Attack on Titan Episode 70

The Farm

There are probably some people who don’t think that Attack on Titan: The Final Season episode 70 was all that good simply because it focused on Gabi and Falco for the majority of the time. However, I enjoyed it because, while there wasn’t an exciting action or new information, it tied earlier parts of the series to the current plot.

The Blouse Farm (or Braus? I don’t actually know, but we already have the Braun family so I’ll continue to say Blouse to differentiate them more) is the ultimate tieback. In case you didn’t pick up on this, there were two levels to it. First, the Blouse family is Sasha’s family. And second, Sasha is the one who saved Saya from the titan that ate her mother.

Why do these things matter? Well, Gabi was the one who killed Sasha and now she’s staying at Sasha’s family’s farm as a guest. And, the girl that Gabi and Falco “befriended” at the farm was saved by Sasha as well. So this entire situation is basically set up to show that the person Gabi viewed as a “devil” was actually a normal, good person.

What’s a bit unfortunate is that Gabi doesn’t realize the irony of her current situation. The surname Blouse means nothing to her, so she doesn’t realize she’s staying with the family of the person she killed. And since Kaya never names her savior, Gabi doesn’t realize that brave hero was also the person she killed.

I also just really like this episode because we get to see how stark the difference between Gabi and Falco is. Gabi buys into the Marleyan propaganda so much that even when she’s faced with reality, she ignores it. On the other hand, Falco understands that they’ve been fed lies.

Influencers and Influencees

The part of the episode that didn’t focus on Gabi and Falco at the farm was about how many of the Scouts’ new recruits have sided with Eren over the military. They believe that Eren did the right thing by preemptively attacking Marley and that it’s about time the Eldians got their revenge.

Remember, unlike Gabi who wasn’t alive when the Eldians oppressed the rest of the world, these Scouts members were alive and affected by Marley’s attack on Paradis. Gabi’s angry about something her own people did hundreds of years ago. The new Scouts are angry about something Gaby’s comrades did just a few years ago.

But as I’ll get to later, that doesn’t really compute in Gabi’s mind. To her, those two situations are entirely different (which they are, but not the way she thinks).

While there are other named Scouts who sided with Eren, such as Floch, the primary one in this episode is Louise. What’s interesting about Louise is that she was actually inspired to join the military and Scouts in particular after she was saved by Mikasa when she was younger. So she didn’t start out as an admirer of Eren.

And this is a bit of an awkward situation for some of the older Scouts. We saw this previously with Jean and Floch, but the new Scouts and the old Scouts don’t have the same idea of what it means to be a Scout.

For Mikasa, the Scouts are the protectors of Paradis. They fight when they need to in order to protect the weak. For Louise, the Scouts are a means by which to get revenge. Yes, she was inspired to become a Scout by Mikasa, but the Scouts mean something very different to her.

Gabi Braun

If you hate Gabi, you’re not alone. I think most Attack on Titan fans hate her, and I’m no exception. But I hate her as a person, not as a character. As a character, I love Gabi because she shows us a different perspective on the war between Paradis and Marley.

There are a lot of characters who are somewhere in the middle. Most of the Scouts recognize that war with Marley is probably inevitable, but that’s not their first choice. And likewise, we have those on Marley’s side such as Reiner and Falco who understand that their beliefs may not be built on a solid foundation.

But then on the two extreme ends of the spectrum are Gabi and Eren and his followers. Both of them are similar in that they view the eradication of the other side entirely as the only course of action. But as I mentioned earlier, Gabi doesn’t exactly have a valid reason to believe this.

To Gabi, all of the Paradis Eldians need to be eliminated because of the sins of their ancestors. In this belief, she conveniently ignores some key points. First, none of the Paradis Eldians alive had anything to do with the sins of their ancestors. And second, Gabi is an Eldian herself, so she’s just as guilty as they are.

And there’s a point in this episode where you can see that Gabi has a moment of doubt. After Eren attacked Marley and Zofia and Udo were killed, Gabi asks why it happened. She says that they had never done anything wrong, so why were they being attacked like this?

Kaya says the exact same thing to Gabi. She says that her mother never hurt anyone, so why was she eaten by a titan? I still think at this point though, Gabi doesn’t really recognize that Paradis has been isolated for 100 years while Marley has been attacking not only Paradis but many other countries. If anyone deserved to be attacked, it was Marley.

Conclusion

What do you think of Attack on Titan: The Final Season episode 70? Did you like this episode despite the lack of action? How do you think Mikasa and the other older Scouts should react to the views of the new Scouts? And what are your thoughts on Gabi’s character? Let me know in the comments.

If you enjoyed this review, remember to click the like button ❤️ down below. Also, follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama so you don’t miss out on any future content. And come join our Discord server if you’re interested in discussing anime with other members of the community.

Finally, I’d like to thank Roman for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of the next episode is available here.