Attack on Titan has a lot of things going for it. It's based on an incredible, award winning manga. It's got a killer animation studio producing it with a bold visual style. It's got a gritty soundtrack.

But it does not understand what makes a story compelling or a series enjoyable. Every installment ends on a cliffhanger, typically with the characters more beaten down and miserable than they started. This creates a gloomy monotony that drags you from episode to episode.

The show is dark and violent, but if the story was paced differently there would be some tonal variety. Additionally, it would allow them to invest the audience in the characters before mortally wounding them. The way the show is structured, it whisks you through characters building a relationship with each other and cuts right to the fighting. It never earns its action scenes or emotional plot points.

The only reasons to care about a character are a) you like the character design, b) you like the trope assigned to that character, or c) you are heavily invested enough in the main character to care how he feels about this new person. Considering that the main character is your typical shounen action hero, that last one is a tough sell.

The premise has legs and the animation has the chops, but the writing is toothless, thoughtless, and monotonous.