Attack on Titan: The Anime Guide – An in-depth guide to the hit anime series…

Attack on Titan in both manga and anime forms has been a true mega-hit that has crossed the boundaries between manga/anime fandom and general popular culture. The series is now a bonafide franchise with video games, live action movies, theme park attractions, crossovers with Marvel and more to its name. And with the second season of the anime now underway, now is a perfect time to look back on the original first season that helped make this series such a cross promotional hit.

For fans of the series, Attack on Titan: The Anime Guide features everything you could want to know and more about the iconic 2013 series. Almost every character both human and titan is spotlighted with character study artwork, design work and production notes giving fans a great insight on the transition from page to screen. And that is only the beginning on the art front with features on the backgrounds, weaponry and equipment, how a Titan vanishes after it’s been killed, storyboards and much more. But perhaps most helpful is the collection of “Currently Publically Available Information” cards that pop up before and after advert breaks which are usually blink and you’ll miss it scenarios. These pieces provide invaluable information to help better understand the series including city and wall layouts, guides to weaponry and ODM Gear, history of the titans, military plans and tactics and much more. On the more light hearted side and to showcase the series huge success, there’s even a collection of series merchandise including snacks, underwear, inflatable punching bags and even Pizza Hut tie-ins (it’s going to take a while to get the image of the Colossal Titan wolfing down on a Pizza Hut pizza out of my head). Alongside this, there are some photos from promotional events both in Japan and abroad again showing the depth of the series’ success. To cap it off, it also comes with four special edition postcards featuring the main cast so you can do whatever you do with post cards these days.

But the main meat of this guide comes from the many interviews with various people working on Attack on Titan in some shape or form. This includes members of the main voice cast (Eren, Mikasa, Armin and Levi) discussing the impressions the series and characters left on them, animation staff discussing how the manga was adapted and key sequences, script writers, composers and Revo from the band Linked Horizon (who wrote and performed all of the epic Attack on Titan opening themes that spawned many internet memes). But best of all is an extended double interview with series director Tetsuro Araki and original manga creator Hajime Isayama who both go very in depth when discussing the series. It’s must read material for any fans and even includes a revelation about Eren and Armin you’ll find here first.

If you like Attack on Titan, this is simply a must buy and is a great addition to the ever expanding series library. The great art collected would make it worth purchasing alone, but the addition of so many great interviews and in-depth thoughts from the series creators makes this truly something special.

See our preview of Attack on Titan: The Anime Guide below: