The convoluted and lengthy final season of horror anime show Attack on Titan is almost at an end, again. The fourth season began in 2020 and had already been split into two parts, so me and my best friend were quite surprised when at the end of Attack on Titan: Season 4 Part 2 it was revealed there was yet more to come. Rather than stretch things out even further it turns out the final two episodes are both bumper ones, with Attack on Titan - The Final Chapters: Special 1 being an hour in length, rather than the usual twenty or so minutes. Obviously there will be spoilers for previous episodes to follow, so read on with caution in your hearts.
The story is too much to sum up, basically, Eren (voiced by Yuki Kaji) has unleashed 'the rumbling' onto the world, which equates to him unleashing a seemingly unstoppable army of titans (giant humanoid monsters) whose sole goal is to crush and destroy all they come across outside of Paradis Island. There was little hope for the enemy city to survive, being so close to the sea from where the monsters appear, so Eren's secondary goal is to then march to the location of the enemy's mountaintop military base, in order to fully defeat them. The goals have a very high civilian casualty rate, and so his former colleagues, including among them his childhood best friends Mikasa (Yui Ishikawa) and Armin (Marina Inoue) have teamed up with some of the original invaders of Paradis Island in order to try and find a way to stop his terrible plan of genocide to the world outside of his home.
Due to the scattershot approach to the release of the series (it all started ten years back with the first season), it has been increasingly hard to follow the story, especially in later seasons where politics and internal machinations have really made some plot points hard to follow. Thankfully then, this first part of the very end of the show tells a somewhat simpler story. In addition to the main and urgent storyline going on, there is also a few flashback moments that try and justify Eren's approach to dealing with the threat of the outside world to his people. This displays the fact that he isn't a heartless monster, but instead is very aware of all the innocents that will be killed in his murderous path as leader of the rumbling. The key theme appears to be about stopping the cycle of hate, with most characters putting aside their differences in order to try and save what remains of the world as a whole. Each character recognises they have committed terrible acts that have resulted in the deaths of innocents, and so maybe for some, they see stopping Eren as a way to somewhat atone for their atrocious acts. On a side note, I find it funny that the bonus character skin for the new season of Fortnite is Eren, due to him currently being a genocidal maniac in the anime!
The animation is fantastic here, with some really wonderful moments, such as a sequence in which a long standing character all the way from the first season dies (a moment that saw my best friend tear up). There are also lots of moments of gratuitous violence, with the titans crushing all they come across. Most violent moment of the episode shows a child's head getting crushed in slow motion by a titan's foot, very graphic indeed! For the first proper hour long show (I don't include the lengthy recap specials), this was perfectly paced, going around to all the key characters. It all leads up to an exciting showdown, I fully expect a lot of the final final episode will be a protracted fight sequence in which all the special titans come to the field of battle.
Initially I had expected to review the final part in one review, but learning that not only that it consisted of just two episodes, and that the second one isn't due to air until this Autumn, I felt I had to review this now, rather than wait till later in the year and forget what had happened. If you've got this far then of course this is essential watching. For me nothing eclipses the horror feel of Attack on Titan: Season 2, nor does this excel itself above some of the simply stunning episodes of Attack on Titan: Season 4 Part 1, but regardless, this was a fantastic special that sets things up very nicely for the final run.
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