair of blades and engages the oncoming Titans.

Meanwhile, Floch gets up, surrounding by the bodies of the other recruits, and wonders why he is alive. He wanders through the carnage, calling out for other survivors.

On the other side of the Wall, Armin Arlelt notices that the Colossal Titan has gotten thinner since they started fighting it. As Hange Zoë had theorized, the Colossal is weak in a battle of attrition. It eats up a lot of its own body mass when it uses its attacks, particularly the steam emission. This gives Armin a plan and he asks the rest of his squad to draw Reiner's Armored Titan away while he and Eren Jaeger handle Bertholdt Hoover themselves.

Leaving Reiner to them, Armin heads up the Wall and lands on Eren's unconscious Titan. He shoots his ODM into the Titan's body so he cannot be thrown off and prepares to stab Eren with one of his blades. Armin realizes that if this plan works, he will not be able to look at the sea, but thinking of the outside world gives him courage. He drives his blade into Eren's Titan and calls out to him, waking him up. Armin then explains his plan.

Jean Kirschtein leads the remainder of their squad towards the Armored Titan with a plan to fight conservatively and keep Reiner away from the battle with Bertholdt, but Reiner completely ignores them and runs past the squad in pursuit of Eren. Mikasa Ackermann declares that they will have to kill Reiner and changes direction to follow him. She cripples his Titan with a Thunder Spear to the back of the knee so he falls to the ground. Though Jean is initially upset with her, he agrees with her assessment. However, their squad has only three Thunder Spears left.

Reiner looks at them in confusion, wondering what took out his knee. His memory of everything that happened since he left Bertholdt is foggy, but looking around he can see Eren's Titan sitting on the Wall, so the Warriors can still win if they capture him. Reiner decides he will hurry up and finish off the rest of his former comrades before running to help Bertholdt.

Closer to the Wall, Bertholdt finds it strange that their former comrades from the 104th appear to have been the only ones who survived his explosion. He hoped to have gotten everyone, but finds he has gotten used to things being harder than expected. Bertholdt sees Armin talking to Eren ahead of him and wonders what Armin hopes to accomplish when Eren is so clearly in a weakened state.

Meanwhile, Armin tells Eren that their success depends on how long he can hold out. Sensing Eren's unease, Armin assures him that he cannot let himself die until he looks at the sea, so he will back off if things get too intense. He smiles and asks Eren if he has ever lied to him. With a final reminder for Eren to stick to the plan, Armin jumps off his friend's Titan.

The two of them wait for Bertholdt to approach, but part of the Wall crumbles beneath Eren and he slides off the Wall, landing in a motionless heap by the gate. Bertholdt is unsurprised, knowing they did not have much of a chance. He doubts Eren even has the ability to stand. Deciding to end it, he lifts an arm and swings at Armin. Armin dodges and grapples on to the Colossal Titan's body with his ODM, hurling himself up in front of its head. Bertholdt acknowledges that Armin has fought well, up until the very end, and emits a blast of hot steam.

Mikasa sees the blast, and though she worries over Eren and Armin, she focuses on facing Reiner. Jean has a plan that will use all their remaining Thunder Spears. He goes in first himself, acting as the decoy, and leaving Reiner open to attacks from Conny Springer and Sasha Braus, who are to strike either side of his jaw with their Thunder Spears. However, Sasha is knocked away by some of the debris from Reiner's attack against Jean, and only Conny's Thunder Spear hits.

The plan was for Mikasa's Thunder Spear to hit Reiner's nape by going through his mouth after the other two had blasted his jaw open, but that has not happened. Deciding she does not have a choice, even if his jaw is not open, Mikasa prepares to attack.

By the Wall, Bertholdt is puzzled by the fact Armin has not been blown away, but is still tethered to him somehow, held up by the blast of scorching air. Armin has in fact anchored himself to the Colossal Titan's teeth, correctly concluding that they would not be consumed like the softer parts of the Titan's body. More importantly, while the Colossal Titan is emitting so much steam, Bertholdt is unable to move. Despite the pain from his body roasting in the heat, Armin struggles to hold on and buy more time.

Perplexed that being cooked like this is the best plan that Armin could come up with, Bertholdt wonders what Armin is trying to accomplish and if this could be a diversion, but when he looks, Eren is still sitting unconscious where he landed, and the others are busy with Reiner. Deciding that if this is going to be the end for Armin, Bertholdt can at least make it quick and turns up the heat.

Armin holds on as best he can in the face of the Colossal Titan's increasing temperature. As his body withers around him, he entrusts everything to Eren; his dreams, his life, and his hope of reaching the sea. When he can no longer hold on to his ODM, he falls.

In the battle with Reiner, Conny tries to get Mikasa to stop her attack, but a wounded Hange unexpectedly arrives and shoots a Thunder Spear at the side of the jaw that Sasha had missed. When Reiner's jaw falls open, she shouts for Mikasa to take her chance, and Mikasa lunges at Reiner. She lands in his mouth and fires her Thunder Spear inside, detonating it. Reiner is blown out the back of his Titan’s nape.

Now that Armin has fallen away, Bertholdt moves on with his previous plan, taking care of Eren and the horses. But when he looks down at Eren, he realizes that rather than a Titan, he is seeing the hardened shell of one.

Behind the Colossal Titan, Eren flies up on his ODM, blades out, and cuts into Bertholdt's nape. He pulls out a shocked and dismembered Bertholdt, who realizes that Eren was just pretending he could not move and that Armin was a diversion so that Eren could harden and make a decoy. The Colossal Titan collapses and smoulders now that Bertholdt is no longer inside it.

In the aftermath of the battle, Eren drags Bertholdt's torso behind him as he walks along a rooftop. He realizes that he should have known that Armin was up to something. When they were kids, Armin would not fight back against bullies, and while he would get beat up, Armin would never call it losing, because he never ran. That was why Eren wanted to know him.

Eren finds Armin's body and says he knew Armin was more of a hero than anyone else.

The Outside World
''It's said a world beyond our wildest dreams extends outside the Walls. It has fiery waters, lands of ice, sandy snowfields, and a saltwater lake called the sea that stretches far past the horizon. Some have joined the Scout Regiment to fight solely because seeing it is their dream.''