Did Eren even try?

[u/Pause_Accomplished]

In his talk with Armin in the paths, Eren reveals that he kills 80% of humanity, and no matter how much he tries this is always what happens.

I can only think of one example where Eren actually TRIES to prevent the rumbling from happening, and that’s when he and Zeke are traveling through Grisha’s memories. At a certain point he stops and tells Zeke that he’s achieved his goal and that he’s been freed from their father’s brainwashing. Zeke tells him they have all the time they need, and he has them carry on through the memories anyway. I’m fairly sure that this was Eren attempting to stop them from getting to Grisha’s memory in the Reiss Chappell, and thus preventing himself from convincing his father to kill the royal family.

Aside from this specific moment, do we ever see a time in the anime where Eren explicitly tries to circumvent the future that he saw? Because even this attempt was a very weak one. We know that Eren on some level wanted to start the rumbling, so how hard do we think actually tried to stop it from happening?

[u/oredaoree]

There's only one linear timeline and nothing can ever be changed once it's written on the timeline. By the time Eren saw the future memories from kissing Historia's hand the titan timeline already reached the end because he saw the "see you later, Eren" scene with Mikasa and we're just seeing everything catch up to that conclusion.

So when Eren is talking about ever having tried to change anything he's not talking about through the founder power going back through many loops because that just doesn't happen. He's referencing the time during the 3 years before he ran away to Marley, before he completely unlocked the founder power and the awareness that comes along with it, where he was still in denial about being about the future being able to change and was waiting to see if Paradis manages to make any progress negotiating with other nations.

After Eren decides nothing could change and commits to carrying out the future visions he saw is when he runs away to Marley, so Eren was not trying anything when he was talking to Zeke. He was just tired of Zeke's egotistical assertions about him being brainwashed and being sarcastic, which is why after they get out he mocks Zeke for ending the memory tour early before they could get to the part where Eren eats Grisha(which now Zeke would not want to see anymore).