Attack on Titan, The Movie: Part 1

The first of two live-action films adapting Hajime Isayama's manga, directed by Shinji Higuchi with a screenplay from Yusuke Watanabe alongside Tomohiro Machiyama and a score by Shirō Sagisu. Isayama supervised the adaptation, which keeps the Titans, the Walls, the three military branches, and the omni-directional gear while inventing freely elsewhere: an all-Japanese cast, visibly more advanced technology including motor vehicles and rocket launchers, a timeline set in the years 858 to 860, and a new strongest soldier, Shikishima, standing in for Levi. Original characters Kubal, Souda, Sannagi, Hiana, Lil, and Fukushi fill out the cast, and the Colossal Titan's identity is not Bertolt in this continuity. The story concludes in Attack on Titan, The Movie: Part 2.

In the town of Monzen, restless Eren, gentle tinkerer Armin, and quiet Mikasa daydream over a buried dud missile painted with an image of the ocean, then sneak toward the Wall itself. The soldier Souda breaks up their arrest and reveals a new Scout branch will soon venture outside, but the conversation is cut off when a Colossal Titan looms over the barrier and kicks it open. Titans flood the town; Armin's father is eaten, and Mikasa vanishes while trying to save a dropped baby as Eren, locked inside a church, watches a Titan bear down on her.

Two years on, Eren and Armin are Scout recruits in a plan to seal the breach by detonating explosives stored in Omotemachi, collapsing the Wall's upper section into the hole. The convoy is a portrait of a starving, conscripted society: Sasha the bottomless eater, sneering Jean, the young mother Hiana, the gentle giant Sannagi, and the lovers Fukushi and Lil. A crying infant Titan lures Hiana and Eren into a trap, its wail summoning a horde that scatters the column while Kubal's Military Police drive off with the vehicles. At Omotemachi the survivors are rescued by Captain Shikishima, humanity's strongest, and his prodigy lieutenant, who turns out to be Mikasa, alive, cold, and scarred by a Titan's bite.

That night Titans overrun the outpost. Hiana is eaten mid-conversation, Fukushi dies protecting the retreat, and a grieving Lil rams a stolen truck loaded with every remaining explosive into the Titans, destroying humanity's means of sealing the Wall. Coached mid-battle by Shikishima, Eren scores his first kill, loses a leg, and is swallowed saving Armin from a Titan's throat. Mikasa, out of gas and cornered by the same Titan, watches it convulse as a new Titan tears itself out from inside and begins methodically destroying every Titan around it. When the creature collapses, Souda orders its nape cut open, and a fully healed Eren spills out screaming while Shikishima observes from a distant rooftop.

The project had a long road to theaters: announced in October 2011 with Tetsuya Nakashima attached, it lost its director to creative differences before Higuchi took over in December 2013. Filming ran from May to August 2014, with locations including Hashima Island off Nagasaki, plus Kumamoto, Ibaraki, and the Toho studio lot. Funimation hosted the world premiere at Los Angeles's Egyptian Theater on July 14, 2015, ahead of the August 1 Japanese opening, then gave it a limited North American theatrical run beginning September 30. Sekai no Owari provided the theme songs Anti-Hero and SOS. Many of the mindless Titans were performed by actors in makeup against green screen, while the Colossal Titan was a constructed, crew-operated effect. Haruma Miura stars as Eren, Kiko Mizuhara as Mikasa, Kanata Hongō as Armin, and Hiroki Hasegawa as Shikishima.