Review of Neon Genesis Evangelion

I'll be honest. I'm one of those people who first heard of this anime from various memes from it's opening. Upon first watching watching it 3 to 4 months ago (on an illegal stream site because dammit they don't have this anime on Neflix, Crunchyroll, Funimation and/or VRV) I definately liked it but I am a little salty about a few things. This review IS by my memory reviewing a 26 episode long anime that's around 20-25 years old that I've only seen though once (and a half) so don't take is review for granted. Story: The story is good assuming you can comprehend it. The conceptis that angels are attacking humanity and the japanese government needs the help of 3 anxey teens to pilot giant mecha robots known as Evas to fight against the angels and hope for the best (hmm kinda like Attack On Titan with Gundam elements now that I think about it) Don't think that the story is gonna be like a fun battle shounen that you can turn your brain off and enjoy. It's anything BUT that! The story can get extremely complicated and confusing as fuck if your not paying close attention and there's a fuck load of phsylogical moments and religious symbolism is pretty much everywhere. (Some of them aren't very subtle if your a religious person)
Maybe it's just me but there were some episodes that to me felt a bit pointless. They're not fillers but sometimes the story goes nowhere to me and that ending is utter garbage in my opinion.

Art:
It looks alright for a 1995 anime. The animation is very limited and there were a lot of times when animation would be non existent. Seriously sometimes all you see is one still frame for a good 15 seconds and unless the characters are talking to each other, these moments can feel very awkward. At least the visuals themselves look pretty tho... up until the last episode. A lot of anime do get worse in animation and visuals in later episodes but here, it just felt like all of the budget was thrown out the window. At least 25 out of 26 episodes look decent enough.
Also Sega Saturn sponsorship!

Sound:
One thing I fucking love about this show is the opening. Memes aside, the opening theme is fucking awesome! It perfectly sets the mood of the whole show, starting a little eerie but overtime getting a little more catchy and flashy. The in show music is, just there. It definately makes some of the EVA vs angels fights tense but overall, they are just kind of... there. For the sake of having an easier time to comprehend the story I watched Evangelion dubbed so for english voice acting, it is a little off. almost as if the delivery for some characters weren't quite right. I can forgive it for this anime cuz it's a 90s anime and back then, The only well known anime that had good English dubs in my opinion were Dragon Ball Z, Yu Yu Hakusho and Cowboy Bebop. Professional dubs weren't much of a thing back then especially considering 4kids was the dominant anime dubber at the time.

Characters:
One pulberizing character in the whole series is non other than the main character, Shinji Ikari! He's as natorious for being one of the worst anime protagonist as Kirito from SAO. Unlike Kirito tho, I don't think Shinji is that bad. I mean yeah he's winey as fuck but if I was in the position he was in, I probably would hate myself too. Imagine being a 14 year old who's forced by your fatcher who doesn't give a shit about your existence suddenly giving you a task that is crucial to human kind and if you fail, you pretty much doomed all of humanity. I would want to kill myself!
As for the other characters, Well Rei has a cool backstory but lacks personality imo, Asuka is fucking annoying, Misato is probably my favorite Evangelion character, Shinji's father is unlikeable but intentionally so idk how to feel about him, I also like the 2 classmate characters and that blond chick with glasses is cool I guess.

Overall: I don't quite agree with the notion that Evangelion is 'da best anime ever'. The plot can be unneedingly convoluted, the visuals ran into a brick wall by the last episode and the some characters are unlikeable. That being said, I do consider Evangelion a good/great anime. Even if the story is convoluted, there is a lot of meat to the story with the correct mindset, the music can range from okay to amazing and the characters definately feel very realistic. (unlikeable or not.)
If your looking for a mecha anime with phsyological aspects, religious symbloism and realistic characters and you can shrug off the okay to subpar visuals, I highly recommend Evangelion to you. Availabilty is a little stingey because at the time of this review, Evangelion has yet to be available in a legit video streaming service. You'll have to either buy a physical DVD/Blu Ray collection copy or view it on an illegal streaming site like Kissanime or 9anime.