But that arc in the manga was 11 chapters though, trying to cram that into 4 episodes, seems unlikely it will work.

Manga is on going monthly series with 46 chapters, with 47 coming this month.

Indeed.

Indeed.

But to be fair, every anime does that, no?

That's cause the author is a new comer/newbie, it's his first series, so he doesn't have any experience on pacing. I wouldn't say it got slowed down a lot in the latter half, but rather that the author has grown, to know how to do pacing. If you indeed read the manga, you should know that the author also planned a lot…

Mikasa? Well it's only the beginning...she does get more moments later on, and the manga is on-going too, so anything can happen(including more stuff about her past).

They talked a lot, because there was a lot to talk about and express, aka. there was a lot of dialogue in the manga. Also in the manga, the Trost arc was 11 chapters. And if you think the basement is the only main plot/mystery...then your dead wrong :)

Your comment seems like it was very close to spoiling stuff :P

To be honest, the free-running and Jetpack usage seem so far, rather limited and not very impressive.

When there's too much action guess what people complain about? Not enough development.

Oh, so that's what you mean. AoT is actually borderline shounen and not of the mainstream kind, eg. bleach, naruto etc.(it certainly doesn't follow those formula)

There's just something, that makes it looks like your reviewing it as a whole, rather then the first 13 eps. I dunno what it is, but I'll try and find it.

Same as always.

I would say the latter parts of the manga, is just the author growing and has learned how to pace things, because there was non at the beginning volumes(this is his first series remember).

If you read the manga, then you might know the world of Attack on Titan, might has more then meets the eye...

Well it does follow the manga closely at about 97%. So yes the manga is kinda like that, but granted the anime fixed many things the manga had problems with. For example what you said about how it was so fast in the first few episodes, well it was like that for the manga too. It was so fast, there was no pacing at all.

You just shot yourself in the foot, as they were part of the manga and not fillers at all(with the exception of episode12, with the Jean and Connie parts).

Your friends are wrong. She does develop, and also the manga is still on-going, so anything can happen.

The opening is actually not JPOP/JROCK, but rather fantasy theatre music(the full song at least).