Oh boy do I love Eva

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Sleep tight

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I really don’t want to Google ‘evangelion clones’ or similar

What is the reason Gendo can’t ensoul a clone with Yui’s metaphysical bits? Is it stuck in the EVA for good until mankind is defragmented? Does he just enjoy playing the long game so much that he goes along with the dead seas script rather than take the obvious step?

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ive never watched Eva and i suspect i might hate it if i do

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Avoid it, for it is rich in suck

Granted I saw it in like 2004 as a thoroughly grown adult which I think matters

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Yeah it sounds like it would have been my jam in high school.

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Argh

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Ooof!

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Nah, Eva is pretty cool

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I watched Eva when I was in high school, that seems like the right time to watch it.

I am so hyped for the new Godzilla.
HYPE

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So steins;gate

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I’ve been thinking about Eva. Specifically, what if Evangelion’s original TV run had a second season?

I don’t think it’ll count as a spoiler if I remark that the first half of Evangelion is a sci-fi action show, albeit one that focuses on the mental state of the characters. Most episodes revolve around this really, truly weird giant monster, and The Eva Team has to come up with a solution around a specific problem. In a way, the best parts of Evangelion are the best parts of a Star Trek series. Sure, you’ve got 13 year old kids in giant robots angry that no one loves them, but there’s also a lot of scenes of the adults coming up with crazy solutions to crazy problems. And I love it for that.

The second half, where everything really, really, really gets weird and depressing, though. We all know the ending of Evangelion is awfully abrupt, and the movie version of those same events is essentially the opposite of the original ending, so we can’t say one is an extended look at the other. But what I’m asking myself is, is the quick descent into depression and madness what causes Evangelion to stick out, or would the breathing room offered by another 26 episodes have been enough for them to write the gradual slide of each character into desperate personalities?

I think the question is relevant because not only is Evangelion one of the few anime to do this, it’s one of the few pieces of any media that does what it does: chart the story’s heroes’ downward spiral. What makes Evangelion stand out is that each character has a breaking point, and that breaking point gets crossed a number of times with each important character. Nobody comes home from war unchanged. Why would the men and women who fight Gods be any less apt to feel that same weight?

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Eva is at a perfect length when you tac on the End of movie.

It’s not even that weird. Everything fits, and everything works.

It’s a damn near perfect piece of fiction.

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Eva is still basically perfect and haters can go watch outlaw star or something.

The movie reboots is bad tho

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I don’t know if those count as “media” or not, but downward spiral plots are really, really common in literary novels and theater. And yeah, it’s pretty surprising that this highbrow trope ended up driving this very popular and extremely blunt piece of mass entertainment. I think it’s partly that teenagers correctly perceive the structure as highbrow and prestigious, without realizing that the crude and histrionic execution makes it trashy regardless. Basically it’s a really odd variety of middlebrow.

Anyway, I still legit like the first half of Evangelion. The setting and the monster/mecha designs and the slow buildup of tension are fantastic. That’s the other reason Evangelion is popular: the first half had these fun Star-Wars-y positive qualities. My favorite episode is the one where they use the high-powered laser to snipe the crystal.

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My head just about explodes to hear two people use the word “perfect” to describe Evangelion. I mean, there are many reasons to like it for the glorious mess that it is, but “perfect” and “Evangelion” are not words that belong on the same continent. I mean really, the 2 minutes of footage in the elevator, that is part of perfection?

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You’re gonna give low hanging fruit? Yes those elevator scenes were that long to make the viewer uncomfortable. The silence unbearable so when it’s broken there’s drama but relief in the fact that the characters are communicating.

It’s quality editing right there and that technique is discussed here:

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Evangelion’s whole modus operandi in the second half is to paper over all its flaws with vague unstated justification about why that flaw actually is artsy and for the greater good. The “maybe we can justify this scene as silent tension” is one of them – also this comes back to the fake-highbrowness since prestigious directors do use such long static shots.

But the main trick it actually pulls along these lines is the implication of “grand conspiracy/mystery that we want the fans to figure out themselves”. Characters are constantly taking actions that have no logical motivation, don’t add up, and/or clash with their previous stated personality and goals, but they’ve successfully got their fanbase to absorb it all as clues to the grand mystery, and enjoy the construction of highly complex and twisted fanon edifices that somehow explain every nonsensical detail.

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You’re wrong.
It would take me a grand thesis and hours to dig in and mull over everything, but you are wrong. If you watch carefully there is very little mystery.
Eva is very concise but fairly straight forward. If you don’t understand the motivations, watch it again. They’re fairly clear.

I have literally no idea what you mean by nonsensical detail here. They symbolism used in Eva is actually really impressive, one of it’s strongest assets.

Instead of stating general gobbily gook, point out what your’e saying.

I can see why the elevator scene didn’t make sense, it didn’t until I gave it some thought, but I think I answered that clearly for you.

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I remember big problems around Gendo’s behavior in particular. He’s one of the puppetmasters driving many of the plot beats so they need him to act in various contradictory ways episode by episode depending on needs. It’s very unclear what he thinks he’s doing in the early episodes jerking Shinji back and forth, for example. I think he shows up less in the second half, and when he does, it’s quite fragmentary and confusing, even though in theory he’s still running the show.

Gendo is basically less a person than an icon of harsh judgemental maleness to create reactions in the rest of the cast, and well as a central hub to tie together all the loose ideas in the plot.