“Attack on Titan” has attracted an overseas readership as well. Our chaotic times: The ‘Attack on Titan’ manga speaks to a post-Lehman Shock Japanese readership as much as it speaks to Hong Kongers struggling to maintain their democracy. The series “has resonated with an uneasiness hanging over modern society where information is overflowing and people have become distrustful, doubting justice and truth,” he says.

Sugita says it is this sense of being “suspended in midair” that makes the story realistic.

The series addresses real-life themes, including ethnic discrimination, and readers are forced to ask non-judgmental questions, such as whether the enemy is really an enemy and whether Eren is correct. Joining the military to fight the Titans while seeking freedom for his people, Eren “represents the right of revolt and right of resistance against political corruption,” Sugita says.Īt times, the story featured fascinating clashes of political thought between Eren’s seeking “justice” to an excessive extent and his companions who call for a more tempered approach through dialogue. The protagonist of the story is Eren Yeager, a teenage boy raised in a world where humans live in cities surrounded by three enormous walls to protect them from the Titans.Įren swears revenge on the Titans who destroyed his town and devoured his mother. Noting that the series thoroughly encapsulates today’s politics, critic Shunsuke Sugita, 46, says, “No other shonen manga out there has so vividly integrated the gritty social atmosphere of the past decade.” thus coinciding with a time when people were starting to call existing values into question, according to experts. investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.

“Attack on Titan” started in 2009, the year after the global financial crisis triggered by the collapse of major U.S. The story’s climax, which was enthusiastically received by fans worldwide, was carried in the May edition of Kodansha’s monthly Bessatsu Shonen Magazine released on April 9. has published more than 100 million independent volumes of the series - including online versions - around the world. Shonen manga (boys comics) such as “Attack on Titan” are marketed toward men in their early to late teens. Cleverly illustrating the fate and despair of humans as they find themselves unable to escape conflict, the story attracted readers both at home and abroad by resonating with the chaotic modern times we live in.

Attack of titan