The AoT ending doesn’t choose between determinism and freedom, you do
I tried to search for this specific idea and even posted another version on r/attackontitan, but it did not really spark the kind of discussion I was hoping for. Since this sub is usually more analysis focused, I wanted to try again here, in a longer and clearer form.
If someone knows a prior post that makes this argument in basically the same way, I genuinely want to read it.
# Two endings in one structure
# 1. The deterministic ending
If you approach the story as a determinist, the pieces line up very neatly.
* Ymir always controlled everything from the Paths.
* Eren never had real freedom. His future “memories” were not warnings, but confirmations of what must happen.
* He does not move toward the future. He is dragged into it.
Mikasa killing Eren does not change the structure of reality. It only changes who holds power for a moment. The Founding Titan disappears from the world and the power returns to the same source, the “tree” or origin point.
The last image of a child approaching a tree after a destroyed future city is then read as a reset. The cycle is eternal. The illusion of change is part of how the curse works.
In this reading:
* Ymir never truly escapes.
* Eren is always a tool.
* Freedom is an illusion inside a closed system.
* History does not really change, it only loops.
This is a bleak ending, but internally consistent if you assume a fixed timeline.
# 2. The indeterministic ending
If you lean toward indeterminism, the same scenes can be read very differently.
Eren believes the world is fixed because **he** cannot change. He is locked into his own nature and mistakes that for a universal law. The future he sees is not “all possible futures”, it is simply **the one future that results from him always making the same kind of choice**.
Ymir is also stuck inside this closed loop, emotionally and psychologically, even though she exists outside time. She keeps choosing submission, because she cannot imagine anything else.
Mikasa is the first person who actually acts against the internal logic of the system.
She loves Eren, and kills him anyway.
She refuses both the fantasy of saving him and the fantasy of being powerless.
That act does not rewind history, but it changes something deeper: Ymir herself. And if Ymir changes, the structure she sustains can no longer be the same.
In this reading:
* The loop that Eren experiences is real for him, but it is not the only possible world.
* Mikasa’s act breaks the necessity of this specific reality continuing forever.
* A new branch of reality becomes possible. For example, a world where Ymir never jumps in front of the spear and Titans never originate.
That new world is never shown. The anime and manga keep following the “old” timeline all the way to the militarisation of Paradis, the destruction of the city, and the child finding the tree.
So we end up with something strange:
* The “Eren timeline” continues to its bitter end.
* The “Ymir finally free” timeline exists off screen as a possibility that the viewer gets to imagine themselves.
Nothing that happened is undone. The suffering in this world is still real. But **determinism is no longer the only rule in the universe**.
# Why I think both readings are intentionally supported
This is where I think the story becomes more philosophical than many shonen endings.
1. Eren speaks and acts as if the world is absolutely determined.
2. Mikasa acts as if her choice really matters, even if she has no proof.
3. Ymir experiences both perspectives at once through them.
4. The narrative never steps in as an objective “voice of the universe” to tell us which one is right.
So:
* Every scene that supports determinism has a counterpart that can be read as a real rupture.
* The structure of the ending gives you just enough to build either a fully deterministic or a partly indeterministic metaphysics.
* It never resolves the conflict in text. It leaves it in the viewer.
That is why some people come away saying “nothing changed in
I tried to search for this specific idea and even posted another version on r/attackontitan, but it did not really spark the kind of discussion I was hoping for. Since this sub is usually more analysis focused, I wanted to try again here, in a longer and clearer form.
If someone knows a prior post that makes this argument in basically the same way, I genuinely want to read it.
# Two endings in one structure
# 1. The deterministic ending
If you approach the story as a determinist, the pieces line up very neatly.
* Ymir always controlled everything from the Paths.
* Eren never had real freedom. His future “memories” were not warnings, but confirmations of what must happen.
* He does not move toward the future. He is dragged into it.
Mikasa killing Eren does not change the structure of reality. It only changes who holds power for a moment. The Founding Titan disappears from the world and the power returns to the same source, the “tree” or origin point.
The last image of a child approaching a tree after a destroyed future city is then read as a reset. The cycle is eternal. The illusion of change is part of how the curse works.
In this reading:
* Ymir never truly escapes.
* Eren is always a tool.
* Freedom is an illusion inside a closed system.
* History does not really change, it only loops.
This is a bleak ending, but internally consistent if you assume a fixed timeline.
# 2. The indeterministic ending
If you lean toward indeterminism, the same scenes can be read very differently.
Eren believes the world is fixed because **he** cannot change. He is locked into his own nature and mistakes that for a universal law. The future he sees is not “all possible futures”, it is simply **the one future that results from him always making the same kind of choice**.
Ymir is also stuck inside this closed loop, emotionally and psychologically, even though she exists outside time. She keeps choosing submission, because she cannot imagine anything else.
Mikasa is the first person who actually acts against the internal logic of the system.
She loves Eren, and kills him anyway.
She refuses both the fantasy of saving him and the fantasy of being powerless.
That act does not rewind history, but it changes something deeper: Ymir herself. And if Ymir changes, the structure she sustains can no longer be the same.
In this reading:
* The loop that Eren experiences is real for him, but it is not the only possible world.
* Mikasa’s act breaks the necessity of this specific reality continuing forever.
* A new branch of reality becomes possible. For example, a world where Ymir never jumps in front of the spear and Titans never originate.
That new world is never shown. The anime and manga keep following the “old” timeline all the way to the militarisation of Paradis, the destruction of the city, and the child finding the tree.
So we end up with something strange:
* The “Eren timeline” continues to its bitter end.
* The “Ymir finally free” timeline exists off screen as a possibility that the viewer gets to imagine themselves.
Nothing that happened is undone. The suffering in this world is still real. But **determinism is no longer the only rule in the universe**.
# Why I think both readings are intentionally supported
This is where I think the story becomes more philosophical than many shonen endings.
1. Eren speaks and acts as if the world is absolutely determined.
2. Mikasa acts as if her choice really matters, even if she has no proof.
3. Ymir experiences both perspectives at once through them.
4. The narrative never steps in as an objective “voice of the universe” to tell us which one is right.
So:
* Every scene that supports determinism has a counterpart that can be read as a real rupture.
* The structure of the ending gives you just enough to build either a fully deterministic or a partly indeterministic metaphysics.
* It never resolves the conflict in text. It leaves it in the viewer.
That is why some people come away saying “nothing changed in
the end”
while others come away saying “something fundamental broke, even if the world is still cruel”.
Both camps can quote the anime and manga. Both feel backed by canon.
# The viewer as the final decision-maker
This is the part that interests me the most.
Most stories eventually pick a side. They declare, explicitly or implicitly:
* “In this universe, fate is real” or
* “In this universe, freedom really can rewrite destiny”.
Attack on Titan seems to refuse that final step.
Instead, it gives us:
* Eren, who embodies inevitability.
* Mikasa, who embodies rupture.
* Ymir, who is caught between them.
* A final image that can be read as either a reset or a new unknown.
Then it quietly steps back and leaves the last choice to us.
If you walk into the ending as a determinist, you will almost certainly see a closed loop that even Mikasa never truly breaks.
If you walk into it as an indeterminist, you will see a world that was deterministic up to a point, and then fractured by a single act of refusal.
The text supports both. The story does not tell you which one is “correct”. It asks you which one you are willing to live with.
# Why I am posting this here
On r/attackontitan this idea got a lot of silent attention and even some people DM’ing me that it helped them make sense of the ending, but almost no one really said anything about it.
That makes me think either:
* I am missing something obvious that breaks this interpretation or
* the ending really is constructed in a way that makes people feel it very personally, and they do not always want to unpack that in public.
Personally, I find it fascinating that two people can watch the exact same final scenes and walk away with completely opposite metaphysical conclusions, both feeling fully justified by the text and ready to argue their view on Reddit to the death. That alone makes me suspect the ambiguity is intentional rather than accidental.
So I wanted to bring it here and ask:
* Do you think the ending is actually committing to one metaphysics, and I am overcomplicating it?
* Or do you see the same “double support” for both determinism and rupture?
* And if both readings are possible, is that a strength of the story, or a cop-out?
# TL;DR
I do not think the ending of Attack on Titan commits to either determinism or indeterminism. It is structured to support both at once, and then hands that final metaphysical choice to the viewer. If you are a determinist at heart, you will almost inevitably see a closed loop. If you lean toward indeterminism, you will see a genuine rupture. The story confirms neither. And I think that may be the point.
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while others come away saying “something fundamental broke, even if the world is still cruel”.
Both camps can quote the anime and manga. Both feel backed by canon.
# The viewer as the final decision-maker
This is the part that interests me the most.
Most stories eventually pick a side. They declare, explicitly or implicitly:
* “In this universe, fate is real” or
* “In this universe, freedom really can rewrite destiny”.
Attack on Titan seems to refuse that final step.
Instead, it gives us:
* Eren, who embodies inevitability.
* Mikasa, who embodies rupture.
* Ymir, who is caught between them.
* A final image that can be read as either a reset or a new unknown.
Then it quietly steps back and leaves the last choice to us.
If you walk into the ending as a determinist, you will almost certainly see a closed loop that even Mikasa never truly breaks.
If you walk into it as an indeterminist, you will see a world that was deterministic up to a point, and then fractured by a single act of refusal.
The text supports both. The story does not tell you which one is “correct”. It asks you which one you are willing to live with.
# Why I am posting this here
On r/attackontitan this idea got a lot of silent attention and even some people DM’ing me that it helped them make sense of the ending, but almost no one really said anything about it.
That makes me think either:
* I am missing something obvious that breaks this interpretation or
* the ending really is constructed in a way that makes people feel it very personally, and they do not always want to unpack that in public.
Personally, I find it fascinating that two people can watch the exact same final scenes and walk away with completely opposite metaphysical conclusions, both feeling fully justified by the text and ready to argue their view on Reddit to the death. That alone makes me suspect the ambiguity is intentional rather than accidental.
So I wanted to bring it here and ask:
* Do you think the ending is actually committing to one metaphysics, and I am overcomplicating it?
* Or do you see the same “double support” for both determinism and rupture?
* And if both readings are possible, is that a strength of the story, or a cop-out?
# TL;DR
I do not think the ending of Attack on Titan commits to either determinism or indeterminism. It is structured to support both at once, and then hands that final metaphysical choice to the viewer. If you are a determinist at heart, you will almost inevitably see a closed loop. If you lean toward indeterminism, you will see a genuine rupture. The story confirms neither. And I think that may be the point.
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@attack_on_titan_topic
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How fucking slow was he biting or how fucking fast was he writing?
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Why did Bertholdt and Rainer destroy wall gates?
I understand that they're mission was to find the 'coordinate' because of the Rumbling danger, but why on earth would they go about it in the most destructive and dangerous way possible? Like, what was the exact reasoning? Did they hope the coordinate would show himself? What if it triggered the Rumbling instead?
Maybe I misunderstood the story, but it looks like the fact that the vow to destroy the world was a bluff and instead there's the vow of peace was a secret known only to the Reiss family, so from the point of view of the plot its a literal miracle that there was this vow of peace, because otherwise losing wall Maria should have warranted a Rumbling. Marley was a hair away from accidently destroying the world. (well, technically, their mission did end up resulting in just that)
I really think the way Marley entrusted this super important and dangerous mission to 4 kids paints them as comically incompetent. There obviously should have been adults with them to oversee the mission. They should have first infiltrated spies into the walls to try to find out any information (and they had all the means to do it anyway) instead of charging head on to bang the wall gates and hope for the best. You're telling me they lost contact with the kids and it took **5 years** for them to send Zeke to check up on the mission ???
https://redd.it/1pciozl
@attack_on_titan_topic
I understand that they're mission was to find the 'coordinate' because of the Rumbling danger, but why on earth would they go about it in the most destructive and dangerous way possible? Like, what was the exact reasoning? Did they hope the coordinate would show himself? What if it triggered the Rumbling instead?
Maybe I misunderstood the story, but it looks like the fact that the vow to destroy the world was a bluff and instead there's the vow of peace was a secret known only to the Reiss family, so from the point of view of the plot its a literal miracle that there was this vow of peace, because otherwise losing wall Maria should have warranted a Rumbling. Marley was a hair away from accidently destroying the world. (well, technically, their mission did end up resulting in just that)
I really think the way Marley entrusted this super important and dangerous mission to 4 kids paints them as comically incompetent. There obviously should have been adults with them to oversee the mission. They should have first infiltrated spies into the walls to try to find out any information (and they had all the means to do it anyway) instead of charging head on to bang the wall gates and hope for the best. You're telling me they lost contact with the kids and it took **5 years** for them to send Zeke to check up on the mission ???
https://redd.it/1pciozl
@attack_on_titan_topic
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