Two Brothers

Eren's battered Attack Titan limps toward the downed Beast Titan until Porco Galliard's jaws clamp onto his leg. Eren caves in the Jaw Titan's skull and spine, loses an arm to Magath's artillery, and gains breathing room when Floch's riflemen swarm the Cart Titan's gun crew. As Zeke stirs, Colt sprints forward screaming that Falco has swallowed spinal fluid, begging him not to use the scream. Zeke admits he understands a brother's love better than anyone, apologizes, and roars anyway. Falco transforms as Colt embraces him and burns; across the district, every dosed soldier becomes a Titan and turns on the Marleyan army.

Zeke aims the mindless Falco at Reiner, prying the Armored Titan off Eren. Pinned between two opponents, Reiner cannot bring himself to kill Falco, and when Magath's cannon punches through the Beast Titan's nape, Reiner briefly considers letting the boy devour him, believing the Founding Titan is now out of reach. Galliard, dying, exits his own Titan; an inherited memory of Marcel has shown him that Reiner's selection as a Warrior was his brother's way of shielding Porco. Declaring himself the better man to the end, he lets Falco eat him, passing on the Jaw.

Eren hardens his Titan around Reiner's trapped fist, slips out through the nape, and sprints toward Zeke, who faked his death by letting the Beast wither. Steps from contact, Gabi fires Colt's anti-Titan rifle and blows Eren's head from his shoulders. Zeke catches it before consciousness fades, and the touch carries both brothers into the Paths.

A flashback to Marley shows Eren apparently embracing Zeke's euthanasia doctrine, condemning their father's slaughter of the Reiss children and agreeing that never being born is the kindest salvation, a performance sealed with a tossed baseball in place of a handshake.

In the Paths, Zeke sits chained by the vow renouncing war and explains the timeless sand where royal blood commands the Founder. The girl who rebuilt his body is Ymir Fritz herself. Eren refuses to order the sterilization of Eldians and admits he manipulated his brother to get here, but Ymir walks past him and kneels before Zeke. Having shed King Fritz's ideology, Zeke has voided the vow; Ymir, a slave without a will, answers royal blood alone, making Eren merely the key that unlocked her. Zeke resolves to cure his little brother the way Tom Xaver once saved him, by using the Founder's power on Eren himself.

The 19th episode of season four and 78th overall, produced by MAPPA with Teruyuki Omine directing and Hiroshi Seko on script. Japanese broadcast fell on January 24, 2022, the US airing on February 27, 2022. It adapts the chapters Two Brothers and A Fleeting Moment from the War for Paradis arc.

The information segment explains the scream mechanic: Eldians who have ingested Zeke's spinal fluid become Pure Titans under his command, their former selves and wills erased. The episode's title plays across three sibling pairs at once: Zeke and Eren, Colt and Falco, and Marcel and Porco.