We’ve opted to continue reading the manga past where the TV programme left off because the anime has been on hiatus for about a year. In this series, we’ll take a look at each chapter one at a time and give our comments on what we’ve read so far. This week, we’re examining the manga chapter 131, “The Rumbling,” from Attack on Titan. Only through Attack on Titan Chapter 131 are there any spoilers in this article. If you’ve just seen Season 4 Part 2 of Attack on Titan, this page contains spoilers. I read the manga during the year-long break between Attack on Titan Season 4 Part 1 and Part 2. After seeing the anime episode that corresponded to each chapter, I read along with it. Chapter 131, in my opinion, is the saddest of the entire series.
When the programme returns next year, I can’t even begin to conceive how this is going to be portrayed. That would have been a sad way to begin what will most likely be an extended gap of a year for Season 4 Part 2. Eren and the youngster Eren and his pals befriended in Chapter 123 are both featured in this chapter’s exploration of The Rumbling (which was not aired in the anime until the Season 4 Part 2 finale.) The reason for the delay in broadcasting this in the anime is now clear to me. They wanted the audience to feel closer to the little kid when the new episode aired so that they could better relate to him.
An argument over stolen money opens the episode with Ramzi and his companion Halil. Ramzi is putting money aside so that they may all get out of the immigration camps and find better places to live. Their chat is interrupted by individuals fleeing for their lives as the Rumbling approaches. First, we witness the birds taking flight. As Eren observed the birds soar over the wall, they’ve been a recurring motif, often connoting liberation. Similarly, when Falco was unconscious on the battlefield he witnessed a bird soaring above him. They’ve come to represent the ability to avoid impending doom.
When Eren and the rest of the group went to Marley, we saw a flashback Eren had already decided before the visit that he would slay everyone he met. As he put it, they couldn’t figure out why Paradis couldn’t last. Even on the streets of Marley, where he is walking, the thought of what he is about to do haunts him.
Do you think Eren is in control of Eren?
After that, though, he begins to doubt everything. He reflects on the King of the Wall’s promise and wonders, “Aren’t we Eldians the ones who should die?” As he sees it, eradicating the Eldian threat would put an end to the Titan threat. In the end, his strategy would murder much more people than if he had just let the residents of Paradis perish. It appears like he is on the verge of accepting Zeke’s or King Fritz’s principles. Something, though, happens after that.
Although I haven’t read any further, I believe we’re witnessing Eren’s mind being taken over by a Titan in this panel. Look at the sparkle in his eye when he suddenly decides that he can’t accept any ending where Paradis is destroyed.
When Grisha approached Frieda, she appeared to be a little persuaded until the Founding Titan and its philosophy seized hold of her. The Founding Titan was speaking via Frieda at that point, not Frieda herself. This panel suggests that Eren will face a similar fate. Perhaps there is an original Attack Titan personality, one that desires independence and wants to destroy everyone but the Paradisians, commanding his hosts.
Alternatively, if Eren is the OG Attack Titan and he’s manipulating this younger version of Eren in this panel, then the post-Rumbling Eren might be the OG Attack Titan. If the Founding Titan governs the future hosts, the Attack Titan controls the hosts that have come before it. Eren influencing Past Grisha isn’t an outlandish hypothesis, given we’ve seen the Attack return memories to prior hosts selectively. How could Eren ever have felt completely free if Future Eren was in constant control of him? A chicken-and-egg question like this is ridiculous.
I’m having a hard time reconciling the next set of panels with what we saw in Chapter 123. In an alley, Eren sees Ramzi being beaten up by older guys, evoking memories of Eren as a child discovering Armin being beaten up in Paradis just as Attack on Titan was getting underway. In this scene, we witness Eren walk away from the boy since he knows he would murder him. Then we show him taking the child back to his family and wailing about how he actually is exactly like Reiner, but worse. Apologizing to the kid, his tears flow, but the boy has no understanding of why. Chapter 123, where Levi saved the same guy, doesn’t make sense at all. I’m not certain. What if Eren rescued one and Levi rescued his sibling at the same time?
Ymir witnessed Ramzi’s heartbreaking story as he watched Eren be haunted by Ramzi. After Gabi shot Eren’s head off, we watched fragments of his memories following him into the Paths. In both the manga and the anime, Ramzi was one of those characters. Ramzi and his brother’s harrowing journey to leave the Rumbling is now depicted in the manga. Nowhere else to go. Even if they climb a mountain, they will be trapped by the Rumbling. The final moments of Ramzi’s life are horrific. The Rumbling’s total, squalid violence is depicted in full force in the manga. Since the anime will be aired on public television in Japan, I’m thinking it will have to be censored a lot.
Ramzi’s death is interrupted by an image of the founder, Ymir, in the distance. Even if he dies, Ramzi may be able to see her once again. Can Ymir resurrect Ramzi in the Paths as an Eldian, even if he never rose to Titanhood? However, the more important question is why and what it means for Ymir to be there. Is Eren under the thumb of Ymir? The carnage surrounding her seemed to be too much for her to bear.
Lament and a Wish That Is Like a Vow from Eren. “There’s no universe out there like Armin’s writings,” Eren laments, “not even close.” I’ve always wondered if Armin’s narrative has more to tell, and I’m not sure if we’ll ever find out. He stated unequivocally that his grandpa had given him the name. His granddad possessed a smuggled copy of a book that described the outside world. We never saw his parents since they went on a trip beyond the walls when he was a child, and we never saw them again after that. The only conclusion we can draw from this is that they were consumed.
That’s not the point of this post. As soon as he realised what life was like beyond the gates, he was disgusted. This decision to employ violence, which resulted in the death of even a sweet little kid called Ramzi, is equally regrettable.
That was his final thought. “I longed for it all to be erased,” I said to myself. It seems as though everything has been put in motion by Eren’s request. Is there any way for him to go back and change his mind? Is it a vow, like King Fritz’s pledge, that cannot be broken?
Eren’s enormous Founding Titan body is finally shown after a few pages of Rumbling dread. They were always just there, wherever I looked, from the day I was born,” read the words on that panel. Those dreadful walls,” he said.
It brings back memories of him as a boy when he was certain that anyone who could see beyond the wall would be the most liberated person on the planet. “Child Eren” stands above all the sadness, staring up into the sky and relishing his freedom as he tramples the earth under him. Age regression has been suggested as a possible cause. In fact, it’s probably considerably more complex than that and linked to the Paths in some way.
Eren, the youngster, exclaims as he takes in the vista, “We finally made it!” To be clear: (I think it’s crucial to stress that he’s not staring down at the damage.) Because of his anguish, is Eren “dividing his personality” like Reiner? Is his childish innocence being protected and dissociated from the atrocities he faces? Do you think Ymir intervened to protect him from learning the truth about what he’s doing? At that time, it was difficult to know what to do. Armin appears to have been summoned to the Paths by a child Eren, much as Eren had summoned all Eldians to join him in the Paths once before.
Only for a few seconds. Armin sees him, recognises him, and then returns to his own room. Is it possible that Eren, the child, has been stuck in the Paths for some time? Or did Eren merely invent this as a new line of defence?
With the help of Armin and Annie, we are once again grounded. Despite the tragedy, we’re reminded of the crew’s efforts to stop Eren. Armin and Annie are having a fascinating talk. Invite him to join her and praise him for keeping her company while she was stuck in a self-imposed exile for so long. Armin explains to her that he spent so much time with her because he missed her.
In spite of how Hitch taunted him, he inquires as to if she still doesn’t “get it.” And she has no idea what’s going on. Armin, she concludes, is a kind person who is trying to avoid conflict. In the same way that he is still attempting to contact Eren, he spoke with Annie for the same purpose. The thought of him being attracted to her because of who she is is too much to bear. Armin, on the other hand, is no longer certain that he is a nice guy. As a youngster, he encouraged Eren to imagine a world outside the walls, and he feels some guilt for it.
He desperately wants to think that the world still holds something resembling the utopia he once imagined. And, in all honesty, it’s possible. After seeing only a little portion of the outer world, Eren concluded that he needed to destroy it. But they’ve only ever seen Marley outside the house. The more terrible Eren’s decision becomes. Armin’s adoration for Annie still baffles me. It took them a while to discover she was the Female Titan before they had any sort of connection.
I’m left wondering if Bertholdt’s rumour that he was still influenced by Bertholdt was accurate. Finally, we get a good look at Eren in his new, twisted form. He has a sad look on his face. Although he’s disgusted by what he’s doing, he continues on. In the meanwhile, Armin is clinging to the faint hope that things could get better. It’s a harrowing yet brilliantly executed chapter. And you’ll be thinking about it for a long time thereafter.