I know Mikasa's character development doesn't satisfy you in that you equate growth for her with more independence from Eren and Armin and towards military soldierdom and following orders, but I know you subscribe to the liege stuff when it comes to Levi towards Erwin, so I wonder why Mikasa's towards Eren bothers you? To me it's like if someone punched Erwin in the face in front of Levi I could totally buy a triggered reaction from Levi and not call it regression. That's basically what [1/2]

[2/2] happened when Levi punched Eren, so I’m wondering why the inconsistency in how you read Ackerman liege loyalty between Levi and Mikasa. You seem much less forgiving of her whereas you celebrate it in Levi.



I probably shouldn’t be answering this at 1am, but it’s a question I love and something I feel strongly about.

There’s a world of difference. Levi was an adult with a lifetime of experience who made a conscious decision to follow the person he deemed to be higher than himself. Mikasa was a traumatized nine-year-old child who had no frame of reference outside of her remote family farm. Levi was “fully baked” as an individual when he chose Erwin. Mikasa had barely started out in life.

I wrote about this more extensively in this post. I feel like there’s an in-story issue with Mikasa bonding with Eren as a child. She swore to follow a person more childish than herself. Those are Isayama’s words, not my own. The Ackerman clan should’ve had measures in place to prevent “ackerbonds” from forming until a child reached maturity.

To address your other point, if someone punched Erwin, Levi would be up in their face in a hot second. Actually that’s something I’d have loved to see :D So maybe I have a bit of a double standard there. But I also think Erwin would’ve told Levi to stand down. He wouldn’t have encouraged it, and Levi would’ve listened. Levi had a mature liege. So that’s another difference.



My bottom line is that I don’t want anything to permanently separate Eren and Mikasa. I think their bond is unique and wonderful and deserves to be celebrated. It’s one of my favorite ships. But I also want to see Mikasa develop independently of Eren. I think it would be healthy and advantageous for both of them. I hope there is time in the story for that to happen.

As you’ve noticed, Mikasa is my meta weak spot. Because I want so much more for her, I often say things I regret. I word things poorly and speak in anger. The main point in all of those posts is that I think her development has been uneven and neglectful and it frustrates me. I wont budge on that.