Attack On Titan Season 4 Just Welcomed Two Important Cameos

01/24/2022 11:37 am EST

Attack on Titan Season 4 just brought fans two important character cameos. Episode 78 of the Attack on Titan anime saw a decisive turn in the battle between Paradis Island and Marley – and the deeper battle between the Titans, as Eren Jaeger and Zeke tried to finally unite and unleash the power of the Founding Titan! (Warning: Attack OnTitan Episode 78 SPOILERS Follow!) The bloody desperation of battle ended as Eren was fatally shot (and beheaded) by Gabi, mere seconds before making contact with Zeke. 

As Eren teetered the line between life and death, he had a flash of memories from his own life and that of his Titan predecessors. A montage of those memories swirling in the aether contained none other than fan-favorites "Nerd Armin" and "Goth Mikasa" (aka "Gothkasa")! 

If you don't know the reference: Attack on Titan creator Hajime Isayama loves putting faux "previews" at the end of his manga chapters; one of the most popular ones is 'Attack on School', which re-imagines the series as a high school drama. In that non-canon version of AoT, Armin is nerdy and wears glasses while Mikasa is a Goth girl. The actual canon manga storyline has also referenced that high school imagining as well, making it somewhat official. 

Clearly, the team at MAPPA took the time to animate these brief appearances by Nerdy Armin and Goth Mikasa as a fun Easter egg nod to the fans and the manga. However, that hasn't stopped Attack on Titan fans from going berserk over the Easter egg reference – with some fans going as far as insisting that this visual in the anime now "confirms" that Nerd Armin and Gothkasa are canon – and by extension, the entire high school backstory. That's highly debatable logic – but you can be sure that Attack on Titan will be debating it! 

In addition to the 'Attack on High School' reference, Episode 78 of Attack On Titan's manga also gave manga fans a steamy reference (literally) to an infamous manga image of the male characters of the series (particularly Levi and Riener) sitting in a sauna. It was an all-around deep-dive treasure of riches for longtime fans of both the manga and anime series. 

Fans need to probably go back and pay careful attention to the entire sequence of Eren's "memories" at his moment of "death": there are all kinds of images in that sequence that are probably there for some key reasons – beyond the Nerd/Goth references, of course. 

Attack on Titan streams new episodes on Funimation and Hulu on Sundays. 

Disclosure: ComicBook is owned by CBS Interactive, a division of Paramount. Sign up for Paramount+ by clicking here.