With all of the new streaming platforms furiously competing for subscribers, now is truly the Golden Age of television. There are far more shows I have some interest in than I have time to watch. My cinephile friend recommended this to us but we’ve been burned by Japanese anime before as they are usually too juvenile for our tastes. So it was with some reluctance that we dived into this and the early episodes seemed to only confirm our worst fears. However the pace picks up later and the first season ends on a rather strong note, so this turned out to be surprisingly good overall.

The story is set in a world in which humans are confined within a concentric series of three protective walls as monstrous giants called Titans who eat humans roam freely outside. As children, Eren Jaeger, his adopted sister Mikasa Ackermann and their friend Armin Arlert witness a Titan break through the outermost wall and kill his mother. The survivors flee behind the second wall but the loss of the land makes it impossible to feed so many people. Years later all three of the friends join the military, learning to use the maneuver gear and swords that the humans have devised as weapons against the Titans. Soon after they graduate, the Titans attack the wall again and the new recruits struggle to cope. Mikasa turns out to be an outstanding soldier while Armin is an excellent strategist. In the battle Eren’s entire squad is wiped out and he himself is seemingly devoured by a Titan. But he survives by transforming into a Titan himself, much to the shock of everyone present.

Anime shows usually suffer from such a predictable set of flaws that it’s a trope: stock characters drawn from standard archetypes, annoyingly long recap scenes in episodes, overly emotional characters, action scenes that consist mostly of posturing etc. There are times in this series when there is too much recap but thankfully they confine it to the extent of individual arcs and not the whole show. It’s mostly free of the other problems with the action scenes being very dynamic and rather fast-paced. But it does have the problem of characters all having their emotional responses turned up to 11. Whether it’s grief, rage or fear, the characters emote in a greatly exaggerated way that is very tiresome. These people really don’t know how to be subtle. Still the recap issues get better over time and once the plot starts really moving, the grimness of the setting and the unapologetic level of violence and sacrifice more than make up for the other flaws.

The show has numerous pluses: a genuinely interesting and original world that is effectively a post-apocalyptic fantasy, the willingness to keep introducing new characters and letting enough named characters die that there’s a genuine sense of tension and danger, the central mystery of the nature of the Titans and their relationship with humans to keep the plot going etc. But one of the best ways that this series stands out is that a great deal of the conflict arises from the psychological trauma of facing a seemingly invincible enemy. Soldiers regularly quail at the sight of the giants and are eager to be assigned behind the last wall to avoid ever having to fight them. The military suffers from such devastating losses that the populace questions the point of even having a military force at all. Even the main characters have to deal with feeling useless and impotent while their comrades are being slaughtered. I found this willingness to show fear and cowardice to be rather refreshing though the cynic in me wonders if the creators deliberately went for a predominantly European esthetic here in order to avoid depicting Japanese characters as being cowards.

Anyway we’re just done with the first season so who knows if it keeps on being good. But we’re definitely going to watch the next one. But it’s definitely one of the better, more adult anime shows we’ve seen yet so I’d recommend this one.