data-urlencoded-name="will-grahamss" class="grid permalink display-related-posts">
1.5M ratings
277k ratings

See, that’s what the app is perfect for.

Sounds perfect Wahhhh, I don’t wanna
qmisato

walonvaus:

i’ve been wondering lately - what is it about nge that was so cohesive, that one singular vibe you saw in each of the characters. like, they all felt like they were part of a set, the same notes in a tone, regardless of the different stages of life, motivations, they ways they held other people at a distance (or too close), etc.

it’s contempt. i’m pretty sure that’s what it was. 

you see it most in ritsuko and asuka - but contempt is there in varying levels with the others; shinji, misato, fuyutsuki, even rei. they say that contempt/disgust is one of the 7 universal expressions of humanity and i don’t know how much of that is bs, but contempt is such a crucial element in viewing nge, i think.

you have to start with understanding that contempt is a defense mechanism, and go from there. you miss so much of the subtlety in shinji’s narrative if you don’t see how tiny bits of contempt leak out in how he interacts with everyone (especially the girls, holy shit); how asuka tries to use her contempt as literal fuel for her fire until she burns from the inside out, how kaji thought he had it under control and stuffed down too many layers of lies but it poisoned him in the end, too.

it’s there. but the pinnacle of nge is not just the exploration of contempt and what it takes to truly hate yourself and others, but ultimately how nge doesn’t allow you - or the cast - one bullshit excuse to wave off your issues because of it. instead, it sits you down and says ‘you can be better than this.’

imo that’s something that needs to be said more. with that kind of honesty.

qmisato Source: walonvaus

More you might like

project-evangelion

qmisato:

qmisato:

evangelion is not a deconstruction of the mecha genre

evangelion is not a deconstruction of the mecha genre

evangelion is not a deconstruction of the mecha genre

everybody now

eva doesn’t deconstruct anything - deconstruction is a very specific approach to literary analysis with the intent of exposing semiotic contradictions within a genre - it doesn’t mean what western dudebros think it means (i.e: “dark and edgy storytelling”). space runaway ideon (1980) and gundam (1979) are both mecha shows that trade heavily on psychoanalysis, and anno Geek’d The Fuck Out on these shows (along with mazinger z, getter robo, ultraman, + many others) and wanted to pay his ultimate respects through evangelion. evangelion was paying homage to the mecha genre: anno didn’t reveal any ~hidden irreconcilable contradictions within it, he loved it and wanted to include his own OCs in the mix. (the ending of ideon and evangelion? exactly. the. same.) anno himself is a self-proclaimed otaku, and holds otaku sentiment to high regard. eva isn’t even genre-critical, it’s genre-exploratory

project-evangelion Source: qmisato
doorofguf
Evangelion is like a puzzle, you know. Any person can see it and give his/her own answer. In other words, we’re offering viewers to think by themselves, so that each person can imagine his/her own world. We will never offer the answers, even in the theatrical version. As for many Evangelion viewers, they may expect us to provide the ‘all-about Eva’ manuals, but there is no such thing. Don’t expect to get answers by someone. Don’t expect to be catered to all the time. We all have to find our own answers.
Hideaki Anno (via evangelion-complex)
doorofguf Source: evangelion-complex
adamworu

Anonymous asked:

How do you feel about relating to the NGE characters? Some people say that they relate to Shinji, for example. I don't see any problem about others saying that, but I... He lost his mom, his dad abandoned him, he has to save the world etc. I kind of feel like saying that I relate to him or his loneliness would diminish his suffering, because his circumstances are much worse than whatever I experienced? I know that's not the point, I know we're supposed to sympathize and connect, but...

adamworu answered:

… That’s the thing with fantasy/sci-fi, if the characters - almost everyone in NGE - have suffered due to many occasions they had no control of, I can’t just brush them off as metaphors for the human condition. It may make me worse, actually, like, those characters suffer more than I ever would and I’m still so fucked-up. Of course, they’re fictional characters, but you always find RL people with more complicated lives who seem to have dealt with it better than you with your privileged life.

I think this really needs to be said on that matter: You don’t need to be a carbon copy of a character to relate to a character.

That being said, there’s a lot about Shinji which makes him relatable as well as any of the Evangelion characters. I’ve already gone over his awful relationship with his father (awful is an understatement), whose interactions honestly are a good example of emotional abuse. He’s hardly selfless, his go-to way to solve his problems is by running away from them. He’s a character who desires validation and it’ll do for anyone (sincerity isn’t even considered). He’s still making sense of the world, slowly trudging onward, and being that he’s roughly midway though adolescence, of course he (and other characters) is going to have a trove of misguided ideas.

Some people find Asuka relatable. Considering she puts on the idea of independence to mask her massive insecurities (and traumatizing childhood), I think she’s pretty relatable. This is especially because she received no closure about her mother before EoE comes around. When she recovers from her lowest point, her will to love reignites, and when she receives closure, she’s able to grow more as an individual. 

Some people even relate to Rei, and considering her identity is forced upon her and not really given any exploration of it, I think she’s pretty damn relatable as the others. I mean, you don’t have to achieve actualized deityhood to find Rei relatable. You don’t need to have the ability to travel through time and space (Quantum Rei) to find her arc about stifled identity exploration something that hits close to home.

It’s these struggles, personalities, and choices which make people in real life bond with these sorts of characters. It’s a big reason why people have an emotional bond with those types of people.

Most people have gone through these things and relating to a character isn’t trivializing their struggles. 

I mean, this are just small examples, but part of what makes Eva so good is that any character is relatable because of how real they are. I also don’t really ascribe to the idea that Eva is of the human condition, considering the AT Field encompasses both humans and angels, both literally as well as metaphorically.

adamworu
See this in the app Show more