Board Thread:Manga/@comment-27321453-20181206222153/@comment-24407809-20181229063937

Penguinluver1431 wrote: Tdfern14 wrote: Penguinluver1431 wrote:

Tdfern14 wrote: Penguinluver1431 wrote:

Marco1995mega wrote: سلومي العليمي wrote: Penguinluver1431 wrote: TheMagicalWonders wrote: Penguinluver1431 wrote: The con is Nicolo. After what he did last chapter, why the sudden heel-turn? Are we supposed to believe that just a few inspiring words from the SC is enough to make him feel regret? He attacked Gabi and Falco for their role in Sasha's death, someone very close to him. I'm not buying that he suddenly feels remorse. I certainly wouldn't. I'm not convinced by the sudden change of heart that is an unfortunate trope in a lot of manga and anime. Maybe that's just you, but I'm going to believe that Nicolo feels remorse. He acted out of blind rage; it's not like he was calculating "I'm going to kill those two brats" since he heard Sasha died. Earlier in this chapter, Nicolo actually wonders "What was wrong with me, I nearly killed a kid" and then breaks down. He's trying to act responsible for his actions. I just have a hard time believing someone could change their mind in such a short time span, whether it was impulse or not. Frankly, I liked Nicolo's character a lot better before, considering Isayama has literred the Marley arc onward with anti-revenge crap. It was nice to have a character acting on basic human emotion rather than unbelievable preachiness (looking at you Mr. Blaus, I still hate you and Mikasa both lol), and I really thought Nicolo would be kind of an independent/third party between the Yeagerists' plans with trying to destroy their enemies for good and the SC which has fallen into a pointless circle of attempted peace talks. I think its quite possible for a person to change their mind in such a short time span when faced with all the logical arguments, and their brains telling them how wrong they are. Agreed. It's especially true if someone does it when on an emotional high. Plenty of, if not most, mistakes are a result of a sudden impulse due to intense emotions. After calming down, many realize the mistake they did. It's been portrayed in books, TV shows, films, and has happened a lot of times in real life. Emotional highs, I get. But flying into a murderous rage only to think, "Oh crap, what have I done?" is usually reserved for the holier-than-thou characters of Disney flicks or (shudder) Naruto's brand of irredeemable-yet-somehow-redeemed-without-merit villains. Since no one in AoT is truly innocent, vengeance should not be something the author shies away from, nor should it be something that is considered bad. I've already expressed how much I despise Mr. Braus for being (and i quote) "a weak and pathetic coward". For someone like Nicolo, however, the sudden change of heart is, again, Disney-esque kinds of cheesy (and preachy) tropes that made me shake my head.

In a way, Nicolo is like Mikasa in that sense; someone I had high hopes for but then one bad decision made me realize "Huh...guess they're not so great after all" Hasn't there been enough vengeance? Although if you want vengeance try Black Clover. For the protagonists on Paradis? Not nearly enough, Eren's blow to Marley was just a taste of a well-earned victory. After knowing what he know about Marley's treatment of Eldians, and the rest of the world's desire to wipe Paradis off the map, I can't wait for the rumbling, aka, the ultimate vengeance. So needless to say, I was very pleased with Eren's character this chapter. So thats the issue with the chapter, "not enough vengeance"? Is that it? Not specifically. Like I said when it was first released, I found it to be a vast improvement over the mess we got last month, lot more pros over cons this time. So I wasn't expecting full-blown revenge scheme this chapter, and we finally got the long awaited EMA talk. But in general? Kind of, yeah. Everything prior to the basement reveal was all about Eren slaying the Titans for good and, after learning more of their nature, making his enemies suffer. And after everything Eren had been through, I say he's deserved to satisfy his bloodlust.

But then once they started with Marley, Isayama suddenly slipped into this "oh no, the enemy isn't that bad" and "only love can solve all the complex problems of the real world" or that somehow going all biblical like "turning the other cheek" is an adequate solution a conflict dealing with an enemy nation that wants nothing more than to wipe Paradis out.

It's not about empathizing with the enemy, it's all about individual circumstance. I was thinking of things like the movie Taken where the dad goes to rescue his daughter, and more than a few times the enemies would tell him it wasn't anything personal; he didn't care, as far as he was concerned, they took his daughter, and he killed everyone in his path to get her back. Also in something like John Wick where the bad guys killed his dog just to get to him...JW didn't leave a single enemy alive. No questions asked, no misguided attempts to humanize his enemies, just pick up a weapon and watch the bodies pile up.

Given the grim nature that AoT started with, I thought Eren would get that same journey throughout the series. Then Isayama decided to get political/soft/cliche, whatever you wanna call it, and give us 10 chapters of RBA/Warriors when only 10% of me can muster enough interest in their side of the story. Hell, 10% is actually a generous number on my part, I couldn't be bothered to care about anyone outside of the Walldians. So long story short, yes, my issue is that it's straying too far from the revenge-based story elements from early on that made the series great. I don't like being told to empathize with people that are of no interest to me. You don't want to empathize with "bad" people, that's fine. That doesn't mean that there isn't still merit in what Isayama is trying (poorly, I'll admit) to do. Sometimes if you take a step back you'll realize that your enemy is just sad little man suffering from PTSD, deep-seated parental issues, and serious regret for the actions he's committed. Sometimes it's just a confused little girl who has no idea what she has done, because she was educated in a different world from you, and has been fed lies about what your people are her entire life.

Personally, I don't think promoting forgiveness is "weak" or "soft" or anything else. I think it's probably the hardest thing to do, and only the strongest mentally and spiritually can truly do it. At the end of the day, if Mr. Blouse (using him as an example because I honestly think it would be disrespectful to use a real-world example in something as trivial as this) chose to kill Gabi for what she did, it wouldn't bring Sasha back. I have no doubt that it's not what Sasha would have wanted, either. She was the type of girl to cry after seemingly killing Reiner in Shiganshina, despite the things he had done. All killing Gabi would have done was create one more dead body, and create a world of pain for Gabi's family. Then her parents would have had to kill Mr. Blouse in retaliation (I'm assuming that in this hypothetical situation, everyone shares your belief that revenge is the only appropriate response), and so on and so forth. It does not lead anywhere good, only more pain and more atrocities.

In a world goverened by the eye for an eye principle, everyone goes blind.