Jean Kirstein

Jean has a blunt personality. He holds no restraint when it comes to speaking his mind, even when he knows it would not be wise to do so or when it could spark conflict. Jean is also pragmatic: he has a strong aversion to exposing himself to dangerous situations, and has openly admitted his desire to join the Military Police is due to wanting an easy and safe life.

During his time as a trainee, Jean was extremely hot-headed, easily becoming frustrated and quick to resort to violence when pushed. Jean was also very cynical about defeating the Titans, believing that humanity has no chance against them. He openly mocked more idealistic individuals like Eren, and saw resisting the Titans as a hopeless cause.

Despite his shortcomings, Marco describes Jean as a natural leader, being able to understand others and assess situations well because of his flaws. Indeed, during the Battle of Trost District, Jean proves capable of leading his fellow soldiers when they are left confused and leaderless, and rallies Armin and Reiner in an attack on the Female Titan, knowing that not fighting her would endanger the rest of the Survey Corps. His awareness and leadership capabilities were further displayed during the Battle of Shiganshina, when he took command of Armin's squad, and Liberio when he led many of the 104th graduates to attack the Marleyan military. Over the years he gained great appreciation by Connie who deems him capable of becoming a future leader of the Survey Corps.

Although he presents himself as self-centered, Jean places high value on the lives of others, and is ashamed and horrified when he must leave helpless allies behind to save himself and the remaining soldiers with him. He is also willing to risk his life to slow down the Female Titan, as refusing to do so would have resulted in additional deaths. Jean later criticizes Erwin withholding information from his subordinates out fear that there was a spy among them, feeling that the plan was not acceptable, because of the lives that were lost because of it.

Jean's first instinct is to always see life through cautious and doubtful eyes. He was hesitant to accept Armin and Reiner's plan of having the Attack Titan fight for them, and immediately admitted to never having trusted Ymir when she seemingly kidnapped Krista. Despite this, following the second appearance of the Armored Titan, Jean was also the one to motivate Eren to continue fighting for humanity's victory, showing that he is slowly adopting the same idealistic outlooks he once criticized.

In addition, Jean is greatly averse to taking human lives, Jean's moral principles initially prevented him from killing enemy soldiers, but he reluctantly set aside his conscience for the sake of his friends and allies. He refuses to kill civilians and child combatants though, chastising Floch Forster's disregard for the civllian casualties and later disregarding his suggestion that they throw Gabi Braun and Falco Grice out the airship. Jean's will to stick to his morals regardless of the situation is shown further during the initiation of the Rumbling. While he could initially sympathize with and understand Eren and the Yeagerists feelings of wanting to secure Paradis Island's future, he could not bring himself to be an accomplice to the mass slaughter, or kill those that were in opposition to it.