Since we're talking about Eren's mental health, the scouts did an absolutely horrendous job of helping him with his depression, and that's what baffles me. You're supposed to view the Scouts as sympathetic but the way they treated him was borderline abusive.
Take this scene for an example, from their vacation to Nazi Germany. Eren is very obviously not in a good mood, it's a very obvious cry for help.
And Mikasa just looks at him like he's being a bitch and killing the mood for no reason.
Even during Mikasa's narration in the present day (Isn't Armin supposed to be the narrator?), she acts like the problem is they didn't notice Eren's obvious desire to kill everyone for no reason, when it's very clear the way they fucked up is that they knowingly ignored obvious signs of Eren suffering from depression and feeling isolated from everyone else.
This is the thing that baffles me, if Isayama wanted to portray the Scouts as being abusive and uncaring towards Eren, and that's what caused him to do what he did, then Isayama did everything right.
I'd call it uncharacteristically good writing but he wanted us to view the Scouts as innocent of any wrongdoing, when that's very obviously not the case.
That's amazing.
*Is having literal PTSD from concentration camp flashbacks to the extent that he doesn't know where he is*
"Hey emo faggot, stop spacing out."
"Yeah, why are you being a bitch, we're trying to enjoy some ice cream over here, God."
*five years later*
"WHY DOES EREN WANT TO MURDER EVERYONE?! IT IS A MYSTERY"
Levi is so fucking incompetent. He's supposed to be supervising this living weapon and absolutely does not give a singular absolute fuck about Eren. He's like an angry babysitter who is annoyed he has to look over this child who he expects will never ever ever disobey him. Its absolutely perplexing. He looks after Eren basically at the barest obligation to Erwin. His friends in those flashbacks basically ignore his increasing isolation and his memories. They don't even bother trying to counsel him. Levi basically treats him like a loose cannon when all he's been wanting to do is just protect people he cares about and he's just ignored and treated like dirt over and over again.
When Eren reaches out to Mikasa, as basically a last act of desperation, Isayama basically has to write a shitty excuse as to why this fails. Its not really tragic when its so badly done and you basically have no build up. He shouldn't have even had the shot, it should have been prevented by Levi (who should have been written as a villian). But for some fucking reason, after clearly loving Eren this entire time, she's just like, 'Nah' and basically brushes him off without a concern. For no fucking reason I can figure out.
Levi needed to be the villain. He's always greatly disliked Eren, right from the start. Levi has NEVER respected Eren, ever. He's viewed him as a means to an end and pretty much hates him and basically offers him the barest respect. But for some fucking reason he's written as a hero? Uh, no. Levi needs to be written as a villain. Otherwise you're just writing a fucking idiot (which Levi is, but he's clearly not meant to be). Other people will say, "Well, Levi saw Eren as a loose cannon!" No motherfucker. If he foresaw that, he would have done something to curb it, not do everything in his power to reinforce that attitude and hatred. At every turn Levi treats Eren with absolute contempt. If Eren was a grease fire, Levi put on an apron and danced around, pouring more and more water on it until the entire house was engulfed in flames.
Levi should have been purposefully written as a villain. Instead of incompetent, he's actively malicious. He treats Eren with disdain because he doesn't want to be shown up. He prevents Eren from transforming in the forest not because of any trust issues, but because of his own hubris. He's Levi fucking Ackerman. Then he rages and blames Eren for getting his squad killed, even though he's the one at fault. He chooses Armin over Erwin because he WANTS Erwin to die. He's questioned his loyalty to Erwin ever since Eren arrived, since he views Eren as inferior. With Erwin dead, he'd be in charge. So he is relieved that he didn't have to betray Erwin, the choice is made for him. As a result, he treats Eren like trash. Even worse than before. He isolates him from his friends. Tortures him mentally. Trains him to become a weapon. Just regularly beats the emotion out of him. Maybe the other scouts look the other way, because Levi is so effective. Perhaps its even kept from his friends, whom Levi lies to regularly. With perhaps the exception of Mikasa, who is kept as far away from Eren as possible because she's the only one who would ever have the fortitude to stop what is going on.
What breaks Eren is Levi lying to Eren about why Mikasa is staying away from him. At this point, Levi would basically be his 'mentor' and only connection to the outside world, even. Levi, sensing an opportunity to twist the knife further, just says to Eren Mikasa views him as a disgusting thing, not a friend or family member. Just a creature, which is why she stays away from him. I mean, make him fucking Iago from Othello. Pretending to be this friend, but just secretly loathing Eren. And that just BREAKS Eren, past the point of no return. Then you can have him become engulfed with rage and possessed by it.
But nope, its just trash writing instead.
Hell Madoka (itself a deconstruction of the Magical Girl genre ) did that with both Mami and Sayaka.
What is it about the last decade where everything has to be woke to protect hurt feefees or grimderp edgy?
Eren isn't a deconstruction. As much as I hate Shinji, there's your deconstruction basically. Fuck, even Asta from Black Clover is more of a deconstruction of a shonen protagonist than Eren.
Because the more Grimdark you are, the smarter your work is.
