In This Fading World: How Shipping Solves Everything (in TG)

In This Fading World: How Shipping Solves Everything (in TG)

aka hamliet’s ramblings about what the point of all the romance is in the manga

*before my inbox explodes, the title is facetious, please don’t send me hate*

I like ships. A lot. Usually I view them as fun for a series but only a few, if any, are like, central to the plot/themes. But in TG the romance is actually extremely relevant to the series’ themes, and despite the common assumption that TG isn’t a romance manga, it… kind of is in a lot of respects, because TG is about life, and what makes life worth it is connection, and all kinds of connections–family, friendship, and romance. (I might do other metas on the family and friendships in TG and how they convey certain themes too, just as powerfully as the romances, but this meta is specifically about romantic dynamics.)

TG honestly has a lot of romance (like the whole story started with a date) and is basically Ishida’s “shoujo with corpses.” Each canon/likely to be canon ship is at its core driven by loneliness answered with empathy, and each ship allegorizes the story’s main themes and the importance of solving the ghoul/human conflict the same way: through an alliance based in empathy and self-reflection. 

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Francis Picabia (French,1879-1953)

Femme aux arbres, c. 1930

oil and charcoal on canvas

I'm going to make myself cry typing this but here we go..

I think one of the points of Attack on Titan is that humanity is forgetful. Doomed to forget, actually.

Our main cast are heroes, not just the surviving ones. Levi deserves to have statues built of him. The surviving members of the 104th even went on to become politicians, traveling the world to help change things for the better. I have no doubt that they had buildings named after them, streets and parks named after them. There were probably history books specifically dedicated to each and every one of them.

But humans are forgetful.

There were no photos of Eren. He probably only continued to exist in history books, where he was demonized and vilified for decimating the world. By the time their fingers started to get all wrinkly from age, Mikasa and Armin probably forgot what Eren looked like. What he sounded like.

Time passes and humans forget. Statues crumble, buildings rot and fall apart. People forget figures that used to be significant. History books are changed. Even atrocities eventually become dulled in humanities collective memory. Bombs turn everything to dust. Humans are doomed to forget and repeat their mistakes again and again and again.. and I think that's the point.

㋡🥀