PinkuBentoBox

You know, instead of teasing fans with a project that’ll never happen, ADV should just take the 50 million or so they’ve raised for their hypothetical live action Evangelion and just put it to licensing the new Rebuild of Evangelion movies and promoting the everloving shit out of them. Get those into mainstream theaters, because not only has Anno soundly beat them to the punch at getting a cinematic Eva remake out there, but his is so well done that there’s really no way ADV could top it.

Now, I guess I should point out that back in the day, before we became crotchety old men, Neggo and I were huge Evangelion fanboys. Yes, we were those pretentious faggots that would analyze the show endlessly for the greater meaning behind a blue-haired girl (in an anime) and snub our noses at “lesser” series, like Dragon Ball Z and Trigun (well, okay, I still snub my nose at Trigun). I don’t know about The Neg, but my excuse was I was a naïve high school underclassman, and the ravages of time have long since wrenched my head from my ass. At least mostly. As I got older, my fondness for Eva waned into an idle nostalgia, and my interest in its greater meanings outright vanished in a wash of raging skepticism and common sense. And if I ever hear “Fly Me to the Moon” again, I’m taking Alan Shepard’s six-iron upside the head of the person responsible.

That in mind, it should come as no surprise that when I heard Anno was remaking Evangelion into a series of four feature films with a slightly altered story, I didn’t give the news much more than a passing grunt and went back to gushing over the Boogiepop novels or Black Lagoon or whatever was coming out at the time. The fact that I’m also a former Gundam obsessive and was long subjected to that franchise’s miserable excuses for cinematic retellings of television series only further diminished my already miniscule excitement for the project. Once you’ve seen the second Zeta Gundam movie (“Lovers,” or as it should’ve been called, “Sarah Zabiarov’s Big Day Out”) or the absolutely nonsensical mess that was the Gundam SEED Special Edition, you kind of lose hope in Japan’s ability to condense meandering television productions into tight, snappy feature films.

So imagine my surprise when the first Evangelion movie, You are (NOT) Alone, absolutely blew my mind.

For those that haven’t yet seen it (hint: DO SO), Fucking Awesome (MOVIE) Title covers the first six episodes of the TV series, from Shinji’s arrival in Tokyo-3 to the destruction of the fifth Angel, Ramiel (or according to the movie, the sixth Angel, but more on that in a bit). Now I feel the need to point out right away that even at the height of my younger Evagasm, I was never a big fan of some of the early episodes of the series, and episodes three through six held a particularly special place of loathing in my heart. Shinji making friends, Shinji running away, and the Evas battling a giant blue cube that just…sits there…were pretty much akin to watching dried paint dry some more. That the movie would improve upon these events is not surprising, but what’s amazing is that it didn’t just make them slightly more bearable, but it actually succeeded in making them compelling. Shinji’s making friends and running away from NERV are no longer agonizingly drawn out and we’re no longer clubbed over the head with the same repetitive ‘AWW THIS POOR KID’ message ad nauseum. The point behind both episodes is quickly gotten to, we quickly move on, and we’re not so bored with Shinji by this point that we can’t actually feel sympathy for him for once. And the battle with Ramiel actually feels like a battle this time around. It’s tense, there’s a real exchange of firepower, and there actually seems to be something at stake, where previously it just felt like the NERVies were poking this big blue block with a stick until finally deciding to pop it and walk away Raiders of the Lost Ark style. And man, SHIT FUCKING BLOWS UP.

KABOOM!!!

It would seem in revising the plot, a few key characters have also been given a little cleaning up. I say this because as impossible as it may sound, I actually sat through this entire movie without once getting the urge to grab Shinji by the neck and fucking wring the pathetic out him. I know, I know, it’s hard to believe–Shinji’s long been considered one of the most obnoxious characters in the entire pantheon of animedom–but it would seem here that he’s actually been made a stronger character for these movies. He’s far from GAR to be sure, but his former wormlike nature has been toned down considerably. He now acts like…well…a kid with confidence issues realistically traumatized by being chucked into a robot to fight giant fucking monsters. You actually kinda feel for him here, and even better, he even seems to improve! TV series Shinji was pathetic all the way through, but in this movie, he actually seems to collect the first couple vertebrae to build his spine during the battle against Ramiel. He takes a hit from the Angel almost head-on, and where TV Shinji would’ve curled up in a ball and cried about it, or snapped or let Eva-01 bail him out, he actually bucks up and gets back into the battle with some sense of real determination. Fucking omedettou, Shinji-kun. Similarly, Misato seems to be a much stronger character this time around. She doesn’t seem to mother Shinji as much as she did in the TV series, and seems to handle her job with a greater sense of professionalism. We actually get to see her behave like a military commander and devise some actual sound strategy; we really see her earn her supposed rank this time around, instead of running about wildly irresponsible with Ritsuko as her keeper. And her own emotional scars are much more effectively represented early on. We actually see them come to the surface once or twice, where the equivalent TV episodes just focused on the lackadaisical behavior she used to mask it. Makes for some very powerful interactions between herself and Shinji.

If I had one complaint about the way the movie handles the events of the first six episodes, it’d be in the battle with the third fourth Angel, Sachiel. In the movie, we see the entire battle right up front, from Sachiel skullfucking Eva-01 with his hand-poker to Eva-01 going berzerk and beating the shit out of Sachiel with his own rib. Seeing it all at once, as opposed to only seeing Eva-01’s berserk state in Shinji’s utterly traumatized flashback as in the series, kinda takes away the shock value of it. At least to me. And the sound department really could’ve tried harder. Why redo Eva-01’s berserk roar for the movie when the TV version was creepy enough? The new roar just sounds whiny and silly. And what was with the fucking melodramatic piano bit when Shinji was deciding to first board Eva-01? Talking right around the 9:50 mark in the film, here. The original music (and occasional lack thereof) for that scene was fine and cinematic enough, where this new piano number sounds like something out of a silent film when the villain shows up and twists his mustache. Most of the changes made in the movie are welcome ones to be sure, but it seems as though when the staff were just starting and running through the first couple episodes’ content, they struggled with just how much they should change, and overdid it in a few places. Luckily, by the end of the film, these little bits of awkwardness seemed to all but vanish, so hopefully this will be the last we see of them.

Moving beyond the plot, there are two rather infamous points about Evangelion that the movie has already shown very promising signs of rectifying: insane, aimless psychobabble and amazingly cheap animation stemming from a threadbare budget. One of the supposed aims of the new Eva films is to make the series more accessible to mainstream audiences and anime fans who were initially put off by the series’s pretentious, self-important philosophical waxing and waning, and it would seem they’re ready to make good on that offer. Granted, the first few episodes were always rather light on the stuff, but it was still there, and for the most part it always seemed as though Gainax could never make up their mind on how to present it, and would bring up theoretical concepts in one episode only to promptly forget all about them by the next. One minute Shinji’s sitting in a folding chair getting clapped at while pondering the Hedgehog’s Dilemma, and the next he’s flexing his hand to represent the…Dirac Sea or what-the-fuck-ever. With this movie, however, it seems that not only did they finally pick a consistent way to portray Shinji’s neuroses, but they’ve picked the most effective and fan-friendly method, downplayed its importance, and actually followed through with a couple of their random ideas. The “unfamiliar ceiling” actually becomes a rather recurring theme here, making it all the way into the episode five and six content as opposed to being something Shinji said twice in episode two and never again. And the short-lived “Shinji talks to himself in a train at sunset” method of showing Shinji’s internal fucked-upedness from episodes sixteen to twenty-ish seems to have become the standardized approach, which works for me because I’ve always found it to be the most direct and easy to understand of Gainax’s random and sporadic attempts at being “deep.”

Visually this is one of the most gorgeous anime of the year, easily. Considering I’m saying that about Evangelion must come as a surprise to some, seeing that the show was rather infamous in years past for its methods of stretching out a miniscule animation budget. Surely everyone’s at least seen one of the series’s patented long, slow, agonizing camera pans over still scenery set to five to ten minutes of off-screen chatter. Well, now that Anno’s collected himself a veritable dragon’s hoard of yen and has his own animation studio to utilize, it would see that shit was the first to go in making the new films. Any long, slow camera pans that were actually relevant to the plot now sport some manner of motion so that people’s ocular senses don’t get bored, while the bulk of them are just plain trashed. And in a true example of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” the few truly excellent animation sequences the TV series was able to boast are lovingly revived shot-for-shot, with at most a touch of remastering and a little bit of smoothing out around the edges. As for new animation, it’s exceedingly difficult to find fault with it, and even more difficult to properly convey just how good a lot of it looks. The scene in which Shinji gazes out upon Tokyo-3 as the buildings all rise at sunset now appears every bit as breathtaking as we’re led to believe it to be, instead of just looking like cheapo matte painting manipulation fuckery. And minor touches here and there, like having the Angels bleed something other than sparks and giving Shamshel’s appendages a little motion (so that now it doesn’t just look like a floating purple penis when it glides into town) and actually showing Tokyo-3 as a bustling metropolis really go a long way in improving the show’s overall atmosphere. All in all, the movies take what could’ve been a feast for the eyes in the TV series, and genuinely fulfills its potential in a big way.

Yes, that thing on the right is Ramiel. He actually…y’know…moves around this time.

And now for that one aspect that’ll never elude Evangelion fandom no matter how much the series is dumbed down and debunked: rampant, spoilerific, ill-informed speculation! Even as a less heady retelling of the TV series, these movies give us plenty to chew on here, in particular because the last couple minutes of this film and the trailer for the second film promise some genuinely radical departures from the original story almost immediately. For one, Kaworu. Originally only showing up in episode twenty-four, he now makes a super early appearance in the story, popping out of a box and having fun naked chat with the SEELE monoliths about all the nasty things he’s gonna do. His early appearance, combined the the mention in the trailer of at least two new Evas, seems to imply he’ll stick around much longer and be much more involved in the plot than he was in the TV series. His rather ominous word choice also implies he’ll be much more sinister than his rather innocent and misguided interpretation in the original episode twenty-four. It’ll be interesting to see if he once again tries to shmooze up to Shinji, or if he’ll prove much more antagonistic this time around.

The setting Kaworu appears in is also worth serious note. For one, the boxes. He appears out of one of a series of rather coffin-like boxes, of which the first four to his right have already been opened. And whaddya know, there’ve apparently been four Angels to already assault Tokyo-3! Sachiel, Shamshel, and Ramiel are all identified as the fourth, fifth, and sixth Angels by NERV, and as a giant humanoid chalk outline at the beginning of the movie implies, the third Angel likely attacked Tokyo-3 before the arrival of Sachiel (which raises a whole new set of questions about who killed that one; was it Rei and Eva-00, or did the JSDF actually bag themselves a giant monster for once?). Of course, Adam and Lilith have always been listed as the “first” and “second” Angels, but they’re considerably higher in power and authority than the usual lot, and thus likely wouldn’t have coffins for themselves. The fact that it looks like Adam is the one overseeing the opening of these coffins would serve to reinforce that notion. And on that note…holy shit, Adam! We’ve never properly seen him before, as he only ever appeared in the series as first a giant humanoid apparition of pure light, and later as an embryo stuffed into Gendo’s hand. His appearance here not only marks the first time we’ve seen him, but also raises some fundamental questions about the story and its direction. For one, it seems doubtful at this point that Kaji’ll be shipping Adam to Gendo in convenient embryonic travel size. For two, it would seem Adam (as well as Kaworu and all the Angel coffins) are actually on the moon, as you can see what appears to be the Earth behind Kaworu in some shots. If Adam is being excavated by SEELE on the moon, did he still cause the Second Impact on Earth, and if so, how? That was kind of an important point in the original story, seeing as it…established the setting and all.

Speaking of Angels, it’s mentioned in the movie that there are only going to be twelve of them this time around, as opposed to the seventeen seen in the TV series. Understandable, given that some of the Angels were either very filler-ish (the fishy Angel Gaghiel, that conveniently attacks when the Evas are at sea, the lava baby Sandalphon, which…doesn’t even serve as much purpose as Gaghiel), or were fairly redundant (Iruel, Bardiel, and to an extent Armisael were all basically viruses infecting either technology or, in Armisael’s case, Rei as well as her Eva). However, the question must be raised as to exactly which Angels are staying, and does that twelve count include Adam and Lilith? If it does include Adam and Lilith, then we already know all but two of the Angels that appear in the movie series: Adam, Lilith, Sachiel, Shamshel, Ramiel, Kaworu, and as evidenced by the trailer for the second film, Israfel (the twins), Leliel (nega-shadow zebra ball), Bardiel (Eva-03, or the virus that infects it), and Zeruel (sheet metal Ginsu arms). There’s also Mister Chalk Outline, which may be one of the TV series Angels, but I personally doubt it considering the outline is humanoid, and beyond the known Angels to be appearing, there really is nothing remotely resembling a human form among the ranks, meaning we may only see one more of the TV Angels. If the twelve count does not include Adam and Lilith, that obviously means we may see three of them. So who are these unknowns? Considering their relevance to Asuka and Rei’s character developments respectively, I’d expect Azrael (mind raper) and Armisael (Mr. DNA) to be among the top candidates. Iruel would be a possibility for its involvement in Ritsuko’s character development, but again I think it’d be redundant to shoehorn two virus-type Angels into a movie series, and Bardiel’s already claimed the spot. Gaghiel and Sandalphon I don’t expect to see, nor do I want to see, and the remaining two names (Matariel the eyeball-spider and Sahaquiel the suicidal modern art) are equally as filler-ish and pointless.

There is one more option, though, according to the trailer: the new character. The Eva films promise a whole new character that we’ve never seen before…except now we’ve seen her briefly in the trailer and if you’ll pardon my saying so, she is HOT. Her exact role is uncertain, but speculation has it she’ll be an Eva pilot. Narration in the trailer goes on to mention Eva-06 descending from the moon, and seeing that the Angels all seem to be spawning on the moon, that leaves the possibility that this new character (assuming she is the pilot) might either be an Angel, or a SEELE operative acting as a pilot. The fact that she seems to stare rather unimpressed at a series of Angelic cross explosions would seem to further the suspicion. Personally, though, I’m skeptical. Of her being a pilot, at least. My gut instinct tells me the “pilot that descends from the moon” in Eva-06 will actually be Kaworu, while this new character will be filling some shady non-piloting role. Perhaps Kaji’s killer finally has a face? A sexy, sexy face in glasses and twintails?

I just hope she’s not replacing Touji in Eva-03.

OMG SO HOT

So what can we expect from the second film? Well, if the trailer is anything to go on, it would seem we’re shitcanning most of the filler and filler Angels and rushing right along from Ramiel to some rehash of Jet Alone (rampant speculation places the “provisional Eva-05″ as JA’s replacement in the story), to the appearance of Israfel (guessing Asuka makes a grand entrance helping to thwart either of the two), and then directly to the events surrounding Leliel, Bardiel, and Zeruel. Somewhere in there, we can also apparently expect to see Eva-04 for the first time in film. It seems like a bit of a leap at first, but considering how much useless crap actually transpired between about episodes seven and sixteen, I for one expect number two to be an incredibly streamlined and jaw-dropping experience in much the same way that Fucking Awesome (MOVIE) Title is. As for movies three and four? There’s such a dense amount of plot material between episodes twenty and twenty-four (I mean fuck, they had to go and make director’s cuts of those episodes just to fit everything in) that they could make up one full movie all on their own. And then I imagine the fourth movie will be some rewrite of End of Evangelion, in which everything is slightly less fucked up and hopefully more conclusive. It’ll be interesting to see if I’m right on that.

“Provisional” Eva-05 on the left, Eva-06 on the right.

Anyway, in short, if you haven’t yet seen the first Eva film, SEE IT NOW, YOU FUCKERS. It soundly kicks its equivalent TV episodes in the balls with how much more polished it is (and not in that shitty George Lucas way, either), and I’m willing to bet that even people that hated the original Eva will find something more to enjoy here. Hey, it broke down my skepticism and made me a fan all over again.

And by the by, WHAT THE HELL IS THAT!?