Attack on Titan Season 3 Part 1 (Limited Edition Blu-ray & DVD) Unboxing

Attack on Titan (進撃の巨人, Shingeki no Kyojin) Season 3 is a 2018-2019 television anime series based on Hajime Isayama’s manga series of the same name. The series was adapted by WIT Studio, and the staff credits include director Masashi Koizuka with chief director Tetsuro Araki, series composition writer Yasuko Kobayashi, character designer Kyoji Asano, and music composed by Hiroyuki Sawano. The season first aired in Japan on July 2018, distributed by Kodansha.

This is the first part of the third season of Attack on Titan, so any images and details mentioned below will be considered as major spoilers for those who have yet to watch or read any of the story aspects covered in Seasons 1 to 3.

Note: This post has been updated in May 2024 to reflect the current blog layout and some minor tweaks to the original write-up.

Background:

“The truth about the Titans begins to come to light. Political secrets, a false king, and the reality that will shake the foundation of the world—all falls on the shoulders of Eren and his friends, as they fight to survive. With Historia set to be the rightful Queen, the Levi Squad must act. But a figure from Levi’s past, the deadly Kenny, could turn this into a losing battle. Are Eren and his friends prepared to face the true monsters that lie within the walls?”

Plot Synopsis via Manga Entertainment, August 2019.

As mentioned before, Attack on Titan is rather popular with both anime fans and those who do not watch anime in general. Over-time due to the lack of new anime content, the hype has toned down but with the recent seasons in the past few years plus a final season scheduled for 2020, the hype is slowly coming back, despite the controversies that the story takes which has divided the fanbase.

Season 3 of Attack on Titan follows on from the events of the second season with a unique adaptation approach. The author wasn’t very happy with how he handled this particular story arc, so he got WIT Studio to revamp it for the anime. By that, the pacing is different and story events are swapped around. This season, in particular mostly Part 1, does not actually focus that much on titans but rather the humans instead. Think of this as the calm before the storm type of arc.

Funimation has the rights to the anime franchise for the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Ireland. They have streamed the series on their service Funimation Now, offered an English dub through Toonami, and also brought it out on Blu-ray. As mentioned with my unboxing for Season 2, the series has had it pretty rough for the UK & Ireland in terms of home video licensing. Season 1 was covered by Manga Entertainment but controversy ensued, then Season 2 was handled by Sony Pictures on behalf of Funimation, and now Season 3 is back with Manga Entertainment now that Funimation has acquired the distributor.

Note: This blog post will contain photos that feature massive spoilers for the events of the third season. Just a heads up!

Limited Edition Contents:

Much like how Sony & Funimation released Season 2, Manga Entertainment were able to release the US limited edition digibook packaged set from Funimation for Attack on Titan Season 3 over to the UK. The main difference here is that the DVD discs are now in NTSC going forward.

This release is presented with a hardcover digibook housing both the Blu-ray & DVD discs, with the 24-page Booklet “Notes from Beyond the Wall: Part IV” contained inside with an Ender Box to house the set. The Notes from Beyond the Wall includes character designs and anime illustrations from the series.

The artwork is free of any information or BBFC content and the info sheet covers the information and specification like previous Manga Entertainment releases. The limited edition Blu-ray was 1000 units printed for an SRP of £64.99. A standard edition Blu-ray is available.

The series was purchased from UK retailer United Publications as they had one of the last copies available.

Physical Contents:

• Rigid Digibook with clean artwork
• Info sheet for specification
• 24-page Notes Beyond the Wall Part IV Booklet

On-Disc Contents:

Distributor: Manga Entertainment
Released: 12th August 2019

The limited edition release for Attack on Titan Season 3 Part 1 contains the first half of the third season (episodes 1-12) across two Blu-ray discs and two DVD discs, with the encode & authoring done by Funimation. The audio options available are Japanese with English subtitles and the Funimation English dub.

The white subtitles were locked during playback and the disc regions were locked to Blu-ray players set to B and locked to DVD players set to 2.

All of the discs feature Marathon Play mode which is basically watching all of the episodes from beginning to end of the disc without any interruptions like opening & closing sequences.

Blu-ray Specs:

Languages	English, Japanese
Audio	English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0
Video	1080p High Definition Native format 16:9 aspect ratio
Region	B
Subtitles	English
Locked Subtitles	Yes
Discs	2 (1 BD-50, 1 BD-25)

DVD Specs:

Languages	English, Japanese
Audio	English Dolby Digital 5.1 Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0
Video	Standard Definition in NTSC format 16:9 aspect ratio
Region	2
Subtitles	English
Locked Subtitles	No
Discs	2

Blu-ray On-Disc Extra Features:

Disc 1:

• English Audio Commentary for Episode 3 (Ep. 40)

Disc 2:

• English Audio Commentary for Episode 10 (Ep. 47)
• Attack on Titan at Anime Expo 2018: Interview with Yuki Kaji
• Attack on Titan at Anime Expo 2018: Interview with Bryce Papenbrook
• Inside The Episode: Interview with Director & Voice of Kenny
• Inside The Episode: Interview with Voice of Flegel and Voice of Erwin
• Inside The Episode: Interview with Voice of Mikasa and Voice of Historia
• Inside The Episode: Interview with Voice of Armin and Voice of Carla
• The Directors Break Down Episode 46
• Chibi Theater: “Go Get ‘Em, New Levi Squad!”
• Eyecatch Gallery
• Promotional Videos
• Textless Opening “Red Swan”
• Textless Closing “Akatsuki no Requiem”

DVD On-Disc Extra Features:

Disc 2:

• Eyecatch Gallery

Unboxing Photos:

Final Notes:

Attack on Titan Season 3 is available to own on Blu-ray & DVD by Manga Entertainment. The UK limited edition was available to own but has now sold out.