Hange ZoΓ« - understanding and inquisitiveness
I want to dedicate this post to an Hange character analysis and I think that the one above is one the first yet one the most representative moments in which we get to know Hange.
This is set in chapter 25, and it shows us an Erenβs memory of the month that he has spent with Levi squad, prior to the mission in which they encounter the Female Titan.
During this period, Hange, assisted by Levi, sets out to start experimenting on Eren and his titan transformations. As opposed to the othersβ concern and reluctance to experiment, we see her firmly stating the importance of doing it. βIf thereβs something we donβt know, we should find out. Itβs absolutely worth putting our lives on the line.β I think that it is one of the greatest quotes from SNK and one of the most representative of the spirit of the Survey Corps.
Up to this moment, we have seen a lot of soldiers willing to give their lives and dedicate their hearts in order to reconquer humanityβs freedom. In order to do that, they are ready to kill the bulk of titans, risking their lives out of the walls. However, none of them has appeared to be interested in understanding who and what actually the enemy is. They just continue to slicing titans napes.
And then thereβs Hange. Contrary to the other members of the Survey Corps, her focus is not restricted to kill the titans. She tries to look at things from a different point of view. She tries to really understand the nature of the enemy, and the truth about their world, she doesnβt think that just slicing titans napes is enough. She tries to understand what they are actually facing, because she understands that this way is their best chance to succeed and to win the battle against the titans. When no one else does, she put all of her efforts to gain the necessary knowledge, even if at first sight these efforts donβt seem to bring an immediate result, even if the other SC soldiers donβt support her and donβt understand the importance of this (except of course for Erwin, Moblit and Levi).
I think that just this is so admirable. She is the one who really tries to augment their knowledge, even just a little bit, in order to improve their situation.
Hangeβs ability to analyze things and her scientific way of thinking
Hange is able to look into what stands in front of her, and she analyzes it like no one else can.
She notices that, considering their size, titans couldnβt stand and move like they do. She points out how Eren titanβs body came up from nothing, and she formulates hypothesis about that. She conducts various experiments on the titans they manage to capture, even dangerous ones, even others when she actually tortures them, but still (!) empathizes with them, as shown by her suffering expression in inflicting them so much pain.Β
However, she does all of it, because all of the knowledge they can gain from those methodically conducted experiments could bring them a little bit closer toward the discovery of the truth about the titans, and, extensively, the truth about this world. She has really a scientific way a thinking: she gathers facts and data, she makes hypothesis and tries to elaborate theories that can scientifically, rationally explain those data, and then she always elaborates new experiments, always furthering their understanding of things, always gathering new data. All of the little observations that she has made, all the theories and possible explanations with which she came out, then, lead her to wonder about the nature of their reality. She has questioned the nature of their phenomenal understanding of the world, she hypothesizes that the true nature of things could be something ontologically different from what they experience and think to know about the world.
As the story continues, they discover a lot of things. The walls are made up of giant titans with their endured skin. Hange, together with Armin, is the one who actually hypothesizes it, and also comes to verify it, picking up a shard of the hardened skin of the Female Titan, having noticed that it is not evaporating, and a fragment of the walls, and analyzing them in order to compare them with a microscope, up to discover that they have the same physical structure.
Then, they discover the true nature of titans, their human nature, and again Hange is the one who realizes that: putting together what they know about the situation and Ragako village, she comes up with that and makes the harsh, astonishing conclusion. However, I think that this has come not totally as a novelty for Hanji. What makes me think this is, first of all, her approach to titans during her experiments. She gives them a name, and she talks with them (not only for experimental purposes). She cries and screams when she conducts pain experiments on them. It is like Hange, without even realizing it (or maybe being fully aware of what she was doing?) has always treated them as they were conscious creatures. And of course she knows that at least one titan has shown sign of intelligence, namely speaking intelligible words and showing sign of remorse for having killed a human, as we see in the Ilseβs Notebook OVA. And then the quote about the difference between what we see and what actually exists. It is possible that Hange may have sensed that titans are not the mindless creatures came up from nothing that they seem, that they could be something really different.
I was also astonished by her sharpness when she suggests what is actually inside titans napes, how she is immediately able to link the human origin of titans with their weak point and explain that so well.
There are many other times in which her insights, or better hypothesis, have informed the SC how to resolve seemingly obscure situations, as for example when she suggested to Erwin and the rest of the SC that Reiner and Bertholdt, escaped with Eren and Ymir, had probably reached the nearest Titan forest in order to rest, or when she hypothesized that, given the strange and suspicious story of the Reiss chapel, kidnapped Eren and Historia might have been conducted there, so Levi gives the order of heading to the chapel, trusting Hangeβs judgement.
Also, she is the one who, having rediscovered the technology which has been hidden till then by the the First Interior Squad, devised new weapons that significantly improve the survival chance and power of attack of the SC, namely the βExecutioner from Hellβ and the βThunder Spearβ, suggesting that she has also notable engineering creativity.
Hence, there are a lot of things and victories of the Survey Corps that wouldnβt have been possible without the bright contribute of Hangeβs intellect and intuitions. Her ability to analyze and make deductions from the data they have, applied to battle and titan issues have lead them to resolve complex situations many times. She is indeed the character with the highest score in intelligence in the SNK universe (together with Zeke), with a 11/10 (source Attack on Titan guidebook):
Her infinite curiosity and love of knowledge
For the sake of humanity, in order to reconquer the freedom that they have lost, she has always devoted herself to apply her bright mind to the SC cause. However, what I really love about her is her genuine curiosity and inquisitiveness in understanding what she sees and in discover new things about the world that she shows in every moment of her life, above what is needed in terms of battle strategies and titan issues. She is so curious and amazed by every discovery that she could make.
Sheβs in love with the process of discovering new things.
In the Smartpass interview, she said that, if humanity will be finally liberated from titans, she would like to research vegetation outside the walls, or study about humanityβs past.
In the SNK Short story The Library Thatβs Covered In Dust, while the other soldiers are resting, we see her merrily searching through the books of the library of the old castle where the SC soldiers are taking shelter from the rain, and then starting wondering, expressing her thoughts to Levi, about those ancient manuscripts written in letters they canβt read, and how they suggest the existence of an extinct civilization. It amuses me that, while the other soldiers are just taking rest during the mission, Hange instead is all caught up in searching books and making speculations about what they may contain and extinct civilizations.
Another precious moment is when they finally arrive at the sea. I just love how, at the very first encounter with the ocean, Hangeβs just being Hange: she notices sea cucumbers in the water and, despite the concerned Leviβs warning, she grabs them, because she just canβt help herself xD:
Then, about one year later, for the first time the SC encounters Marleyans, and also gets to know Yelena and Onyankopon. Hence Onyankopon, in order to prepare them to build a port for the arrive of other Marleyans, and improve Paradis technology, which has remained backward due to their isolation from the rest of the world, starts to explain what a port and all of the other things are, and this is Hangeβs reaction:
She immediately realizes what a port is and how they can use it, even before Onyankopon has time to say it.
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She is just so amazed for all the new things that they are learning. Despite the burden of being the new commander and all the responsibilities that come with that, she still manages to get excited and her enthusiasm is so precious. Of course, she knows how important it is for them, the Paradis people, to know the outside world, if they want to start a communication with it and be prepared for any outcome it may have (and we know how things went...).
She truly acknowledges the importance of understanding things, and how it is not possible to live in this world if one doesnβt try to comprehend it, a way of thinking that the Survey Corps has always embodied, but also if people donβt allow others to know and understand who they are:
I think that Hangeβs way of thinking truly represent, in her special way, what the spirit of the Survey Corps has always been about: to research, explore the outside world and gain knowledge, try to understand things (and let others understand you). This is what, eventually, will make you free in this world.
(This post wasnβt meant to be a comprehensive analysis, I had rather focused on Hangeβs intellect and on her curious, bright, rational, scientific yet full of empathy and intuition approach to the world. I think that this is one of her most distinctive traits, and one of the reasons why I love her so much).
Happy Hange greeting a car (sheβs such a cutie ^^)
