Attack on Titan Studio Releases Key Art of Yelena’s Meme-able ‘Staring Face’

The latest Attack on Titan art shines a spotlight on the character of Yelena and the infamous, terrifying expression she flashes at Armin.

Two new pieces of art were released by MAPPA, the animation studio behind the final season of the anime. The first image is a recreation of one of the most meme-able panels from Hajime Isayama's original manga, when Yelena suddenly appears overs Armin's shoulder with an intimidating look on her face. The second piece of art comes from episode 77's director, Dae-Yeol Park, and shows the anti-Marleyean rebel with a substantially more flattering and friendly expression.

The Yelena portraits are the second batch of art to be released by MAPPA since Attack on Titan began its final run of episodes. The studio has promised to release new illustrations and key frames from the anime series every week until the show reaches its end. The first batch of art from The Final Season - Part 2 highlighted the Eldians and several of the series' main characters, including Eren Yeager and Reiner Braun.

The second half of Attack on Titan's final season premiered on Jan. 9 and proved that, despite a mixed response to the manga's finale, the series is as popular as it ever was. Demand for the new episode was so high that it overwhelmed Crunchyroll's servers, temporarily taking the popular anime streamer offline for part of the day. A clip of the series' new opening title sequence, which is set to the song "The Rumbling" by Japanese rock band SiM, was released to YouTube and pulled in over 10 million views in under three days.

Attack on Titan was created by Hajime Isayama in 2009. Isayama's original work has sold over 100 million copies worldwide, making it one of the most successful manga series of all time. The anime adaptation debuted in 2014, and was originally produced by Wit Studio, the animation company behind the upcoming Spy X Family anime and one of the most critically acclaimed series of 2021, Ranking of Kings. Wit Studio animated the first three seasons of the series but was unexpectedly replaced in the fourth and final season by MAPPA, the studio behind the Jujutsu Kaisen anime and the upcoming Chainsaw Man series. While MAPPA's run on the series initially received some criticism for supposedly not looking as good as Wit Studio's work, the shift has clearly not affected the show's popularity.

The series' last batch of episodes are being released through Crunchyroll, Funimation and Hulu, with new episodes going up every Sunday.

Source: Twitter (1, 2)