There's no denying the impact that Attack on Titan made on the anime industry when it first hit screens back in 2013. The audience it managed to capture is absolutely enormous, and with the final season just over the horizon, the fan base hasn't shown any signs of slowing down. It brought with it an interesting premise, violence and, for the first time for many fans, a real sense of death having consequences in an anime.

After an explosive opening sequence, a carrot was dangled in front of the audience in the form of a key -- one that would lead to Eren's basement, which supposedly held invaluable secrets. The basement was always in the background of the story until the fabled return to the Shiganshina District dozens of episodes later.

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Everything Built to the Climactic Battle in Shiganshina

Eren vs reiner

After many arcs of political turmoil, battles for survival and betrayal, humanity finally reached the point where they could fight back against the titans. After learning about Grisha's past, questions about what lay inside the Yeager family basement started to be formed. Knowing that he, Eren's father, came from outside the walls, what other information did he keep hidden in the house?

The Survey Corps hatched their plan to retake the outer wall of the city, with Shiganshina being the key. It was here that the climactic final battle of the first half of Attack on Titan took place, and it stands today as the peak of the series for many fans, as well as one of the greatest arcs in shonen history. Despite the fantastical nature of the world of Attack on Titan, it remains grounded and realistic within the boundaries it sets for itself. Throughout the battle, there are no deus ex machinas that save the protagonists, leaving them to survive purely on their own wits, survival instincts and clever resource management.

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The Battle for Shiganshina Is the Perfect Battle Arc

Levi vs zeke attack on titan

Before the battle truly begins, Armin begins to suspect something is wrong. The Survey Corps had come to Shiganshina to seal the hole in the wall and succeeded, but everything was just too easy. After finding a campsite left by the trio of Zeke, Bertolt and Reiner, Armin commands everyone to check the inside of the walls for them.

Armin laments that the reason they've lost so many times against the titans was because there were so many things they didn't know about them. This information gap is critical in the battle, as it does an excellent job of setting expectations for the audience. It allows for moments like Reiner being seemingly defeated, only to reveal that he transferred his consciousness to his titan body to survive a mortal wound.

While fans criticize moments like this, it's well within the logic of the Attack on Titan universe and gives the battle an enormous number of peaks and valleys. Each victory for the heroes is quickly dashed by a crushing defeat in another avenue, forcing them to think on the fly to dig themselves out of the new hole they've found themselves in.

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Erwin's Final Charge Was the Only Way to End the Battle

Erwin leads the charge in battle

Everything was riding on the conclusion of the battle of Shiganshina. No one knew where the series would be going next, what was inside the basement or who would make it out alive. An impossible situation forced Erwin to make the ultimate sacrifice, leading his troops into a suicide charge against Zeke, the beast titan. Erwin rallied his troops by telling them their sacrifices today would make the lives of those who died before them mean something -- a central theme to the story. In order for the story to move forward, someone had to sacrifice themselves to make it a reality. That someone was Erwin.

After the defeat of the trio, the basement was finally opened, and everything both the fans and characters thought they knew about the world was completely flipped on its head. Attack on Titan was no longer a fantastical story about man vs. titan but rather man vs. man. The opening of the basement was the ultimate Chekhov's Gun, and only a battle the size of Shiganshina was fitting enough to fire it. While not every fan is happy with the direction the story took afterward, no fan would say that the battle of Shiganshina was anything but a masterpiece, and the perfect climax for the first half of the story.