English Dub Review: Attack on Titan “Special Operations Squad: Eve of the Counterattack, Part 2”

15 episodes in, and we finally get away from the city. Also, the rest of Levi’s special operations squad finally introduce themselves, as well!

Spoilers!

First things first, I was surprised at how multi-talented Levi was. Not only is he the leader of the most effective squad in the show, as witnessed with everyone’s kill / assist ratio. but the man can clean! The castle they are taking over used to be both a royal residence, and a former scout HQ. Levi seems a little cooler, but the aura of badass that everyone says he has still eludes me. Levi is still the Sasuke Uchiha of Attack on Titan, and that’s not necessarily a good thing.

Unfortunately for Eren, he meets the rest of the Levi Squad, composed of Petra Rall, Oruo Bozad, Eld Gin, Gunther Schultz, and of course, Levi. He realizes that this oddball group of misfits is his execution squad if his Titan ability goes AWOL again. Eren also seems very dismayed when he is forced to sleep in the basement, again, this time with restraints. Levi is leaving nothing to chance in case Eren goes Titan at any time.

“Special Operations Squad” is a really refreshing take on the world of Attack on Titan. For one, there’s no impending doom of a Titan attack this week. Also, we see what Scout veterans are like instead of the new recruits that have been force fed into Trost since graduation. To be honest, I think that getting Eren away from Mikasa and Armin is a great chance to let Eren grow as a character, since he isn’t fumbling with Mikasa and Armin all the time.  Towards the end of the Battle of Trost arc, it really felt like Mikasa and Armin were holding Eren back from any substantial growth as a character. It was a breath of fresh air to see them nowhere near Eren for this week.

Unfortunately, it looks like Eren is only getting a one week reprieve, because command is sending a bunch of new recruits to the castle as the Spec Ops main back up. Of course, the squad isn’t happy because the team either views them having little experience, or taking on too much because of the battle for Trost. As the team was asking Eren about his Titan transformation, Section Commander Hange shows up right on queue to start talking to Eren about his transformation. This forces everyone in Levi’s squad, save Eren, to escape before Hange rambles on about Titans.

I think that Hange’s obsession with Titans is the bright spot in the episode. I was drinking my soda, and spit it all over my screen, because her facial expressions were priceless. They got even more hilarious when Eren asked about how he is going to help Hange. Eren’s biggest mistake was asking for a full disclosure when Hange glanced over her findings and experiments. Silly, Eren. What got me, was the story of cannibals Hange told the Titans, because everyone got sick of hearing the same story. This was all for a naming process for the two Titans. This graphic story got more than one scout to throw up. The two Titans are named Sawney and Beane.

The end of “Special Operations Squad” pretty much segues right into the plot for the next few episodes. Both Sawney and Beane were killed just before dawn, and it screams military job. Eren wants to know how this happened, but Levi tells him to let it go. Erwin, however, gets him wondering again by asking Eren what he sees. Erwin also asks Eren who is at fault? This just leaves Eren even more confused.

Like I said earlier, this episode was a breath of fresh air. No Armin, Mikasa or Titan battles gave us time to delve deeper into the world. We finally see what one of the three branches of the military actually does, after 15 episodes. It seems like it took forever, because the writers took the long way around to get to develop plot, setting, and character development. It was something different, sure. But as the preview for next episode shows, this reprieve is only lasting for a week before it’s back to Armin and Mikasa stunting Eren’s growth.

This was a good effort to bring other aspects of the Attack on Titan world into the light, even if it was one leaf of the entire branch of the scouts. Hopefully I’m wrong about Armin and Mikasa going forward, because Eren shined here.