By Adam Sarsfield
For 100 years the walls of Paradis Island stood tall and massive to protect the people on the island from the monstrous beast that can be as tall as 15 meters. These titans as the inhabitants of Paradis call them roam the lands beyond the walls. Their primary food is the people of the walls however they will eat any living thing they see and sometimes each other. The only way to defeat the titans permanently is striking the back of the neck at the nape. There are 3 walls: Wall Maria is the outermost wall, Wall Rose is in the middle, and Wall Sina is in the center. Each wall has 4 districts, one in each cardinal direction. The walls are ruled by a monarchy. A Church of the Walls exists which worships the Walls. We meet our protagonist, Eren Jeager, having a nightmare about giant beast eating people. Eren is a young boy who dreams of freedom and joining the Survey Corps. His father, Grisha Jaeger, is a doctor, and he has a mother named Carla Jaeger and an adoptive sister named Mikasa Ackerman. His best friend is a boy named Armin Arlert. Eren and Mikasa gather wood for their family and return home, Eren gets in a fight with his mother and runs off, Mikasa follows him, they meet up with Armin.
Pre-Survey Corp
Unfortunately, the Wall Maria would fall to the largest titan ever seen standing at 60 meters tall. This breach in Wall Maria gave all the other normal-sized titans a chance to feast on the unprepared citizens. Then an Armoured Titan appears and destroys the Shiganshina Inner Gate. Eren’s mother is killed by a Smiling Titan, but he and Mikasa are saved by Hannes, a Garrison soldier. They make it outside the city and into the evacuation area and are escorted onto a boat heading to Wall Rose. Eren, Armin, Mikasa, and many others become refugees while 10 000 people die in the attack. Another 250 000 people, including Armin’s grandfather, are sent out on a suicide mission by the nobility to solve the food shortage, resulting in all of their deaths. 2 years later, Eren, Armin, Mikasa, and several others join the military as part of the 104th Training Corps. They are trained on how to use 3-D Maneuver Gear to fight Titans.
Siege of Trost
On the day of their graduation, Eren and some other trainees are cleaning Wall Rose, when suddenly the Colossal Titan shows up and attacks Trost District. Eren attempts to fight it, but the Colossal Titan seemingly disappears in a cloud of steam. Mikasa is assigned to the rear, helping with the evacuation. Eren leads a squad of his fellow trainees, including Armin, but they are quickly attacked and wiped out by the Titans. Armin is caught by a titan and almost eaten but Eren sacrifices his own life to save Armin. The surviving trainee squads gather together in the middle of the city. They cannot reach safety at the top of the Walls due to gas shortages. The supply depot has been overrun by Titans. Mikasa yells at the soldiers to desperately make their way to the depot. However, she herself runs out of gas and crashes into an alleyway. Mikasa is attacked by a Titan. Suddenly, that Titan is attacked by another Titan. She witnesses this Rogue Titan attack and kills several Titans in the city. Jean and several other trainees manage to reach the supply depot, despite heavy casualties. Armin, Mikasa, and Connie successfully lure the Rogue Titan to the supply depot, and it begins to kill the ones swarming the building. Armin devises a plan to deal with them using rifles and blades and it succeeds. Outside, they see the Rogue Titan being swarmed. It is able to break free and kill the last of the Titans in the vicinity, but is exhausted and falls to the ground. From the nape of the Rogue Titan’s neck emerges Eren, with all his limbs intact. The trainees bring Eren back to the Wall where he is threatened by the Garrison Unit, the wall guards, to explain why he just exited the body of a titan. The commanding officer commands his soldiers to opens fire with an anti-titan canon. Eren half transforms into a titan and stops the armament from hitting its target. Armin tries to convince the soldiers that Eren, Mikasa, and himself are no threats and that convinces the Commands of the Garrison, Commander Pixis has a plan to use Eren’s Rogue Titan form to block the breach using a giant boulder. Most of the soldiers will be used as bait to lure the Titans out of Eren’s path, except for a team of elite Garrison soldiers. Eren transforms into a Titan once more to lift the boulder, but instead goes mindless and tries to attack Mikasa. Armin is able to communicate to Eren inside his titan body and reminds him of his dreams of freedom. Eren regains control and successfully uses the boulder to seal the breach. Eren then leaves his titan form and rejoins his team but titans surround them. The team is saved at the last minute by Captain Levi and the Survey Corps returning from an expedition beyond the Walls. Eren is taken into custody and put on trial to decide his fate. Captain Levi and Commander Erwin both give the idea of taking Eren into the Survey Corp but under strict supervision by Levi and his elite team.
The Female Titan
Eren joins the Levi squad and meets its members consisting of Eld Jinn, Petra Ral, Oluo Bozado, Gunther Schultz. Commander Hange Zoe also meets up with the team at a secure safe house. Hange is fascinated by Eren’s ability to transform into a titan and asks to run a test on him. They started with how big of an area does Eren need to transform. Eren however fails to transform at all during the testing process. When the team is enjoying tea at a table seated outside the safe house Eren drops his spoon and goes to pick it up. Upon touching the spoon he transforms into his titan form and scares the entire team. His hearing and vision are slightly botched and he can’t make out the words and yelling he hears. When his hearing does come back he hears Captain Levi yelling for him to calm down. Soon after however he learns that Levi isn’t yelling at him but yelling at the rest of the Levi Squad, which all of their weapons out and ready to take Eren’s life. The group all makeup after the confusion is batted away and they prepare to set out for an expedition to Shiganshina district, the district that was breached, and the home of Eren, Mikasa, and most of their comrades. During the expedition, another new titan is spotted, a Female Titan, the Female Titan takes out many of the soldiers on the right-wing of the expedition formation. Armin, Jean, and Reiner fail to take down the Female Titan. Armin figures out that the female titan is most likely another person who can transform into a titan, or shifter as the Survey Corp dubbed them, and is most likely looking for Eren. Commander Erwin leads the formation into the Forest of the Giant Trees. He orders most of the soldiers to stand at the edge of the forest on top of the trees and stand guard. Levi Squad rode into the forest but were attacked and chased the Female Titan. Eren wanted to engage the Female Titan, but his comrades convinced him to instead continue forward. They successfully lead the Female Titan into a trap set by Erwin and Hange, and the Titan is captured. Female Titan breaks free by screaming to summon nearby mindless Titans to swarm and devour her. She ambushes Squad Levi while Captain Levi is with Erwin, and kills them. Enraged, Eren shifts into the Rogue Titan and battles her. He is defeated. She captures Eren and almost escapes. The Female Titan is intercepted by Levi and Mikasa. Levi incapacitates the Female Titan, but his ankle is injured while saving Mikasa from a trap. Armin figures out that the Female Titan was actually Annie. They lay a trap for her, attempting to lure her into underground tunnels beneath Stohess District, the easternmost city in Wall Sina. However, she realizes the trap, and shifts into the Female Titan. The Female Titan attempts to escape by climbing the Wall. Mikasa succeeds in cutting off her fingers, resulting in the Female Titan crashing to the ground. Eren and the military attempt to capture her, but Annie encloses her human self within an unbreakable crystal. The crystal is taken into military custody. The battle causes minor damage to the Wall, and it is revealed that there is a massive Titan inside the Wall. This is the end of Season 1