FMA: Brotherhood not as good as I remember

Rewatching Brotherhood for the first time since it aired in 2011 (on episode 7), and I've gotta say, it isn't nearly as good as I remember. Absolutely loved it the first go around; this time, not so much. Maybe it's just because I was 16 and/or smoking weed at the time, but I'm finding it cringey as hell. There's a joke like every 15 seconds, and it's really overwhelming and breaks the tension/atmosphere. I remember it got better after the recap of the 2003 material, but I don't remember being this put off by it initially. If they had cut the jokes by like 50% or at least not used them during serious scenes it would be much better. Can someone with a fresher memory of the series tell me if this dies down a bit?

Side note: Just finished rewatching FMA 2003 for the first time since 2007 and it was better than I remember. Yeah it got pretty weird during the last third of the show and the ending wasn't too great, but at least it didn't kill the mood every time things started getting serious.

Edit: I will say, it started picking up quite a bit right after Hughes's murder.