Analyzing Why Eren Did The Rumbling (He's Stupid And That's Genius.)

Analyzing why Eren did the Rumbling (He's stupid and that's genius.)

There's a lot of confusion and misunderstandings of the reasons why Eren did the rumbling, due to so many conflicting factors and the mask he was using during the entirety of the final arc. In his final conversation with Armin, he gives so many reasons and yet keeps contradicting himself about everything and it only adds to the confusion, so this is my attempt to explain why Eren did what he did, and why it's founded on irrationality and how that's perfect for his character and the themes of Attack of Titan.

Eren's Motives

Three of his generally accepted motives are these:

1- To see the sight in the book, aka, "levelling" the land. His childish dream he couldn't let go of.

2- To save his friends by having them kill him (they would be seen as heroes and the titan curse would end, saving Armin, Reiner, Annie, etc.).

(The result being the end of the titan's curse)

3- Keep Paradis safe (the level of development of the world would be incredibly reduced, Eren's friends could act as diplomats, and Paradis would now have a fighting chance.)

(I'd argue this motive is just a happy consequence of his real priorities, number 1 and 2).

But the first and second motive directly contradict each other, no? If Eren wanted to do a complete rumbling and truly level the land, he wouldn't wish to be stopped. But according to the second motive, he always intended to be stopped. Not only that, he knew he'd be stopped at 80% because of the power of the Attack Titan.

So why bother doing the Rumbling at all even though it could never accomplish point 1? For his friends only then? But he didn't even know which one of his friends would survive, just that they'd stop him and end the titan curse.

Maybe everyone but Pieck could have died while trying to stop him, so his plan wouldn't fulfill point 1 nor point 2. He wouldn't get a full Rumbling to fulfill his dreams nor a happy ending for his friends.

To make sense of this, my theory is that Eren is stupid and just couldn't help himself despite the risks and impossibilities. He just had to do it.

Eren is an Idiot.

Eren has always been stupid. He tried things irrationally just because he wanted to be free and go outside the walls, believing that it would go well as he severely overestimasted himself, almost getting killed several times because of it.

He's a subversion of a shonen protagonist in a realistic world. The only reason he got so far is because so many people were covering his back and because he got the Attack Titan. This is a vital part of his character. He is average, childish, and prone to succumb to his feelings; and that's exactly what he did. Eren developed so much along the course of the series, and managed to keep control of his recklessness with rationality and discipline... but he never developed emotionally, and this was the result.

Even if he knew that the Rumbling would stop at 80%, it'd still partially fulfill his dream to see a levelled land and becoming free. At least for a moment, he'd be able to feel like he was accomplishing that goal of his and feeling free because of it.

He fought back against Armin because Eren wouldn't give up his freedom without a fight, and he wanted to know that he truly tried everything (aside from taking away his friends' freedom, which would make him a hypocrite in his eyes). Eren was a slave to freedom and was unable to give up on it unlike basically every other character in the series. (give up on your dream and die). He was the ultimate shonen protagonist, especially in his unyielding dream, and it backfired immensely. In no universe Eren was able to stop himself from doing the Rumbling, because it's what he wanted to do to get his freedom, even while knowing it'd fail. It isn't rational. He just couldn't help himself from doing his upmost to live freely, because he was born into the world and thus had a right to, in his eyes. Eren latched onto that childish idea, of never compromising, of being unable to give up on his desired outcome, and it ended up making him a mass murderer. He never grew up, and this was the result.

At the same time, though, he did want to give his friends the chance to stop him and become free themselves, which would also save them to boot. There was the risk that they died, but he couldn't help himself, and in the best case scenario, most of them would live.

Thus, no matter what, the Rumbling was the best way of fulfilling Eren's contradicting goals, not from a logical sense, but from an emotional one.

Rationalizations

In the end, Point 2 and 3 of his motivations are just rationalizations for going through a plan he knew would fail. Point 1 was the main reason he did it (even though, as I explained, it's not really the only reason, just that if he truly wanted to save his friends and Paradis this plan was one of the worse options), and the worst part is that he knew it wouldn't go his way and he did it anyways.

So yeah, he's smart, stupid, free, trapped, selfish, selfless, and that's the point? If so, I think it's a pretty interesting point to make. Eren never managed to mature enough out of being a child—he was denied agency again and again by the world, and unlike everyone else in the series, he couldn't accept that. He couldn't compromise, not on his dream, but not on his friends, either.

I think it's really clever writing to hide all these layers behind Eren, even though the confusing explanation did end up making a lot of people wrongly excuse his genocide "because he did it for his friends", even though he straight up admits he wasn't, he just thought he was.

In truth, he killed 80% of humanity because he wasn't mature enough to pinpoint his irrational motives founded in the trauma of living trapped in walls with the physical manifestation of being trapped embodied by the titans. (A systemic analysis of Eren coming in another post!)

I do admit that actually understanding that all of this was Isayama's intention though, if I even got it right, was completely convoluted and confusing and could've been written way more neatly; but I still love the ending, because it shows us that Eren is doing the most Eren thing imaginable through the Rumbling—showcasing his stupidity, rashness and average nature, which was always a huge part of his character that I'm glad wasn't forcefully taken out of him because of his "cooler" role in the last season.

If there's one thing I've always loved about Eren, is how human he is. How imperfect he is. And his actions are, without a doubt, the embodiment of what it means to be an irrational being with a brain that tries to rationalize everything—a being that would kill 80% of humanity for his dreams, while risking his friends' lives, while also deeply wishing to save them.

I guess that his character (and humanity) can be summed up by Mikasa quite well, don't you think? Because in the end, even if he's stupid, he's also kind. He's cruel...