Anime
Attack on Titan (進撃の巨人 Shingeki no Kyojin) is a manga series written and illustrated by Hajime Isayama. It was published in September 2009 in Bessatsu Shonen Magazine, by the Japanese publisher Kodansha. Each chapter is published monthly, at December 2019 the manga series had reached 125 chapters.
Summary
The story begins with Eren Jaeger living peacefully with his family, his adopted sister Mikasa Ackermann and his only friend Armin Arlert. They live in Shiganshina District, one of the main cities located in Wall Maria.
However, everything changes when one fateful day the Colossal Titan creates a huge breach that allows the entry of Titans into the city. During the attack, Eren watches in horror how a Titan eats his mother while his father disappears after handing Eren the key to the basement of his house. After the disappearance of his father, Eren swears to kill all the Titans and decides to enlist in the 104th Training Corps along with his friends.
Five years later, the three young friends have graduated as cadets and at that time live in the Trost District, one of the border cities that stands out from Wall Rose. The same gigantic Titan appears and the same story is repeated. In the subsequent battle, Eren manages to save Armin from being eaten by a Titan at the cost of being devoured. While all hope of survival seemed to be extinguished, an atypical Titan appears attacking the other Titans instead of the humans. This Titan is revealed as Eren who for some reason can transform into a Titan, to everyone’s surprise.
Although some people, such as the nobles, the clergy and the Military Police consider Eren as a threat even after helping them to recover the Trost District, other see this ability as an opportunity to save humanity. Eren is subjected to a military trial in which it was finally decided that he should be part of the Survey Corps, assigning him to the Special Operations Squad under the command of Captain Levi Ackermann.
As the story continues, many mysteries are revealed regarding Eren’s ability to transform into Titan, from the reasons why he got such power to the fact that he is not the only one who possesses this ability. The origins of the Titans, the revelation of their true enemies, and the decisions Eren must make about the future of humanity, of his friends and his own are also discovered.
Adaptations
The Attack on Titan manga series was adapted to an anime series that was directed by Tetsuro Araki and produced by Wit Studio, in collaboration with Production I.G. The first season was aired in Japan on April 6, 2013 by the television channel Mainichi Broadcasting System (MBS) until it ended on September 28, 2013 with a total of 25 episodes. A second season of 12 episodes premiered between April and June 2017. The third season was aired in two parts, the first one being released between June and October 2018, and the second one between May and June 2019. The fourth and last season will be broadcast in autumn 2020.
In addition to the anime series, many other products such as light novels, video games, OVAs, two manga spin-offs, parodies, two live-action movies and a new production by Warner Bros have been created.
Reception
Since its publication, Attack on Titan became a commercial success both in Japan and in the rest of the world, reaching 100 million copies sold until the end of 2019, and the approval of the specialized critics. Both manga and anime received many awards and a lot of recognition. The manga was immediately successful in Japan and became one of the most successful series of 2011. It ranked eleventh in the ranking of the best-selling Oricon series with 3,766,194 copies sold. In 2012, it reached the fifteenth position of the Oricon bestseller lists in series with 2,682,504 copies sold. In December 2012, the total circulation of the first nine volumes was 10 million copies.
The anime adaptation increased significantly the number of sales in the series; the 10 volumes of the manga were present in the top 50 of Oricon during the week of April 8 to 14, 2013. At the beginning of May 2013, volumes 2, 3, and 4 had passed more than one million copies each one, to later reach the first 5 volumes one million sales by the end of May 2013, which raised the total circulation to 19.5 million copies in mid-2013.
Sales of the French editions of the manga were ranked fourth in the Oricon ranking with 4,292,208 copies sold. In June 2013, 8.7 million copies were sold since the premiere of the anime series. In September 2013, the number of volumes sold exceeded 20 million copies, becoming the seventh series that exceeds this amount since the creation of Oricon in 2008. During fiscal year 2013, Isayama’s work reached 2nd place best-selling post with 15,933,801 copies, with the full volumes now out in the top 15 of Oricon. Thanks to the success of the series, Kodansha registered an increase in its turnover for the first time in 18 years.
Although it is also extremely popular in other Asian countries, there has been sole political interpretations of the series that have caused some controversies, especially in China and South Korea.