Image via Wit Studio
Perhaps no shonen anime series is more well-known for its politically charged messaging and controversies than Attack on Titan. One of the biggest criticisms anime fans have about Attack on Titan is that the protagonist, Eren Yeager, evolves from a typical shonen anime hero to an unrecognizable radical by the end. Anime fans had always known Eren as a hothead fighting Titans to protect what he thought was humanity’s last city, but he changed a lot after his real enemies finally appeared: the Marley Empire. Once Paradis Island was united behind that threat, war broke out, ultimately leading Eren to set The Rumbling into motion.
The Rumbling was a jaw-dropping moment that broke the internet when it was first released, and now, anime fans look back on it with horror. To some, the Eldians of Paradis Island were backed into a corner and had no choice but to become the monstrous devils everyone thought they were. To others, The Rumbling sends a terrible message that cannot be applied in real life without massive consequences. Even if Eren felt pressured into unleashing the wrath of the Founding Titan with The Rumbling, the nightmarish Attack on Titan plot twist seemingly ruined the story’s core message.
Why Did Eren Start The Rumbling in Attack on Titan?
Image via MAPPA
The context for The Rumbling meant everything in Attack on Titan, whether or not fans supported Eren’s extreme move. Many shonen anime heroes reach the peak of their powers to save the world from a supervillain, but Eren used the opposite means to get a similar outcome. Like his shonen anime peers such as Naruto Uzumaki, Edward Elric, and Izuku Midoriya, Eren was desperate to protect the people — but at any cost. As for the context that pressured Eren into becoming a monster, things were more complex than anything in Naruto or My Hero Academia, and that’s why Attack on Titan went off the deep end with The Rumbling.
For heroes like Naruto and Deku, the fight is a clear-cut one between the forces of good vs evil, right vs wrong, survival vs destruction. Even anime with some moral ambiguity, such as My Hero Academia, make the final fight black and white. Attack on Titan, meanwhile, struck near-perfect moral ambiguity with its ethnic tensions between the Eldians and the Marley Empire. The Eldians, more than any other group, were the central focus of the world’s conflicts, both past and present, so any effort toward either peace or war would involve them.
Eren knew what danger awaited him as the full history of the Eldian people became clear. By the time Attack on Titan‘s final season started, the Marley Empire was determined to squash the Eldian threat once and for all with their armies and their own Titan Shifters, pushing the Eldians even closer to the brink of extinction. As far as Eren could see, peace was impossible to negotiate, and the Eldians weren’t guaranteed to win a conventional war. To protect his people against an entire world that feared them, Eren marshaled the power of the Colossal Titan army with The Rumbling as a final push for his own kind of peace.
On the face of it, Eren wanted to destroy the entire non-Eldian world for survival’s sake, fighting fire with fire in a big way. However, Eren’s true goal was to unite the world against the threat of the Founding Titan and the Colossal Titans, succinctly demonstrating that humanity couldn’t afford to keep fighting itself much longer. The Eldians even lost their Titan powers, eliminating any need for them to be branded as dangerous devils. However, scattered events and character arcs in Attack on Titan confirm that Eren went too far when other means could have brought about peace.
Marleyans and Eldians Had a Chance to Make Peace Without The Rumbling
Image via MAPPA
Attack on Titan anime fans were tempted to defend Eren’s radical actions because fans saw the direct threat the Marley Empire posed with its high-tech invasion fleet and its own Titan Shifters. Fans could also point to characters like Theo Magath and Gabi Braun as personal examples of why the rest of the world would never accept or trust Eldians as equals on any continent. Of course, Eren fought fire with fire when he and the Yeagerists had their backs to the wall in the face of extinction, but now that the dust has settled for three years, fans can see more nuance in Attack on Titan‘s narrative, even when the fight for Paradis Island’s survival seemed clear-cut.
Fans will never know if a non-violent and honest attempt at peace negotiations could have worked between the Marley Empire and Paradis Island, but there were signs that it was worth a try. Gabi was once the face of anti-Eldian sentiment as a brash Warrior candidate who felt deep guilt about her own people while wanting more than anyone to crush Paradis Island. To that end, Gabi shot Sasha Braus in cold blood, but then Gabi ended up on Paradis Island, where exposure to the true nature of the island’s Eldians changed her mind. Gabi’s redemption arc was symbolic of the fact that meeting a feared «devil» can change everything and end the fighting.
As for Theo Magath, it’s true that the beginning of The Rumbling and the actions of the Yeagerists pressured him into cooperating with Dot Pyxis. For some time, Theo had been shedding his hostility and hatred for Eldians, to the point that he felt more like a protagonist than Eren. Still, fans might say that Eren and the Yeagerists could have done more to convince Theo Magath to reconsider a peaceful resolution. It likely only would’ve taken the threat of The Rumbling to build bridges between Marleyans and Eldians, with it being wholly unnecessary for Eren to actually go through with it.
The Rumbling Sends a Bad Message, No Matter Eren's Intentions
Image via Studio MAPPA
No matter how exotic the elements of an anime may be, the stories are often meant to send messages to people in the real world. Shonen anime usually sends constructive and inspiring messages, but Attack on Titan inadvertently sends the message that ruthless destruction is worthwhile if the result is peace and unity. In short, going nuclear is apparently acceptable if the intentions are good, according to Eren Yeager.
Attack on Titan has been grim, violent and morally gray from the outset. Despite the anime’s low points, Attack on Titan reinforces that there is always hope, but Eren seemed to think he could dispel the darkness with an even heavier, nastier shade of dark. There isn’t even an acceptable way to learn from or apply Eren’s nuclear option in real life, since The Rumbling would cause untold devastation in the effort to end the war and probably wouldn’t work anyway. As characters like Gabi and Theo show, negotiations and fostering understanding aren’t guaranteed to bring peace, but they’re always worth trying.
