[Attack on Titan] - 24
I've noticed that a lot of people, and I am guilty of this as well, have mentioned how great this episode without really giving explaining why it's good. People watching the series don't really need to have that explained to them but for anyone who isn't watching it, or who dropped it at some point earlier, deserves some explanation about what sets this episode apart.
To set the scene it's worth pointing out that
Attack on Titan is a show with very inconsistent production values. Due to some problematic production scheduling the show oscillates between having average production values punctuated by nifty 10-30 second action scenes all the way down to nothing but a series of stills and flashbacks to previous episodes. Even when the show is on top form in terms of animation that doesn't tend to stretch across more than a couple of minutes and even then the direction of the series tends to be very boring and flat. Worse yet, the pacing takes a major hit from all the extraneous scenes of people talking about nothing that are apparently present to save a bit of money because animating lip flaps is easy. I could go on about all the production shortcuts they take (background art!) but I won't - you get the picture.
Sometimes, however, an episode will raise above the general mediocrity and achieve greatness. Episode 8, episode 17 and now episode 24 have each done this. Episode 24 was directed by Akitoshi Yokoyama. In fact it wasn't only directed by him but he did the storyboard, the key animation and 2nd key animation for the episode - he really poured a lot of passion into this episode and it shows. So where does Yokoyama come from? Recently he directed Photo Kano, a series which can hardly be accused of setting the world on fire, but he's been around in the industry since the late 80's largely working in animation. From his work on this episode it's clear that action animation is one of his specialties. So, let's get on to explaining why this episode was so good.
Firstly, and this may sound a little bit odd, but things were actually animated and most of the time it was animated well e.g. it was fluid when it needed to be, it was detailed when required and it was weighty when required. All of these things are important to the series because it's very easy to have a bunch of people bouncing around on wires look weightless and when they look weightless they have no impact or power to them. This isn't the case here. Characters have a strength and impact appropriate to their role:
Moreover the animators stretch and bend the characters, exaggerating their movements to give them a sense of speed and momentum:
Distortions aren't simply used to demonstrate movement, but to exaggerate and enhance sequences where a character is displaying a certain emotion:
Fluid animation, in itself, isn't particularly interesting without interesting lines of visual movement. This episode has lots of cool looking character movements, smoke trails, and distortions that exist simply to make things appear awesome:
Animation, as I've said above, certainly isn't the be all and end all (although it's rather important for action sequences) but it can't stand on it's own without good direction. Luckily there's lots of creative camera work, unique cuts (weird dutch angles, completely inverted shots etc) and fairly solid film form. For example effective use of depth of frame:
Note how something happening in the back of the image has transitioned to the front of the image. This might not sound like it means much but it's actually important and something that a lot of directors seem to forget because it actually creates a sense of depth. The frame itself is not just a left to right 2D plane but a window into a fully 3D image. Using the depth of the frame creates a real sense of space and, when you use it in a surprising manner such as this show, it can shock the audience because it feels like something is coming out of the back of the image hurtling at top speed towards the viewer.
Pulling focus is a very common technique in traditional film making but you don't see it a lot in anime because most anime is shot as if the camera has a perfect lens that captures every single layer of an image in crystal clear detail. This isn't always a good thing, however, because having everything in focus also makes everything feel flat because it's all on the same plane. Where you pull focus onto one element of a scene not only do you emphasise that element to the viewer but you also create depth in your image which makes it feel more real.
The shows called Attack on Titan, right? So scale is important - it's us tiny humans vs those giant bastards. Yet, often, the episode directors fail to really emphasise how big the creatures are because they just assume that having them be bigger than people is enough to impress their size upon us. However it really is best to have the audience measure them up against things such as buildings etc because that's far more impressive. Also, shooting the titan from a low angle like this further emphasise how terrifying their presence is especially when the humans in the image are helpless civilians rather than trained soldiers. How badly must they be crapping themselves? Moreover, there's numerous cuts like this in the episode to further drive home the point so it's clear the director understood the power of scale and comparison.
One element that doesn't far too well in this episode, or any episode, is the quality of the background art which is usually reduced to bad cg to allow for the characters to move through the space in interesting ways. Still, when they can afford to show it off in a scene without much movement the background art can look pretty good:
Finally the detail isn't just in the animation. There's a number of shots in this episode, mainly close ups, that are packed with character and power. This shot of Mikasa looks like it's from a horror movie due to the lighting on her eye, the lighting of the scene in general, her presence looming over Eren etc:
There's also plenty of other detailed, interesting shots to be found throughout:
(Those eyebrows)
Leaving aside the visuals, which are obviously important, it's really worth nothing that the pacing of this episode isn't dog-awful. I was concerned, at first, that they were spending too much time making Eren appear to be a terrible protagonist and weak character (something which happens fairly frequently regardless) but this was all set up that actually paid off later on in the episode. I'm not used to this series having even basic set-up to pay-off scenarios happen like that in a single episode! Oh yeah, and while I'm no great lover of the soundtrack it's usage throughout was flawless.
