This is a spoiler free review.
*Story*
*Insert synopsis here*
Aside from the monsters being replaced with Titans and the interesting weaponry the people have, we've definitely seen similar stories in anime before, whether it's Claymore, Blue Gender and maybe even Highschool of the Dead.
Leaving that aside though, it doesn't do a very good job with its narrative. The story relies on coincidences, has forced exposition, uneventful pacing and it also has unexplored themes that are tossed away as soon as they're raised.
The setting in general is poorly explored. For example, they make it clear that there's a slave trade going on within these walls, but that issue is never raised again. Apparently they also have religious sects that worship these walls as deities or something, but that's never explored either, aside from killing them off in an ironic and disrespectful manner (hah! that'll teach those religious people for having faith and hope!). There are even social classes among citizens, and of course, the higher the class, the more evil you are (that's how it works in cliché land), but even that is just there to show us what good people the main characters are by comparison.. They also present corruption within the military and competition amongst its different branches. Granted, the latter is explored a little, but the former is hardly touched and is just there to shock you. So despite how rich the setting seems at first, at the end of the day all you will care for is the fight against the titans since the rest just remains background decoration.
It's a common thing to say that the first episode is Amazing, but I wasn't impressed. To me, the first episode is also the first mistake it made. It seemed deliberately rushed in an attempt to make the audience gasp at the sudden deaths of characters we know nothing about (pure shock effect).
This is the first mistake because the pacing does slow down significantly later on and I think the first episode was the only one worthy of getting fleshed out more, instead of diving in to the massacre straight away. The rest of the episodes don't even exploit most of their slow pacing very well. It has a habit of slowing down deliberately in order to end most episodes on a cliffhanger. Sure, it might raise the tension, but it also serves to make the series less eventful inside its already limited number of episodes (which means less of a story).
And maybe I'm just nitpicking here, but the exposition insults me. It assumes I'm a retard who can't put 2 and 2 together and the characters have to go out of their way to explain things about their world that they should already know just by being born there. This show could've had no dialogue whatsoever and I still could've picked up on a great deal of what's going on. So the script just comes off as amaturish.
And like I said, the story also relies on occurrences that are not very likely, but because it involves the main characters, anything is possible. It's nothing that bad or distracting, but I'm still gonna go on a limb here and say; that's not good storytelling.
Lastly, it just ends in the middle of nowhere and leaves you with nothing but another cliffhanger (surprise, surprise).
To be fair though, the setting is still pretty creative (as unexplored as it is) and it does do a decent job in foreshadowing some interesting plot twists and gradually revealing mysteries, mainly about the Titans. But that's pretty much it and even that is incomplete for now.
*Characters*
These are tired shonen characters who are completely out of place.
You have a Mary Sue who's super strong for no good reason, the smart one and mr angry pants.
Granted, Eren, the angry one has good reasons to be angry, it's completely understandable. Unfortunately, that's pretty much all he is and it's probably not the best idea to have him as a main character since it gets old really fast.
You also have Mikasa who's an absolute perfect being for some reason (I gave up on questioning it). We can't make her flawed of course since that'd mean she'll have room for character depth, we can't have that. And there's simply nothing to remember her for besides her relationship with Eren, being perfect and her sexy lips. So yeah, a lame character with no development and the most ludicrous backstory I've seen in a while, which also happens to be Eren's backstory. Which explains why she's his pet.
Nice..
The third character is Armin, the weak but smart one. I guess he's ok, since he does seem to grow more than the other two.. Aside from that he's forgettable as well since this show's characterization in general is very shonenish and obnoxious in an otherwise dark setting. "The power of friendship!" (ok, they don't actually say that, but they come pretty close).
By the way, these 3 characters are each supposed to complete each other with their traits, which is a nice idea, but that fact is stated directly to the viewer, much like everything else in this series (so much for subtlety).
There's also another notable character named Jean, who's kinda like the Vegeta or the rival in a shonen series. And much like Vegeta, he's the only one who goes through actual growth and he even reacts to the events in a way that resembles a human being. Too bad he wasn't the main character, he suits the grim setting much better than the others.
The secondary characters are defined mainly by their quirks or their looks and there are others who are just evil for the sake of being hated by the audience and aren't shown more than once. Many secondary characters aren't fleshed out and the vast majority of deaths in this series are of nameless characters or ones you don't remember. It's understandable considering the circumstances, but that just makes the main cast appear more plot armored than they already are.
On the other hand, the characterization of common people during the intense moments is pretty decent. Probably a little over the top at times, but I still think it was handled rather well with how they panic and such.
Overall the characters could've been worse, I mean at least they have character consistency, they are given some focus and I should probably applaud them for not being overly sexualized, which is a very rare thing in anime these days. But I have no clue what people see in them since most of them are pretty simple and feel ridiculously out of place.
*Art & Sound*
I'll cover this part more briefly.
The character designs are kind of unique, I guess. I actually like the thick outlines the artwork has, you really don't see those much anymore. The surroundings look beautiful, both the forests and the towns. Everything just seems gigantic. The animation itself (while not always consistent) is great and the battles with the 3d camera movement is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Though I wasn't too thrilled about most of the Titan designs, and some are significantly cooler than others.
The opening song is arguably one of the best openings in recent years, it's just masterful (too bad opening 2 happened midway). Same goes for the soundtrack in general which is beautifully intense and makes everything seem more epic. The voice acting is nothing special and maybe even over the top, but I realize that the script probably told them to scream a lot, which is not always easy to pull off so give them some slack.
*Enjoyment*
I enjoyed some of it, but from a point on I mainly just watched it apathetically. I do concede that it's not a boring watch, that's for sure.
*Overall* 6/10
I've been mostly negative in this review, but to be fair it was still a fine show, or at least passable in some respects and the production values are great. But I doubt it will stand the test of time
