WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Attack on Titan Season 4, Episode 18, "Sneak Attack," now streaming on Funimation, Hulu and Crunchyroll.
Despite being just two episodes into Attack on Titan - The Final Season: Part Two, it's already clear that the anime is dragging its feet rather than racing for the finish line. There's a lot of ground to cover between where the anime currently sits and the manga's end, and it doesn't look like it's going to make it. Fans were worried at the end of Season 4, Episode 16 when the series abruptly halted without being anywhere close to the end, only for the surprise announcement that the second half of AOT's farewell season was on the way. Now, history seems poised to repeat itself, but the surprise this time could be that Attack on Titan is getting a movie.
The second half of Season 4 picks up on Chapter 117 of the manga and has only 12 confirmed episodes to cover 22 chapters of material before the manga's end at Chapter 139. Chapters from Attack on Titan's manga are pretty lengthy, as the first two episodes of the Final Season: Part Two have covered exactly two chapters. With 10 episodes and 20 chapters to go, it doesn't take an Armin-level genius to see that the current pace isn't going to cut it. MAPPA -- the animation studio behind Attack on Titan -- must have a plan, and a movie to cover the manga's monumental final chapters seems to be a likely scenario.
The Final Season: Part Two's pacing is suspicious because clearly, the series could be moving faster if it wanted to. After all, the premiere episode ended on almost a full minute of Eren screaming, and the second episode backtracked several minutes into the premiere episode's ending without adding any additional context. A stalling tactic to pad the episode's runtime, it's an interesting approach to the last season of an absurdly popular series that already felt like 12 episodes won't be enough.
At the anime's current pace, The Final Season: Part Two should end on or around Chapter 130 of the manga, leaving the final nine chapters of the series up in the air. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, nine chapters of content is a very doable amount of material to turn into a feature film. Without getting into spoiler-y specifics, the grand scale of Attack on Titan's final chapters would be well suited to the big screen. As the success of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba the movie: Mugen Train proved, audiences appreciate anime films based on the series' manga -- something that's unusual for anime films -- more than enough to see them in theaters.
While there's been no official word on whether Attack on Titan is getting a movie, it seems likely enough given the smaller-than-expected number of episodes that make up the Final Season: Part Two. In fact, a movie feels like the only option, considering it would alienate the entire fanbase if the series were to cut material from the manga to speed-run to the end, or if it changed the events of the manga at all. Given the massive success that AoT has experienced during its run, it's not like MAPPA couldn't afford to finish the series with a spectacular, theatrical finale.
Easily one of the most popular anime in recent memory, Attack on Titan more than deserves the grandest of finales. The only downside to a hypothetical movie would be the (likely long) wait until its release, which even then would still be worth it. One of the manga's climactic chapters, entitled "The Battle of Heaven and Earth," even provides this theoretical film with the perfect, epic subtitle for an emphatic end to a beloved series. Only time will tell how the Final Season: Part Two will play out, but as it stands, a movie to conclude Attack on Titan is beginning to feel inevitable.