Re-Watched Evangelion for Raid "Preparation"

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

Oh, I was enjoying OG Eva alright. Shinji is a good kid, and I think the hate towards him is rather unwarranted. The whole Misato/Ristuko/Kaji dynamic was super engaging, and I even like Maya, Makoto and Shigeru.

But then the show stopped being about any of that, and it became about a pretentious nihilistic message about the end of the world, and how Shinji is a coward, despite him coming through every single fucking time up to this point.

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It's been awhile since I watched Eva and End of Eva, but the impression I came away with was that the guy who wrote it was Going Through Some Shit and it bled into his anime pretty hard. I still enjoyed it, more or less.

But yeah, Shinji is a good kid going through some hard times, and I think ultimately he does the right thing.

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

And that's the thing in the end: If we consider Eva as an allegory for all these philosophical concepts, I can see why it can be interesting as an exercise... but as a story? I still think it's not very good when it comes down to trying to wrap all these ideas in a way that makes said story complete or even reasonable, at least when we're talking about OG and End. It's a mess, and makes me wonder if they themselves delved into something they just didn't fully understand. I can respect the attempt, but the story only ever got so far.

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They certainly tried to insert these concepts to make the overall plot feel more profound. However, I don't think they fully committed to these concepts until very late in the show, which I believe is around episodes 25 and 26.

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Originally Posted by TeresaFortell

We cannot truly recognise each other as free individuals until we recognise the impossibility of fully understanding each other, since the inability to fully understand each other creates the aforementioned conflicts. In other words, knowing that we cannot truly fully understand each other is the step towards recognising each other as individuals.

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This is really interesting, and for once, I can see some logic to it. I still believe relationships are also a basic part of the human experience, and thus Hegel's idea needs to reconcile with the fact that such bonds can overcome complete understanding and flourish, but I don't wanna walk out of my depth here xD

Thanks for your posts, they're all really interesting reads :)

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Originally Posted by TeresaFortell

SEELE

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Fuck em https://cdn.betterttv.net/emote/60c9...c3e7e3/1x.webp

I don't remember Shinji being useless for more than about 25% of End's content given he isn't central to several scenes. Once he sees the particularly gruesome result of a certain battle close to mid film, his sympathetic nervous system is off the charts the rest of the film.

And I mean that battle itself is a great example, it takes up a decent chunk of screen time.

I remember thinking the show was kinda mid and not understanding the hype over it after finally getting to watch it on Adult Swim way back when. Never saw the movies or Rebuilds, but that's because the show its self didn't do enough to make them worth seeking out.

Much like the Nier and FF11 raids, the Eva one is just going to end up another series I don't bother doing (and people wonder why others are so allergic to unlocking more alliance raids when half of them are collabs).

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Originally Posted by DiaDeem

This is really interesting, and for once, I can see some logic to it. I still believe relationships are also a basic part of the human experience, and thus Hegel's idea needs to reconcile with the fact that such bonds can overcome complete understanding and flourish, but I don't wanna walk out of my depth here xD

Thanks for your posts, they're all really interesting reads :)

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One thing about SEELE and NERV is that they are both sides of the same coin. The show tried to present NERV as the overall good guy in the anime, but it was a front for SEELE, and its attempts to stop the angels from reaching Lilith were carried out under instructions laid out in the Dead Sea Scrolls. NERV, under Gendo's guidance, was also attempting to trigger an impact. However, unlike SEELE's goal of elevating humanity, Gendo only wanted to reunite with Yui via the impact. The grief from the bereavement made the man desperate, after all.

This dichotomy between SEELE and Gendo's NERV, in terms of the "why" in seeking another impact, may be seen as a reference to Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy. In this writing, Nietzsche presents two opposing concepts: Dionysianism and Apollonianism. Dionysianism refers to the Greek god Dionysius, who was the god of wine, chaos, and madness. Nietzsche uses Dionysius’ characteristics to represent the death of the individual. In Nietzsche’s view, this is the state of an “intoxication”, and in this state, “their heightened forms cause the subjective to dwindle into complete self-oblivion”, resulting in “nature” in reconciliation with “its prodigal son, man” (Nietzsche and Smith, 2000). Using Schopenhauer’s Hedgehog’s Dilemma, Nietzsche believes the dilemma is resolved through the “oneness” of all individuals, culminating in the death of the “ego”, and the principium individuationis, or the principle of individuation (Nietzsche and Smith, 2000 & Schopenhauer, Adrian Del Caro and Janaway, 2015, p. 584). This is what SEELE believes: that the death of the individual and their “ego” through synthesis can end the pain that we, the individuals, cause each other.

Regarding Apollonianism, it refers to the Greek god Apollo, characterised as the god of light and order. Here, Nietzsche presents it as another state. In this state, the boundaries of individuals, determined by "me" and "you", are clearly defined. The "ego" exists due to the set boundaries, and thus, the principium individuationis also exists. Putting this into the context of eva, it makes Gendo's motive of triggering an impact clearer. He wanted to create a synthesis of all individuals, in which all would be united, so that the boundaries between himself and Yui could be removed. Therefore, he was driven by his desire for his wife, Yui. Yet, such a desire cannot exist with the death of the "ego" and the individual (Friedrich Nietzsche and Douglas Smith, 2000). Therefore, viewed from this angle, Gendo's NERV is portrayed as the opposite of SEELE, in which they, despite also wanting to throw the world into a Dionysian state, are portrayed as the opposite of SEELE.


References:
Friedrich Nietzsche and Douglas Smith (2000). The Birth of Tragedy.
Hegel, G.W.F. (1807). The Phenomenology of Spirit.
Schopenhauer, A., Adrian Del Caro and Janaway, C. (2015). Schopenhauer: Parerga and Paralipomena.

Didnt the writer say he only used the religious theme visuals because they look cool? Lol
Its kinda like the episode of south park where the kids write a book of disgusting profanity nonsense and everyone reads into it way too far lol.
But i do like that eva captures the hopelessness and misguidedness of a generation. Lack of purpose and direction besides what is forced on you. Everything falling apart around you with the weight of the world threatening to crush you at every turn. Forces beyond your control you can only face with something also beyond your understanding. Relationships are scary, awkward, and dangerous at worst, and at best they are transactional to cope with pain.
Fun to think of how these ideas may be reflected in evercold.

There's a great video essay on youtube about eva and gurren lagann/kill la kill as answers to eva. Saying, be shamelessly individualistic, there's great power in being yourself. Relationships dont have to be awkward and painful, be hot, assert your personality and make a move. The overcomplicated sci fi details dont matter, nonsense is how we roll.

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Originally Posted by Wildheaven182

Didnt the writer say he only used the religious theme visuals because they look cool? Lol
Its kinda like the episode of south park where the kids write a book of disgusting profanity nonsense and everyone reads into it way too far lol.
But i do like that eva captures the hopelessness and misguidedness of a generation. Lack of purpose and direction besides what is forced on you. Everything falling apart around you with the weight of the world threatening to crush you at every turn. Forces beyond your control you can only face with something also beyond your understanding. Relationships are scary, awkward, and dangerous at worst, and at best they are transactional to cope with pain.
Fun to think of how these ideas may be reflected in evercold.

There's a great video essay on youtube about eva and gurren lagann/kill la kill as answers to eva. Saying, be shamelessly individualistic, there's great power in being yourself. Relationships dont have to be awkward and painful, be hot, assert your personality and make a move. The overcomplicated sci fi details dont matter, nonsense is how we roll.

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It seems to me that there is a shift from artistic expression to capitalisation in the animation medium. The old Eva is but one of many 90s animations that delve deeper into these profound topics. One other shining example that comes to mind is Lain. You could hardly find these elements in most modern-day titles, and it would perhaps be attributed to either a change in environment or a change in audience reception.

The religious references in general can be considered superficial. Its actually sci fi elements like AT fields, LCL, and the entry plugs that are used to explore the aformentioned influences as well as, imo, Jung.

Also if those are truly themes of Gurren well, there's tons of anime that looks and sounds like that including Rebuid. So people should enjoy those. Eva is commonly misunderstood anyway because there is no "answer" to it. Despite its conclusion, throughout Eva we see through AT fields for example how they not only reinforce individualism but act as conduits for collaboration. Eva does not dismiss symbiotic relationships or collectivism, in fact it explores the pro and cons.

I'm with you, rewatched it recently too and was like "Why did I like this back in the day and why does it get so much praise today?" Like for the most part it's a fairly decent anime with it's glaring issues, but then it just nose dives when they throw in the rest of the religious stuff. Maybe it's because modern me has since played/watched other things that tackle that stuff better or more my style (the Xeno-series for example). Maybe I need to watch another good mecha anime to hype me back up (any suggestions?)

I do think to help the raid series that we need to go to the Eva world and not them coming to us, I feel like that will be the better option, since Nier and even XI are just kinda there