Review of Evangelion: 3.0 You Can (Not) Redo

I'll preempt this by expositing my relationship with Eva. I watched the series for the first time this year, and didn't like it all that much. I watched EoE, and thought the same. Most of my interaction is through reading various fanfictions for it. That was mostly why I bothered to watch Rebuild—I like the fanfic, and 4.0 just came out. I really liked 1.0. Much of what I disliked about the original was the characters, and how nonsensical many of the plans were. 1.0 fixed many of these problems, in my opinion, as well as looking excellent and having a soundtrack to match. 2.0 continued thetrend. I didn't entirely understand the ending of 2.0, but the soundtrack was immaculate, Asuka's character was better, and everyone else continued being more enjoyable to watch.

So I came into 3.0 with the expectation that that would continue: reasonable characters, a sensible plot (even if it can't just retell the series now), and excellent music and art.

Well, the art and music sure are great. While I think that 2.0s is the best OST of the series, 3.0 has some really great songs, with The Ultimate Soldier standing out to me. Artwise, it looks excellent most of the time, though the CGI can be a bit jarring and out of place.

And that's where my praise ends.

Let's start with the characters. Wait, hah. What characters?

Importantly, there is a 14 year timeskip that occurred between 2.0 and 3.0 that affected every character except for Shinji (who was busy taking a nap). Now, 14 years is a long time, so it would make sense that all the characters would change, yes?

Incorrect. Imagine being stupid and thinking that. Asuka, despite being a 28 year old woman now (that's one year younger than Misato in the series, btw), still acts as if nothing has changed- focuses on piloting, gets mad easily, is unreasonably mad at Shinji for no reason given how they knew each other for what, three months (14 years ago), and the only difference I could tell was swapping out 'baka-' for 'gaki-' when referring to Shinji.

And we're just starting. Misato is unreasonably bitter toward fourteen year-old Shinji, seemingly blaming him for all that's wrong in the world, despite how much she and everyone else were cheering Shinji on at the end of 2.0, and the trend continues throughout most of the cast. Ritsuko is an exposition machine who exists to give Shinji his suicide choker ex machina, the unnamed and new characters that make up the bridge all hate Shinji, Fuyutsuki is another exposition machine, Gendo exists to fulfill his keikaku, and Rei is back to not being interesting.

Out of all the characters (of which there were less than 20 in the entire movie, I do believe), I liked Mari, Sakura, Shinji, and Kaworu the most. In order, Mari, because despite not having a character that's interesting in the slightest, she still manages to stick to it and not be stupid. Sakura, in her four lines manages to be sympathetic to Shinji unlike the rest of the crew. And Shinji, because for someone who just spent 14 years in a coma, he could be doing worse. Not a whole lot worse, mind, but it's possible.

It seems like every character was gutted from 1.0 and 2.0 to make way for soulless tropes that made way for teenage rebellion, instead of the well honed anti-NERV organization this is supposed to be. Nearly every character, despite half or more of their life having passed since they last saw Shinji fucking despise his guts for no reason. I realize I've never hated someone for destroying the world, but I imagine I'd be able to at least get over *some* of it in 14 years. Asuka sure hasn't.

And that's just characters. Let's get started on the plot.

It's completely nonsensical. Why was there a 14 year timeskip if we won't have anything explained for the interim? Misato and most of NERV have decided to split, forming their own organization, and apparently have a few dozen aircraft carriers and destroyers to make a fleet with. Speaking of NERV, it consists of Gendo, Fuyutsuki, Kaworu, and Rei Q. Not exactly a world-ending threat there (or are they????).

After all, apparently NERV, or Seele, or whomever has been working for the past 14 years to get the Fourth Impact to happen. For a few examples, Shinji and Unit 01 got thrown into a coffin in space... somehow, and nobody decided to stop this, or retrieve him, or wake him up... or anything. Just left him there for fourteen years. Also, they have some sort of foundry that can make Evas, judging by the newly created Eva 13, older Eva 9, and presumably hundreds of mass produced Evas that server as fodder for the first thirty minutes of the film.

And they can do all of that but don't have the budget to rebuild their base so it's not just a hole in the fucking ground? Oh, sorry, actually it's a hole that got lifted a few thousand feet into the air... somehow by the Near Third Impact, despite it not causing anywhere near enough damage for that from what I remember of 2.0.

In the end, I see some people praising this movie for returning to the roots of what made Eva great, but I just don't see it. Perhaps I'm just not a 'real' fan, but 3.0 seemed like a nonseniscal mess of strung together plot points, abysmal character writing, and mysteries that were left unsolved for 9 years. At least I can only assume they were answered in 3.0+1.0, as I haven't seen it... but my hopes aren't high.

(Subjective ratings)
Story: 2
Art: 8
Sound: 9
Character: 3
Enjoyment: 2
Overall: 4