In the words of the minister from Spaceballs, let’s plow through these last three episdoes with the “short, short version.”
Episode 35 – Children
Ymir’s been a Titan Shifter for 60 years, after spending time in a cult and after said cult was injected with something that turns them into Titans.
Episode 36 – Charge
The good guys try and take Krista out of harm’s grasp, saying Ymir is lying to her about wanting to save her and herself.
Episode 37 – Scream
Eren has “the gift” of being a Coordinate, that controls the actions of Titans. How will the military continue to not-use this to their advantage? Find out next season!
I know, short and too little on detail. But you’ve already seen these episodes, you don’t need me to synopsize everything. Now let’s wrap up season 2, already.
Let’s get this out of the way, first. The second season took four years to come out, yes, and the wait killed a lot of fan interest. But for what we got, we got a lot of great stuff from these 12 episodes. We got a lot of character backstory and motivation, with Sasha, Reiner and Bertholdt, and also Krista and Ymir, which have served to flesh out more of the story. We also got some further character development with Eren, coupled with him not being on-screen in most of the season, so that’s a double-win. And we even got an awkward 3DCG Colossal Titan, which, yes, looks awkward like crazy. Combined with some rather impressive fighting animation and Titan battles to add to everything, this would end up being a big smash hit like the first season, right?
Well, not exactly. As I said, the four-year wait did far more harm than good, but more than that, when the first season launched in 2013, it became immediate must-see programming because nothing like it had ever come out and it completely took the anime community by storm. It wasn’t a super-peppy show filled with wish fulfillment, it was a dark and brooding story about monsters and warfare and death, and it WORKED. And it lead to the manga getting a major boost in sales, some bundled OVAs being produced, recap films being made, and even a pair of live-action films getting produced. In short, Attack on Titan grew from just another manga series into THE series for this new generation of anime fans. It became an evergreen title for newcomers, alongside titles such as Fullmetal Alchemist and Sword Art Online. And to an extent, it still is such a title, only without as much fanfare as there was, before.
Don’t get me wrong, though, this season of episodes were great for what they were. The pacing issues that plagued the first season were fixed, more emphasis on story development was placed in, and the fighting animation improved greatly from when the series began. It just wasn’t filled with enough episodes to serve a needing audience’s palate. But the silver lining to this is that the production staff has already announced a third season for 2018, and if the format and pacing of season three will be on par with season two, then I’ve got little to complain about.
In closing, the second season served very well for what it was, and I considered it to be an improvement on the first season, in almost every regard. But yeah, too short and too long to bring out. Kinda hinders it.
As to what I’ll be doing next season… well, I won’t be doing anything next season. In all honesty, I’ve become rather burned out on doing these write-ups, and due to my inconsistent schedule outside of the site, it has become increasingly difficult for me to make time to do these. So I’ll be taking the summer off of the weekly write-ups, but that won’t mean I’ll be gone forever. I’ll be doing more reviews, for other things on this site, as well as hosting and producing PodcastONA, and I will be returning to Decibel Boost very soon. So stay tuned for more stuff from yours truly, continue checking out the write-ups for My Hero Academia, and enjoy the summer season of anime.
Final Verdict: Quality over quantity, well worth watching. Attack on Titan is licensed by FUNimation Entertainment and is available subtitled on Crunchyroll and FUNimationNow, with an English simuldub airing on Saturdays at 12:30am EDT on Adult Swim and Sundays at 10:00pm EDT on FUNimationNow.