Attack on Titan 4x2 "Midnight Train" - Early Access

I think I am definitely going to continue paying patreon, Aot has really piqued my interest after yesterday's episode.

xRyann_

Oh cmon people it looks completely acceptable. The guy wasnt put off by the stiff ass Eren vs Reiner 2 fight with all the CGI bricks flying around every 10 seconds and barely any movement or the atrocious Colossal CGI but he cant bear to look at this 8/10 CGI with amazing handdrawn mixed in? This fandom is something else.

Rinne

i assume he's been put off by the CGI, which i totally understand

R

Anyone have an idea when he's starting Vinland Saga? Can't wait

999

I don't think you were ever interested by it and watched it for very different reasons than most people here, then.

FlabbyGentleman

Bye.

JAM

Not even staying for other shows? Vinland Saga's coming up, you know.

Eugene

nobody asked

GeorgeYTG

👋

Tom

Im gonna miss you.

Rinne

ok cool

Zero 陰陽

Why is that?

CrazySundii

I think I will not continue paying patreon, Aot has stopped interesting me after yesterday's episode

Diego Reyes

I knew you would love the art used in this new season! cannot wait for more, cheers!

mangacho

Yes the beginning is not great visually and in terms of staging but it gets better. also the manga is not uncensored of course. Its more graphic and I think the art style give a more gloomy atmosphere. I find also the cutting.

Hassan

Mappa likes to move some scenes around so no, that's a terrible idea

IronWoodkid

Don't know if you noticed but they used rotoscoping for quite a few scenes this episode, like Zeke-Colt-Magath talk, Udo's rant and Gabi and her parents little moment at the dining table. It allowed a more expressive, realistic character movement. Athough it's not exactly fluid animation, most likely because they didn't have much time to animate this season

IronWoodkid

My god these are too good. I want you to be able to do Shingeki 2x a week for the next couple weeks so you can catch up with us so badly!! Thanks for a great discussion as always.

Raghav

Dude this show is on another level.

Maszkus

Inject the next three reactions into my veins

Alejandro Gil

There are some things that Mappa didn’t adapt in the anime - explanation of Zeke’s power (chapter 93) and Gabi’s motivation for becoming the Armored titan (chapter 95). Chapter 94 is a spoiler, second half of chapter 95 is a spoiler after Reiner says “I have to go back to that island”

Roman Ostashov

The pacing of the manga could never work in the show, it is laughable that you think MAPPA destroyed the pacing, you seem to have no idea about adapting a story from a medium to a total different medium. And someone else did wrote it: A lot of people working on season 4 are the same who worked before on the show INCLUDING THE SCRIPT WRITER. But I am curious - what are the core themes that got lost in this season, written by the same writer who wrote the seasons before? btw I could take your arguments way more serious if you wouldn't babble about MAPPA Fanboys - it just shows that you are a butthurt fan yourself

Theo Traumato

The part about omitting critical lines of dialogue, I have a feeling that some of them will show up at later episodes. MAPPA has stated that they are rearranging parts of the chapters for a better flow of the story. Ofc can't be sure until we have all the episodes

Åsmund Bergsbakk

Yes. The dinner table scene. You are first reactor who noticed the brilliancy of that scene and appritiate what Isayama did there. Personally it was one of my favourite scenes since i read it in manga. And Mappa did a great job adapting it like this. Tho in manga there were panels of Reiner's memories, pictures of our crew. It's so good still. Im so glad you loved it too. Can't wait for a next week. You are the goat.

Владислав Черниенко

You should actually do like an excel spreadsheet ranking all your aot episodes, i'd love to see how you rank them and how season 4 changes them

Uzair Ali

Lmao "The Grice Clan" xD

Majestical Popo

Loved the reaction and discussion, looking forward to next week. - I think Zeke's beast titan is different only in controlling the titans he transforms. about 2000 years ago, they had to have a way to transform people into titans, unless at that time, all the Eldian's that held one of the nine had to die at the age of 13. That's why I think all the previous beast titans were able to transform people into titans. - This episode had two amazing transitions, the first one was from Zeke to Reiner. it blended very well to the point that you did not see it coming. The second one is the 'BOOM' transition, you first see how the war for people is like hell, and the other is like achievements. - One of the things that I thought I would see is Zeke's children, I thought he would be a married man. But now thinking about it, it is not a good idea to have children of 'royal blood' in Marley. - The last thing, I have just noticed, Reiner seems to be left hand. He reached out twice using his left hand.

Hussain Alghazal

The art gets infinitely better and there are a TON of scenes the anime skips. The whole uprising arc in season 3 is really different in the anime and skips most of Levi's dialog and some scenes. The characters are a tiny bit more fleshed out in the manga. Season 4 also skipped a couple of scenes so far. The anime is the final product so its better for the most part but I still recommend reading if you're really into the story.

Rinne

The "new type of animation" you mention is likely a rotoscoping, actually a very old technique which involves first live-filming actors, then tracing over images to make them drawn. So it is, in fact, camera work just like in live action.

Рюмин Константин

You catch a lot of things is great to watch.

Aras Paty

Yeah if im gonna read it'll be after the show has ended. I was just wondering if you think it's worth it.

TheStruggler

What he did is irredeemable imo. The ol "just following orders" conundrum but it is still annoying that people dont see he is obviously conflicted.

TheStruggler

I will agree, season 1 is better in the anime. The artwork is getting better and better to the point that you are not sure what looks better, the manga or the anime. Some scenes are way better in the manga in terms of artwork, others not. The point is, it gets better. Also you get some extended scenes, and some scenes that have been cut. You also get also get extra artwork, for example in this episode, in the dinner table, when Reiner is talking about the devils, in the background it shows the characters he is talking about and you see Reiner among them, happy.I highly recommend reading it from chapter 90 onward (that is where season 4 starts). But if you are gonna start doing that now, instead of waiting for the season to end, i recommend not to try and catch up with the anime, because they are re-arranging some scenes because it flows better in the animated version and you might see something that havent been shown to the anime. Staying 2 episodes behind will most likely keep you safe.

Thanos D. Alexioy

Makes me anxious about how the are gonna handle the other action scenes without Arifumi Imai. Definitely the biggest lost to the series.

TheStruggler

FINALLY someone that immediately realizes what Reiner was doing on the train. Way too many reactors and reviewers were either faulting him for it or just discarded it as Reiner being "crazy". The payoff of watching the seasons carefully and analyzing everything is huge in this final season.

LaZa

Anime only question. I tried reading the manga but the art is just awful and the sequence of events played out better in season 1 than the manga. Does the art get better and what else is better?

TheStruggler

How is Mappa better? We won't be getting anymore Arifumi Imai scenes anymore and we've only seen limited animation in between so and so CG.

TheStruggler

While I understand the criticisms, dropping terms like “MAPPA fanboys” makes you sound like a fanboy yourself and totally devalue the points you were trying to make

Muhd Zulhilmi

Seeing you this excited already makes me worried that you probably gonna have a heart attack or two by the end of the season. And yes i recommend reading the manga when the season is over.

Thanos D. Alexioy

MAPPA is incomparably better than WIT. An appropriate final season. And I don't recommend to read the manga at least until S4 part1(?) is done. Because they’ve been rearranged the order of scenes some time, so a scene that seems to be cut could come in the another episode.

dobley

You sound so bitter, things will need to be cut and I'm pretty sure Isayama is involved with the anime. Most people are still really enjoying this season and unfortunately for you it does not seem like you will.

Tsenoble

What solidified my impression of you as the best AoT reactor was your approach to Reiner, Bert and Annie when they were revealed. You wanted their motives, their backgrounds, and while they're certainly the enemy of our protagonists, you knew they had their own stories long before that was revealed. Good stuff.

Annatar

All I see from your comment is hate. Yeah I was a bit disappointed in the anime Marley arc too but that has to be done considering there's only 16 episodes and amount workloads from the studio. You gave next to no credit to Mappa which isn't true at all.

Trung Ta

But it’s the same person handling the scripts/adaptation for both WIT & MAPPA though. We likely would have run into the same cuts regardless of studio. Not going into specifics on any cut scenes to avoid spoilers and the possibility we may see some of the cut content later though

Sarah S

I disagree

Zero 陰陽

The video kinda cuts off at the end? Is that on purpose?

Xlash

something to note is that Reiner was able to halt his healing until the moment he revealed his identity in season 2

Kettleroot

I'm not sure if you've ever gone over this, but if you've avoided the manga, this is the season during which I would most strongly recommend picking it up. Obviously you can't read it before the episodes, but I would advise you to read the manga chapters covered in each episode right after you finish watching it because as much as some people have flocked to MAPPA's defense, their adaptation is completely all over the place. Although WIT stumbled in their own right with peculiar choices (the Uprising arc comes to mind with its sleeping darts) MAPPA is betraying a much deeper blunt lack of understanding of the source material that fails to cut to the series' thematic quik and then some. Not only have they omitted critical lines of dialogue - the likes of which you would have most certainly picked up in your reactions - they've gravely fumbled the pacing of the season and of each individual episode. I'm not sure how you could go about integrating the manga into your viewing experience, but I hope you give it some consideration. You put far too much effort into these reactions and analyses, and with the way MAPPA is handling this season compared to WIT (I'm not at all interested in having a back and forth with MAPPA fanboys btw) it just doesn't seem right for you to wrap up the series with a focus on the decidedly lesser one of the two versions of the series, especially when taking into account just how good the Marley arc is in the manga. For all their errors, with the exception of Uprising, WIT never deviated from the spirit or substance of the source material so gravely that their adaptation felt less than the manga. In fact, in many parts WIT managed to elevate Isayama's work in surprising ways. Having watched the final season thus far, I feel that the same can sadly not be said for MAPPA. Just a thought, at any rate, I hope you enjoy the final stages of the series in their fullest!

Elise Flanagan

Yeah, good point - it's important to see that Reiner is actually aware of both the soldier and warrior side and has reconciled them into major depression. And so when he's talking about the potato and intimidating Falco, he is really just trying to say stuff he thinks Marley wants to hear, but doesn't really believe them.

LEX the Lexicon Artist

Awesome reaction! Another thing that supports your Eren theory is that in the last episode of season 3 we notice Eren was letting his hair grow out after the 1 year time skip. So after 4 more years it would be pretty long just like the hair of the wounded soldier.

Kayla

Spot on reaction again! I don't think you missed anything so far in the story, which is quite the accomplishment. Keep up the good job!!

Gabriel Oliveira

I love this episode. Everything including Reiner and the cadets warms my heart. Reiner gives off strong dad vibes, especially with him looking like he aged 15 years in the last 4. And if I remember correctly, the chapters this episode adapted came out when you started your reaction to the show, so to finally see you here is such a good feeling. Reiner became my favorite around here and the anime really does a good job of portraying his struggles.

RaijinCloud

So someone who knows more about anime than me can check me on this, but I think I remember reading that MAPPA brought in a special slice-of-life director specifically for this episode and it really shows in how cinematic the direction looks. I think they wanted everyone really to get absorbed in the new environment and characters, and to empathize with them Pieck reaction is absolutely top tier! She is a fan favorite and I like her a lot. Also, so refreshing to see you grasp the scenes with Reiner on the train and having dinner with his family. So many people thought he was actually ranting about Sasha being stingy about a potato, or legitimately intimidating Falco thinking Reiner was still indoctrinated. The dinner scene is one of my favorites too!

Sarah S

mads mikkelsen cameo

roof

This was hands-down one of my favorite reactions of yours! I love the twinkle in your eyes and your enthusiasm as you talk about the cinematic aspects of the episode. Your passion for film really shone through and I just love watching someone talk about something they clearly love. You hit on all the main points I hoped you would as well. Thank you for another great video!

LEX the Lexicon Artist

You mentioned a titan with a hammer in "that day" and now they revealed the name of this new titan is war hammer titan 😆

Chitranshu Singh

I am so excited to watch your reactions to this season. It has all been so powerful.

Zachary LaVoie

I believe the line that Zeke said that Magath was uneasy about was the "not in this room" line itself. Also, up to what episode have you watched as of now? I've given up on trying to find a way to hide a spoiler in patreon comments so I won't say anything even if you have watched farther than this!

Candy Z

So happy that you appreciated about the cinematography aspect of this episode. I saw people complained about it and I do find that some of the characters’ movement are a bit odd. But I love how Mappa is trying to bring the movie vibe to this season, because it’s definitely how the manga feels like for this arc.

ming

Because of the gray nature of this story, I’ve learnt to not hold it against people who still hold a grudge or cannot empathize with Reiner and by extension the Warriors. They have their own set of morals to what is “bad” to them and it’ll be ignorant to impart my own values onto them. But the dinner table scene and some reactions from other reactors and just the audience in general kinda support the case that this story SHOULD be approached from a more neutral stance. Because I see a lot who completely missed Reiner’s little recollection there, thinking he truly thought that Paradis was evil. I’ve seen some who thought Reiner really despises the potato incident, not catching the sarcasm. And I think it comes down to their bias that Reiner is a bad guy and clouds their judgment of the scene.

Muhd Zulhilmi

Because someone was giving out the youtube link to non patrons

TbcAlex

to keep the links private

Sneaky Pilot

cant wait for next episode

Sneaky Pilot

Chelly