Sasha's Attack on Titan Death Gave Her A Bigger Final Season Role

Dying early in Attack on Titan's final season makes Sasha more important than if she'd survived until the very end. In a franchise where smiles are seldom cracked, Sasha Braus was a breath of fresh air in Attack on Titan. Initially catching the audience's attention as "potato girl," Sasha ultimately became Attack on Titan's chief source of optimism - a fun, selfless, innocent soul who refused to be jaded by the tragedy of her world. Sadly, Sasha's happy-go-lucky persona made her the perfect emotional fodder for Hajime Isayama to kill off.

When Attack on Titan's final season begins, Eren Jaeger is embarking on a solo invasion of Marley that his Survey Corps allies are reluctantly forced to follow. Sasha is among those who arrive in Liberio to support Eren, but as Eldian's forces are retreating, Gabi - a brash young Marleyan Warrior candidate - steals aboard and shoots a bullet straight through Sasha's stomach, killing her. The death of such a bright personality hit Attack on Titan's audience hard (as was Isayama's intention), and as the anime's final battle looms, Sasha remains the only main protagonist absent from the last-ditch fight against Eren's Founding Titan. Sorely missed though she may be, death has actually enhanced Sasha's influence upon Attack on Titan's ending.

Sasha's posthumous impact begins with her killer, Gabi. After Marley's young firebrand jumped aboard that blimp and started blasting, she strolled away delighted to have killed at least one "Eldian devil" before getting herself captured. In a twist of fate, Gabi later grows close to Sasha's family, who treat her with kindness... even after learning she killed their precious daughter. The Braus family believe Sasha wouldn't want her murderer punished or persecuted, and this forces Gabi to shift perspectives. Her changing attitude toward Eldians then lays the foundations for an alliance between Survey Corps and Marleyan Warriors in Attack on Titan's final season, so every time we see these former enemies working together, Sasha's inspiration is at work.

Though she can't physically be there fighting alongside her friends, Sasha's spirit hangs heavy over Attack on Titan's port battle (between the aforementioned alliance and Floch's Jaegerists) too. On a mission to halt the Rumbling, the Survey Corps fighters have little choice but to kill their former friends now supporting Eren, and in Attack on Titan episode 85, Connie cries uncontrollably as he guns down a Jaegerist. Though killing ex-comrades is traumatic enough, Connie's intense reaction is partially due to Sasha. In an easily missed detail, the character Connie shoots is Samuel, who Sasha saved back in Attack on Titan season 1. Connie and Sasha shared a sibling-like relationship, and he was affected most deeply by her death, so executing a soldier Sasha once rescued probably felt like a betrayal. Had Sasha still been alive in Attack on Titan's final season, she might've pulled the trigger herself, but Samuel's connection to his dead best friend makes Connie's task infinitely harder.

Sasha's Attack on Titan death also casts Eren Jaeger's crusade in a somewhat hypocritical light. Eren's ultimate goal is protecting his friends at all costs - even if that means triggering an extinction-level event via the Rumbling. Sasha, however, died directly because of Eren's scheme, which works in favor of the Eldia-Marley alliance by making the Rumbling harder to justify.

If Sasha were still alive in Attack on Titan's final season, she'd likely be zipping around slicing up Jaegerists and offering potatoes of peace to her new allies... but she'd be unlikely to leave any stamp upon Isayama's biggest narratives. In death, Sasha's ethereal presence drives the Survey Corps and Marleyan soldiers together, accentuates the tragedy of fighting Eren's Jaegerists, and exposes the flaws in the Rumbling plan to protect Paradis Island. Losing Sasha might've stung audiences right in the heart, but her legacy has underpinned Attack on Titan's final season in a way that couldn't happen otherwise.

More: Why Attack on Titan's Armin Rarely Transforms Into The Colossal Titan