Do people still hate Evangelion 3.33?

[Reichu]

...Relevant?

SPOILER: Show

IBUKI:
Your perspective on reality and the importance you place on reality,
the slightest difference in these things
will greatly change the world inside your mind.

Kaji:
There are as many truths as there are people.

KENSUKE:
But there is only one truth for you.
One made from your narrow perception of the world
and from information that was altered to protect yourself,
a warped truth.

TOJI:
Well, one person's perception of the world's bound to be tiny anyway.

HIKARI:
But people only have that tiny ruler to measure their surroundings with.

Asuka:
And you only try to see things
through the truths that other people have given you.

Misato:
On sunny days, you feel good.

Rei:
On rainy days, you feel down.

Asuka:
Once you've been taught that,
you make yourself believe that's how you should feel.

RITSUKO:
Even though pleasant things can happen on rainy days too.

FUYUTSUKI:
It's a delicate thing that can be completely transformed
just by how you perceive something. The truth within people, that is.

Kaji:
That's about how solid the truth is for humans.
Though, that's what also makes people seek a deeper truth.

[Bagheera]

...Relevant?

Indeed, exactly what I had in mind!

[gatotsu911]

Eva is a confrontational series, and people have differing responses to being confronted in art.

[user-02]

This is the Empire Strikes Back of Rebuild. It starts off, like ESB, kinda-sorta where we left off, but also, not at all where we left off. You get the sense that so much has happened since we last parted ways with this world. And it has. And so much continues to change as the movie unfolds.

Are those changes for the better? Let's take stock of them:

First, Eva 3.33 is by far the most visually stunning Evangelion footage ever created. Seriously. It blows everything that came before it out of the water, in terms of both the effects used and the ambitiously stylized use of the camera angles and editing.

Thematically, this is one of the most interesting Eva films in the entire canon. Essentially, we're given the full duration of a feature length film in which to immerse ourselves in the philosophy and morality of the Third Impact, the Fourth Impact, and the Human Instrumentality Project. We jump right into the deep end, and we stay there, treading water, every now and then dipping our heads below the waterline to catch a glimpse of whatever is slithering around underneath us.

In terms of plot, storytelling, and emotional resonance? I think it falls short of the best of the franchise, but it's not an abject failure. It has some particularly poignant scenes between Shinji and Kaworu that felt the most emotionally "real" of any of their previous interactions. At the same time, the plot itself felt so rushed and condensed that the emotional payoff was cut short in many cases.

Intellectually, there isn't that much to puzzle out in this one. Kaworu pretty much spells out the entire thing, soup to nuts, in his pivotal monologue to Shinji. It's Evangelion at perhaps its most WYSIWYG. Of course, so much is left ambiguous and mysterious around the margins of the plot. What actually happened prior to the events of 3.33? And how many times has it happened, over how many years? What happens after this? Is Kaworu a reliable narrator? If he's not, that changes things quite a bit. Lots to mull over between the lines in this one, so it's not a total wash.

And the way we sort of take in Shinji's perspective as we go along -- as confused as he is, learning as he learns, drawing similar or different conclusions as we react in tandem with him -- is quite clever as a storytelling device, even if it doesn't consistently work. This is very much Shinji's movie, and he's a character we really needed to spend some more time with in the Rebuild series. It's not a stretch to call 3.33 a character study of Shinji Ikari, and there's a vague possibility -- again, mystery at the margins! -- that the whole thing is taking place in his head. (And if it is, where is he? Right? It's interesting.)

I'm disappointed by the amount and depth of Asuka and Misato in this film. They're set up for interesting emotional journeys, but those journeys are only teased. Rei gets a fantastic bit of depth, as we see her grappling once again with what it means to be a replica. But again, this is just teased. Just hinted at, and then taken away.

And last, I think 3.33 deserves a great deal of credit for staking out virgin territory within the Rebuild series. This is definitely not a retread (unless it really is...).

In the final analysis, I think 3.33 will be held up to be a flawed masterpiece. It's far from perfect, but it's among the finest contributions to the franchise. Whatever the case, you may love it or you may hate it -- but you can't deny that it changes everything.

[zlink64]

Eva 3.33 is by far the most visually stunning Evangelion footage ever created.

The crazy part is they are probably gonna step it up for the final. I look forward to see what they come up with.

[gatotsu911]

The preview clip at the end of 3.33 looks surprisingly hideous though. This time I hope it really is all lies.

Still want to do that analysis post on 3.33's visuals when I have the time. Would anyone else be interested in making a project out of this?

[robersora]

The preview clip at the end of 3.33 looks surprisingly hideous though. This time I hope it really is all lies.

Don't worry, this footage won't appear in Final.

Still want to do that analysis post on 3.33's visuals when I have the time. Would anyone else be interested in making a project out of this?

Oh, I'd love to do that!

3.33 breakdown

Beautiful essay, love it! Pretty much sums up my current feelings. +1

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

The preview clip at the end of 3.33 looks surprisingly hideous though. This time I hope it really is all lies.

Like, the animation quality? Or the story elements being promised?

Animation-wise, these "previews" for the next film are built on the current movie's budget, and not the next movie's budget. The preview for 2.0 was made using the 1.0 budget and production assets, which changed by the time 2.0 was actually produced. The preview for 3.0 was made on 2.0's budget and production assets, which had upgraded significantly by the time 3.0's production actually started. The same thing's true for the preview we saw for "Final." It was made on 3.0's budget and production assets, and weren't produced for the Final movie itself. By the time they actually start producing Final, I'd suspect their production would have improved significantly.

There's also the fact that Anno probably wanted to put in as much time, effort, and resources into the actual Eva Q movie as much as possible, and probably allocated only a couple week's worth of work to the preview. There's no need to break the bank over what's essentially a post-credits easter egg.

Story-wise, I'm not sure if it's all lies or not. I mean, have you seen the preview at the end of 2.0? It looks nothing like the movie it was announcing.

[gatotsu911]

Gonna get to the imagery soon, but while I'm thinking about it here are some things from the original series I still miss in Rebuild:
- train scenes (you know, those train scenes)
- character moments where ironically apropos radio or TV programming is buzzing in the background
- psychosexual fuckery
- animation recycled for ironic effect (...and budget concerns)
- weird intrusions of live photography, screen scratches, or other instances of the medium of animation calling attention to itself

[Bagheera]

In the final analysis, I think 3.33 will be held up to be a flawed masterpiece. It's far from perfect, but it's among the finest contributions to the franchise. Whatever the case, you may love it or you may hate it -- but you can't deny that it changes everything.

Honestly, the more I think about Q the more I think it's just a straight-up masterpiece. I'll put it this way: how do we determine whether or not a work is flawed? In the context of Q people point to a lack of non-Shinji character development, a lack of explanation about what happened during the timeskip, people being mean to Shijnji, etc. But the problem with such criticisms is that they're looking at what the audience wants vs. what the movie is trying to accomplish. Consider the charge of lack of character development: since NGE made use of an ensemble cast it's natural to expect the same from the NTE, but it is not the same work -- this is a story about Shinji, not Asuka or Mari or Misato, so the latter three don't need character development. They're props in a story about Shinji, nothing more. The same holds true for most other criticisms of the film; none of them really hold up under close analysis.

There are technical flaws in the film; while most of the CGI is exquisite some of it is rough in spots, and some of the dropped/changed plot elements are legitimately perplexing (the Key of Nebuchadnezzar, the contract with Lilith, the role of the Mark 6, the question of how the heck Gendo and Fuyutsuki ran Nerv all by their lonesomes, etc), but AFAICT the movie succeeded brilliantly at being what it was meant to be -- a dizzying, thought-provoking experience that ultimately puts Shinji in a similar spot to where he was at the beginning of EoE, setting up one hell of an existential journey for the final act. How can it be called flawed in light of that?

[Dima]

Hate it? No. But i can't say that i enjoyed it as much as 2.22. Sure, visually speaking, it's the most impressive from the other movies but for me that is not enough in a film. Story, pacing and characters is what matters most for me and unfortunately i wasn't pleased with how 3.33 handled all these.

[robersora]

Gonna get to the imagery soon, but while I'm thinking about it here are some things from the original series I still miss in Rebuild:
- train scenes (you know, those train scenes)
- character moments where ironically apropos radio or TV programming is buzzing in the background
- psychosexual fuckery
- animation recycled for ironic effect (...and budget concerns)
- weird intrusions of live photography, screen scratches, or other instances of the medium of animation calling attention to itself

I don't think they should retread territory they've already mastered the first time around.

@Bags: +1
My thoughts exactly.

[WunderBah]

Honestly, the more I think about Q the more I think it's just a straight-up masterpiece. I'll put it this way: how do we determine whether or not a work is flawed? In the context of Q people point to a lack of non-Shinji character development, a lack of explanation about what happened during the timeskip, people being mean to Shijnji, etc. But the problem with such criticisms is that they're looking at what the audience wants vs. what the movie is trying to accomplish. Consider the charge of lack of character development: since NGE made use of an ensemble cast it's natural to expect the same from the NTE, but it is not the same work -- this is a story about Shinji, not Asuka or Mari or Misato, so the latter three don't need character development. They're props in a story about Shinji, nothing more. The same holds true for most other criticisms of the film; none of them really hold up under close analysis.

There are technical flaws in the film; while most of the CGI is exquisite some of it is rough in spots, and some of the dropped/changed plot elements are legitimately perplexing (the Key of Nebuchadnezzar, the contract with Lilith, the role of the Mark 6, the question of how the heck Gendo and Fuyutsuki ran Nerv all by their lonesomes, etc), but AFAICT the movie succeeded brilliantly at being what it was meant to be -- a dizzying, thought-provoking experience that ultimately puts Shinji in a similar spot to where he was at the beginning of EoE, setting up one hell of an existential journey for the final act. How can it be called flawed in light of that?

[TheFriskyIan]

How can it be called flawed in light of that?

You bring up the point where the characters are just there to guide Shinji's story. While that may be true, they're still characters and deserve some development, especially since 1.0 and 2.0 gave them development and it didn't feel forced at all, it's not like the first two movies went out of its way to give these characters development at the cost of moving Shinji's story. Also, it really goes down to impact mechanics and how Shinji is blamed for it. I'm pretty sure it has been discussed to death while I've been dark on here, but when I try to piece together N3I and actual 3I to see where Shinji can be blamed, I legitimately struggle with it.

I mean, yeah I guess the flaws of the movie helped get Shinji to the point Anno needed him to be at the end of the movie, but they're still flaws. We shouldn't just ignore them for the plot's sake. If that were the case, Cinema Sins wouldn't exist.

And just for a bit of fun, some of the scenes have pretty funny body proportions with the characters. When Shinji faces away from Kaworu to bring up not knowing about his friends, his legs seemed freakishly long, either that or he was pulling his pants way up to above his belly. That along with Giraffe necks really make me laugh during the movie when I'm not supposed to be.

[Sachi]

You bring up the point where the characters are just there to guide Shinji's story. While that may be true, they're still characters and deserve some development, especially since 1.0 and 2.0 gave them development and it didn't feel forced at all

The hordes of raging Asuka fanboys would have to disagree with you there.

[TheFriskyIan]

The hordes of raging Asuka fanboys would have to disagree with you there.

Is their beliefs justified though? Or are they just upset Asuka didn't win some sort of shipping war?

[Mr. Tines]

A good part of the hate expressed here about Ha centred about Asuka being totally out of character for Sohryu. That and the movie being so Shinji-centric that other characters only got developed in as far as they interacted with him.

Q doing the latter thing redoubled and in spades has been well down the list of dislikes.

[Bagheera]

A good part of the hate expressed here about Ha centred about Asuka being totally out of character for Sohryu. That and the movie being so Shinji-centric that other characters only got developed in as far as they interacted with him.

Q doing the latter thing redoubled and in spades has been well down the list of dislikes.

Exactly. As I said, it amounts to "this movie is flawed because it didn't do what I wanted it to do!" But that doesn't make it flawed at all. That just means lots of viewers missed the point of the exercise, which is an altogether different problem (and one that has nothing to do with the movie).

[Dima]

One thing i noticed is that EvaGeeks love 3.33 while most people in other forums hate it.

[TheFriskyIan]

One thing i noticed is that EvaGeeks love 3.33 while most people in other forums hate it.

I'm almost positive Q could be more of the same that Ha was and people on here would still love it. I really don't see the hate for 2.0 on here that everyone keeps talking about.