Shin Seiki Evangelion

Name: Shin Seiki Evangelion Anime Review
Item: Shin Seiki Evangelion
Rating: 93
Author: Pulpstar

ARCHIVIST: Pulpstar

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LOGGED: 2001-05-19

93%

Editorial Score

Consensus Grade: Vindicated by History ⏳

📊 Production Parameter Matrix Scale 1.0 – 10.0

S+ [STR] Story & Narrative Direction 10 / 10

A [AGI] Animation & Cel Craftsmanship 8 / 10

S+ [INT] Character Dynamics & Cast 10 / 10

A [SYN] Voice Acting & Soundtrack 8 / 10

Consensus: Vindicated by History ⏳

CLASSIFICATION S-TIER

[+] Strengths & Highlights

Almost everything about this is well done, the plot, the characters. Pen Pen is so kawaii! Misato's fan service ;). Asuka's generally dark + brooding manner towards shinji, her pathetic attempts to woo Kaji. All the music too! This got me listening to classical stuff. I now regularly listen to lillum's highest achievements :p Also the bgm is great! Buy IT NOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWW

[-] Vulnerabilities & Flaws

The series ending. This was an absolubtely shocking cop-out of gigantic proportions. The movie ending, whilst being prozacly inducingly depressing to some, was a MUCH better way to finish evangelion.

⤢ Fullscreen • Hover 2001

Vindicated by History ⏳

Modern Consensus: The 2001 review debated the abstract psychological finale, whereas modern critique universally celebrates it as a landmark narrative achievement.

📖 Overview

This is the one that shocked japan. A modern day classic.

🎬 Storyline & Narrative

Shinji Ikari is a a 14 yr old boy , who lives with Misato Katsuragi and pen-pen ;). He is quite shy for a 14 yr old boy, and listens to his DAT player alot.
Anyway, he is called in by his father's agency Nerv when a new and terrible adversary threatens to tun tokyo 3 and the rest of the world into a pile of rubble.
Now Shinji must face not only the mysterious angels, but also his own demons in Shin Seiki Evangelion!!
Nice direction by Hideaki Anno, with some pretty big plot twists ;)

👥 Characters & Dynamics

There is a lovely mixture of characters in here, ranging from the quiet and selfless Rei Ayanami to the brash and brilliant Asuka Soryu.
The minor characters are all developed to a point also, which is nice to see. The teenage characters all have big complexes, normally relating to their parents, as do some of the adult characters.
Probably the most devloped charachter though is Shinji Ikari. He tries to do a full scale psychological analysis of himself more than once in the series, and this could probably lose some viewers.

🎨 Animation & Visual Direction

This is pretty good, the characters are all done nicely. Particularly the females ^_^. The eva units are nicely done and the computer animated effects blend well with the hand-drawn stuff here too, till the last few episodes, when they ran out of money :/
Episode 13 and the movie use some weird (read cheap) techniques at times, which can give the anime a very surreal feeling at times (the plot is often doing this too) - to add to the general weird feeling!

🎵 Voice Acting & Soundtrack

Only seen it dubbed, so i can't compare to japanese voices :/
Gendo's voice is pretty good though. Sounds like hes in charge.
Misatos voice had nice emotion.
The one voice i thought fitted the character REALLY well was Kaji. Almost slightly sleaz-ball, but with kind tones too. The voice actor sounds almost disinterested at times, but then so is Kaji, clever no ^_^.
OK For english voice acting, I've heard Asuka is alot better in the japanese version.

🟢 What We Liked: Almost everything about this is well done, the plot, the characters. Pen Pen is so kawaii! Misato's fan service ;). Asuka's generally dark + brooding manner towards shinji, her pathetic attempts to woo Kaji. All the music too! This got me listening to classical stuff. I now regularly listen to lillum's highest achievements :p Also the bgm is great! Buy IT NOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWW

🔴 What We Disliked: The series ending. This was an absolubtely shocking cop-out of gigantic proportions. The movie ending, whilst being prozacly inducingly depressing to some, was a MUCH better way to finish evangelion.

💬 Early-2000s Fandom Pulse Community Rating: ★ 4.7/5 (3 historical responses)

• Community Praise: Why can't they release Evangelion in a format NOT costing a gajillion dollars? A boxed set would be nice. No wonder they ran out of money, they priced themselves out of the market, and everyone just pirates it as a result. Anyone know of plans for an Evangelion boxed set or DVD collection? Even if they cut it up a bit to make it smaller, anything to make it cheaper! • If your not ultra fussy , consider buying someones old vhs set when they want to get the dvds. This is what I did :)

• Contentious Points: The series ending. This was an absolubtely shocking cop-out of gigantic proportions. The movie ending, whilst being prozacly inducingly depressing to some, was a MUCH better way to finish evangelion.

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