I loved the manga when i started it by only like it a lot (8/10) now. And i asked myself why.
The art is now finally truly great, the plot and world come together nicely and i can see a lot of forward planing from the get go. It first i though it was because the manga became a bit shonen fighty around the end of the anime and slightly afterwards but that went away big time and i had a revaluation then. My problem is the lack of attachment to the characters aftre a while. They started of great and i cared but they now have stagnated into "men an a mission". They still retain a bit of their personalitys and backstorys but i don´t feel them moving forward or being "alive" outside of the panel. Nearly every action they take is to protect their unit or focus on the mission. Other(arguably interiorly written) game of death manga like Terraformers or Gantz didn´t have that effect on me after a dozen volumes. I now managed to forgotten nearly all the names and i would describe nearly everyone as determined or brave or capable or capable despite. This is a problem in a manga about death. I can thou retell you the current story and lore without a problem. I do not have the same problem with the shorter and character driven Before the Fall and enjoy it more as short as it will last. So did i stumble upon something or do i have a brain disorder that makes me not care about the characters in this series.

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I also read EU/US comics and am a librarian.
Manga-Masters, My ANN-Lists + Imdb

Nah, the characters in this series Are pretty bland. It says something when one of the more popular characters is Potato girl, whose only defining quirk is that she steals potatos. But that's because she's the only character in the main group with a noticeable quirk. The interactions between the characters has also been pretty poorly developed. Mikasa, for example, is just very single-minded when it comes to Eren, but there isn't much more to her personality.

The manga has another weakness, and that's the facial expressions. The characters look horrified and all, but they are not expressions that the readers empathize with, if you know what I mean. There's a certain bland, emotionless quality to it. So it's hard to get attached to the characters and feel their plight.