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The Kick-Ass Women of Attack on Titan


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Elric_Edward



Joined: 18 Dec 2014
Posts: 18
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 11:07 am Reply with quote
Too bad season 2 won't get to what I believe is hands down, the best AOT arc in the Uprising Arc :/
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Nordhmmer



Joined: 11 Feb 2017
Posts: 1028
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 11:14 am Reply with quote
Elric_Edward wrote:
Too bad season 2 won't get to what I believe is hands down, the best AOT arc in the Uprising Arc :/



Season three, neighbor.
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Animechic420



Joined: 25 Sep 2012
Posts: 1724
Location: A Cave Filled With Riches
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 11:45 am Reply with quote
If Ymir wasn't such a (redacted), I'd like her character more.
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MrTerrorist



Joined: 20 Oct 2010
Posts: 1348
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 11:48 am Reply with quote
No mention about Hange?
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whiskeyii



Joined: 29 May 2013
Posts: 2240
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 11:54 am Reply with quote
MrTerrorist wrote:
No mention about Hange?

There's quite a bit of evidence from the mangaka that Hange doesn't identify as female, as he specifically requested that the English translation avoid using female pronouns (something the Japanese version avoids as well), which they've since abided by. So, for now, Word of God says Hange isn't female.
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zrnzle500



Joined: 04 Oct 2014
Posts: 3767
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 12:39 pm Reply with quote
Mikasa may not be the best female character, badass or otherwise, but I do like how they haven't really made her a damsel in distress. Many such characters in shows like these are indeed kick-ass but often the male lead is even more so or the female character is put in a situation where they can't be their usual kick-ass self. But not only is Mikasa one of the strongest characters (including over Eren), Eren is usually the damsel, which is a nice role reversal. I don't know if that will change (and this doesn't apply to the live-action adaptation from what I've heard) but it is an improvement over many such characters.

Mikasa has also made me much more amenable to muscular female characters.
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maximilianjenus



Joined: 29 Apr 2013
Posts: 2855
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 1:36 pm Reply with quote
yeah, mikasa dependence on eren reminds me more of guts and his dependence on casca than any other anime relationship.

about her lack of strenght shows, it's the same for levi who is also supossed to be the strongest, the plot just does not want to give them a chance to shine.

the thing with muscular female characters in anime/manga (as mikasa was also kind of a gateway charcter for me too) is that they used to be too "male-muscular", and had a build taht was only attainable by female bodybuilders, if at all and they did not really resemble a muscular female or athlete but that kindof bodybuilder or plain males.

I was into fighting games before I was even into anime and they had more reasonalbe depictionsof muscular females, where they resembled athletes rather than bodybuilders; thankfully isayama's mma hobbie made him give us a nice design with mikasa, other authors noticed and followed through; nowadays we even got a manga of cute girls lifting cute weights which 5 or so years ago was unthinkable.
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CaRoss



Joined: 11 Nov 2014
Posts: 457
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 3:52 pm Reply with quote
Attack on Titan has one of my all-time favourite casts of female characters for a shonen series.

While I'm not really a fan of Mikasa - I find her extremely bland despite having a really appealing character design - I find the rest of the women present in the cast to be a great group of characters who frequently manage to outshine almost everyone else (save for maybe Levi and Armin who drive a lot of the story themselves in their own ways).

In particular, my favourites are Annie and Sasha.

Annie is a fantastically written character who doubled as the best of the three villainous shifters (I'm a manga reader and so am mostly caught up here when I say this). Her dubious motivations and her friendships with others from their group of recruits was absolutely pitch perfect in making her a viable threat with motivations far different than many female villains are given.

Sasha, on the other hand, is just so utterly ridiculous that I cannot even begin to describe how much I love her. While she's frequently used as comic relief, it's always done in a way that shies away from traditionally sexually oriented jokes in favour of her personality quirks. Add in the small amounts of information that we've been given on her past, she melds wonderfully into this ensemble.
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7jaws7



Joined: 17 Aug 2013
Posts: 704
Location: New York State
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 5:27 pm Reply with quote
whiskeyii wrote:
There's quite a bit of evidence from the mangaka that Hange doesn't identify as female, as he specifically requested that the English translation avoid using female pronouns (something the Japanese version avoids as well), which they've since abided by. So, for now, Word of God says Hange isn't female.


I'm gonna be that guy and say that because she has breasts, she is a female, regardless of what Isayama thinks. Even "God" can't dispute scientific fact. If she doesn't identify as a woman that's one thing, but female specifically refers to anatomy.

Besides, Hange is probably the most kick-ass female character in the whole show - so she definitely belongs in the discussion.
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whiskeyii



Joined: 29 May 2013
Posts: 2240
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 5:51 pm Reply with quote
7jaws7 wrote:

I'm gonna be that guy and say that because she has breasts, she is a female, regardless of what Isayama thinks. Even "God" can't dispute scientific fact. If she doesn't identify as a woman that's one thing, but female specifically refers to anatomy.

Besides, Hange is probably the most kick-ass female character in the whole show - so she definitely belongs in the discussion.


I dunno, I feel like if you apply that kind of logic to the rest of the show, that implies that no Titan is "female" save Annie because they lack distinguishable female body parts. Even, y'know, Ymir's Titan. But instead I'll just agree that yes, Hange is awesome.
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SailorTralfamadore



Joined: 25 Feb 2014
Posts: 499
Location: Keep Austin Weeb
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 7:05 pm Reply with quote
whiskeyii wrote:
MrTerrorist wrote:
No mention about Hange?

There's quite a bit of evidence from the mangaka that Hange doesn't identify as female, as he specifically requested that the English translation avoid using female pronouns (something the Japanese version avoids as well), which they've since abided by. So, for now, Word of God says Hange isn't female.


Yep, this is the reason I left Hange out of the article (despite being a big Hange fan personally). I don't count Hange as a female character because of the author's statement that they don't have an official gender, and I think even putting that clarification in an article about "the women of Attack on Titan" would open a huge can of worms.
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Mad_Scientist
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Joined: 08 Apr 2008
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PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 7:24 pm Reply with quote
7jaws7 wrote:
whiskeyii wrote:
There's quite a bit of evidence from the mangaka that Hange doesn't identify as female, as he specifically requested that the English translation avoid using female pronouns (something the Japanese version avoids as well), which they've since abided by. So, for now, Word of God says Hange isn't female.


I'm gonna be that guy and say that because she has breasts, she is a female, regardless of what Isayama thinks. Even "God" can't dispute scientific fact. If she doesn't identify as a woman that's one thing, but female specifically refers to anatomy.

Besides, Hange is probably the most kick-ass female character in the whole show - so she definitely belongs in the discussion.


Sorry, but "female" does not exclusively refer to anatomy, and even if it did, some cis women are flat chested, and some cis men have big breasts, so a "breasts = female" would break down and become meaningless.

Regardless, what Isayama thinks DOES matter, because he is the writer of AoT, and if he says that Hange does not identify as a woman, then they're not a woman.

Maybe some day in the future we can have an article about anime characters that don't fit into a gender binary, and Hange can be included, as they are a great character. But that's not today.
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#861208



Joined: 07 Oct 2016
Posts: 423
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 7:31 pm Reply with quote
You know, between seasons, I kept seeing people go on and on about how feminist Attack on Titan is, and I was never that into it, so I just took them at their word...

and then in the first episode of the new season, Eren has a flashback about tagging along while his mom and Mikasa did laundry, and his mom tells him he has to be strong because he's a man, and like...

I think it's another case of people throwing ideas they like onto shows they like... which goes hand in hand with throwing ideas they don't like onto shows they don't like... and neither is really very productive, honestly.

Also, good characters don't "kick ass". The best characters are the ones that solve their problems without violence, and gender has nothing to do with that. Of course, in this series, the violence is the point, which basically means the author has put a ceiling on how worthy the characters really can be, by denying them a scenario where they can do the truly worthy thing and solve problems without violence - again, regardless of gender.

Can we have a post celebrating characters who don't "kick ass", and solve their problems without violence (female, regardless of gender, or whatever)?
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Tuor_of_Gondolin



Joined: 20 Apr 2009
Posts: 3524
Location: Bellevue, WA
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 8:37 pm Reply with quote
Gemnist wrote:
~REMOVED~

I hope to God that you didn't just give out a manga spoiler, because that's what it looks like to me.
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Redbeard 101
Oscar the Grouch
Forums Superstar


Joined: 14 Aug 2006
Posts: 16935
PostPosted: Fri May 26, 2017 8:41 pm Reply with quote
How about everyone stay on topic and forgo any further transphobic comments or OT sexual orientation debates about a character that is not even on the list.
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