Kinda tired of seeing all the unjustified hatred towards Gabi, so here goes a thread reviewing the great development of this misunderstood character until chapter 127.

PART ONE

I hope you like it and if you do, help me with a RT
#StanGabiBraun

Gabi is introduced as a presumptuous girl who’s pretty confident on her abilities and has high expectations for herself. She believes that she is a kind of genius and that no one deserves as much as her. This superiority complex makes her act so recklessly that+

she’d even put her life at risk just to get praised and improve her position as the future Armored heir.

Although she behaves that way, she’s aware she needs to become stronger in order to not depend on others or be a charge for them.

She also pretends to play the role of the bossy leader for her fellow warrior candidates. This makes her threaten them if they happen to disagree with her. However, she does seem to care about them, her only friends.

At this point, her only motive is the hatred she bears towards Paradisian people. She has experienced a bunch of negative situations and received hatred from Marleyan people just because she was an Eldian. This makes her want to prove the world that not all Eldians are bad.

Just like Eren, she wishes for a future where her people can live a proud and peaceful life.

Gabi is a prisoner of her beliefs and can’t do anything about it. She was BRAINWASHED since little. She’s adopted that ideology from her family and Marleyan people. She was taught and grew up thinking Paradisian were devils. Beliefs are too hard to go against especially+

when you’ve grown up with them and been reminded the same thing over and over. Just like Grisha, she takes responsibility for the problem and feels that she has to do something to solve it.

We know little about her early life, but she most likely spent most of her childhood in the training fields. Let’s not forget Gabi’s still a kid, so she obviously loves her family with all of her heart and feels happy whenever they recognize her effort.

She shows much excitement for going back home , and gets emotional for being praised by many people. Even if this just helps feed her ego, it also helps build her self confidence.

Gabi’s first bewilderment takes place when Reiner tells his family about the time he spent in Paradis Island. He mentions that different people live there. Gabi feels confused since she was told all of them were devil. However, her aunt contradicts what Reiner says and+

reminds her the story she already knows. Gabi just can’t believe the person she looks up to the most has those “wrong” feelings. Nonetheless, she tries to understand her cousin and believes the time he spent there has somehow affected him.

Gabi never had the childhood an average kid is supposed to, due to all the training. That’s why she feels confused when a festival in Liberio starts. She’d never experienced that kind of things before, so it was as if a new world started to open in front of her eyes.

A world where she wouldn’t have to worry about being the armored heir for a while. Alongside her friends, she enjoyed the whole festival as if there was no tomorrow. A lot of new things happened to her that day and she wished everything would just stay the same.

She felt like her whole life was going to change, that if she kept on giving her best, her people could be happy forever just like that day. Little did she know what would happen later and the way her life would change.

Gabi’s new world and dreams were shattered when Eren and the survey corps attacked Liberio. Her hometown, the people she loves, Zophia, Udo, disappeared in front of her eyes, out of a sudden, and she couldn’t do anything. She gets traumatized, just like Eren once did.

This impotence makes her act and triggers her determination to kill all of those devils, especially Eren.

Panels reflecting her pain.

She’s determined to sacrifice her life to avenge her fallen loved ones. Even in this situation, she still thinks about being recognized and praised for her heroic action. She says goodbye to Falco, recognizes him as a good guy and rival, then gets into the plane and kills Sasha

After being captured and taken as a hostage, she still keeps her ideals and shows that she’s capable of everything just to prove she’s loyal to her beliefs.

She knows she can’t trust anybody in that “hell” and escapes from the cell. Falco tosses the armband out of her arm and she gets upset and fights him to recover what she thinks makes her a good Eldian because she’d feel miserable if she didn’t wear it. Evident brainwashing here.

Suddenly, Kaya shows up and Gabi tries to kill her with a rock, but Falco stops her and tells her he’ll be in charge. Gabi finally understands Falco is the only one she can trust.

She feels confused again since a demon is offering her help, that’s a total contradiction to her beliefs. She believes in Falco and decides to accept Kaya’s help even though she still thinks Paradisian are devils.

Falco is the one who helps her get along with the devil. She kinda struggles but still does it to survive. When Kaya tells them she knows they’re from Marley, Gabi is willing to kill her, but again is stopped by Falco. He’s the only one that can calm her down somehow.

At this point Gabi’s confusion keeps increasing. Reiner’s feelings, Sasha’s not killing her, Zeke’s betrayal, Kaya’s saving them and keeping their secret. All of these makes her want to reaffirm her beliefs and confront Kaya when she asks her why her mom was killed.

I’d like to point out Gabi’s hypocrisy. When Falco tries to stop her from getting into the airship and tells her the reason why Eren and the others attacked, she says that if he hadn’t seen that himself, there was no way to prove that. Yet, when she argues with Kaya, she appeals+

to the same story of Eldians slaughtering the world, even if she didn’t witnessed it and has no proof of that.

Kaya tells her that her mother didn’t do anything wrong and asks Gabi again the reason why she was eaten. Gabi is completely shocked and confused and doesn’t know how to respond. That argument with Kaya has just opened her mind a bit.

Still, Kaya continues helping them and tells them she knows someone from Marley that might help them. Gabi can’t believe a demon is helping her get out of “hell”.

Then, at the restaurant, Falco saves her from Nicolo’s attack and gets severely injured. Gabi gets hit too and Nicolo puts her life at risk when he tells Sasha’s parents she killed her daughter. Gabi faces death, she’s scared of dying and breaks down in tears.

She realizes for the first time that her actions cause pain to people who’ve helped her: the Blouse family, the ones who gave her shelter, Falco, who’s willing to sacrifice his life to save her and in fact the only one who is left for her.

She might lose him due to her selfish actions. She doesn’t wanna lose him.

Gabi’s bewilderment reaches its peak when Mr. Blouse decides not to take revenge and forgive her. He knows that’d be useless, killing Gabi wouldn’t bring Sasha back. Despite the pain, he considers that both of them are victims of an unfair war.

He shows her that forgiveness is an option and recognizes her daughter did bad things as well, so he’s no one to judge other people’s actions. These words have a huge impact on Gabi and work as a trigger to her development.

Gabi had started to forge a bond with Kaya, so she can’t help feeling sad for being called a murderer by her. She sees Kaya behaving the same way she once did and feels shaken. Just look at her face.

Gabi asks later Armin and Mikasa the reason why they saved her despite having killed her dear friend. Armin tells her that killing her would do nothing but increase the circle of hatred. Those words confuse her even more, maybe revenge is not the solution.

She never really understood what hatred is and how far it can go if you let it consume you.

When she meets Pieck in the cell, she breaks down. She no longer knows what her purpose is, what she’s living for. Her only motive is vanishing, she doesn’t know what to do.

Gabi finally accepts her fault and is determined to save Falco at any cost. She doesn’t wanna run away and be saved anymore. She wants to recover what she’s lost and compensate him for the things he’s done for her.

Gabi starts to trust Paradisian people to save her life and she doesn’t even know why! She’s still confused, a lot of things have happened in a short amount of time.

Gabi hears Kaya talk about wanting to kill her for the pain she caused her. I personally think this is the breaking point for Gabi. She’s listening to a person who’s thinking the same way she did a short time ago. A person who once saved her, is know trying to kill her.

This panel explains itself. This is just amazing. A before and after in her development.

This is my favorite moment, Gabi tossing Falco’s armband out just like he did with her a while ago. She gets rid of her proud and accepts that such meaningless things shouldn’t label a person.

Unfortunately things didn’t go the way she wanted. She ends up losing everything . Colt and Falco disappear in front of her eyes, again she couldn’t do anything to save them. Just when she started to understand and thought she could do things right, everything is robbed from her

She has Eren, the cause of all her suffering, in front of her eyes. She’s broken, she’s lost everything, nothing’s left for her but her resentment. She takes Colt’s gun and shoots Eren as a way of ending her pain and suffering.

This represents the end of an obscure stage and the beginning of a new one for Gabi.

Thanks to Reiner, she is informed that Falco is alive and safe, but that he’s been taken by the survey corps. Gabi is shown a new opportunity and is determined to save her loved ones and do the things right. She needs to FIGHT to do that. A new stage of redemption has started.

She saves Kaya from being eaten by a titan. Just like Sasha, the demon she killed, once did. Kaya immediately recalls that moment and sees Gabi as a resemblance of her sister. She’s now the confused one.

Still, Gabi is scared of being reported by the Blouse. She’d never imagine that the ones she once called demons would protect her instead and that they’d even call her family. Gabi feels touched by those actions and shows Mr Blouse’s words have really made a deep impact on her.

Then she holds a conversation with Kaya about the reasons why they saved each other. Gabi accepts she is a devil for all the things she’s done. She learns that everybody has a devil inside and that she must keep trying if she wants to defeat it and get out of the hatred circle.

She gets to Armin and shows her despairing. Shows how human she is, and that she’s capable to do everything just to save the person he cares about the most. She’s determined to collaborate with people she used to hate to save Falco.

Before heading, she says goodbye to Kaya, who’s forgiven her. This panel just melts my heart so bad.

In the latest chapter 127, Gabi makes a notable gesture: she nods her head. All the experiences she’s lived in the island have made her change her ideology. She’s given up her dignity and proud to asks the people she once swore to destroy for help.

She finally apologizes with everyone and shows how much she regrets the horrible things she did.

This scene shows the great development of this character. A development that’s based on freeing from indoctrination and create your own thought, an own ideology. She no longer considers them as demons, but people like her who try survive and fight for their own motives.

End of the thread. Take it as my little contribution to make the AoT fandom more wholesome and less toxic. I know many people hate Gabi for the things she’s done and how she used to think and behave, +

but they also ignore all the shit she’s been through and how those things have made her change for better.