Attack on Titan: Manga Volume 14 Reaction & Review!
Added 2023-06-23 17:00:05 +0000 UTC**KENNY-SIZED HEADPHONE WARNINGS**
I am FLOORED by not only what was cut from the anime in this volume, but also how things were re-arranged -- you'll have to excuse me lamenting that we wouldn't get the badass Kenny entrance...only to finally get it this volume along with a CLIFFHANGER!
From more character work with Dimo Reeves, Flegel Reeves, Eren and Historia, to of course Levi and Kenny, this volume had me STUNNED! More, please!
Thank you for watching with me and for all the support!
Comments
There’s a lot of good things that I loved were included in the manga that helped explain things in the anime; I don’t remember how I reacted to Pixis and Erwin, but this definitely made it better. Yeah, Sannes and the way he’s drawn in the manga does make him seem much more uncomfortable with what he “had to do,” which relates to a lot of our crew, now. That also makes sense with the guy that made the guns; thanks for noting that! That is such a good point about Levi and Isayama writing characters – I DEFINITELY will want to talk about that in a future volume! There’s so much in AOT that I’m just taking it volume at a time, and I don’t really want to talk about Gross or Kruger until we get to that point in the manga, so I didn’t read #4 – you might bring it back up when we get to later volumes the similarities. 🙂 I just can’t mentally get too ahead of myself in the comments yet and I’m sticking to just the things pertaining to what we’ve seen up until this point in the manga. Hahahahaha, does Kenny have an agenda against short people? That’s also funny about the comparison to Eren and Hange with the “rebellious phase.” Oh wow, you’re so right; that IS a major development with Mikasa’s character in staying back – I like that Isayama doesn’t call direct attention to it either but just lets it happen naturally – that’s a great point to bring up; I’ll have to note that, too! Thanks for the comment!
Romaniablack
2023-06-30 13:51:33 +0000 UTCI like the extra conversations/content that is here but some of it i probably like better in the anime. That said, if this was the way the anime did it and the manga instead had the anime version i might just have the opposite view/feeling. The extra dialogue we get with Pyxis and Erwin makes the "altered memories" theory feel more plausible, it felt a bit out of left field in the anime. With the way the manga also makes the strife between the walls/classes more clear it sets up the way Erwin tricks the council later a bit better in my mind. I am not gonna go bat for Rodd Reiss again but is it gaslighting if he believes what he is saying? :P Also, i liked that we got to see more of scary Armin... although he tried to laugh it off as a joke.
Christopher Pettersson
2023-06-29 18:36:05 +0000 UTCWe were ROBBED with that shirtless Erwin shot, right?! UGH. And that line from Kennyyyyyy -- there was a lot to like in this volume! Thank you for the comment! :)
Romaniablack
2023-06-26 14:33:34 +0000 UTCThe "That midget is my pride and joy" and shirtless Erwin erasure is real.
Cart
2023-06-26 03:23:49 +0000 UTC4. Levi’s speech about being “abnormal” also parallels Gross’s speech to Grisha and the audience where he also calls himself abnormal. Though there are similarities in what they’re saying they diverge in the meaning behind them. Levi: “Will those around you still be there tomorrow? I never think so and I doubt normal people think about these things on a daily basis, so that means I’m abnormal. Probably because I’ve seen far too many abnormal things. But if Wall Rose were breached tomorrow and we faced an emergency, I’d be faster than any of you to react and to fight” Gross: “Do you wake up feeling like you might die today? I don’t know how many people do but the fact is, that feeling’s the natural state for living things. But in a society that takes peace for granted, the people who think that way are abnormal. Well, I’m different. We’re all gonna die, but me, I’m ready to accept it when my day comes.” Levi calls himself abnormal in the way he’s quicker to react than anyone and willing to get his hands dirty and do cruel things for the sake of a better future for humanity that doesn’t involve them all being eaten alive, and as such he is willing to be cruel and kill who he has to when necessary. Whereas Gross calls himself abnormal in the way that he is supposedly in touch with his sense of mortality and is able to commit these cruel acts to stay in touch with live and death, whereas everyone who takes peace for granted has become too neutered by it and unable to do these things. In both speeches they’re justifying they’re cruelty and why they’re able to do these things, how they’re both abnormal and able to take actions that everyone else can’t. However for Levi his justification is part of a grander goal that hopefully by doing these cruel things, humanity won’t have to get eaten alive by titans. Whereas for Gross it's merely a shallow justification for his cruelty that has no end goal, he calls feeding Grisha’s sister to his son’s dogs education for them, he says that he wants people to experience what it’s like to feel alive that you can only experience when you see brutality and people’s lives at risk like in times of war. Though we see directly after this speech how shallow his words truly were, since when he’s pushed off the wall by Kruger, he doesn’t accept his fate because he understands the truth of the cruel world like he claims, but instead screams in fear, desperately afraid of dying. Showing that it was only ever justification for the cruel stuff he does to others, not some form of enlightenment that he attains from his actions that allows him to face the cruel world head on, unlike Levi who we know constantly puts his life on the line, facing the hardest battles and toughest decisions the cruel world can throw at him. Both are capable of being cruel but Levi’s has purpose behind it and he’s able to take what he dishes out, whereas Gross clearly wasn’t. 5. In the anime it wasn’t Levi who told Historia to hit him, it was Mikasa. Which does make sense condiering the little grudge she’s held against him since the courtroom trial lol. But Levi doesn’t rough Historia up at all in the anime. In the anime her hitting him isn’t payback but moreso her just declaring herself queen by punching humanity’s strongest soldier and telling him there’s nothing he can do about it. Which is definitely funny but doesn’t have the weight or meaning it has in the manga of it being her proving herself and getting back at Levi specifically for what he previously did to her. In fact in the anime she only learns that she’s supposed to become queen after she’s been rescued from the Reiss cave and has already gone through her character arc of rejecting her father and deciding to live for herself and her friends. Completely different circumstances since in the manga when Rod gets his hands on her, she’s already being forced into becoming the queen by Levi and the Survey Corps, a role she doesn’t want and see herself fit for. Which makes more sense as to why she would fall so easily into her father’s plan of becoming God and being what he wants her to be, when she’s in her most vulnerable state of course she’d grasp at this chance for familial love that she’s been starved of her whole life, rather than the political schemes the Survey Corps has planned for her which she never asked for. 6. I find it funny how Kenny greets Historia and Levi in the exact same way “Look at how ya’ve grown. No ya haven’t chanted much” Kenny needs to stop picking on short people! 7. The way Hanji in chapter 57 describes Eren as the “personification of teenage rebellion” is hilarious! It reminds me of when he grabs her by the collar through his prison cell bars in season 4 and Hanji tries to play it off by saying he’s still in his rebellious phase lol. 8. Mikasa choosing to trust Levi when the rest of the 104th is losing faith in him after what he did to Historia is huge! Even being fine going along with the plan to willingly hand over Eren to the interior police, and obeying Levi when he tells her they need to give up on Eren and Historia and figure out a different plan instead of chasing after them. Compare that to the anime version where Levi has to physically hold Mikasa back as she screams his name while he’s being taken away. There’s no development for her shown during this arc in the anime, whereas the manga shows her being able to distance herself from Eren more than she always to previously and prioritise the goals of the Survey Corps over his immediate safety. We see this further in season 4 where Mikasa chooses her duty as a member of the Survey Corps over her need to protect and follow Eren.
Doccyy
2023-06-26 00:15:43 +0000 UTC1. I do love Pixis and Erwin’s conversation in the manga. You can tell throughout that Pixis is sympathetic to Erwin’s plight but isn’t convinced his goals are in humanity’s best interest and makes it clear to Erwin that he’ll send him to his death if he’s unable to convince him that overthrowing the king would help humanity within the walls. Pixis is the one laying out all the reasons why toppling the king could be a terrible idea and proposes multiple ways they could come to a diplomatic agreement with the king. Whereas in the anime their conversation is drastically shortened with Erwin essentially explaining his plan and his backstory to him and Pixis expressing essentially 0 doubt, or scepticism about it unlike in the manga. He’s essentially just onboard with it immediately. 2. You could probably tell but the Sannes torture scene is a lot more brutal in the manga, obviously the anime is restricted by censorship laws which limits the things they’re allowed to show. Sannes has a lot of interesting dialogue during that scene like when he expresses that he’s never seen people take as much enjoyment in torture as them. We see that in the glimpses of his flashbacks when he’s torturing Erwin’s father, Sannes at least originally seemed very uncomfortable and hesitant about what he was doing. As we saw with Pastor Nick, the interior police torture people to get answers out of them, whereas Hanji tortured purely for revenge when she ripped off all his nails and told him she’s not gonna ask him a single question until they’ve already done everything to him that he did to Nick. That was purely just to get back at him. You can tell she’s acting emotionally here and letting the guilt she felt for Nick’s death influence her, like when she decides to rip out one of Sannes’ teeth just because he didn’t answer a question immediately. I also love lines from this scene that didn’t make it into the anime like Hanji noting that it was the interior police that withheld technological advancement which of course makes sense since if technology was allowed to develop, they would be able to create new weapons to defeat the titans, explore outside the walls, and discover that the rest of the world was still out there. Which of course would entirely ruin King Fritz’s peaceful paradise where he wants everyone to stay within the walls completely clueless to the rest of the world. You’re right to note that you didn’t remember the guy who made guns that Sannes killed, because that one didn’t make it into the anime. Plus the line where Sannes tells them the Survey Corps was only allowed to go outside the walls in the first place despite this going against the king’s wishes, because they naturally assumed they’d never make any progress and just get themselves all killed out there. Which puts a dark spin on the what the Survey Corps has stood for this whole time, to the members they're meant to be this bastion of hope and freedom for humanity beyond the walls, whereas for the king they acted as perfect examples for the rest of the population to show how dangerous the outside world is and how utterly pointless it is to go outside the walls. As we’ve seen in this arc with what Sannes said to Hanji in their first meeting, and what the Trost civilians said to Levi, the Survey Corps are just seen as these suicidal bastards that accomplish nothing but still get paid well, eat well and are a waste of the people’s taxes. This negative image has been prevalent since episode 1 of the series and was especially prominent in episode 22 when they came back after the Female Titan exhibition. I find it so interesting how our heroes are just seen as a nuisance to most of the rest of society up till this point. Finally, that line Sannes said about being able to easily justify whatever actions you take as long as you do it for a righteous cause which can tie into so many characters. Reiner doing the attack on the walls so he can be seen as a hero who killed the island devils, Gross having fun killing Eldians since he’s just fulfilling the wish of humanity everywhere, Floch descending more into his sadism and villainy as he justifies his cruelty under the banner of saving Eldia. 3. I adore that scene where Levi grabs Historia, that along with the speech he gives to the 104th afterwards might be my favourite Levi scene in the whole series so it’s a real shame absolutely none of it made it into the anime. He’s a kid who grew up in one of the toughest areas within the walls, where it was a kill or be killed environment. He was raised by a serial killer who taught him that power and strength is the most important thing in life. And that violence makes up a big part of Levi’s identity and how he deals with situations. Him beating the life out of Eren in the courtroom, him threatening to cut Annie’s limbs off when he’s stood on her head, him threatening to torture Pastor Nick in the carriage, him helping Hanji torture Sannes, him grabbing Historia, him knocking half of Eren’s teeth out during Serumbowl, etc. I feel like cutting this scene roughs down his sandy edges a bit since this is one of the few times where Levi makes a decision that the rest of his squad doesn’t agree with and think he’s out of line. Levi is a flawed man, but people naturally have flaws, just because Levi may be slightly dependent of violence and his strength because that’s how he was raised, is a flaw but he’s not going to have a pointless character arc to learn that it’s wrong and change himself, it’s just a part of who he is. I love that about the way Isayama writes characters, he writes them all with their own flaws but doesn’t write them so that they fix all these flaws and become perfect versions of themselves but writes them in the messy way people actually are. He writes characters like Annie who are selfish, characters like Mikasa who are co-dependent, characters like Historia and Ymir who are way too self-sacrificial, characters like Armin who have little self-esteem and doubt themselves, characters like Eren who despite having good in them and doing good things, are ultimately unable to break out of a continuous negative spiral. None of these characters ever completely move past these flaws, you just accept that it is part of who they are. Because in a world as messed up as Attack on Titan, these characters don’t have the time to sort out all their personal issues and become the best/healthiest versions of themselves, like you might expect in a more upbeat Shonen or slice of life series.
Doccyy
2023-06-26 00:12:33 +0000 UTCThank you so much! It DEFINITELY is different and I'm really enjoying getting a fresh take on the story at this point! :) Thanks for the comment!
Romaniablack
2023-06-23 23:05:42 +0000 UTCThat's totally cool if you preferred the anime! There's definitely an "apples and oranges" vibe to it! :)
Romaniablack
2023-06-23 23:05:12 +0000 UTCIf I‘m being honest I like the anime version much more. The manga was too slow paced for my taste. But there are also a few things in the anime that I would criticize. That is only my opinion of course.
Melisa Erkaya
2023-06-23 18:51:41 +0000 UTCI remember when the uprising arc for the anime released a lot of us manga readers were so disappointed with how much was cut and changed to make it more compact! I'm excited to see you see these scenes ^^
Kotaro 14
2023-06-23 17:21:26 +0000 UTC
