Shingeki no Kyojin: The Final Season Episode 3 Discussion

Harsha1314 said:
yeah people need to give a lot of attention to dialogue

MironBiron said:
@SirTristram

I've been watching Kino's Journey lately (I've seen it in your favorites) and holy shit, it really showed me how a great director can use the limitations of an anime production to its advantage, as long as the scripts allow for every scene to be paced properly. The animation is impossibly limited and the art direction isn't anything to write home about either, but every still frame in this anime gets the proper amount of time to settle into the viewer's eyes, every little question is built up with care, attention and focus, and there's so much space for the director to emphasize visual metaphors and draw parallels.

This is the stuff that makes works of fiction last; all the little, presumably unimportant things, details, directional choices that together make up a show's identity, and they all need time to breathe in order for an anime to become more than a plot-machine.

Sometimes I also appreciate it when a show scripts its dialogue at a menacing pace though. This works in Bakemonogatari or Steins;Gate because they deliberately play scenes at high speed in order to convey a sense of wittiness and smart-assery befitting to the dialogues themselves. The scriptwriters and directors make it a point that it's fast because it enhances the content, while sometimes switching to slower paced scenes during introspective segments of the story.

These are the creative choices that fly over many people's heads, but they very much influence the viewer's experience on a subconscious level. Hardly anyone is actually going to say: “Holy shit, the way they paced and edited the ending-scene of Episode 14 (the one where Hanji looks inside of Eren's mouth, preceded by Erwin and Levi talking to Eren for a bit) was fucking amazing”. Nobody notices these abstract, almost invisible moments, but they help tremendously in order to achieve the poetically mind-blowing and lasting effect it has on people. (It's obviously just an example, I could list many of these kinds of moments from every episode of the first three seasons but that scene is one of my personal favorites, lol.)

Almost everyone's favorite anime series are actually filled with creative and self-aware choices like these in one way or another, and it's sad that the Final Season of AoT doesn't really allow for these moments to happen.

keragamming said:
So I guess you are going to beat the dead horse until its over? Looking forward to your analysis on how bad episode 4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15 & 16 will be.

I mean we get it, Mappa is bad, Wit is good! It doesn't get anymore black and white than that.

MironBiron said:

Please stop being so defensive bro. You literally ignored everything that I said (including my mildly positive review of episode 2, as well as my statement that the staff is not at fault, as well as my statement that it’s still a perfectly watchable show) and framed my post as MAPPA hateposting. Learn something from it instead of getting offended!

MironBiron said:

Please stop being so defensive bro. You literally ignored everything that I said (including my mildly positive review of episode 2, as well as my statement that the staff is not at fault, as well as my statement that it’s still a perfectly watchable show) and framed my post as MAPPA hateposting. Learn something from it instead of getting offended!

Cornelius_ofSucc said:
It's difficult to provide valid critiques on an anime forum, as chances are uptight individuals will strawman your argument and dismiss it. It's ironic considering the moral of the AoT's narrative is to understand another's perpsective.

SirTristram said:
Other than that, I completely understand what you mean and agree with the points you make since I'm a cinema person first, a theater person second and an anime person last.

Bhaskar_Singh said:

Yeah like always. They are not gonna spoon feed you like your typical generic shounen with 500 plus episodes.

spiderboi said:
These set of chapters in the manga were fantastic, I can say the anime episode was decent but disappointing in some ways. I kind of understand the situation given the tight schedule and limited frame of 16 episodes, but the ways in which this flashback was adapted makes me sad. Ideally it should have been an episode and a half or 2. Most of the cut content I'm not even upset about, except for them just cutting straight to the wall breach. Not animating RBA's struggle to the wall, with Bert's POV and the tight situation that pushed them there is a shame. It ruins some of the emotional impact and it also creates confusion with anime viewers as they think Annie was unconscious during the whole operation. Also cutting from 2d WIT amour titan to the 3d mappa one in the middle of Reiner's inner monologue was kind of awkward which ruined some of the impact of the scene.

The main problem is the pacing, it felt more like a recap in some ways. Going from scene to scene at a very fast pace with no breathing room and time to linger on scenes/moments just diminishes the overall emotional impact. Like some of these scenes do not come close to the manga due to how quickly they fly by and appear like Reiner's confrontation with his dad. It also makes some parts awkward like quickly cutting to Annie and Kenny. Especially given the slow pacing of this arc (and the next one) in the manga, it makes me worried about how they'll handle the content. The episode itself was pretty well directed and animated for the most part imo.

I'm expecting this episode to be the exception regarding pacing since they stuffed like 2.5 chapters in this episode. The second episode which was dialogue heavy was paced pretty well and most of the cut content was minor. The director and screen writer seem to have a good understanding of the source material. Obviously, it's an adaptation so it's not going to be exactly the same regarding how the story is presented and they can change/cut stuff if they want. It becomes an issue when the cut content is important to the story and characters, and also affects the pacing.


I think for anime viewers they definitely liked this episode and thought it was good, but good isn't enough considering how amazing it is in the manga.

So far the team behind this adaptation are doing a great job, especially given the tight schedule and 16 episodes they were given. Ideally this season (if it intends to end around 122) should have been 20 episodes. Episode 4 seems to be paced well and has no major cuts based on leaks, I just hope they are able to keep this consistent momentum as seen in episode 1 and 2 regarding the pacing/content for the later parts.

Harsha1314 said:
a certain person on twitter very reliable one did state that they will be adaptidng relatively low amounts after ep 5. Idk what exactly that could mean but prolly the paradis island arc if pacing and direction is done well could be the best arc yet if done well

spiderboi said:
I hope so, it seems chapter 106, the end of the Marley arc will end in the middle of episode 9 which will give the next arc 7.5 episodes. This is worrisome as although not as dense as Marley it’s still dialogue heavy and slow in some parts, so it will be 2 chapters an episodes if they intend to end at 122. Do you remember the user?

hyperfire said:
Rushed pacing for sure, but rather have it be rushed here than in later episodes where the content is much meatier.

Honestly they could've cut out the hanged man scene entirely and allocated that saved time to flesh out other parts of Ch 95-97 of the manga (i.e. expand either the fall of Wall Maria from the Warrior's perspective or the 104th trainees spending time together, etc.)

Harsha1314 said:
you will see why the hanged man scene is one of the most imp ones for this arc after ep 5

Harsha1314 said:
you will see why the hanged man scene is one of the most imp ones for this arc after ep 5[/quoam a manga reader but I forgot: how does the hanged man scene come back again?

Neil1998 said:
its related to reiner's character. Spoilers:

spiderboi said:
I hope so, it seems chapter 106, the end of the Marley arc will end in the middle of episode 9 which will give the next arc 7.5 episodes. This is worrisome as although not as dense as Marley it’s still dialogue heavy and slow in some parts, so it will be 2 chapters an episodes if they intend to end at 122. Do you remember the user?

NakolHira said:
umm, did I say entire series? 32 chapters include 91-122, not the entirety.

Rasco said:
What a mess. I couldn't follow or even get into this.

keirakeira said:
am i the only one who's kinda lost? like, on everything? maybe i'm just being stupid but i cannot keep track of all the flashbacks and time skips and who's who and where all the characters are.