How do you feel about Shinji ending up with Mari?

[TyroLuuki]

Shinji's line about "never crying again" in his life

I really disliked that line, it's such an immature approach to maturity. Not crying anymore does not mean being an adult, having a handle on your emotions and knowing when to healthily express them is. Shinji being stone-cold and emotionless during his goodbyes with Asuka, Kaworu, and Rei didn't make him look mature, it made him look uncaring and unsettling. Characters said over and over again how much Shinji has grown up but I couldn't really believe in it myself.

[evaunit13]

Shinji's line about "never crying again" in his life

I really disliked that line, it's such an immature approach to maturity. Not crying anymore does not mean being an adult, having a handle on your emotions and knowing when to healthily express them is. Shinji being stone-cold and emotionless during his goodbyes with Asuka, Kaworu, and Rei didn't make him look mature, it made him look uncaring and unsettling.

Interpreting this line requires the context of what it's responding to. Kaworu is expecting Shinji to cry, and, earlier, after they board the Wunder, Sakura expresses an expectation that Shinji would have abandoned WILLE after seeing Kaworu explode. On a meta level, these are narrative insertions of our (the audience's) own expectations: after watching Shinji abandon NERV and mope and cry in EoE for the past 25 years, these have become our expectations of his response to this situation. Shinji realizes the only way to break the loop and actually help others is to subvert these expectations, which means giving up the "tears which can save only oneself."

[TyroLuuki]

Shinji realizes the only way to break the loop and actually help others is to subvert these expectations, which means giving up the "tears which can save only oneself."

I can certainly understand that to be the intention, I guess my issue is that I don't like the implications behind that and the message it sends to the audience. I can't help but feel like the movie is saying: "To grow up you must stop crying and accept what you're told without protest."
But Shinji wasn't crying in the beginning of the movie to be childish, he was crying because he was grieving over his friend dying. That's a normal human response to have, and I don't like the movie attempting to paint that as being selfish and wrong to do. Shinji quickly getting over Rei Q's and Misato's deaths without grieving to show how much he's grown up also leaves a bad impression on me. There's nothing wrong with shedding tears over the death of someone that was close to you lol.

[evaunit13]

That's a normal human response to have, and I don't like the movie attempting to paint that as being selfish and wrong to do.

"Cause shouldering the bereaved's sadness and anger is part of the job, I think," said by Toji, on having to quickly become an adult to survive and protect his family. They obviously had to endure hardships and struggles worth many tears, but part of growing up is knowing how much is enough and doing whatever you can to help those still living.

It's not selfish and wrong to grieve, but in excess, at the expense of neglecting duties that could help the the others around you, is. If everyone had grieved in excess, there would be no village of survivors.

I can't help but feel like the movie is saying: "To grow up you must stop crying and accept what you're told without protest."

I don't read this at all, particularly the "without protest" part. We've seen in EoE what would've happened if Shinji kept crying and protested against what he was told to do. Him growing up is realizing that he will eventually have to accept those hard decisions.

he was crying because he was grieving over his friend dying.

The sentiment Shinji learned is the same as what Misato was trying to tell him on the beach at the end of NGE episode 24: Kaworu willingly chose death, and there is not much to be gained from obsessing over it.

Also, Shinji was crying for reasons far beyond just Kaworu's death, more generally for the mass murder that he was responsible for.

"I had to pay for my mistakes and take responsibility," said by Toji in the same aforementioned scene, on growing up. Shinji's excessive grieving did nothing but make him more of a bother for those trying to help him.

[Dartz]

Bringing in an outside element parachuted in to break a continuous cycle who also ends up riding Shinji in the end sounds like we just watched the plot of some weaboo's self-insert fanfic from a 3rd person perspective.

.... not that I'd know about such things.

[Kendrix]

Shinji doesn't say "never again" though. (that would be a huge difference and unforgivable indeed, but that's not what's being said here)

He just says that he's not gonna cry in this situation


From the beginning one of Shinji's #1 problems has been that he tends to get overwhelmed by his emotions.

The best example is the Bardiel debacle and it's immediate aftermath, or indeed EoE.

He's not selfish or uncaring by nature, after all we see him doing plenty to, say, make lunch for lonely classmates.

If he paused 5 mins to think and realized that his sulking/quitting is gonna get everyone killed, he would not want that result, but he wasn't thinking/processing at all because he was consumed with his pain that he couldn't see anything beyond it, like tunnel vision. In the most extreme case, he'd be begging Asuka to help him when she's the one who's unconscious in a hospital bed. Insofar as he even realizes that he could have helped others, that only led to him spiraling further into self-blame.

And the point here is not wether he realistically could or should have fixed the other's problems - the is literally compared to Touji being unable to save every patient as a doctor. Not the "you did this" kind of guilt, but the "I wish I could have changed it", emotional sort, and how to channel it into helpful action instead of being paralised by despair.

Shinji very much wanted to help others. That's why he beat himself up so much for not doing it. It's something he wanted all along since day 1, he just couldn't pull himself together long enough to actually do it.

That's what he does here.

The point is not that emotion is bad or childish, (after all Shinji affirms several times during the impact sequence will still deal with pain) but getting so blinded by it that you can't do anything else.

I liked the line actually, like, it was a profound conclusion that follows as logically from the good parts Shinji always had as surely as the events of EoE flow from the flaws he always had.
The difference is the few months of decompression time & the example of the grownup classmates.

[aboose]

Shinji realizes the only way to break the loop and actually help others is to subvert these expectations, which means giving up the "tears which can save only oneself."

I can certainly understand that to be the intention, I guess my issue is that I don't like the implications behind that and the message it sends to the audience. I can't help but feel like the movie is saying: "To grow up you must stop crying and accept what you're told without protest."
But Shinji wasn't crying in the beginning of the movie to be childish, he was crying because he was grieving over his friend dying. That's a normal human response to have, and I don't like the movie attempting to paint that as being selfish and wrong to do. Shinji quickly getting over Rei Q's and Misato's deaths without grieving to show how much he's grown up also leaves a bad impression on me. There's nothing wrong with shedding tears over the death of someone that was close to you lol.

There are lines in both the original and NTE where Asuka exposes Shinji for shutting down and pushing people away in order to cope with his emotions. Him throwing tantrums and crying are part of that cycle. This is independent of the normal human response of being sad and crying when your friends die, which complicates our judgement of Shinji's behaviors.

[evaunit13]

Shinji doesn't say "never again" though. (that would be a huge difference and unforgivable indeed, but that's not what's being said here)

He just says that he's not gonna cry in this situation

This is my reading of it, the actual Japanese line is 「もう泣かない」,「泣かない」= "to not cry," 「もう」= now, already, or again. Translations may have chosen "again," but the original has enough nuance to be read as "now [I will not cry]."

[Jayfive]

I want to read Shinji and Mari's interactions in the final scene as non-romantic, but I feel the implication is pretty clear.

Indeed. When a girl looks over the top of her glasses in that way Mari does, the chap on the receiving end would do well to clear his schedule for the rest of the day.

[El Squibbonator]

Much as I disapprove of it from a narrative perspective, I do think the idea of Shinji living with Mari opens up some humorous possibilities. I can picture the two of them living in a house with half a dozen cats because Mari can’t resist adopting them. Shinji, meanwhile, is a semi-successful surrealist artist whose work incorporates what may or may not be memories of his previous existence.

[Settie]

It's like watching a fanfiction being animated where the self insert mary sue gets with the MC. As a famous dodgeball commentator once said "it's a bold strategy cotton".

[Natalie the Cat]

Are you not entertained? Is this not why you are here?

[GentlemanX]

My feelings are about the same as Joseki's from a while back: I just don't connect with Mari on a level to be invested in seeing her play such a large role in the ending. I'm fine with her acting as an outside element that brings about change in Shinji's (or just Eva's) world, but beyond the meta I wish we knew more about her and had a more defined dynamic between her and Shinji. Her being playful with him is great, but the two share so little screen time together even in this film that it can't help but feel too sudden. What I think would have helped would have been more scenes between them in 2.22, 3.333, and 3.0+1.01 along with us getting a definitive background for her at the end. I was kind of expecting she'd get a longer flashback scene during Instrumentality before she caught up with Shinji that served to lay out everything hinted at with her conversation with Fuyutsuki and her cameos during Gendo's flashback. Giving us all the answers at the end to completely re-contextualize the character so we could see her in a new light essentially. But it didn't happen and I think that's a shame.

Whether she ends up with Shinji romantically isn't too important to me. I'd personally have preferred if they left things open ended and hinted that Shinji could still end up with Rei, Asuka, Kaworu, Mari, and maybe even Sakura. I don't really have a favorite ship in Eva, I enjoy all the different pairings and would have loved to see them all in a new context where the characters were older. I know, that's why we have fanfiction, but it's not the same as teasing from the official source, ya know?

[Archer]

I don't hate it, though I think Rei was pretty explicitly set up (not just in this movie, but throughout the Rebuilds) as the "main love interest", as much as Asuka was the "main love interest" of NGE. Mari really just desperately needed more screentime and development in the early movies, and while this would NEVER have happened, I almost wish she had completely replaced Asuka in the Rebuilds. Because when it's all said and done, I would rather take a well-developed Mari, over a poorly-developed Mari and an Asuka who's so watered-down that she's almost a played-straight tsundere.

Also, after having marathoned all four movies today, I have to say 2.0 really is a mess of a movie that barely holds itself together, so at that point why NOT just stick the deleted Mari scenes back in? It's not like it's a particularly coherent narrative as it is, so it's not like you'd be disturbing a careful balance or anything.

[Axx°N N.]

Shinji doesn't say "never again" though. (that would be a huge difference and unforgivable indeed, but that's not what's being said here)

He just says that he's not gonna cry in this situation

This is my reading of it, the actual Japanese line is 「もう泣かない」,「泣かない」= "to not cry," 「もう」= now, already, or again. Translations may have chosen "again," but the original has enough nuance to be read as "now [I will not cry]."

Thanks for the linguistic breakdown. Nagging issues with the way in which "composed Shinji" manifests aside, this attenuates my read of that line for sure.

[cremino]

3.0 + 1.0 was pretty light on the romance side. There's a good chance Shinji and Mari will end up together but you can interpret it differently if you wish so and probably it's intended to be a bit ambiguous

[Stuart]

After seeing the final movie I believe Anno idolizes his wife for being his light in a dark point of his life, and thus created Mari to act as his self-insert for how he personally feels she is as a woman. Which is adorable.

I thought that too! Anno's wife seems to have brought him so much happiness and I do think that's been reflected in 3.0+1.0. In the way that Mari kind of sits outside of the established narrative and is the one who disrupts the audience's expectations, Anno's wife is the one who supports and guides him outside of Eva.

[lazysaturn]

Shinji's line about "never crying again" in his life

I really disliked that line, it's such an immature approach to maturity. Not crying anymore does not mean being an adult, having a handle on your emotions and knowing when to healthily express them is. Shinji being stone-cold and emotionless during his goodbyes with Asuka, Kaworu, and Rei didn't make him look mature, it made him look uncaring and unsettling. Characters said over and over again how much Shinji has grown up but I couldn't really believe in it myself.

I agree with this!! Maybe not uncaring but it didn’t feel real anymore. Shinji wasn’t a person but a character following a poorly written script

[aboose]

The translation isnt't good for that line. It could easily and more accurately be translated as "Now, I won't cry."

[Shinichir0]

Rebuild always had this fanfic-tier feeling to it, so I wasn't really surprised at the ending.