But outside of the action the show doesn't excel in much. At the start of the story, you will often wonder, how does everything here even work? Like, what's up with the wall, when did they ever have time to even build it? Why in 100 years have figured no way to combat the titans, no technological advancement? I mean if stuck in the same place for 100 years, you might figure some way to combat them. More efficient ways. I mean, there is a story about the wall which will be written in the midpause for advertisment that you should read so you will understand a bit more about it and I suppose all the details about their developments throughout those pauses are also nice and you can see how they did figure out ways to deal with them, but I find it so hard to believe that they barely have any ideas on how to deal with them after so many years. They really feel majorly underdeveloped, which I understand is something you want to keep the theme alive, but even with it set in the 8th century and all, I doubt humanity would be this stupid. However, if you ask yourself these questions long enough some possible speculations might pop to mind. You might be able to fill some gaps yourself based on some events and the fact that humanity barely has enough knowledge of anything. The fact they barely know anything is not a complete blowout since they are actually trying to gather intelligence on their enemies constantly throughout the show and it does keep it moving along and in a way the action of the show uses this as a challenge to develop.
The story itself deals with war, loss and tragedy, but it's usually swing and a miss. While it does nail some moments and I do mean really nails them, most of them are either ridiculous or you don't care much for. The reasoning for it is more often than not it's done through redshirts with no development put into them or how shounen-ish the mindset of most characters (in an aspiring war drama...) are and how similar to each other their thinking really is. Dramatically the show does have its good moments, but they're about as slim as the survival rate of the characters seen in the show. So don't get your hopes up. Those redshirts I mentioned are there to setup the action more often than not so I do see the point for bringing them along. Just keep in mind that more often that sometimes the show will be really desperate to keep the despair in its world up.
What really saves the show for me is the action itself, it's got good animation and I'd say better than average sound choices, the design is bleak but it does help with what the show is intending to do and the action bits are really well done so I'd say the design of the show is good. The action bits of the show are really hype and seeing humans fighting titans and how they develop their strategies to combat them is often really enjoyable. The fights and how their set up will feel good, the logistics of them didn't feel questionable, everything else does, but in its action the show it does excel. The show's got some really enjoyable action, better than most action shows, so this is this show's saving grace. The parts I enjoyed were almost never the characters or what happened to them but rather the various ways the humans have developed to deal with the titans, formations, strategies, planning, making the best out of the worst situation. That's what's executed well within the show.
The characters are of two types. Those that get their fill of interesting moments. And those that die so they can get those. More often than not you can distinguish whether or not a character is gonna have any relevance later on if they have gotten any discerning trait of their own. If they're too similar with any other character, they are cannon fodder. Which is a problem in this show because most characters are really unmemorable and alike. The characters that do have said traits you can like and sympathize a bit with them, but the high number of them mostly get hardly enough effort put into them. I mean, I get it, you try to create a war setting, but you could at least try to create losses you, the viewer, care about, rather than the characters in the show, since they're almost always a means to an end. The characters that die almost never stand up on their own, which is a problem. In some cases it's the point, but in most I really don't think it is its intention. How do you plan to succesfully convey the desperation of war and frequent loss when you can't give the characters enough anything to get the viewers to feel concerned for the safety of their favorite characters?
What I do have to conclude through all of this, all of my complaints and concerns don't impact the way the action moments pass too much, but they could've enhanced it to be so many times better.
Overall, I'd recommend this show to people who really enjoy the action side of anime and weigh it of the same value or above that of the story elements themselves. If you value the action that way, I really don't doubt you will enjoy this show. But if you don't my expectations are that you will find the show at best mediocre. It does have ups in the story and the ups are often good to really good, but they're pretty infrequent. The show is good. It really is good despite all its flaws. But if you can't enjoy the action, I have no doubt you will find this bad. Case in which you should definitely avoid this and watch anything else.
