Review of Neon Genesis Evangelion

Evangelion is still one of my all time favorite anime shows... hell, it's one of my favorite shows period. I've seen it close to twenty times... all of which have happened during college. And considering it leaves me slightly depressed after viewing it, it may have not been the best idea for me. Nevertheless, it still had struck a huge chord with me over the huge dissection of these extremely real feeling characters. It's not so much how they deal with situations in the show as much as the deal with relationships in each other that make themselves feel oddly familiar in a way. Story:10/10

As many people have probably said before, Evangelion is generally not what people think going into it. It's a mecha anime from the outside, but turns into something more of a psychological thriller once becoming admirsed in it. It lends itself too many disturbing and suggestive imagery that are meant to read as interpretations for both story and writing.

The story isn't as clear cut as most anime, since even what I believe for it to be as its main purpose might be read as differently to someone else. It is one of those stories that I believe is suppose deliver a new perspective rather than carry out a memorable story arch. I say this because, once again, going into it, you might see a narrative forming that will pull you into its story, that will then flip itself completely upside down in the last couple of episodes. It will be enough to make you question everything you ever thought you knew about the world and it's lore that has been given to you. Upon first viewing, it was the first anime that made me go, "what the hell did I just watch”.

However, unlike most serious changes in narrative, it was intentional, and felt intentional. That's what made me so fascinated by it and why I kept coming back to it.

Shinji's character is met with all these different personalities, all of which have different stories and demons. In different regards, Shinji needs to open himself up to get to understand them better, and the more he tends to do so, we realise that why both he as well as ourselves at time tend to close ourselves off. The world at times can be hurtful and painful, and this strange halfway into full apocalypse world that these characters reside in is no different, with the exception of strange looking alien life forms and riding a robot based from your mother's corpse.

Art: 9/10

I'm a huge sucker for the lower resolution, faded color look of 90s cells. Since I'm a 90s kid, I'm not sure if it has to do for reasons of nostalgia, but I absolutely love it. There is a huge quality of this decade that I think was perfectly matched for this show. It may sound far-fetched, but I think that's part of the reason why I personally don't like or think the rebuild series works. And I also say this in regards to the show's art.
Having run through Evangelion for the first time in the summer after high school, I was already having a weird nostalgia for the times that have now come to a close, going back as far as childhood.

Sound :10/10

The entire soundtrack is a masterpiece. Between the unsettling drifts, the soft jazz in the background during the lighter moments, to incorporating already existing classic pieces of orchestrated composition, the music sets itself right with the show, foreboding and thoughtful. The some of the sound effects, such as the Angel Rafael's cry still gives me nightmares when thinking about them. Like all of the things to come out of EVA, it really does get at you with unexpected surprises.

Characters: 10/10

The characters for Evangelion, to me, appear as extensions of a body of problems, but I don't mean that in any way as a negative. Since I personally read that the show's intention is more of an impact statement to the world than rather a memorable narrative, every single established character in Evangelion seems to have a purpose for the overall take away you get from this show.

For instance, Shinji, while unnerving, is a quite complex character in how he is written and delivered. The loss of his mother to the absence and neglect of his father lead him into his own head space as a teenager as he is thrown into responsibilities he doesn't want to have, yet has no control over. Along with the life threatening dangers that comes with piloting a huge robot, he also is brought into situations with adults and kids his age that he seemingly never really had before until he started to work with the EVAs. As he interacts more with these characters, the more he somehow taps into the deep issues that each of them are experiencing in this post yet pre-apocalyptic world. Yet despite it being of a time and space that is completely different to us, all of these characters problems are human and familiar. Even in the case of Rei, where she herself is not exactly human, is suffering from the loss of identity in a way that the audience can understand and relate to.

To me, there is no inherent resolution for these characters, even at the ending, but as mentioned before, I don't believe that it was the show's intention to inherently show a finished narrative existing. If I believe anything that has a type of closure, it's Shinji's closing statement of "My life is worth living”. Whether or not you believe that the entire story you had just seen was an illusion or a reality, the overall goal of this story and its character to me is the realisation that no matter what you decide to do with yourself, you will have an impact on the world. And life would never be the same without you in it.

Enjoyment: 7/10

You're probably wondering why my score is so low for enjoyment compared to the rest of the answers and also due to the fact that I said that this was one of my favorite shows? Well, as mentioned before, this show gets kind of rough on the material, and leaves me in a weird yet insightful state after watching it. I'm not saying that Evangelion isn't enjoyable, between the slice of life and also mystery that takes place in a larger portion of the show. However, when it falls to the end, I feel myself getting so invested with these characters that everything kind of slips and falls with them. Not to discredit the ending at all, since it is literally my favorite ending to any show I've ever seen over how deeply it dives into each character, and pulls out an extremely optimistic way of overcoming ones demons in so many different ways. The ending is a really beautiful way of wrapping up this show, but before that, you have to get through the heavy stuff. And that's not as fun to watch as an audience, but the writer in me can't help but be absolutely fascinated by it.