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| “ | Yes... Normal people accomplish nothing... Special people do exist. This just means I was never one of them. | „ |
| ~ Keith Shadis |
Commandant Keith Shadis is a supporting character in the manga series Attack on Titan and its anime television series adaption. He is the chief instructor of the Military Training Corps and the former 12th Commander of the Survey Corps, being the direct predecessor of Erwin Smith and the only commander in the corps history to quit before death. After failing many expeditions, without achieving any progress and at the cost of many lives, Shadis lost faith in himself and resigned his position as a Survey Corps member, deciding that his second-in-command Erwin would be a better commander.
As the head instructor of the Training Corps, Keith is in charge of the Cadets' training and evaluation to become soldiers of the Three Branches. During the year 847, he becomes the personal direct Commandant of the 104th Training Corps, the southern division in Wall Rose, and drilled them with an iron fist. He initially appears to be irked by Eren Yeager and tries to sabotage his training 3DM gear in an effort to discourage him and being able to kick him out of the Training Corps. But after seeing Eren's resolve, Keith changes his mind and concludes that he cannot stop the boy's desire to join the Survey Corps's expeditions outside the Walls, so he reveals the damage on Eren's gear, without admitting it was him who did it, and allows him to continue his training.
Keith serves as the Chief Instructor of the Trainees for 9 years, from sometime after the Fall of Wall Maria in 845 to one month after the Raid on Liberio in 854, his life changing twice during two respective invasions on Paradis Island and Marley. Following the uprising of the Yeagerists, Shadis and all the leaders of original Eldian military are ousted and deemed "old relics of the past" whose ways are archaic and have no place in the world's modern age of militarism and human warfare. Cast aside, Shadis convinces his former Trainees to join the Yeagerists for their safety, while he lays low and realizes he has no longer a place in the new world. He finally decides to help an allied group of Eldians and Marleyans who are trying to stop the Rumbling and ends up sacrificing himself to prevent the Yeagerists' victory.
He is voiced by Tsuguo Mogami in the Japanese version and by Patrick Seitz in the English version.
Overview[]
Keith Shadis is a very tall, powerfully built and intimidating man with an intense stare. Years before the beginning of the story, he used to have a healthier and much more youthful appearance, without wrinkles, clean shaven and with neatly combed hair. Some years after becoming the Commander of the Survey Corps, Keith's hair became more unkempt and start to recede and he keeps thin facial hair. By the time he is seen again in 847, he is completely bald, with wrinkles, a beard, and dark bags under his eyes. He is tough, direct and rather foul-mouthed. He is not happy with himself and never forgave himself for having failed the Survey Corps and having killed many of his own subordinates.
As an instructor of the Training Corps, Keith deliberately presents himself as imposing, strict and frightening; and because of this most of the trainees from the 104th Squad avoid misbehaving in his presence. Typical of a drill sergeant, he often shouts and issues commands at the top of his voice, putting the trainees into submission and fear. He is observant and can distinguish character traits of others based on their expressions, mannerisms, actions, and abilities. He trained and ranked all the known young Trainees in the story, with the exception of Marlo Freudenberg, Hitch Dreyse and Boris Feulner, who trained in other divisions in the north, west or east. Keith oversaw the training of many known characters, including Mikasa Ackerman, Reiner Braun, Bertholdt Hoover, Annie Leonhart, Eren Yeager, Jean Kirstein, Connie Springer, Marco Bott, Sasha Braus, Christa Lenz, Ymir, Armin Arlert, Thomas Wagner, Daz, Mina Carolina, Floch Forster, Samuel Linke-Jackson, Franz Kefka and Hannah Diamant.
Ever since he was young, Keith was dissatisfied with having to live trapped within the human society within the Walls and claimed that the place was too cramped for him. Seeking freedom from such world, Keith was always fascinated with the world beyond the Walls and the possibilities it may have offered. Like any other person who felt the same way he did, Keith was seen as abnormal and self-destructive by the majority of the people living within the Walls, and he felt frustrated at the average mindset and lack of imagination of human beings. As such, Keith developed a self-righteous personality and saw himself as "different" from the majority of humans, and looked down at most people who are labelled as "normal" by society, and criticized their lack of faith and support for the Survey Corps. Keith judged average people to have tiny brains and not being able to look into things and think deeply, and hated how most humans are content with living simple uneventful lives, not wanting to bring change to the world. Keith saw himself and everyone else who did not share the average standards of society as smarter, while all other people would never understand greatness, let alone accomplish it.
Keith's dream to see the outside world led him to join the military, and once he graduated he joined the Survey Corps to be able to get out of the Walls in the expeditions in Titan territory. As a soldier, a fighter and military leader, Keith performed so well that he eventually became the second in command to the 11th Commander of the Survey Corps. He was frustrated with the royal government's constant threats to disband the Survey Corps and with the Corps's lack of progress, believing he would accomplish a lot if he was named the new commander. His feeling of superiority was only strengthened after he met Grisha Yeager in 832, who high praised Keith and the Survey Corps as the "wisest people inside the Walls" and "chosen ones". Keith began considering himself a special "chosen" human being, and because of this began to look down on others even more, always considering himself the smartest person in any given situation.
Keith seemed to have strong feelings for a barmaid named Carla and he frequently visited her. Due to his feelings for her, Keith ignored the fact she completely lacked any interest for the outside world, shared the same mentality as most people within the Walls and saw the Survey Corps as nothing but a useless, stupid and reckless organization bound to fail forever. As Grisha presented himself as a doctor, Keith introduced him to a hospital, where he ended up working in. Grisha would become known as a great doctor with a superior talent for medicine (in reality perfectly normal and basic medicine in Marley and the rest of the world, who are far more advanced), and even nobles were cured by him, although Grisha never rose to better status nor gained more money for his service. When a plague hit Shiganshina District, Keith personally brought the sickly Carla to the hospital, begging Grisha to heal her. He was shocked and hurt when he saw that Grisha and Carla were starting to fall in love and harbored feelings of sadness and envy towards Grisha. In later years after his repeated failures as a commander, Keith would develop feelings of resentment toward Grisha for making him think he was special.
Shortly after being named the 12th Commander of the Survey Corps, Keith attended at Grisha and Carla's wedding with a saddened and quiet behavior and silently left the venue earlier during the ceremony. Ever since he rarely saw Carla, presumably wanting to forget her, but also due to choosing only to focus on his scouting missions, since he no longer had private life's concerns anymore. Some years later, Keith found Carla personally waiting for him in front of Shiganshina District's outer gate, when he returned with his Scout troops from another failed mission outside. As she did not seem him for a long time, only assuming he was too absorbed by his mission, Carla wanted to speak to Keith, bring him Grisha's regards, and introduce him her baby Eren Yeager. When she saw Keith's more aged and stressed physical appearance, while knowing how all previous Survey Corps commanders and most of its members always ended up dying horribly, she was concerned for Keith and wished he would just settle down for a more joyful life. Carla expressed her worry about Keith's stressful and dangerous life in the Corps and suggested he should resign, resulting with Keith furiously ranting about ambition and rudely accusing her of being a worthless individual who ingratiated every man she saw by pouring them drinks, and that she was too ordinary to ever understand what great deeds were. While surprised, Carla was not offended and kindly told him she believed there was nothing wrong in not being special. Unlike him, she was more content with the simple aspects of life and did not believe that is necessary to be acknowledged by others. Keith would later regret his words to her.
When he was made commander, Shadis had made the Squad Leader Erwin Smith his second in command and main strategist. However he rejected any new plans from his soldiers as he felt his own ideas were adequate. Keith would often ignore Erwin's propositions for new strategies and formations and ways to focus on avoiding Titans, rather than always face them in battle. Keith was against Erwin's ideas and new expedition methods when they were against the more traditional ones Keith was used to. This because Keith had always a fragile ego and a fear of being useless, inferior and less important than others, and was too stubborn and close minded to change. When Erwin showed him his newly created long-distance enemy scouting formation, Keith rejected it and insisted that the expeditions would continue with the old ways, despite its repeated massive losses. For years Keith achieved nothing from his leadership; all the bases built by the Corps outside the Walls were destroyed by the Titans and humanity remained completely ignorant about the world. The people of the Walls had little to no respect for him and called him a "moron who always charges ahead", while they showed higher hopes and respect for Erwin, whose squad always tried to focus on ways to avoid Titans.
Over the time Keith began to change his mind about Erwin, as he constantly had little or no casualties when compared with other teams under Keith's command. In 844, the much more tired and disillusioned Commander, whose pride was long-hurt, started to rely more on Erwin's advice and strategical plans and even saw himself as a "pawn" of Erwin. In Attack on Titan: No Regrets, the repeated failures of the Survey Corps after years and the leadership of twelve commanders give the monarchy a reason to finally get rid of the military branch. An anti-expedition faction leader nobleman, Nicholas Lovof, manages to gather enough favor to convince the parliament to stop funding the Survey Corps's expeditions, much to Keith's rage when the general Darius Zackly informs him that he cannot prevent the disbandment of the branch. Keith entrusts to Erwin the task of dealing with Lovof personally outside of legal methods without interfering or asking for details, when Erwin himself offers to do so. Always in 844, Keith finally accepts to use the long-distance enemy scouting formation as the standard way for the Scouts, and also allows Erwin to take in Levi, Furlan Church, and Isabel Magnolia, three petty criminals from the Interior's Underground (and secret assassins hired by Lovof), outside the regular procedure through Training Corps graduation, despite all the other Scout leaders arguing against Keith and Erwin.
In the spinoff manga Attack on Titan: No Regrets, Keith personally tries to harshly discipline Levi, Furlan and Isabel to make them proper soldiers. While the other two are terrified of him, Keith notices that Levi is too stubborn and prideful to be made obedient through normal methods. He correctly judges Levi's original thuggish character, showing his ability to judge people's traits and concludes that for Levi to learn and be disciplined it will take a harsher lesson, that lesson later being Levi's pride costing the lives of Isabel and Furlan during their first expedition outside the Walls. Ever since their deaths and Erwin's speech, Levi abandons his criminal ways and starts to become a proper disciplined soldier, never disobeying the commands of his superiors and showing them respect, and followed Keith and Erwin in more expeditions.
Despite the changes, even with Erwin's new formation and Levi's skills the Survey Corps suffered heavy losses and kept failing all their expeditions, without ever bringing any clue about the Titans' origins to the government. In 845, upon returning from a terrible expedition outside the Walls and several hours before the Colossal Titan's appearance, Keith has a mental breakdown at Shiganshina District when he is confronted by an elderly lady he personally knows about the death of her son Moses, a Scout soldier close to Keith. Despite only one severed arm being left from Moses, Keith insisted to deliver the human piece to the mother due to his personal acquaintance with both. After being forced to admit being a failure, Keith decides to step down as a commander in order to let someone more qualified like Erwin lead humanity to victory. He still thinks that "special" people and "chosen ones" do exist, but assumes he was never one of them and took him too long to realize that.
Having set himself free from his burden, but not from his regrets, Keith thinks about paying a visit to Carla and apologize to her for his harsh words from years ago, only to learn the next evening at Trost District that Shiganshina has been decimated and Wall Maria is being invaded and overrun by Titans. He helps Grisha to find his son Eren with the refugees at Trost, only to learn from him that Carla did not make it and has been eaten by a Titan. Keith collapses and is devastated by the news. Two years later in 847, he is not be happy to see Eren enlisting in the Training Corps to become a Scout and tries to sabotage his 3DMG for Carla's sake.
Keith also entirely quit the Survey Corps, not just his rank, and became a drill instructor for the military, claiming it is a penace for all the soldiers who died under his command. Hange Zoë used to have a great of respect for Keith and admired him as as a selfless leader who wanted the best for humanity. Her veteran friend, Marlene, implies that Hange used to adore Keith and have a crush on him. Upon finding out about Keith's true self-centered reasons, Hange is disappointed in him and she is upset because he did not remain in the Survey Corps under Erwin's command, having felt betrayed by Keith's sudden abandonment years ago. Hange believes that Keith only quit because he wanted to run away from his failures. It also turns out that even Erwin was not that selfless leader of humanity he presented himself as in public, and like Keith he only joined the Survey Corps because he too dreamed to learn the truth of the world. Hange is the only Scout commander who works solely for humanity's sake, which is not solely limited to the people within the Walls, and yet even she finds out how stressful the position of Keith and Erwin is and realizes she was much happier when she was still doing Titan research and slowly trying to find out the truth, instead of knowing everything and having to deal with politics and carry the fate of many on her hands.
Like all the rest of the military, Keith ends up being looked down by the younger members of the military following the reveal of the existence of nations outside the Walls, and even his own Trainees start to feel his leadership and training are unnecessary and old. When they take over the government in 854, the Yeagerists seek to purge all the old military, including all its old-fashioned leaders like Keith, Commander Pixis and Captain Levi.
Despite claiming he harbors no ill will towards Keith, Floch Forster shows a low opinion of his former training instructor and has no problem forcing the Trainees of the 109th Squad to beat him up under the threat of detainment. Keith personally seems to have always held Floch in contempt even before the Yeagerist insurrection, and calls him a weak person who cannot gain followers for his cause without resorting to scare tactics and brutality. Following the begin of the Rumbling during Marley's surprise attack, Keith helps Jean Kirstein to rally the surviving soldiers against Zeke Yeager's Pure Titans, personally rescuing Surma's life from the Pure Titan of the MP leader Roeg and leading the Trainees of the 109th Squad in battle.
Despite the Marleyan Warriors having caused the deaths of Carla and many of his own Trainees, Keith does not appear to hold any resentment toward his former double agent students, Bertolt, Reiner and Annie. He is even moved when he sees his former 104th Trainees join forces with Marley to stop Eren and the Rumbling. In his final moments, Keith killed all the Yeagerist reinforcements by blowing them up inside their own train during their attempt to stop the Survey Corps and Marleyan allies. At Paradis Island's sole harbor, Keith meets the new leader of Marley's military dictatorship, General Theo Magath. Despite Magath telling him he is the one who personally ordered his Warriors to destroy the Walls for Marley, and that helping him will likely doom Paradis to death, Shadis chooses to aid him and the other allies to defeat the Yeagerists, both men taking their own lives to save humanity and the world.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Keith is the tallest known human character in Attack on Titan, being 198 cm.
- According to the series' creator Hajime Isayama, he remains single because he does not believe he deserves happiness after so many soldiers died under his command.
- He was the first commander of the Survey Corps to ever name a successor and step down before being killed.
External Links[]
- Keith Shadis on the Attack on Titan Wiki.
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 Heroes
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