English Dub Review: Attack on Titan “I’m Home”

I’ll be home for carnage, you can count on me.

Spoilers Below

The Survey Corps has been dispatched to deal with the titans that have crashed through Wall Rose. Everyone has to pack up their junk and move out, but Hange just has to eek out a bit more time studying samples from the walls and Annie’s cocoon. At the same time, the laser-honed wit of Armin reaches the same conclusions based on the observed properties of the walls. The walls are incredibly durable, and the “stones” are fitted so close together, that they hold without mortar. Nobody even understands how they were put together. But, the gates, which seem to be made of a different substance, are much weaker. That is how the titans breached Wall Maria: by attacking the gate. The titans sealed inside the walls only gives further evidence to Armin’s theory, which Hange confirms. The walls are made of the same substance as the cocoon that Annie sealed herself in. The titans in the walls are intentionally protecting the last vestiges of mankind.

The crew loads up into a wagon, bound for the titan horde. Joining them on their little excursion to oversized-mastication-ville is Pastor Nick of the Cult of the Wall. Everyone has their own threats to hurl at him if he doesn’t spill the beans, but Hange lets them know it’s futile. Instead, they should let him see the reality of the world he is protecting, and see if that loosens his tongue. His silent begs one question though: What secret could he be hiding that was worth more than the fate of humanity itself?

In the meantime, Sasha leads one of the soldiers to a nearby village, then turns off for her hometown. We get to see a brief moment in her past between her and her father. They have been starving since the fall of Wall Maria. The homeless of those destroyed towns have pushed inwards, and what wild game they haven’t hunted, they’re driving off. He and many of the others in their district are giving up their traditional ways, deciding to switch from hunting to farming, in order to support the new local population. They have also taken to raising horses. Unwilling to see her beloved mountain home become a domesticated farmland, she joined the military. Now, after three years, she finally returns home. Everything is different. An entire town with windmills and bridges has sprung up when she wasn’t watching. And, it is empty.

All except for a woman, her child, and a “tiny” titan, only 12-ish feet tall. He is eating the woman while she is still alive, and her trauma-shocked daughter is watching. Sasha takes a woodcutter’s ax to the thing’s neck, but she lacks the strength to cut all the way through. She apologizes to the woman, grabs the girl, and runs, picking up a bow and four arrows on the way. Unfortunately, her own fear spooks her horse. They have to hoof it, and the titan is heading after them now. They cross the drawbridge and make it to the road. Sasha has another flashback, this time to an exchange she had with two of the girls in her class.  Ymir berates her for being polite all the time because it isn’t the real Sasha. She understands that Sasha is just hiding the backwater district she came from. In the meantime, Krista defends Sasha’s decision. Everyone has the right to re-invent themselves. The truth being somewhere in between, Sasha can’t help but laugh.

Back t0 the present, Sasha urges the little girl onward and decides to take the fight to the titan itself. She draws the bow and fires, but only hits it in the throat. She runs up a hill for a better vantage point. Her next arrow only grazes him, but the third goes straight in his eye. If she could blind him, he’d be unable to chase her or the girl! With one shot left, she’d have to make it count. She throws away the bow and stabs the arrow in its other eye. Slick from the woman’s blood, she slides out of the titan’s impending bear hug and begins to run for it. Along the way, she sees a posse on horseback carrying the girl. Among them, is her father, and he is proud of what she had accomplished.

In another meantime, Connie arrives at his home to find it devastated. No building stands that hasn’t had chunks torn out of it. By the time he reaches his home, he can do naught but stare at the site. A dead or dying titan is lying on its back in his house, its arms and legs far too small to carry it anywhere. But then… How did it get there?

To be honest, I think I’m going to get tired of singing the praises of the art and animation of Attack on Titan. Beautiful, painstaking, and animated to the nines. If I had to grade on just the visuals, this series would be getting nines and tens every episode. Voice acting was nice. Armin no longer had to shout all day, so Mister Squeakums got to stay home. My ears are happy. Ashly Burch did very well bring Sasha to life through all the different moods that she is pushed through. The plot was rather light this episode, but the script kept it intense enough to keep me interested. It is strange to me that the longest part of my summary is devoted to the shortest portion of the episode. The first two paragraphs were just the first few minutes, and most of the episodes were what happened with Sasha. I was really intrigued by these new abnormals, and what threats they bear. A titan that is small enough to walk into a house presents a whole new series of tactical considerations for our heroes. I give this episode eight homecomings out of ten.