Evangelion: my baptism of fire
On a number of occasions I’ve alluded to my somewhat unconventional (albeit not unique) introduction to anime fandom. While it hasn’t exactly changed my entire outlook on life or anything, it certainly set the course that my viewing and appreciation would take and even to this day shapes my views on many of the aspects that make up the reviews and editorials on this very blog, for better or for worse.
I’m doing this review partly because Neon Genesis Evangelion hasn’t had a full review or editorial here dedicated to it; also it’s a way of putting my current opinions on anime in general into context. Two of these are those of the Apologist and Elitist stances, which hopefully will be accompanying posts in the coming weeks. Everyone’s hobbies and interests have to start somewhere, even if that somewhere is a little embarrassing and inappropriate; this was mine, and I’ll leave it to you to decide how embarrassing and inappropriate an introduction it was.
To understand where I’m coming from here, try to imagine for a moment how I felt back in 2003 or so. At that time my anime viewing pretty much began and ended with having seen Miyazaki’s Laputa on TV at the age of nine or thereabouts. My knowledge and experience as an anime fan was a completely blank slate, although I was exposing myself to the genre of world cinema in a big way for the first time. I was in the middle of a pretty unpleasant course of antidepressants and in the second half of my university degree so my views on a lot of things were in a state of flux and, looking back now with hindsight, in a state of confusion too. Two good friends of mine at uni were into a lot of musical and film/TV stuff that I was into and perhaps because we had so much common ground they took it upon themselves to show me some more eclectic parts of their DVD collections.
With a certain something playing on his PC in one corner (I later deduced that it was an early episode of the second season of Naruto), my uni buddy passed me a cup of coffee and declared “this is a science fiction show about some kids who fight alien-like creatures called Angels in giant robots. Let me know what you think.” The DVD in question was a R1 import of NGE (at this point the only way to get hold of the box set in the UK was via import and a multiregion player). I watched the first episode, and was intrigued. I watched the rest of the first volume and politely requested to see the second. At approximately eight am the following morning, with the final “Congratulations!” ringing in my ears, I felt that I’d seen something extraordinary.
In the months that followed we’d chill out and watch the opening ep of Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi that was on a free DVD on the cover of Newtype, an ep of two of Najica Blitz Tactics (one of us thought it was great, while the other two of us rolled around with laughter), or the full series of FLCL (which is another story). Sometimes we’d listen to some Our Lady Peace or Counting Crows, or play Operation Desert Storm 2 with the OST to Black Hawk Down as BGM but aside from good memories of good times, I remember those days as being a Eureka Moment when one of my biggest interests first took hold. Granted, I never saw much of it coming. Joining the UK-A forums, getting an e-mail from Bateszi with a request to be a reviewer for his fledgling fan site, starting an anime blog of my own. I couldn’t imagine any of this happening, nor can I guess where it would lead in future. To Rob and Seth, I know we stay in touch but you guys probably don’t read this blog. If you do, you have my sincere thanks; here’s hoping we can meet up and hang out together sometime in 2008 and have a laugh like the Good Old Days.
The Review
So, Evangelion. If you didn’t go all tl;dr by now, you’d realise why I’ve found it so hard to look at it objectively that only now have I dared to review it. Since certain aspects of reviewing are anything but objective, I hope you can at least understand why it’s important from my own perspective. Moving away from my own point of view into facts and hard evidence though, is it still an important show?
If only from the perspective of understanding why it’s such a talked-about series, you can’t help but take on board the significance of the strained relations among the creative team and the mythology and rumours surrounding its production. Taking the most simplistic view, the studio ran out of money and did an ending few were satisfied with. The promise of a second chance (and/or a cash injection) prompted a theatrical remake of the ending, which was also controversial.
Ignoring this decade of furore and cash cow milking on the part of Gainax (through excessive merchandise) and ADV (excessive reissues of the episodes on DVD and VHS, although the Platinum Edition is the one worth having), the series itself is an outstanding one, if flawed in places. When memories of seeing it for the first time are as rose-tinted as mine, overlooking its faults requires a conscious effort to avoid; when making an effort to be objective though, I’m still temped to say it’s a well-done piece. The old problem of hype is a root cause of it here, because newcomers are all too often made aware of either its shortcomings or strengths, but rarely both.
I didn’t like EVERYTHING about it, mind, and still don’t. The animation quality was uneven throughout, as was the pacing. It seemed to make lusting after 14-year old girls somehow acceptable. Many of the characters had traits that were exaggerated to the point at which they were representations of archetypes than well-rounded people we can relate to. It might not even stand up to what came later if it were to be made today: the likes of RahXephon, Gasaraki and Eureka Seven are more skilful in terms of portraying how real people would behave, in a believable manner; they are also more consistent in quality. The perennial Rah/Eva debate brings up the question “would NGE be the more famous of the two if it wasn’t made first?”, for example. I suspect it wouldn’t, but since it WAS made first, that point is purely academic. I will say though that Rah looks prettier, has more believable characters and is a more consistent product overall, so if I were to stick my neck out and make a choice I’d say Rah is the more enjoyable series - I’ll get around to reviewing that properly in due course too. In getting back to the main point that makes up this latter half of this post, NGE is nevertheless still worth watching and still worth respecting - even though, to put it into the simplest of terms, certain bits of it suck.
The story isn’t as original as it might seem at first glance: the religious imagery and subplots were intended to be superficial but only became topic of discussion when certain viewers (namely overseas ones with a working knowledge of Christian and Jewish lore) read between the lines and sought deeper meaning in aspects that had no deeper meaning. They ignored the simpler messages of facing up to responsibility and, like their Japanese otaku cousins, argued over trivialities such as who killed Kaji. As I discovered with ef-a tale of memories, which incidentally uses artistic techniques and plot devices similar to Anno-isms, there are very few *new* stories; the fun comes from seeing old ideas being blended together and told in a new and refreshing way. In that sense NGE did indeed reinvent the mecha genre and offered an exciting alternative approach to storytelling in sci-fi.
Unfortunately an ‘emo’ lead, a blunt approach to presenting its ideas that came across as clumsiness, obtuseness for the sake of being obtuse and sidestories that made themselves out to be more important than they were obscured this by making it fundamentally flawed in several areas. It makes for frustrating viewing at times because it was at first playful and pandered to the drooling otaku (as exemplified by the promises of fan service in the next-episode previews) but later on moodily dared you to enjoy or even understand it; the creative mind’s thought processes acted like a tsundere’s character development working in reverse.
I lay my praises and criticisms alike at the feet of Hideaki Anno, who I see as being prone to bad judgement but also prone to being a genius. He knew his storytelling approach was risky and self-indulgent; I don’t necessarily think he should have done all of it in the way that he did, but he had personal reasons for his semi-deliberate mistakes. The bottom line is that I love his daring and the Anno-isms: the odd camera angles, the abstract animation styles and the self-confidence in his direction that enters the realms of over-confidence, are not the core of the story but get the messages across in a way that had not been done before; the thing is, they often worked and when they didn’t, you can’t help but admire their inventiveness.
The groundbreaking mecha designs (which are awesome partly because they aren’t mecha at all), Sagisu’s excellent soundtrack and Sadamoto’s iconic character designs all work together to make it great. The one aspect that makes it both epic win and epic fail simultaneously is the creator’s brazen and deliberate attempt to make an animated science fiction series into not only a successful commercial product but a successful artistic one and a ‘fuck you’ aimed at the fan culture he both worked for and derided. Anno is a complicated man but he’s a gifted film maker too. I can’t NOT respect him, even when I don’t like what he’s doing at the time.
In Closing
NGE isn’t perfect. It isn’t even original or the best show of its type; it is however an important and therefore worthwhile viewing experience. For me personally, its mystery-thriller elements made me appreciate stuff that makes you think, and made me into something of an elitist. Its combination of glaring faults and moments of brilliance taught me to overlook the negatives to appreciate the positives, and enjoy something that was both flawed and brilliant; this was the beginning of my life as an apologist. It made me the fan I am today but also did the same for others. I can sympathise with newbies who got into anime through NGE as I did: those people who declare it to be ‘the best evar’. It isn’t. All I can say to those people is, give it time and you’ll see other shows that do the same thing, perhaps more effectively: Rah did the mystery and epic scale better, Gasaraki handled the politics more convincingly and Eureka Seven had a more likeable lead with a more engaging romantic subplot.
NGE is however a landmark of its respective genres, if not the best one; it formed for a number of us a springboard to a wider and more varied experience of the medium as an alternative to Pokemon, Studio Ghibli and Shonen Jump. I don’t recommend it because it’s the best; I recommend it because it shows how an animated story can succeed and fail, how a sci-fi drama can be told. Controversy aside it still matters and I’ll still look at it as something special.
From the point of view of you, the reader, this is either the best post I’ve made to date, or the worst. I honestly don’t know which.
Posted on December 31st, 2007 @ 12:44 am
You and me both, man, you and me both. I’d like to think that like you, I can recognize the parts of Eva that do in fact “suck,” though I can usually come up with a reason why I still love it anyway. RahXephon, for instance, is much more polished and arguably balanced and coherent where Eva is raw and confusing. But when that’s your first anime it’s very hard to not look at other shows through its lens, knowing what anime is capable of. It’s given me a prediliction toward artsiness and serious drama ever since.
Posted on December 31st, 2007 @ 3:53 am
[...] wins this year with daring, inventive directing. As both Martin and I have discovered, they (most likely the double team of Shin Oonuma and Akayuki Shinbo) are carrying the artsy and [...]
Posted on December 31st, 2007 @ 12:59 pm
Eva was part of my own introduction to anime, and I still find it hard to assess objectively. Nostalgia’s a powerful thing. ‘Epic win and epic fail’ pretty much sums it up.
Posted on January 2nd, 2008 @ 3:13 am
Man, where to start…to many things to respond to.
Eva was also my first anime, although I have far less appreciation for it than you seen to. Nevertheless, good job summarizing the various coups and failures of the series. Certainly no one can deny that it was a highly influential series in many ways.
Posted on January 2nd, 2008 @ 5:48 pm
@Mike: it sounds to me like the series has affected you in the same way it did me (in that I often find myself agreeing with the posts and comments you make!). I’d definitely agree that Rah is more polished though - it seemed to have a clearer idea of where it wanted to go.
@IKnight: nostalgia’s the key here I guess. No matter how many details in the show don’t sit right, I can’t bring myself to hate it because it’s the point where my fandom began - I simply didn’t have anything to compare it with at the time, and those rose-tinted feelings kinda stuck.
@Orion: thanks. You’re dead on with the influence thing; as Mike said, it’s a very ‘raw’ production so while there’s no denying it was a first in many aspects, shows that came later used the ideas more effectively. With any luck the Rebuild movies will keep the things it did right and correct some of what it did wrong. Here’s hoping anyway!