Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Postby Protoboy » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:34 pm

So, I just got done watching EoE, after watching all 26 episodes plus 21'-24', and honestly... What. The. Fuck.

I'm not saying I didn't like it, I just don't understand anything about it. I understand that it's supposed to be cryptic and if you cross-reference the judiac and christian bibles with the show you can find more pertinent connections, but I still feel like almost everything in the show can be interpreted by theories. (which is probably part if not most of the allure)

I guess what I'm getting at is I felt more confused and somewhat unpleasantly let-down by EoE than by episodes 25 and 26s original ending to the series, and before I saw EoE, I was EXCITED to see something that would of made more sense. I've only watched one giant-mecha anime before this, and it's not in the same caliber, so I am very much amateur to the genre in general. Perhaps I watched the episodes too fast and didn't let my mind absorb them properly? Maybe I'm more of a simpleton, and like more concrete explanations to what's happening in front of me. I understand Anno's direction of making 25 and 26 more of a psychoanalysis of the audience through Shinji's own introspective, but at the same time, I felt that EoE explained things a bit more about small details that added up to a lot of would-be missed information if the fans didn't want a different ending, thus birthing EoE, if I'm not mistaken. Did Anno have no intentions of creating a movie? Did he only create a movie because of the outcries of the fans for a "better" ending?

Sorry to rant guys, my thoughts are a bit disorganized. I just don't know what to think, honestly. Maybe I'll hit up the Eva wikia in a couple days to read up on some info once my head stop hurting, haha. :stars:
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Re: Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Postby amitakartok » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:47 pm

View Original PostProtoboy wrote:Did Anno have no intentions of creating a movie? Did he only create a movie because of the outcries of the fans for a "better" ending?


EoE was the intended ending all along but the studio's budget ran out around episode 24 so they had to dumb it down to just the psychoanalysis. The movie itself was made later, when sufficient funds were available.

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Postby Protoboy » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:54 pm

EoE was the intended ending all along but the studio's budget ran out around episode 24 so they had to dumb it down to just the psychoanalysis. The movie itself was made later, when sufficient funds were available.


Ah, ok. That makes a lot more sense. I feel that there was just too much information that EoE expounded upon that was crucial to the series that 25-26 didn't touch on. Thank you very much for that, amitakartok!
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Postby Xard » Wed Jan 16, 2013 10:21 pm

You're seriously hoping to understand Eva (and EoE in particular) with one viewing? Hahahaha :lol:


You're going through pretty average NGE-experience right now. Take it easy

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Postby Protoboy » Wed Jan 16, 2013 11:25 pm

EoE was the intended ending all along but the studio's budget ran out around episode 24 so they had to dumb it down to just the psychoanalysis. The movie itself was made later, when sufficient funds were available.


Ah, ok. That makes a lot more sense. I feel that there was just too much information that EoE expounded upon that was crucial to the series that 25-26 didn't touch on. Thank you very much for that, amitakartok!
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Postby Biodude16 » Thu Jan 17, 2013 12:20 am

I just re-watched EoE today, because about a week ago I watched it along with the last 3 episodes of the tv series in a row, at around 2-3 am. I was so tired I was delirious, I was tripping out and had no idea what was going on.
After re-watching it, it was a pretty good movie and I think I understand for the most part, still waiting to watch 3.0 and 4.0 of the rebuild series to see what they do with that :)

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Re: Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Postby Mr. Tines » Thu Jan 17, 2013 2:24 am

View Original PostProtoboy wrote:So, I just got done watching EoE, after watching all 26 episodes plus 21'-24', and honestly... What. The. Fuck.
That's a normal enough reaction. The series is fairly dense, showing, rather than telling you what is going on (and in places expecting you to be as much of a SF fan as they were in order to pick up allusions); and then EoE is deliberately emotionally bruising.

When you view it as mid-90s SF, it's clearly a story about multiple notionally allied factions competing to launch a Singularity bootstrapped on alien technology found under Hakone in Japan and in the Antarctic, but mainly focused on the periphery of what's really going on, where the mundane side-effects are being dealt with in classic Japanese super-robot vs kaiju form. And where the TV end shows the results of the behind the scenes project without showing the transition, EoE actually shows the hard take-off of a SysOp Singularity; until the non-Friendly SysOp heeds a user command to crash and burn the system.
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Re: Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Postby Dream » Thu Jan 17, 2013 5:02 am

View Original PostProtoboy wrote:I'm not saying I didn't like it, I just don't understand anything about it. I understand that it's supposed to be cryptic and if you cross-reference the judiac and christian bibles with the show you can find more pertinent connections, but I still feel like almost everything in the show can be interpreted by theories. (which is probably part if not most of the allure)


Not to be rude, but i don't think you will find anything productive with looking into the bibles, nor with the mindset of "Everything in NGE can be explained"

But in any case, like others said it is pretty common reaction for a first-timer to be confused/mind-fucked after watching the series for the first time (although that didn't really happen with me for some reason) like Xard said, take it easy.

Also, i don't think you really need to have watched a lot of SF or mecha anime to watch NGE.
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Postby Kendrix » Thu Jan 17, 2013 10:59 am

First of, WELCOME TO THE FANDOM!

There's a lot of conflicting interpretation on the endigs - It wasn't the cash that ran out, it was time, and statements from right after the series finished airing indicate that Anno was quite happy with the way it turned out back then. (One of these statements goes "And then, I felt like I no longer needed to bother with the rest and could just say my feelings directly" or something like that)

The plans for movie!ep 25 were already finished in a manner similar to EoE (which is why, once you figure out what's going on there, you'll notice that both versions of ep 25 have fairly similar events taking place, with a few key differences that cause further diversions... ) but the last episode wasn't.

Some people argue that it's in fact the same events from different PoVs, but I'd support the interpretation that they start similar but diverge (à la Rebuild movies vs Classic Series - Did you see those yet? ), mainly, with various lines suggesting that what we saw in 25/26 was in fact, a thwarted attempt at Gendo's Instrumentality plan.

In either case, it's normal not to get it all at the first try, none of us did, I recomend that you rewatch it all atleast once. The second- and first-time experiences are quite different things, but you shouldn't forget the first-time perspective for your interpretation.

Also, there's someone here who's been stockpiling a long list of official statements by the ppl involved in making it, reading that may help a lot. (Someone here have the link?) Oh, and the Red Cross Book (and the other enlightening stuff on that page) and the classified information, tough the former needs to be taken with a grain of salt.
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Postby ShIiNjI » Thu Jan 17, 2013 12:23 pm

View Original PostKendrix wrote:In either case, it's normal not to get it all at the first try, none of us did, I recomend that you rewatch it all atleast once. The second- and first-time experiences are quite different things, but you shouldn't forget the first-time perspective for your interpretation.

Also, there's someone here who's been stockpiling a long list of official statements by the ppl involved in making it, reading that may help a lot. (Someone here have the link?) Oh, and the Red Cross Book (and the other enlightening stuff on that page) and the classified information, tough the former needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

Right. I’d suggest to read the Classified Information only after watching the series at least twice. After the natural WTF of the first time, knowing the story in advance, during the second rewatch you’ll figure out many things you might haven’t noticed before. But reading the Classified Infomation too soon might put too many irons in the fire.

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Re: Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Postby Nuclear Lunchbox » Thu Jan 17, 2013 12:36 pm

View Original PostProtoboy wrote:So, I just got done watching EoE, after watching all 26 episodes plus 21'-24', and honestly... What. The. Fuck.

This sounds exactly like my reaction upon finishing NGE and EoE. What you need to do is go and watch everything multiple times, then come back here and read the wiki until you feel nauseous. Then go back and watch the series some more, all while continuing to rant and post on Evageeks. You'll achieve Evanlightenment in no time. This is a lie. You'll never truely understand Eva, but we all hope to someday.

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Postby Bagheera » Thu Jan 17, 2013 12:37 pm

View Original Postamitakartok wrote:EoE was the intended ending all along but the studio's budget ran out around episode 24 so they had to dumb it down to just the psychoanalysis. The movie itself was made later, when sufficient funds were available.


Virtually all of this has been discredited thanks to interviews with the crew. EoTV is not "dumbed down" by any stretch of the imagination, it was the product of a lack of time (not money), and Anno's "intended ending" changed by the moment all the way along the line. His Platonic ideal ending probably would have been a hybrid of sorts between the plot-centric ending of EoE and the psychoanalysis of EoTV. IOW both are intended endings, their interaction deliberately ambiguous such that the viewer can take them as he likes without being bogged down by any one person's idea (up to and including Anno's) of what is true and what isn't.

And yeah, don't read anything into the religious elements, as they're explicitly there for flavor and nothing else. Hell, you'd probably get a lot more out of reading up on the history of Japanese warships than anything else, as Anno's geekery on that front had a lot more influence on the show than the religious stuff did.
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Postby riffraff11235 » Thu Jan 17, 2013 1:04 pm

View Original PostBagheera wrote:Hell, you'd probably get a lot more out of reading up on the history of Japanese warships than anything else, as Anno's geekery on that front had a lot more influence on the show than the religious stuff did.

I take it that's the part of his psyche that influenced the creation of Kensuke, right? Was it just warships or is Anno a full-on military otaku?
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Postby Kendrix » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:14 pm

It's probably no coincidence that Kensuke seems like a 21st century version of Anno's previous protagonist Jean, from "Nadia of the mysterious Seas" Which involved a space submarine battleship thing... and Jean fanboying at it all the way through the show. (It's cool. Has a lot less mindfuck and more romance comedy, at least in the earlier parts, but still has many stunningly serious elements that you wouldn't expect. But downright skip episodes 23 to 34. Except maybe 31, 31 is cool. It's a long story.)
I read somewhere that Anno put most of his own positive traits into Jean and the negative ones into the female lead, the epynomios Nadia.

Nadia herself could be seen as a prototype for... most of the Children, actually. Shinji got the character design and the daddy issues, Mari got the animalistic traits and the distrust of adults, Rei got the vegetarism and the whole apocalypse maiden thing, and Asuka got... just about anything else, actually. She practically IS Asuka. Including the foreign fanservice, just chocolate flavored this time.
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Postby Hyper Shinchan » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:46 pm

View Original PostKendrix wrote:She practically IS Asuka.

Nope, it can't be, Nadia was my very first waifu while I immediately disliked Asuka, something is off there. Anon is probably correct, Nadia is more like manga!Shinji.
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Postby Protoboy » Thu Jan 17, 2013 4:01 pm

Well, I guess I should of waited a couple hours before posting this thread in the first place, haha. I had just finished EoE about 10 minutes prior to posting and now that first post looks like inane drivel, honestly. I'll need to do just as all of you suggested and start over, but this time with the knowledge of the plot and slowly glean more and more info as I go. I'll hold off on the Classified stuff, but should I look at the Red Cross book before I go back into the series, or give it one more viewing before the Red Cross book? To answer the question, no, I have not seen any of the Rebuilds, which I kind of don't want to do until I understand the original plot a bit more, and when the movies are all released and translated to English by the studio. (I feel like fansubs can miss a lot of things, either interpretation-wise or symantically)

Just to be clear as well, I don't mean ANYONE disrespect by my first post. Evangelion is a wonderfully complex anime of beautiful visual representation and deep psychological exposure. I was just a bit mind-fucked earlier, that's all, haha. Thank you everyone for your input, I really appreciate that there are fans out there that are willing to help other fans. Kind of off-topic, but does Evageeks or any other website have a chat or IRC room out there for Eva discussion? I feel like I'd benefit from reflecting thoughts on Eva in a real-time conversation, sometimes threads get a bit long before I can get back to them. Thank you!
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Postby Mr. Tines » Thu Jan 17, 2013 4:12 pm

View Original PostProtoboy wrote:does Evageeks or any other website have a chat or IRC room out there for Eva discussion?
Well, there's #egf, but how much of that is on-topic, I couldn't say.
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Postby Hyper Shinchan » Thu Jan 17, 2013 4:12 pm

View Original PostProtoboy wrote: when the movies are all released and translated to English by the studio. (I feel like fansubs can miss a lot of things, either interpretation-wise or symantically)

You're waiting until ALL the movie are released and localised? I bet you'll give up sooner than later. :wink: Anyway I wouldn't give too much credit to "professional" translations, they make mistakes too.
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Postby WeirdRaptor » Thu Jan 17, 2013 8:52 pm

Yeaaaaaah... I pretty felt the same way after I first watched Eva.
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Re: Thoughts from a first-time watcher of NGE.

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Postby CJD » Thu Jan 17, 2013 9:36 pm

Surprised no one else has posted it yet.

SPOILER: Show
Image


View Original PostProtoboy wrote:Just to be clear as well, I don't mean ANYONE disrespect by my first post.


None taken. Your reaction, and subsequent reaction, are completely normal. I'd be more concerned if, after watching it the first time, you professed to understand it completely.


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