Is the End of Evangelion "depressing"?

[chaosakita]

Growing up on the internet, it seems like people always described the End of Evangelion as one of the most "depressing" movies ever. But after having watched it so many times, I find it hard to believe people could really think that when the messages about hope and the potential for self-fulfillment are pretty much explicitly beaten into your head throughout the last quarter of the movie. To me, it just seems like a lot of people watched the first scene, skipped over to the last scene, and called it a day. I do think the last scene is very ambiguous and that can leave people upset, but I'm not sure why people don't comment more on the rest of the movie. Just seems strange to me.

[Ray]

It all depends on how you interpret it, I suppose. For me its an unhappy ending, for others. it's the exact opposite.

[Reiggae]

I think people who call it depressing mean that there are many sad scenes in the movie, but the message is still happy. It is a sad movie positive because the sad scenes are very impactful and leave a lasting impression on the viewer, even if the ending is positive.

[Rosenakahara]

Considering i consider EoE the "Big bang" of the evangelion multi-singular-verse (it isn't quite a multiverse as the stories only seem to happen after the previous has finished and not at the same time as i interpreted from a few scenes in 3.0) its sort of a mixed bag for me (before anyone says it yes i think rebuild is a sequel but only in the sense that it is set at the very end of the multi-verses timeline and that it is the latest (and final) iteration of the story) on the one hand i know that as long as the characters souls still exist it will be OK so im fine with the ending we got, on the other this also started a long series of events where these people had to relive some of the worst moment of thier life again and again, i have a theory that rebuild seele somehow knows this but that requires spoilers and an entirely different thread so i wont go into it.

All in all i think bitter-sweet is too strong a word for this ending, it is really neither good nor bad and i don't consider it depressing either, its just.........evangelion, that's the only way i can describe it.

[Ray]

I mean. . .all I really asked for with EOE is that they show Shinji get out if it with at least a modestly happy or bittersweet ending.

They characters talk about hope, but everything that happens in latter half of the series, EOE, (and 3.0) just screams the opposite. At least to me.

I mean if everything else had been the same but they added just a little more, I think I might consider it a happy ending. But Shinji being alone in the world, with the only person left being Asuka, the rest of the human race turned into tang with a shadow of a shadow of hope of coming back? That doesn't strike me as a very hopeful ending, even with all the subtext.

Would a sixty second after credits scene of Shinji living a relatively meaningful life in a rebuilt world really have been too much to ask?

There is also THAT scene in the hospital. If everything else about EOE been the same except for THAT scene, I think the franchise would be a lot more popular than it is, and I don't think Shinji would be as divisive or controversial as a character.

[ElMariachi]

I think it's because EoE break the old storytelling rule of "show, don't tell" : we're told repetitively that Shinji saved the world by rejecting Instrumentality, that now mankind can move toward an hopeful future, that everyone can come back if they want to and that an heaven can be made from anywhere if you have the will to it... and then we cut to the last scene of a ruined city with a blood-red sea and a crazed Shinji trying to kill Asuka before the latter mutters "How disgusting".

Sure it's supposed to be only the beginning of their future story and isn't indicative of what their live will be from now on, but that's still the last we saw of them.

In fact, remove Yui's words about people coming back if they and that you can create heaven anywhere, and the story would be a textbook case of a tragedy with a downer ending.

There is also THAT scene in the hospital. If everything else about EOE been the same except for THAT scene, I think the franchise would be a lot more popular than it is, and I don't think Shinji would be as divisive or controversial as a character.

Agreed, even though THAT scene was here to show us how much down the gutter Shinji is, it dirtied the character far beyond just that scene : now when talking about Shinji, what comes first for most of the people in the Internet is : "wimp"(mainly due to his catatonic state in EoE), "faggot for a gray-aired alien" and "jerk-off to a comatose girl" (and yes Bagheera I know that she was sedated and not comatose! )

Maybe that's the reason why in the Rebuild Shinji is more assertive and the homo-herotism with Kaworu was toned down to a more equal friendship instead of a "seme/uke" dynamic in episode 24. (although the subtext is still here! )
Seriously, a friend of my sister saw episode 24 yesterday and said that she saw many shonen-ais that were less heavy on the yaoi subtext that episode 24, and my sister confirmed!

[ChaddyManPrime]

The ending to me just feels incomplete, but then again every story feels incomplete to me when there are still people left alive

[pwhodges]

But then, stories are typically about facing the future with the lessons of the past; whether it's Sam Gamgee saying "I'm home", or Scott and Ramona floating off to an unknown future through subspace, or when George Smiley is able to retire after defeating Karla - none of these need to die to have a conclusion. In EoE, the future is also unclear, but it is there.

[ElMariachi]

^
Yeah, but your examples ends in a positive note, with a happy scene.

An ending in the vein of LastA, where Asuka kicks her "grave" and tell to Shinji to get up because they have a lot of work to do feels like a final positive note, a crazed Shinji almost killing an almost apathetic Asuka with the latter saying that she feels sick in a desolated landscape don't scream "positive note" to me, even if the possibility for a better future is strongly here. (once people start to come back from the red sea)

[AngelNo13Bardiel]

It's, err...well, it is what it is. It mostly depends on which prism you view it through.

Me? I prefer to think that, as much as it's the last we see of original!Evangelion, EoE by far not the end. It's simply the start of a new beginning (in many ways).

[SEELE]

The question should be: Is this show make you depressed (+EoE)?

And i have to admit that i watched the Ger dub for End of Evan. And the last line was "I feel sick" (not how disgusting like in the english dub or "kimochi warui" in Japanese). So as i was finished with this movie i thought that this was a good movie though. But the truth is am depressed since i started Eva several years ago. And still im depressed and pessimistic about my current workplace and my life. But i read Nietzsche and had experience with this "self-coaching" E25+E26 which are btw. pretty damn good.

There is maybe some Freud influence (and Schoppenhauer) in this show but i have to admit that the show is depressing on people who have optimistic attitude towards the life itself. To me EoE made a good conclusion to what the Otaku/Anime-Fandom is and what i already learned about self-coaching through Talane. And for a downer or pessimistic person like me ... it actually couldn't get any worse.

I would say: No this show (+EoE) isn't depressing*

*You get out of it what you invested. And most of the people who watched the show hate Shinji for doing what he had done.

And it doesn't suprise me that to most of the people (the regular viewer) who doesn't experienced Death and Depression ... they don't get Anno with NGE at all. But i prefer E25+E26 from the tv-show rather than the EoE because at least we see Shinji actually faithfully laughing ... which is most of the part heart-wrenching and good.

[Mr. Tines]

Long-timers will recognise this image



and phrases about the anti-Eden, or "two red dots locked in eternal hatred" in connection with posts about EoE being a BAD END (Whoops! There goes the ecosystem!), especially in contrast with the upbeat, even triumphal, series ending.

The movie's ending very definitely contradicts what it tells (Yui's pious mouthings just before she heads out on her interstellar voyages -- she's not going to get her hands dirty in the aftermath) by what it shows. And when it does what it does to characters in whom I had been invested, well it did what it did well enough to provoke me to fix-fic.

[SEELE]

[...]The movie's ending very definitely contradicts what it tells [...] by what it shows.[...]

In one way or another. EoTV was in my opinion perfect while EoManga was the mirrored EoTV. Now that i actually think about it ... Sadamoto made a better ending than Anno. God have mercy with us and 4.0.

[Rosenakahara]

In one way or another. EoTV was in my opinion perfect while EoManga was the mirrored EoTV. Now that i actually think about it ... Sadamoto made a better ending than Anno. God have mercy with us and 4.0.

as much as i liked manga ending..............yeah no.
i feel like i am the only person that, since i hold it up to my own personal theories was perfectly satisfied by the ending and loved what it did :/

[Dataprime]

I hope this is the right place to put this:

Why do you think there is such a sharp contrast between the tv series & EoE?
The show ends on a high note where Shinji finds "redemption" and able to find
purpose in his life. In End of Eva however he is totally consumed his fears and despair.
Becoming a person who cannot experience any type of joy at all.
Overcome by his own darkness.

Can anyone shed light on this?

[SEELE]

as much as i liked manga ending..............yeah no.
i feel like i am the only person that, since i hold it up to my own personal theories was perfectly satisfied by the ending and loved what it did :/

Okay? Now im curious about your theory. YOU ... PM ... to me ... now.

Can anyone shed light on this?

No. You have to find your own answer. (Anno-Style)
Intermission.
My Chemical Romance - Welcome To The Black Parade - We'll carry on

To shed light on this - i think EoTV is what the Instrumentality is to people and the therapeutic effect on Shinji himself. While E26 (of EoTV) is a overall happy ending with the conclusion to reject this Instrumentality. So like Mr. Tines and i have a "contradictive" ending in mind this don't have to count for you at all.

And when it does what it does to characters in whom I had been invested, well it did what it did well enough to provoke me to fix-fic.

Same here.

[pwhodges]

Now that i actually think about it ... Sadamoto made a better ending than Anno.

The trouble with the manga ending is that although Shinji is now shown to be a better and more balanced person, presumably as a result of what has gone before, he has no awareness of this, and so has merely benefitted, not learned. (The same happens at the end of RahXephon.) That said, I did still like the execution of the manga ending.

[Bagheera]

and phrases about the anti-Eden, or "two red dots locked in eternal hatred" in connection with posts about EoE being a BAD END (Whoops! There goes the ecosystem!), especially in contrast with the upbeat, even triumphal, series ending.

Meh. North America got a tsunami, for everywhere else it was Tuesday.

And old timers will recognize my argument that 2I should have been the death knell for the world; so long, Great Conveyor! It was nice having food while it lasted! If Anno can handwave that and give us hypertech on top of it 3I's chump change by compare.

The movie's ending very definitely contradicts what it tells (Yui's pious mouthings just before she heads out on her interstellar voyages -- she's not going to get her hands dirty in the aftermath) by what it shows. And when it does what it does to characters in whom I had been invested, well it did what it did well enough to provoke me to fix-fic.

It doesn't contradict, it just fails to deliver. Bad enough for some people, though, I realize.

In one way or another. EoTV was in my opinion perfect while EoManga was the mirrored EoTV. Now that i actually think about it ... Sadamoto made a better ending than Anno. God have mercy with us and 4.0.

No, he didn't. He made a copout ending that betrayed everything that came before. Utter tripe.

as much as i liked manga ending..............yeah no.
i feel like i am the only person that, since i hold it up to my own personal theories was perfectly satisfied by the ending and loved what it did :/

Not at all. Many of us love it.

[ElMariachi]

And old timers will recognize my argument that 2I should have been the death knell for the world; so long, Great Conveyor! It was nice having food while it lasted! If Anno can handwave that and give us hypertech on top of it 3I's chump change by compare.

Well, half of the world population died in the two years after 2I, that's already a lot less mouths to feed, from here maybe they built giant farms growing food out of algae and mass uses of GMO (it's that or dying from hunger, I doubt there was much opposition) and managed to survive.
Or maybe they just gained a reprieve of a few decades and most of Earth's life was condemned to die slowly. Now I wonder if Third Impact "repaired" the climate? Yui, Rei and Kaworu were confident that things will be okay, so that means that Earth isn't at the risk of a mass extinction event.

What I really wonder in fact is how there's still people alive in Rebuild after 2I sterilized the oceans, since a roughly half of the world's oxygen is produced by phytoplankton, which would be far more harmful to everyone than an eternal summer.

[Bagheera]

Well, half of the world population died in the two years after 2I, that's already a lot less mouths to feed, from here maybe they built giant farms growing food out of algae and mass uses of GMO (it's that or dying from hunger, I doubt there was much opposition) and managed to survive.
Or maybe they just gained a reprieve of a few decades and most of Earth's life was condemned to die slowly. Now I wonder if Third Impact "repaired" the climate? Yui, Rei and Kaworu were confident that things will be okay, so that means that Earth isn't at the risk of a mass extinction event.

Who knows? All I know is that, without fish stocks, the world dies. And hell, it's not even just that: if the Great Conveyor goes down our carbon cycle gets tanked, too. The atmosphere itself would become too toxic to breathe (though I don't know how long that would take; probably longer than the series timeframe).

Fortunately, this can be handwaved if we say "well, the surface of Antarctica was blasted away, but the rest of the continent is still there." In that case the Conveyor is still fine (assuming the atmospheric heating doesn't nuke it, which is still quite possible). I assume something like this happened as a matter of necessity, but there's no denying it's a hell of a handwave.