Before this begins I'm going to have to go through a lot of intro for this. Now, Gurren Lagann was the my first stop in watching a bunch of the old anime series that a lot of people claim are classics to see if they still hold up today. That means that I've never watched any of it before when I was younger, and I only watched it after getting about 200 series under my belt so that I can have a good idea of what the anime/manga landscape is like. Also, I do realize that some claims I will be making are a product of the time that Gurren Lagann was made, but that doesn't take away from the fact that it factors into how people will view it today. Tl'dr on the bottom. So with all that said, let's begin.

------General Plot Overview------

Gurren Lagann is a mecha action series that finds its place atop a lot of people's favorite anime lists both now and when it first aired. It's set in a world where people live underground because some animal things are oppressing them with their mechas, until one brave dude and the cowardly MC break out onto the surface to find a new life. There, they meet new friends, acquire mechas and begin to fight back, all the way until they free humanity in a battle of ever increasing stakes. Now, I like to split the series into three general portions: coward MC phase, sad MC phase and time skip phase. Each of them has a slightly different tone, with the time skip representing the biggest shift in pacing. Now it's here in the pacing where the first problem start to appear. I'll be honest when I say that the first 4 or 5 episodes of the series are very slow and boring. The series only starts to get a little interesting at the start of the sad MC phase, and only becomes a decent show after the time skip. By today's standards, most people would drop a series if they don't like it by the 3rd episode, so having to wait 12 to get to the really good parts is a lot to ask for for a lot of people.

------Characters and the Negatives------

Next up is the characters, which is an area that I am understandably disappointed in. No one really grows at all in the series besides the MC and maybe like two other characters, but both of those happen only after the time skip. Everyone else is given no time to develop and stay essentially the same from beginning to end, which always makes for a boring show. What's worse is that 70% of the side characters are pretty much all the same character but with reskins. A lot of stuff near the end happens with these characters where the show was trying to be more emotional, but I couldn't help but think that none of the characters deserved it. If I didn't care for them in the beginning, then why would I care for them at the end just because one sad thing happened to them? The most frustrating thing I found though was the role of Yoko in the whole story. She's the third main character we meet and is there for pretty much the whole story, but she does absolutely nothing except act as a way to make other characters more depth (and not even by that much), and she only gets one episode of development the whole way through. Now I said that this was understandable since I never really expected much of the characters in a plot based shounen like this, so take everything I said above as you will.

Some more things I dislike about the show are that a lot of time is wasted on showing flashbacks, recaps and the like, though like I said earlier, it's more of a product of its time than anything. So while at its time it was fine, as an anime viewer today it takes away a lot from the series. Everything else is more of a taste issue I'd say. I didn't find the increasing stakes to be that interesting, and it actually made me less interested in the story than more. I would have been fine with saving humanity and the world, but the fact they had to bring it to the whole universe was a little jarring. Also the mole is just plot armor for when they have no idea what to do. The action also doens't really stand up to anything that we can watch today, and at a lot of points I just thought to myself, "Man, I could be watching another show that does this thing much better than Gurren Lagann."

------The Positives------

So then is there anything good about the series? Well of course, or else it wouldn't be a classic. Almost everything post time skip is pretty good, with actually interesting plot and characters having to face genuine moral dilemmas. Characters actually grow and change, and the world starts to be more well developed when compared to the first half. There is also a fun vibe to the show, so depending on your tastes you can really enjoy the comedy. Other than that, it's pretty generic overall.

------Summary------

So to sum this whole thing up, do I think Gurren Lagann is a must watch for people who are just starting to watch anime today: no not really. It just feels like an old generic shounen anime with parts of deeper storytelling and character development. With everything out there today, both old and new, I can say that Gurren Lagann doesn't stand out anymore. However, that doesn't mean that its a bad show. It does it's job fine and tells the story it wants to tell. I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more when I was younger and more into shounen than I am now. So I'd say if shounen is not your thing then avoid this one, but if it is, then give it a try. Maybe you'll end up enjoying it.

------Tl;dr------
Cons:
-Very slow start for 4-5 episodes with it not getting good till the midway point
-Poor character writing where no one changes
-A lot of emotional beats seem undeserved
-A lot of recap and flashbacks
-Other shows do what it does, only better

Pros:
-Really good second half where characters grow and are challenged
-Fun tone that fits well with certain people
-General feel of constantly going to bigger things
-MC gets good overall development over the story

Verdict:
-Don't watch if you don't like shounen a lot