Ackertheory for Chapter 139 (Spoilers, obvs)
Long long theory, but I've done my homework and I'm hoping I'm on to something here!!
If you love the Ackermans I hope you'll keep reading!
To start with, one day I'll be done analysing the Ackerman family and just what they mean to the overall plot (it's still not been revealed really, and it's such a long-running thread that for it to have no larger meaning at this point would be very strange).
I've had other theories before about the Ackermans: their origin; the scope of their abilities, etc, but I've been mulling over just what it all could mean in terms of the ending of the story.
What we know so far (though some facts can still be taken with a pinch of salt given how often characters lie or are misinformed):
The Ackermans were the the loyal protectors of the Fritz family
The Fritz Kings, presumably through the power of the Founding Titan, genetically altered the Ackermans, giving them titan-esque abilities without them becoming Titans or losing their sense of self.
After the founding of the Walls, the Ackermans protested Karl Fritz's plan to wipe the Eldians' memories.
Following what the King saw as a betrayal the Ackermans were shunned and ostracised, losing all social status. Their business affairs were interfered with, some presumably lost their citizenship (Kuchel), and others were driven to the backwaters (Mikasa's father).
The Ackermans were not killed by the Fritzes though, unlike other dissenters (Armins parents and Erwin's father for example) and were instead allowed to live with their knowledge.
Ackermans cannot become mindless titans - proven beyond doubt given chapter 138.
The above are all interesting and important facts, and they drum up some questions.
Why would the all-powerful King purposefully create a group of individuals to keep he and his family safe, but let them not be influenced by the Founding Titan?
Why were they not wiped out like similar dissenters? Karl Fritz could easily have executed all of them or fed them to Titans before doing the memory wipe and they'd have been erased from history.
Why was Uri so sorry for the treatment inflicted upon the Ackermans to the point of giving Kenny not only amnesty for his crimes, but also a plum job within the interior police, and by extension giving him back the role the Ackermans were created for, ie, protecting the monarch/founding titan.
Why, as well as making them immune to the Founding Titan would the King also make them immune from becoming Titans altogether?
The Founding Titan can do such momentous tasks as reworking Eldian DNA en-masse to create an immune response to a plague, and can also selectively edit memories of hundreds of thousands of individuals simultaneously (Eldians outside of the Walls retained their memories, those within the walls didn't so the Founding Titan screened them), so how come Ackermans were altered *specifically* to be so resistant?
The Fritzes were control-freaks, and their treatment of the Ackermans is honestly quite bizarre when you think about everything else they're guilty of.
The Fritzes have been deliberate in all their actions. All the secrecy and protecting the Founding Titan to give Eldia a hundred years of peace came about due to meticulous planning:
They had to converts hundreds of thousands of Eldians into Wall Titans - I'd reckon these were probably either the lowest ranking Eldian citizens, the ones most devoted to the King who offered themselves up or the zealots (the Jaegerists of their day)
They then had to strip out a lot of technology to ensure no communication with the outside world and to ensure the technology of other nations advanced far past Eldia's rather quickly (we know that technology went backwards because Ymir and Reiner found a can of herring well within the boundaries of the walls - it was probably one of a handful of artefacts of the past to survive a purge given the remoteness of where it was stored)
They had to remove any books or materials with knowledge of the outside world, both to remove knowledge of other peoples but also proof of other written languages.
They had to write fake textbooks to indoctrinate Eldians into their new narrative.
They had to have everything in place and ready for the memory purge or people would have been asking questions from the outset.
They also had to go out of their way to keep their few foreign allies within the walls on-side (giving the "nobles" titles - it's obvious these were other non-Eldians like the Azumabitos)
They also presumably had a hand in establishing the Wall Religion - a fanatical movement who at least in part know the truth, but are so loyal to the King they refuse to talk and exist solely to stop people asking questions about the walls or, more crucially, damaging them in any way. Perhaps the route of this religious devotion is a deep, godly reverence for the individuals who offered themselves up to become Wall Titans?
This planning worked for a hundred years, give or take. In that time the only slip-ups we see are Armin's grandfather's book, that single can of herring...and Grandpa Ackerman being left alive long enough to tell Kenny the truth. The first two are definitely oversights. The Ackermans being allowed to live while knowing the truth? Most definitely not an oversight.
Then - and this is linked - there's the Rumbling itself and what we know:
The Rumbling is a deterrant - more or less Eldia's equivalent of a nuclear arsenal.
The control of The Rumbling rests solely on the will of the Founding Titan.
The Rumbling was never meant to be enacted.
For a family that did so much planning, this seems awfully haphazard. Why?
We're told that each successor Founding Titan is bound by Karl Fritz' will. Why is that? Couldn't another Founding Titan have a stronger will than Fritz's and eventually overcome this?
We know from the Jaw and Colossal titans that Shifters typically inherit only the memories of the most recent Shifter before them. Porco only retains Ymir's memories and Armin only Bertolt's.
The only Titan we know that is different so far is the Attack Titan because it can access paths across time which is why Eren can see Attack Titan holder Kruger's memories but *not* Founding Titan Frieda's as he can only see the Founding Titan's memories back as far as Grisha.
It's wholly conceivable that Frieda only received Uri's will, which would have been informed by his own predecessor's will, rathe than Karl Fritz's directly, meaning that his will could have been diluted through the years.
So there has to be more to it, and I think it comes down to this:
The Ackerman Family were the Fritz Family's true insurance policy.
This is applicable on many levels:
Before the great Titan War, the nine families who possessed the Titans fought among themselves for control and waged war like feudal lords, turning their subjects into Titans to be used as weapons. They also used this methodology to subjugate other nations. This continued until the Tyburs chose to ally with non-Eldians - Marley. (This also basically means out of the nine families it was the Tyburs that won by proxy and used Marleyans - who can't become Titans - to secure that victory).
Fighting using Titans is all well and good, but it's not enough to win, which is why the Tyburs chose non-Eldians allies. They did this because they did not possess a Titan that could rewrite DNA, like the Founding Titan can.
Up until this the Fritzes had the upper hand because they employed human soldiers alongside their Titans - the Ackermans. Ackermans that if caught could only be interrogated or killed, and they were programmed to be loyal so they wouldn't talk. While other Eldian soldiers could technically be caught, turned into an intelligent titan then fed to a mindless titan in order to unlock all their knowledge, Ackermans couldn't.
There was also the gas and the serums. The warring families or indeed the Marleyans could use these to their advantage and just turn these families' subjects into Titans to create carnage.
But the Fritzes with their Ackermans were protected as Ackermans couldn't transform - they would cut down any titans that got near the Fritzes.
So that's why they were initially created.
When the Walls go up however, things become trickier.
The Fritzes always knew there was the potential for the Founding Titan's will to become corrupted or overwritten, therefor making it possible for a fanatic to someday enact the Rumbling.
As a result the Fritzes needed a loyal group who would *not* be bound by the Founding Titan's will in order to stop the Rumbling should it ever occur. I reckon that having already been made immune to turning into Titans, the Ackermans were then set free from the Founder's control and perhaps granted some as-yet unknown power to stop the Rumbling, so long as they remained loyal.
However, the loyalty never lasted. Once the Ackermans discovered the plan to wipe everyones' minds, they couldn't go along with it for whatever reason and when they spoke out, the Fritzes decided that the Ackermans had broken that bond of trust.
But, because the Ackermans were the insurance policy for the Rumbling they couldn't be killed. It would take too long for the Fritzes to engineer another group to take their place.
So instead of being killed, they were made persona non-grata, and the Fritzes banked on the Ackermans' basic humanity being strong enough to make them want to stop the Rumbling should it ever be triggered.
As the decades went by, things changed within the walls. The Fritz family became the Reiss family, and with the Founding Titan aware that the end of Eldia was growing ever closer, the Ackermans were replaced by Military Police rather than another engineered bloodline as there simply wasn't time.
The MPs as we know however, did not do a good job.
Which is why, decades later, when face to face with an Ackerman, Uri gives Kenny amnesty.
It means there's one Ackerman back on-side. One Ackerman to stay close to the Founding Titan. Uri immediately gives him a high ranking role in the police. He seems to realise the Ackerman family's importance, but not the finer details of that - perhaps lost to time as Karl Fritz's will has been eroded.
More time passes, and the existence of the Scouts themselves contradicts the Founding Titan's will - if children can be labelled heretics, and school teachers murdered for the mere suggestion of encouraging questions about the outside world, then why would the Reiss family tolerate the Scouts being set up? They fly in the face of everything else we know about the Walls.
The Scouts are also fairly new - Levi joined shortly before the fall of Wall Maria and his first expedition was the 26th. They're up to the 57th expedition by the time of the Battle of Trost. So I'd reckon that the Scouts were probably only set up in the years immediately preceding Grisha's arrival - indeed he seems shocked to hear of the Scouts - it's obvious Marley never knew they existed and Marley would almost certainly have still been keeping an eye on the Walls.
By the end of season 3, the cracks in the Rumbling plan are starting to show...
The Royal bloodline is still in charge, but it's Historia, completely ignorant to the past who is on the throne
Wall Sina has been damaged - the people now know the walls are made of Titans and the Wall religion that previously stopped any damage occurring is defunct
The Scouts have increasing amounts of power and influence
The truth of the outside world is known, only because a Scout - Keith - went against orders and let Grisha into Shiganshina (If Keith had followed orders he would have left Grisha outside to perish or would have handed him over to the police who would have executed him)
The Ackermans were so badly ostracised that with Kenny's death only 2 of them are left, and one didn't even know he was an Ackerman until his 30s.
The Fritz's own disloyal family members who stayed in Marley to face the music have continued to produce heirs ie. Zeke
The Founder is now in the hands of a xenophobic zealot ie. Eren
This turns the walls essentially into a grenade without a pin. It's a powderkeg.
The only one who might still know the full story is Ymir Fritz.
Perhaps the Ackerman power will finally come into play in this final chapter, with the knowledge being imparted by Ymir herself?
And perhaps there will be a truly tragic ending as Isayama has hinted at many times - maybe the Ackermans had the power to stop the Titans all along, and just didn't know it.