Review of Attack on Titan
Shingeki no Kyojin, the anime that has brought forth a new wave of anime fans and stormed the anime world when it debuted in spring of 2013. An anime that was quickly subbed and added to Netflix after it's airing, that has gained the attention of thousands of people who normally do not watch anime. It has sold extremely well in Japan and the manga has profited well in the States as well. This must mean the series is something revolutionary and a game changer for all anime after it correct? After all it can't all be hype, there has to be some serious substancebehind all of this right?
Most fans will tell you off the bat that it is not like other series, that it is heavily violent, shocking, and sometimes horrifying. That it is a world full of interesting characters and sudden death at every turn. And all of that is true...for the first five episodes. After an introductory which I would say is worthy of the praise it gets, the series seems to fall apart extremely quickly and after it's smash beginning has so substance left to support itself afterwards.
I'll spare a summary of the story as it's almost hard not to know what the story is about by this point. I'll give you my thoughts on it in one word: Horrendous. To call the story mediocre would be too much praise. Out of the three main characters only one stands out as anything special, that being the character of Armin Arlert. However as interesting as he is compared to his two other mains, he is given significantly less time on screen to showcase this than the other two. The characters of Eren and Mikasa are without a doubt two of the worst characters ever conceived in any work of fiction. I would attempt to discuss their personalities but there is little to nothing to discuss. A standard cardboard box has more depth to it than those two, and would probably make a better lead character as well.
Ignoring the horrific set of main characters, the supporting cast is dotted with traces of what could be interesting characters, but there is never enough time given to them to let that shine through. They glimmer with hope that Isayama's writing could be something other than pathetic and are one of the only things keeping SnK afloat in an ocean of fecal matter.
The story itself must have been written by a fourth grader at best. The "plot twists" (even calling them that is a stretch) and sudden character death are all presented in such a shallow way it is often hard to care about any character that dies or any new plot development (hint: there are none, the manga is good at one thing and that is providing hundreds of questions and not a single answer). The entire pacing of the series itself is some of the worst I have had the displeasure of experiencing in years. The plot itself goes from moving at a sluggish pace and solving nothing, to a break neck speed where a character is introduced one chapter only to be killed off in the next one.
The art and animation jump between not bad and hard to even look at. The character designs suffer an often same-face syndrome worse than Araki's recent style and excluding background shots, the art is subpar at most and there is much more to be expected from a studio like IG Production. Their is a constant reuse of animations and scenes to such an extent that anyone would has this displeasure of watching more than one episode in a day would find incredibly bothersome. Reusing an animation once or twice is forgivable and almost expected, but to the extent they are reused in SnK there is absolutely no excuse.
The sound design is the only thing I can find hard to complain about, in a series where everything is so awful it is hard to even say something comforting about one of it's only good points. Which is an absolute shame as I can say the OST is probably the only thing to ever get from the anime at all.
My final verdict on SnK will be a series of questions to ask yourself before watching it. Do you enjoy awful characters that have no depth and lack the personality of even a desk chair? Do you enjoy wallowing in absolute shit? Do you have any other reason to watch this other than to laugh at how utterly irredeemable it is? There is not a single good thing to say about the series other than that the first few episodes are "not bad", apart from that it would hurt to attempt to say anything good about this series.
If you still believe you should watch this show, may God have mercy on your soul, for you are going to need it.