5 Reasons Why Attack on Titan Is Overrated & 5 Why It Isn’t

There is no doubt that the most talked-about anime of the last decade is Attack on Titan, which has a lot of different fans all over the world and is one of the most anticipated anime series of all time due to how it keeps fans posted on what’s to come next for the series. That is why millions of anime lovers and non-anime fans alike watch episodes of Attack on Titan closely, as many details highlight just how awesome it is.

Nevertheless, while we know that Attack on Titan is immensely popular, it isn’t up to everyone’s tastes and standards, as some fans aren’t necessarily fond of it. Some fans even think that it’s too overrated due to its popularity. Nevertheless, fans of the series believe that it isn’t overrated at all and is just rated fine as it is. So, with that said, let’s look at some of the reasons why Attack on Titan is overrated and why it isn’t overrated.

10. Why It’s Overrated: The Plot Isn’t Unique

The one thing that fans often say about Attack on Titan is that it comes with an unconventional and unique plot. Nevertheless, if you look at its storyline and plot closely, it is clear that it isn’t entirely original. We know that the series talks about titans that “pushed humanity to the brink of extinction” and that many different subplots are hiding under the main plot. But the main plot and the way the series was explored weren’t entirely original.

Many of the details of Attack on Titan were borrowed from the story arcs of anime and manga series like Blue Gender and Claymore. However, even Godzilla and Gundam (in a way) also inspired the series. We know that the titan premise is unique, but how the story was delivered and how it ended (Code Geass reference) aren’t really novel to Attack on Titan. 

9. Why It’s Not Overrated: Great World-Building

While some people may be critical of how “unoriginal” Attack on Titan may be, there is no doubt that the storyline built a fantastic and unique world. Of course, we know that the series introduced itself as a post-apocalyptic era where humans retreated behind a walled settlement due to the rampage of the titans. And humanity didn’t even know what these monsters were and where the titans came from.

But the story’s progression allowed the world to build itself as we learned that humanity was far from near extinction because countries were thriving well beyond the walls. The people living behind the walls were, in fact, refugees of the former world that retreated to a secluded island to keep the Power of the Titans away from the rest of the world. This revelation came as a surprise to a lot of fans as it became apparent that there was something deeper that needed to be explored in this world.

8. Why It’s Overrated: Slow Pacing at the Start

Even though Attack on Titan built itself a unique world that slowly unfolded as the story progressed, the series lost a lot of fans during the earlier part of the storyline due to how slow the pacing was at the start. Throughout the first 24 episodes, the pacing was dreadfully slow to the point that it felt that the series was just going through the motions before revealing some of the biggest twists and turns along the way.

Of course, we know that Attack on Titan’s pacing picked up in the latter episodes. It quickly became interesting when the characters began to uncover the mystery behind the entire titan mess. Nevertheless, the twists and turns revealed themselves during the latter seasons. Season 1 was quite slow in terms of its pacing, regardless of how entertaining the human-on-titan action scenes were.

7. Why It’s Not Overrated: The Twists and Turns

Speaking of twists and turns, the surprises that came with the progression of the storyline were some of the best things that Attack on Titan offered its fans. The thing about this manga and anime series is that fans were reading and watching it without any clue of the entire titan mystery and how humanity was “pushed to the brink of extinction.” In a sense, people were blind to the entire storyline.

However, the twists and turns revealed themselves gradually instead of immediately compounding the truth on top of our heads. Every twist and turn along the way steadily unveiled the titan mystery, as fans became just as invested in learning more about the world and the titans as the Survey Corps was. Even after the mystery of the titans was already unveiled, many more twists and turns came along the way until the end of the story.

6. Why It’s Overrated: Can Be Too Violent

Of course, Attack on Titan was never meant to be a shonen anime open to everyone, as it was always for mature audiences. There are a lot of gory and violent scenes in the series, and that’s something that you can expect from a storyline where there are gigantic humanoid beings that instinctively eat humans the moment they see them. That means that it is perfectly understandable why there are a lot of violent scenes involving titans eating people.

But while that may be true, the thing about Attack on Titan is that the scenes can be too violent and very graphic to the point that those with weak stomachs couldn’t handle the gory scenes. As such, while the story itself may be great, the scenes may turn some people off due to how bloody, messy, gory, and violent they can be.

5. Why It’s Not Overrated: The Characters Are Very Human

One of the things that people notice about certain anime characters is that they tend to be too good or too evil. It is tough to see anime characters that dwell in gray areas as most protagonists are seemingly saints regarding how good they are, while the bad guys seem evil by nature. But that isn’t the case when it comes to Attack on Titan. The characters are incredibly human, focusing more on their interests and survival rather than doing things for the greater good.

When we say that the characters are very human, we mean that every character has a relatable story that allows us to see what motivates and drives them. No characters are perfect in that they just want to kill the titans for the good of all mankind. Instead, the characters are fueled by their interests and desires, and nothing is more human than that. After all, deep down to our very core, humans act on self-interest, which was one of the things we saw in Attack on Titan and its characters.

4. Why It’s Overrated: Eren Pulled a Lelouch

Speaking of how some elements of Attack on Titan can be unoriginal, many people pointed out the play that Eren pulled off during the final portion of the storyline. He took a lesson on “How to pull a Lelouch” as he did the same thing that Lelouch did in the events of Code Geass, which is often regarded as one of the greatest anime series ever. In Code Geass, Lelouch turned himself into the villain of the entire world so that the warring nations of the world would unite against him, as he was basically a martyr that sacrificed himself for the good of the world.

In Eren’s case, he did the same by committing mass genocide, which dwindled the world’s entire population to the last 20%. The reason why he did this was for him to become the bad guy and to make the entire world see that the other Eldians were not enemies. As such, he saved his friends from the world’s hatred while ridding the world of the Power of the Titans upon his death. This ending is entirely unoriginal as it is similar to what Lelouch did, except that the original did it better.

3. Why It’s Not Overrated: There’s No True Bad Guy

Going back to our point about how human the characters of Attack on Titan can be, the thing about the series is that there is no true bad guy. Every villain in every arc of the story had a human reason for doing what they did. Annie killed many people because she was brought up as a Marleyan warrior; Reiner and Bertholdt did the same in season 2; and Rod Reiss wanted to return things to the status quo because that was what was best for humanity. Even Eren, who was the final arc’s villain, wasn’t a bad guy either.

In that regard, the storyline of Attack on Titan allows us to see things from different perspectives because every character is a good guy from his perspective. It is all a matter of which perspective you use to view the storyline’s events. As such, we can’t really say that there was a true villain or bad guy in Attack on Titan.

2. Why It’s Overrated: The Ending Didn’t Change Anything

As mentioned, Eren turned himself into the bad guy and reduced the world’s population to the final 20% after using the Rumbling to decimate the globe. He did it to save his friends from the world’s hatred and to get rid of the Power of the Titans upon his death. As such, after he died, there was a period of peace in the world because there were no longer any Eldians that the different nations could hate.

But the fact is that the peace that Eren ushered in was not permanent. It didn’t take too long for the world’s different nations to find reasons to go to war with one another, as this seemingly allows us to see that there was no point in Eren destroying the world. The ending of Attack on Titan merely allowed us to see that there is no end to the world’s cycle of war and hatred.

1. Why It’s Not Overrated: It Mirrors the Reality of War

The final arc of Attack on Titan highlighted the war between the Eldians and the rest of the world. It even allowed us to see the long-standing conflict between the Eldians and the other nations all over the globe due to the things that the Eldians did in the past using the Power of the Titans. Of course, while we know that the Eldians ended up becoming second-rate citizens on Marley after the king took them to Paradis and hid the Power of the Titans there, it still became clear that the conflict between the Eldians and the Marleyans never ended.

This only shows that war has always been a never-ending cycle of hatred between different parties. But the fact is that the casualties of the wars that were happening in Attack on Titan were the real victims of the never-ending conflict between the Eldians and the Marleyans, as those who didn’t even have anything to do with the war were killed or, at the very least, displaced. In that regard, this mirrors the fact that there are no real winners in a war in real life because there are only victims of war.