11mo ago

Just started watching Evangelion, no one told me it was funny

Misato has ice, snacks and 50 GALLONS OF BEER in her fridge lmao. Mood. Her car is wrecked and there's a monster that might kill her and all she can think about is car payment loans lol. She's just like me fr. Well, except for the groomer vibes she's giving off.

I'm sure it's gonna get depressing very soon, I hear all the characters suck and half of them are sexpests. Seems like you get a pretty decent understanding of why they suck though. I already dislike Shinji though, dude get in the fucking robot the world is ending. I guess sucking is hereditary, because his dad sucks too, fucking dumbass. Dude if your son is "the chosen one" when it comes to piloting these things and you're all "I must sacrifice everything for the mission" then sacrifice some free time to be with your son so your top pilot is less psychologically messed up.

NERV is in dire need of a psych team though, insane that there isn't a dedicated therapist to help the pilots deal with trauma.

Also it's so beautiful! I miss old anime like this and Akira, everything just gets to breathe. It's so pretty every frame is a painting. The women have noses and they look like women, which is also impressive. Sadly there's still only one body type women can have, but at least they can look humanoid.

Anyway, bit idea: Guy who only watches Evangelion for the fights.

Edit: Okay so Shinji managed to make two friends and they get sent away. The dude needs a support network, how incompetent can his dad be? "Huh my best pilot is getting some friends? Can't have that, we need him to be as mentally unstable as possible!"
Dude needs to be fired.

Double edit: Now on an episode where an EVA goes berserk and tries to attack the dad and he just stands there looking at it and then when it breaks thru to him he's shocked. The guy is absolutely not beating "himbo, but not actually hot, just dumb" allegations

115 comments

shinji is a child soldier though, the popular opinion of him sucking seems to forget that
I hope you enjoy it and eventually watch the remakes, it's all good stuff
- I just don't understand why the child soldier won't just get in the giant murder blood robot he doesn't know how to control, the robot that has a traumatizing neural interface which makes the pilot feel the pain of the robot's injuries. The one that also makes the robot go berserk and kill everyone nearby if he's not focused (happens multiple times). His abusive absentee dad said he needs to! Didn't he read the script??
  
  Yeah dude, the world is ending, get in the robot.
- Yeah I get that he's just a kid and it seems like everything is fucked in his past and present, but dude, get in the robot please the world is ending.
  He has pretty obvious PTSD and attachment issues though. Probably depression too.
  Just another point for his dad sucking: Children should be easy to radicalise, but he can't even get his own son to be a fanatic. Dude is straight out of a IASIP episode, he's what would happen if Dennis were to try to become a warlord
  
  Seems like it was a show with a lot of mocking discourse though, like a lot of people saying it was bad, but it seems like it's very good. There's so much going on
  
  His dad is just some asshole basically, you gotta put some effort in and have some charisma to indoctrinate a kid, Shinjis is basically a big walking billboard that he'd do anything for some verbal approval and a pat on the back and his dads too stubborn and dumb to even pick up on that being the clear play.
  
  Look at real indoctrination of child soldiers. They will force children to murder, then nurture and “heal” them, and often times it’s their loved ones.
  Evangelion, the TV show, was on TV so it had more restrictions. But I feel like their idea of indoctrination was getting Misato to sexually groom Shinji, which does happen IRL and is successful (see religion and cults), but usually not in the war context.
- There’s a show called Jormungand which is about a child soldier being part of a PMC and dealing with his trauma and hatred of weapons. I’ve only seen a couple episodes, but I’m curious if the themes are similar to Evangelion. I just can’t take all the sci-fi/fantasy elements seriously in Eva.*
  *A literal soul being captured by the living and used in technology is an interesting element though. The game Beyond Two Souls was terrible, but this was part of the climax, and somehow it made me cry while Eva did nothing but frustrate me
God I love Evangelion. A lot of people don't like it, and frankly there is a lot not to like about it, but honestly there is no more impactful media in my life. I can personally attribute a big portion of my development to Evangelion.

Anyway. Don't try to understand the lore, it's not important and doesn't make any sense. Things will just happen. Don't worry about how or why. The actual plot of this show makes next to no sense if you just watch the original 26 episodes.
- spoiler for the theme of End of Evangelion, nothing plot-related. Also CW for mental health, depression and suicide.
  This was beautiful, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts.
  Don't try to understand the lore.
  I'm getting "mad max"-type-lore from the show, where you won't ever be told directly what is going on or why people do what they do, but the world is vivid you might be able to infer it and even if you don't, you kinda get it.
  
  I'm getting "mad max"-type-lore from the show, where you won't ever be told directly what is going on or why people do what they do, but the world is vivid you might be able to infer it and even if you don't, you kinda get it.
  https://youtu.be/6IQqPMsIfX4
Anyway, bit idea: Guy who only watches Evangelion for the fights.
Me as a teenager watching Eva. Came for the robots, stayed for the psycho-sexual drama.
(EoE's got a banger fight though).
- Me as a teenager watching Eva.
  Gotta be honest, what hooked me was the Eva moving its arm in episode 1, but I am a sucker for a good power fantasy "chosen one" trope.
  stayed for the psycho-sexual drama.
  me watching Evangelion trying to figure out if all of the pervy stuff is on purpose or only most of it and some of it is just pure
  
  trying to figure out if all of the pervy stuff is on purpose or only most of it and some of it is just pure awooga
  I think the goal is to explore repressed young male teen sexutality. This show reminded me of what it is to be a virgin straight boy
episodes 24-26 and End of Evangelion are absolute cinema. kino. masterpieces.
- Looking forward to it
dude get in the fucking robot the world is ending
He's a child suffering from PTBS and depression. He barely has the spoons to do anything but lie flat on the floor, yet he is supposed to save the fucking world. ofc he struggles under that weight, that's the normal and expectable reaction in that context and it's honestly surprising that given the enormity of what is asked of him, he somehow manages to pull through. Which he does. He just (very realistically) suffers like a dog while doing it instead of being some dumbass superhero fantasy who always keeps his toothpaste smile in spite of seeing everything he knows being flattened under an apocalyptic onslaught.
The show is a callout of a toxic culture that demands duty and functionality at all times, no matter if the person in question is even remotely capable of it. I don't know if somebody without a history of depression, ADHD or other issues that can actively destroy your ability to perform even the most trivial everyday tasks is capable of understanding this, but it's actually ableist af to expect a boy like him to get reliably retraumatized over and over again without ever complaining about hand-to-hand combat against giant cosmic horrors that need to be drawn with a dwarved aircraft carrier group next to them to demonstrate their mind-rending scale . Shinji acts heroically because he almost always does what is needed, but he doesn't perform the aesthetics of what we think heroism is supposed to look like, he is visibly vulnerable and struggling instead of bottling up his pain and hanging in there for the job and because the show dares to take the needed time to appropriately portray that fight with himself, this has led to several generations of reactionary incels getting mad at him.
Not calling you a reactionary incel, mind you. I understand how you arrive at your impression, i had the same when i watched the show for the first time when i saw it on nighttime TV back in the late 90s and had only the faintest glimpse of what severe executive dysfunction looks like. But that this view is so widespread is a sign of the ableism and toxic masculinity we've all internalized to some degree.
Well, except for the groomer vibes she's giving off.
MISATO SLANDER SHE RAISED THOSE KIDS THE BEST SHE COULD AND WAS NEVER A GROOMER
- I said she gave groomer-vibes
  I also said she's just like me fr (minus the groomer vibes)
  Edit: If I were to make a guess on where the memes come from (apart from her skeevy as fuck behaviour in episode 1) then I'd guess it has a lot to do with her being a hot woman who is comfortable wearing clothes where you can see her cleavage/thighs/ankles near Shinji. This isn't sexual at all, but dorks will see a girl in anything but a full nuns outfit and claim she's sexualising herself.
  
  Nah a lot of the allegations probably really come from End of Evangelion (but still are wrong imo), which I won't spoil for you but highly recommend you watch after you finish!
Thanks for reminding me that I need to actually watch this one of these days
- It fucking sucks, and you should absolutely watch it.
  Make sure to watch the original run first. Then watch The End of Evangelion. Then watch Rebuild of Evangelion. Every new Evangelion product you watch will explain everything. I promise.
  
  Look it all comes together if you just play the Japan-only N64 Evangelion fighting game.
- It has been on my watchlist for ages too, glad to finally have started it. It's good. Even if the story takes a turn for the worse I could watch it just for the art
It was the show that really got anime to click with me, enjoy! Now I'm working thru all 1200 episodes of One Piece.
Only 600ish to go!
- One Piece is great! I never got into the anime, but I love the manga. I wanted to get I to it, but when you already know what's going to happen, then its a bit tough, but I also don't want to skip ahead, because I don't want to miss the (good) filler.
  I did check in with the animation for some of the recent fights though.
  Without spoiling anything there's an arc with a very tough and incredibly awful villain who Luffy just barely manages to beat. 100's of chapters later this villain turns up again, but now Luffy is way stronger and he beats the shit out of him in no time and it is SO SO satisfying. The animation on that fight is just so good.
  What arc are you on?
  
  JUST started Fish man Island this morning, right after the time skip.
  Without saying too much, im guessing you're referring to some character from around this period? Or rather, someone we've already met?
Anyway, bit idea: Guy who only watches Evangelion for the fights.
(As a teenager)
tuned in for the fights stayed for the mean red head.
- Been there, but it was pokemon and I wasn't even a teen.
Lmao I'm on episode 3 now and there's a guy who bullies Shinji and now Shinji is looking like he doesn't want to fight and some other guy goes "jeez seems like your bullying really messed him up" right as they're about to get stomped to death lmao
Honestly I think the “groomer” allegations with Misato are way overstated by people.
She has a difficult relationship with…well relationships and sexuality and this leaks out a few times, but when I watched the show I pretty much got to almost the end not really getting why it was such a meme.
- I mean in some ways they are all being groomed by being manipulated and pressured into being child soldiers, but you know what I mean…I don’t think Misato has any actual attraction to Shinji like that.
  
  Sorry, didn't see you wrote this as a chain!
  Yeah I don't think she's attracted to him, I think she's aware he's attracted to her and she uses this to control him. It's a tool she has available that she uses to mold him into the person she needs him to be.
  That's still grooming.
  She does this because she's also in an insane militaristic environment that demands too much of her, but she still does it.
- I mean episode 1 starts with Shinji looking at a lewd photo of her with a lipstick kiss on it, which she sent him. She flirts with him thru the first episode and makes several sexual comments in general.
  She's young and seems like she's complicated, but she is also giving groomer vibes
  
  I think the show purposefully skirts the line between “hot babysitter” and “mother figure” if that makes sense, but I think the first has more emphasis placed on it by people when I think through more of the show she is the latter.
yeah it's great, there are a few bits of filler which could've been worked into the story with a little effort IMO (maybe the remakes/rebuilds fix this, I didnt get into the artistic direction)
- OP dont read wont make sense anyway
  That sign won't stop me because I can't read. Wouldn't matter if I could anyways because it makes no sense
Keep in mind that Eva is also meta-criticism of mecha as a genre- almost every single child soldier pilot in all the shows before Eva kinda uncritically “got in the robot”, and Anno going “wait that’s kinda fucked up actually” is why Eva’s considered a deconstruction
Also I think a lot of replies you’re getting are from people who finished the show, and a bit further in the show is really going to dig into Shinji’s character and he gets a little more sympathetic there I think
- Yeah there's people telling me why he doesn't wanna get in the robot, and I get why he doesn't wanna get in the robot. It's like they miss out on the fact that I'm describing the very first scene and then they just take all the discourse from the entire show and assume something about me.
  It's cool that this is a deconstruction, but should I watch a mecha anime to hvae something that can be deconstructed? Should I watch gundam and if so, which one?
  
  Ok so this is kinda a big topic but I'll do my best to break it down. To cut to the chase I think Eva stands on it's own reasonably well, although maybe knowing the general history of the genre or having a passing familiarity with the tropes may enhance your enjoyment of the show.
  Mecha as a genre starts with Super Robot (Tetsujin-28, Mazinger Z, Getter Robo), as an extension of the kinda Sci-Fi stories made popular by the likes of Astroboy. To broadly generalize these are (usually) Saturday Morning Cartoon stuff, adjacent to tokusatsu (live action special effects shows, think Power Rangers and Ultraman) so it's all simplistic young protagonist saves the world from the forces of evil with their cool giant robot Modernist Power of Science and Progress power fantasy (but also some of these original shows go into WILD places because basically if your writing Sci-Fi in Japan in the 70's you're some kinda Leftist). Imo you don't have to go watch these old shows, just knowing that they very much directly inspire Eva should give you all the background you need here.
  As we get to the 80's, we get to the Real Robot split. Basically creators decide that they've had enough of writing Saturday Morning Cartoons, they want to write real hard Sci-Fi like Isaac Asimov, Arthur C Clark and Robert Heinlein... and then finding out the only way to do that is to make animated toy commercials. But they manage to despite this commercial limitation, so you get shows like Mobile Suit Gundam and Space Battleship Yamato which are nuanced meditations on the nature of war drawn from the lived experiences of the generation that survived WW2, and they express their anti-fascism very strongly in their art.
  I highly recommend the original Mobile Suit Gundam (UC0079). The compilation movies (Mobile Suit Gundam The Movie, Mobile Suit Gundam II: Soldiers of Sorrow and Mobile Suit Gundam III: Encounters in Space) are great watches and condense the series into a decent runtime, although you will definitely miss some stuff from the series. It serves as a pretty decent baseline for what Eva is critiquing, although even here there's more nuance than "Gundam Tropes Bad", where Eva is more in a dialogue with things Gundam's doing as a story that's evolving beyond the kinda pulpy Saturday Morning Cartoon roots of the genre.
  Mecha as a genre is compelling because the Giant Robot is such a potent visual metaphor and storytelling vehicle. But I think what's special about Eva, and why it has lasting power as a story, is because up till that point no one had ever bothered to question if the kinds of stories we tell ourselves about our technology and our wars were worth telling in the first place, or if they're just comforting lies designed to fill a vacuum in our souls. I think Eva still stands up well even without the larger context of the deconstruction, just from it's sheer brazenness in being willing to break down every single tiny aspect of it's characters and dive into their psychology, while avoiding easy answers, to show human beings as the messy imperfect creatures that they are- it's more character study than anything else.
  (And, like, it's extremely wild that this kinda injection of Postmodern literature is happening to... what isn't really that far off from a Saturday Morning Cartoon, but the 90's were the Wild West of animation, History had Ended (thanks Francis Fukuyama) and um, the director of Eva really suffered from severe depression so... hey, I guess poison pilling existential dread into your Giant Robot show is a winning formula or we wouldn't be talking about it now.)
  P.S. Gurren Lagann is my favourite show of all time (or close to it) but I'll strongly recommend you watch it after Evangelion. Basically the staff who worked on that show were the protege's of the staff who worked on Eva, and Gurren Lagann was them saying "Hey you were right to question all those tropes, but the underlying principles the genre is built on, Hopefulness of the Future and a Belief in the Human Spirit (I'm trying to be as vague as possible to avoid spoilers) aren't bad things and are worth preserving and we're going to prove it with this show." It's a continuation of that larger meta-dialogue all this art is having, and imo it's best experienced in order.
  
  Never been a huge fan of mecha anime, but Gurren Lagann is pretty fucking good
I already dislike Shinji though, dude get in the fucking robot the world is ending.
U wot? Like someone else already said all my thoughts exactly but I just have to chime in and say "give the kid a break", too. Like if you're going to dislike Shinji for anything, dislike him for that scene in The End of Evangelion that made me start noting down any anime I watch that include at any point a POV shot of a character looking down at the palm of sy right hand with slightly bent fingers.
Anyways I've been watching Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water lately and it's been interesting seeing these common elements and motifs between that show and NGE, since Hideaki Anno directed both. Most famously there's the つづく and Shinji's character design being inspired by Nadia — Shinji was originally going to be a girl, in fact, which kinda-sorta adds to trans readings of NGE.
- Not gonna spoil anything but the Shinji and Kaworu stuff later kinda fucked me up when I first went through the series and made me feel some kinda way
- U wot?
  It's just for the scene in episode 1 where a massive monster is using a big ass laser cannon to blow up several skyscrapers and Shinji is told that it won't stop and he's the only who can stop it and he's still like "no". Which is understandable, but I also think it's understandable to react to that with "come the fuck on dude, Tokyo was just blown up."
  
  but I also think it's understandable to react to that with "come the fuck on dude, Tokyo was just blown up."
  *removed unintentional spoiler
  "bro theres this giant alien which leveled half a city and ate 2 supernukes like it was nothing, we're just gonna need you to drown inside this nightmare engine with no training and take it out real quick..."
  nah the entire situation was a horror show, humanity was on borrowed time as soon as a 14 year old was tasked with saving it
"I already dislike Shinji though, dude get in the fucking robot the world is ending."
HAHAHA YESS THE PERFECT EXCUSE TO START THE MUDFIGHT FROM 3 YEARS AGO AGAIN!!!
- We've been thru this before? From the people replying to me with negativity, it seems like it's yet another case of "not fully reading thru what the other is writing" so just miscommunication and frustration
  
  We've been thru this before?
  Ohhh yeah you bet!!! Your side got annihilated!
  
  Miscommunication and frustration
  Nah you were crystal clear buddy. I'll be seeing you.
I loved evangelion. I'll save you a write up and say:
He doesn't wannna get in the robot
Evangelion is like having a severe brain aneurism, but it feels good the whole time
Blocking you.
- Is it for the Shinji thing? Or is it just for watching anime?
- Based.
Please continue with these updates
- Live tweeting Evangelion seems like a concept that has some very specific point where the mood changes drastically.
  So far it's still good though. I'm watching the dub (it helps me keep attention, don't @ me) and I love the voice actors. There's a background piece of dialogue of a group of girls and guys going
  "Ohmygod lookat those guys they're so prettyyyy"
  "Wow those girls have incredible breasts"
  And the voice actors absolutely nailed those lines
I just finished it! It's crazy how the series remains pretty funny for a long time before getting really depressing. I think most people forget to mention the humour because they remember the last thing they saw.
And yeah big CW for all kinds of sexual misbehaviour
- I think most people forget to mention the humour because they remember the last thing they saw.
  See also: Romeo and Juliet.
  yeah big CW for all kinds of sexual misbehaviour.
  My biggest issue with the sexual stuff is that some of it is pretty obviously on purpose, but some of it just seems like its
Imo people have the worst reasons for disliking Evangelion. The shit rocks and all current anime sucks.
NERV is in dire need of a psych team though, insane that there isn't a dedicated therapist to help the pilots deal with trauma.
Realistically, the therapists’ job in this scenario would be manipulating the soldiers and/or finding ways to numb and avoiding the pain
Anyway, despite relating to Shinji in many ways, the grandness and stakes of the show makes it very hard for me to be on his side. Like I literally become military brained and demand they torture or MKULTRA the kid in order to fight the literal demons. Yes, yes, I know they’re all metaphors for current issues. But man. I don’t know. It’s like any other anime where the teenager is the chosen one - it becomes goofy after a while.
If the stakes were more grounded, I’d be more understanding. I guess I’m not into mecha stuff at all lol. Unless it’s something like MGS where the sci-fi stuff is just part of conventional war and not biblical aliens and robots with souls inside. Or Mr Robot which is just live action Evangelion about hackers, down to the semierotic gay undertones between the “villain” and protaganist and singularity of humankind. The setting is grounded and because of that I feel more attached, despite hating the show.
- Realistically, the therapists’ job in this scenario would be manipulating the soldiers and/or finding ways to numb and avoiding the pain.
  Yeah, and they really need someone who actually knows how to do that, instead of Misato whiplashing between supportive caretaker and bullying superior officer.
  Anyway, despite relating to Shinji in many ways, the grandness and stakes of the show makes it very hard for me to be on his side. Like I literally become military brained and demand they torture or MKULTRA the kid in order to fight the literal demons.
  Yeah, the stakes are too high. There's people telling me "you just don't get it!" and tbh I feel like I get it, the show is very good at establishing Shinjis mental state, the reason for his mental state and why he doesn't wanna get in the robot in episode 1. I am still annoyed at his apprehension because the world is about to end.
  I guess I’m not into mecha stuff at all lol.
  Check out the movie "Pacific rim". If that doesn't get to you, then I'd say you're not into mecha stuff.
  There's a scene where a mecha is punching a kaiju again and again and the punches just aren't hard enough, so it activatues MASSIVE JET ENGINES IN ITS ELBOWS so it can PUNCH HARDER and then it PULLS OUT A SWORD FROM ITS THIGH.
  There's also a Chinese and a russian mecha and they're very cool. The russian mecha has a nuclear reactor and it is best described as being a Kruschevka come to life.
  
  I have watched Pacific Rim as a kid and honestly it was just
  to me
Evangelion the show has issues especially in the first half. But once it clicks it is extremely different and thought provoking. As someone who was exposed to it pretty young it had an effect on me that most shows don't.
End of Evangelion. The movie after the show is like ten times better. God it is impeccable. There are very few pieces of art that compare in thematic grandiose. The set pieces are grand, I mean they are pretty much spiritual. I don't want to give too much away but when you watch the movie make sure you have time to watch it with no interuptions on a big screen.
And the rebuilds are pretty alright too. Not a big fan of the animation but the message is far more positive.
- I look forward to the movie! Should I watch the original series or one of the remakes, in your opinion?
  The set pieces are grand, I mean they are pretty much spiritual.
  
  Should I watch the original series or one of the remakes
  You should watch the original, and then End of Evangelion, and then the rebuild series (it's both a remake and a sequel of sorts)
That's how it draws you in to crush your heart 20 episodes later.
Also, a lot of 'serious' media like this is actually really funny. Moby Dick and Ulysses are not very serious in tone at all. Even The Wire has funny character moments.
It's not that these shows are serious all the time. It's that they earn their serious moments and do them properly
- That's how it draws you in to crush your heart 20 episodes later.
  Neat!
  Also, a lot of 'serious' media like this is actually really funny. Moby Dick and Ulysses are not very serious in tone at all.
  Moby dick is just 80 chapters about how big whales are, and the first of those chapters starts with "whales are fish".
  The rest of moby dick is a pretty good story, but my god it needs an editor. Chapter 1 is peak though, and the line about knocking hats off is funny as hell. I also love that Ishmael gets scammed by Ahab and his colleague.
i really getting into basically unconfirmed lore via tiktoks, so fuck it, this post is the impetus for me to download it all
- It's very good so far!
Weathering with You is just as beautiful.
- It's just so much of old anime that gets to me like this. Akira, ghost in the shell, Paprika, all things Miyazaki
I have never watched this. I really don't know what to watch. Is it a movie or series? I'm clueless. I only hear about end of evangelion. Only mech anime I ever watched was eureka seven.
- Evangelion isn't on my "must watch" list, but it definitely doesn't belong on a list of mecha anime imho.
  If anything is interesting at all, its the difficulties the studio and creator had while making it, and his absolute disdain for his fans. To hear him, eva is a repudiation of bad tropes in anime. The tsundere-type and the silent hero type are taken to their illogical extremes (quaint now) and takes great care to also show the ugly side of what a person like that would be. Knowing Anno hideakis hatred of his fans (and maybe even himself) goes a long way in understanding the anime for what it is and what he was trying to do.
I tried to watch it years ago and literally first thing i encountered (it was some ova or movie i think) started with SA. Didn't find it funny.
- That sucks, I'm sorry to hear that
  
  Thank you.
My controversial opinion is that child soldiers are bad.

115 comments