Summary:

The REAL Final episode of Attack on Titan suffers like Game of Thrones (TV) Season 8 and Awful Greedy Marketing

If there’s two things that I want you to take away from my review with this show, it’s this summary.

Alright let’s get to my review, I’ve watched the episode last night before sleeping with lots of processing of what I just watched. I pondered for a good hour or so on what happened and had some discussions a bit with others while wondering if I was satisfied, I was uncertain for a while. After waking up, I’m pretty content to say that I was not satisfied with how the anime ending turned out.

I’m not a manga reader, I’m an anime-only watcher by choice and avoided spoilers on the internet for a long time. 10 years, baby. At least this show's final episode came out before GTA 6 got announced. Even when the manga ending came out, I hoped for a good anime original ending and held out like the Gamestop stock meme.

First, let me help you guys by saying that this is ACTUALLY THE FINAL EPISODE of Attack on Titan. I’m confident to say that the story wraps up in this final episode and no movie was teased or whatever.

With how the show got milked to death with its final season tag and its subsequent parts, the show has gained a poor reputation with audiences wondering when it’ll end. This destroyed hype for future parts because no one will know if they pull another random part later – Final Season Part 4 Part 3 Part 3 - and have another longer wait. Casual western audiences couldn’t be bothered to be hyped when each marketing material got released because of announcing parts and the long wait in-between. Understandably this is because of the intense work done by MAPPA and wanting to do a good job but the greedy marketing really destroyed casual audience retention. I am confident there will be a lot of casual anime viewers surprised that the show has ended and many more people still wondering when it’ll end. This will make Attack on Titan be remembered as the show that had a poor manga ending and a really poor marketing campaign with its final season tag. There might be some controversy with its ending too but I can see this not be remembered for many years into the future besides as a big Shounen when it released which is a shame because I was a big fan of this anime franchise. Oh well.

Okay, but you’re on AniList and reading this review, so maybe you’re not a casual viewer. So why am I comparing this to Game of Thrones (TV) Season 8? As I watched this episode and reflected on how the ending shapes Season 4 & Final Season (with all of its parts), I asked myself if I would recommend this whole show to people, friends, or family. I then concluded that I would ask if the person I’m talking to would watch the Game of Thrones TV series. Both Attack on Titan and Game of Thrones TV shows had incredibly strong initial seasons with amazing production value from its production crew, music, and actors. However, as the show came to its conclusion with its final season(s), it sort of ends on a whimper instead of a strong note like its previous seasons. The thing is that the final season(s) of each show was REALLY good by its actors, music, and production crew. You could tell they were trying to elevate from the previous episodes but the story structure that was the backbone of everything fell apart due to poor pacing, subverting expectations and not earning it, poor characterization with questionable changes, and poor planning to the ending.

Even if you haven’t watched Game of Thrones, I think my description earlier is sufficient to explain my comparison. This is why I compare them both because it is awfully similar in how the story backbone just destroys the franchise with its ending and how it will ruin future recommendations of this show for the future. I do not think this show will be remembered that fondly 5-10 years into the future with its poorly planned marketing campaigns and its poorly wrapped up story that doesn’t justify the wait. Also, I know anime production is difficult, the marketing team takes full responsibility for this terrible image.

In the end, it’ll be seen as a big Shounen for its time many years ago and other shows will be talked over it. It’s a shame that the franchise chose to mainly adapt the manga ending and not take a risk with making an anime-original ending that I coped and hoped for. While they did adapt and change some things around, maybe it was too difficult to make something so different and satisfying.

Overall, I was not satisfied with this final episode and its impact on Season 4 & Final Season. I cannot completely hate the journey though from Season 1 to now; it was fun as fuck and the various number of hours spent watching and speculating was incredibly fun all the way to this final episode. That is something that this episode can’t take away from me, my past fun memories. However, those memories can’t blind me from the poor ending that is worth criticism. Oh well, there’s other shows.

Would I rewatch the series? Up to the end of Season 3 and leave it there, I guess. Season 4 and Final Season seems skippable in hindsight now.