Top 10 Plot Twists In Attack on Titan, Ranked

Pavas Gagneja
Jun 20
5 min read

If you’ve watched Attack on Titan, you know it’s not like other anime. It constantly plays with your mind, keeps you guessing, and then drops bombshells that leave you speechless. Firstly, we thought it was just about humans fighting Titans. But the story goes far beyond that in every sense.

We're all used to tragic backstories and emotional moments. But Attack on Titan took things to a whole new level. The twists are so unexpected that you end up questioning everything you thought you knew. So, here’s the list of the top 10 plot twists in Attack on Titan: the ones that shocked us the most and totally flipped the story upside down.

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10/10 Historia Is Of Royal Blood

Historia hesitates to inject the Titan Serum

Krista Lenz, the sweet and shy girl, turned out to be Historia Reiss, the rightful heir to the throne. This twist gave her a lot more importance and changed her entire role in the story.

Since her big revelation, she did not remained a side character anymore.

Her bloodline was key to unlocking the power of the Founding Titan, which made her life both precious and dangerous. It also brought more attention to the dark politics behind the royal family.

9/10 The Rumbling Actually Happens

When the story first explained what the Rumbling was, we thought it was just a scary theory, like a last resort kind of thing. But no — Eren actually does it. He activates millions of Colossal Titans and sets them loose on the world.

Watching those Titans walk across the planet, crushing everything in their path, was terrifying. Eren had fallen far, and there was little hope left for anyone who wasn’t on Paradis Island.

8/10 Annie Is The Female Titan

Annie was always kind of mysterious, but no one expected her to be the Female Titan. Her reveal was so cold and brutal, especially the way she started fighting back once she was exposed. She didn’t hesitate at all.

It made the betrayal feel real, especially as they were never expected to be the enemy. She was a classmate, a friend, and a person everyone trusted. And it showed that the fight wasn’t just outside the walls; it was within the walls too.

7/10 Eren Let His Mother Die

Remember the Smiling Titan that ate Eren’s mom in episode one? It turns out Eren could’ve saved her. But he chose not to. He used the Founding Titan’s power in the past to let that Titan go after his mom instead of Berthholdt, so he could set everything else in motion.

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Knowing that he could’ve saved her and didn’t puts Eren’s character in the gray forever. He sacrificed his own mother for the sake of his bigger plan. It shows how far he was willing to go to break the cycle of hatred.

6/10 The World Outside The Walls Is Still Alive

For so long, everyone thought humanity was trapped inside the walls, and Titans ruled the rest of the world. But when Eren and the others reached the ocean and learned the truth, that the rest of the world is alive and even more advanced, it was a total shock.

This twist expanded the story in a big way. Now, it wasn’t just Titans they had to deal with — it was an entire world that hated them. Turns out, the Paradis Island, the only hope of the Eldians, is the biggest enemy of the entire world outside the walls.

5/10 Eren Influenced His Father To Kill The Reiss Family

This twist messed with our brains seriously. Eren didn’t just inherit the Attack Titan and Founding Titan from his dad; he made his dad do it in the first place. Using the Attack Titan’s future-sight power, Eren went back in time and convinced Grisha to kill the royal family and steal the Founding Titan.

This plot twist in Attack on Titan changed everything we knew about Eren. Many fans quit seeing him as a victim of fate. The idea that he had control all along, pulling the strings from the shadows, added so much more to the story and his character.

4/10 Eren Has Been Seeing The Future All Along

This whole time, we thought Eren was reacting to the world around him. But in reality, he already knew how things would turn out. Thanks to the Attack Titan's power, Eren could see future memories, which means many of his actions were based on stuff he had already seen.

Eren was not just going with the flow or reacting to stuff around him — he knew what was coming and made choices because of it. Every big move he made, like leaving Marley or talking to Historia, suddenly felt planned out. If we think about it carefully, he was steps ahead the whole time.

3/10 Titans Are Actually Humans

At first, everyone thought Titans were just mindless monsters. But when it was revealed that Titans are actually transformed humans, the entire show changed. It made every fight more painful because the soldiers weren’t just killing monsters; they were killing actual people.

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It also made the story much deeper. Now we had to ask why people were turning into Titans, who was doing it, and how it could be stopped. It was about survival before, but it became about understanding and ending a cruel cycle.

2/10 Reiner And Bertholdt Are Titans

Reiner and Bertholdt tranform into Titans

This reveal was so random and casual, making it even more jaw-dropping. It was like, they’re just standing on the wall, and Reiner’s like, “Hey Eren, I’m the Armored Titan.” We were all just so shocked that we had to hear it once more.

What's more shocking was the realization that two of Eren’s close friends were actually the ones who destroyed the wall and killed thousands of innocent people. They had been hiding in plain sight, and their guilt was eating them up inside. However, they were determined and showed us the true meaning of betrayal.

1/10 Eren Is The Villain In The Final Arc

This one broke the fandom. Eren started out as the guy who just wanted to kill all Titans and protect his friends. He was the classic Shonen hero; full of rage but also full of heart. But by the final season, he’s the one destroying the world. Literally.

The fact that Eren willingly kills 80% of humanity is just wild. It’s not like he went crazy either; he knew what he was doing. He believed that was the only way to give his friends freedom. It’s one of the boldest twists to ever exist in anime, turning the main character into the main villain.