I thought that Dragon Pilot was pretty good. Yes, Dragon Pilot has more than it's fair share of issues, but overall I had a pretty good time watching it.
The characters are a bit archetypey, (and before you ask of course I looked up whether that was a word or not before I typed it) but I like all of them just the same. There were a bunch of characters that were made into unnecessary villains, which immediately after their villain phases were turned into friends throughout the show. These characters were only villains to add conflict, and I don't love that because it felt unnecessary, but it's whatever.
I think that overall this show just had too much stuff in it. It was very ambitious, and I can respect that, but it definitely bit off a little more than it could chew. I know this doesn't really happen, but if this show were 8 or 9 episodes and they cut a lot of the filler stuff they had, it would feel a lot more like a complete and thought-out product. There were just some things that I thought that were completely unneeded.
Another thing this show tries, and fails, to do, is to add drama. The drama isn't the worst I've ever seen, but I really feel like it clashes a little with the tone of the show. There is some serious stuff in starting maybe a little before the second half of Dragon Pilot, which I just found to not fit in with what they had established the show to be like. It had mostly been a funny, coming of age type story until they added in the drama, and it stuck out. Yes, every story needs at least a little drama here and there to be really excellent, but it did feel a little forced into this show.
One thing I don't have too many complaints about is the ending. I'm sure that other people do have a lot of complaints, but *spoiler* I'm a sucker for a happy ending. Honestly you don't really get more of an anime-esque ending than this one. It does clash a little bit with the more original and unique vibe that the show is going for, but I didn't really find it too disarming.
One thing that this show is not lacking is originality. Anime can be weird, and this is far from the weirdest anime I've seen, but dragons that turn into fighter jets sounds like a pretty cool concept to me. I also absolutely love the art, I think it works extremely well. Art is not the first thing I look for when watching an anime, but when it is unique I really appreciate it. If it just looks like any other anime I don't hate it, but it's just a lot better when it has its own look. Some good examples of this that I have seen are flip flappers, AOT, Mob psycho, Kobayashi's dragon maid, kill la kill, March comes in like a lion, and others. It just makes the show more memorable in a good way when the art is different. I don't even mind if it looks worse than a typical anime, as long as it's different, and this is something this anime does well. I have no complaints with the music, either.
I know I took some jabs at Dragon Pilot, but overall I liked it and thought bit was worth watching, and I think you should give it a try too. It's not going to blow your socks off, but it's a solid show and it is pretty unique as well.
