Anime News Network interview with Yoshiyuki Sadamoto

[The Eva Monkey]

https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interv ... to/.102218

After all these years working on Evangelion, how do you feel about the series?

As an anime industry worker, for me Evangelion has been just another job, and I need to get work apart from Evangelion to keep going. It's a franchise I don't really want to work on anymore at this point – but it's an important franchise in Japan and there are many fans, so I take it seriously.

Sounds like Sadamoto has long since had his fill of Evangelion. Is it any wonder it took him so long to finish the manga?

[Ray]

Well lets be honest Nobody expected Eva to last as long as it has or be as influential as it's been.

[Reichu]

Sounds like Sadamoto has long since had his fill of Evangelion. Is it any wonder it took him so long to finish the manga?

Note that he doesn't say (at least in your excerpt) exactly WHAT has put him off Eva. I would imagine that taking so long to do the manga might be part of the reason, as opposed to the result.

[The Eva Monkey]

I would imagine that taking so long to do the manga might be part of the reason, as opposed to the result.

Or both.

[hui43210]

I'm more put off that Production IG hasn't called him back about FLCL season 2, the jerks.

[Sachi]

I'm more put off that Production IG hasn't called him back about FLCL season 2, the jerks.

This actually makes me curious. Based off of this interview, Sadamoto doesn't seem to be involved in the new FLCL series (yet), however, the press release announcing the new series (back in March) claims that he is indeed already attached to the project: https://www.turner.com/pressroom/turner ... eries-flcl

[Gendo'sPapa]

Not surprised to hear that.

Hideaki Anno & the rest of the crew had almost a decade free of scrutiny regarding "What's Next In Evangelion" from Summer 1997 to the announcement of Rebuild in late 2006. After 'End of Evangelion' finished it was pretty much accepted that yep, Eva's done. Those guys were able to go off & do their own things - His & Her Circumstances, Love & Pop, FLCL, Diebuster, Cutie Honey, etc - without anyone saying "Yeah, that's great & all but when's the next Eva thing coming out?"

Sadamoto never had that break because he was doing the manga. I picture his creative endeavors for the past 20 years was a lot like Steven Spielbergs in the period between Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. For twenty years every time Spielberg did PR for his new films it went like this -
Spielberg: Thank you all for seeing my film. Do you have any questions?
Guy Raises Hand.
Spielberg: Yes, you sir.
Guy: I was impressed by your passion project Schindler's List/Saving Private Ryan/A.I./Minority Report/Munich & all but when are you doing Indiana Jones 4?
Spielberg: .... Fuck.

For Sadamato it's probably been "Yeah, those characters in that new film looked great & all but when's the next chapter of the Eva manga coming out you lazy bum?"

It's not surprising to hear the Eva creative team is feeling tiresome of the series. It's been the defining work of their careers for 21 years now. I'm sure Final is going to be a phenomenal movie but unlike "End of Evangelion" I'm 100% certain this will really be THE END for this crew's affiliation - Sadamoto, Anno, Tsurumaki, the cast - with the Eva Universe.

[hui43210]

This actually makes me curious. Based off of this interview, Sadamoto doesn't seem to be involved in the new FLCL series (yet), however, the press release announcing the new series (back in March) claims that he is indeed already attached to the project: https://www.turner.com/pressroom/turner ... eries-flcl

Hmm, I would assume the interview was recent since the interviewer was aware of season 2. I don't know, it seems weird.

[Sachi]

Hmm, I would assume the interview was recent since the interviewer was aware of season 2. I don't know, it seems weird.

This interview was at FicZone, which was at the end of this April, and definitely after the press release I linked.

[Kuseirou]

It was to be expected. He has been with Eva longer than anyone and without a break. It doesn't matter how much you love something, it's been more than twenty years, and it's to be expected he wants to broad his horizonts now and leave Eva already. I remember he said something in another interview some years ago in the lines of 'if you begin something, you must finish it'. So now the manga is finished...
It makes me sad of course because of my love for Eva, but I'll always be looking forward seeing something from him, as I've enjoyed many things where he had been involved into.

This actually makes me curious. Based off of this interview, Sadamoto doesn't seem to be involved in the new FLCL series (yet), however, the press release announcing the new series (back in March) claims that he is indeed already attached to the project: https://www.turner.com/pressroom/turner ... eries-flcl

Sadamoto actually has no idea if he's going to be or not, if we take into account his words in some of the interviews (I've seen three of them at this point, was quite interesting to read that he used some of his own experiences for the end of the Eva manga, or that the Mari's raburabu~ story with Yui was an intentional effect because it'd be interesting) he gave when he was around here in Granada:

Code: Select all

Staff: Barely a month ago it was announced the production for a FLCL sequel (...) What will be your rol in this continuation?
YS: To this day I still haven't been told what will be my job exactly, so at this moment I don't know what am I going to do. The original series were done by both Gainax and I.G, but this time Gainax won't be involved, only I.G. I asked them and they told me that maybe they'll be using my character designs, but in that case my name should be appear in the credits. That's all I know right now.

Translated from: http://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/2 ... de-granada
Edit: Well, I just noticed that question in this interview is similar to the one from the main post. Silly me! I've read more than one interview lately, so my head's a mess. But I guess I can leave the translation to make a comparison between both of them. There are also different questions, like the shirobako one, just in case someone wants to take a look in this one. I can look for the other ones too and/or translate them, if someone's interested.