Will Shinji Ever Find Love In The End?

[caragnafog dog]

I don't think it's as absolute as will he find love or won't he. I imagine there will be some surprising combination of tragic destruction and renewal/second chances like the first time around, whether or not he has found love by that time will probably be left up to us to decide. Like the first time. The stress of eva ending again is going to kill me.

[xdiesp]

Doesn't look like it will be as bad the end of EOE, since we are there now. My guess is we will get a... hard fought resolution with plenty of losses, slightly worse than the tv series.

[Giji Shinka]

Doesn't look like it will be as bad the end of EOE, since we are there now. My guess is we will get a... hard fought resolution with plenty of losses, slightly worse than the tv series.

EoE ending wasn't bad ending. I've seen much much much worse endings in my life of film watcher. I would say that the film was confusing and the ending too, but it definitely wasn't bad one.
But that's your opinion about the film.

[Kendrix]

At this point, I'd even welcome goddamn S/A with rejoicing (as unlikely as it is), as long as Shinji ends up in a state preferable to death.

All sighns seem to point to either death, inferred death (he lives at the end but it's obvious someone will lynch him within the next few weeks), or, the more likely option: worse than death.

[Nuclear Lunchbox]

Killing Shinji would be too merciful. Anno isn't going to let him (or us, for that matter) off the hook that easily.

[Redtophat]

Killing Shinji would be a waste.

[Kendrix]

...which is why I said that something worse than death is a more likely option.

But even if what we know about Anno & his messages tell us that he'll probably survive, I have trouble seeing how. In any other show, he'd be far past the karma event horizont, the way a sympathetic villain is. This looks like obvious setup for redemption equals death - what other redemption could there be for what he inadvertedly did/ got himself caught up in?
Even if nobody lynches him, I have a hard time seeing this ending in a way where he won't just wither away soon after.
But I know that EVA is not "any other show", and that it does not do obvious setups... Anno would probably say that death would be too easy, which is why he had Asuka pull him out.


Scrap finding love, with this grim outlook, I'd be happy if Shinji gets a halfway dignified, meaningful death. At least he won't have to suffer anymore.
This is how horrible the situation has become, for the whole planet and everyone involved, but for Shinji most of all(as far as inescapability goes): Just dying would be an accomplishment!
*shakes head*
Oh EoE, what a happy, merciful ending thou art by sheer comparision. At least there he could undo TI once he realized it was crap.

[Maru]

Because Shinji is the manifestation of the plight (Anno believes) that affects Japanese youth. By making the protagonist Shinji the target audience is able to integrate into the scenario more easily, and thus any development on Shinji's part, positive or negative, is more easily integrated into the viewers psyche. He's trying to "fix" people through the work, and you can't fix someone if they can't believably insert themselves into the exercise. For all the talk of people inserting too hard into Shinji, the reality is those are the people the movie's aimed at.

It's hilarious, really. Whether he realizes it or not he's stumbled upon some pretty basic therapeutic concepts. Unfortunately where he failed with EoE is where he'll fail with Rebuild: the assumption that people who share the same problem have the same root causes, and that the same method of helping one person will help everyone with that problem. If you people are right with the direction Anno's taking this, then I'll stand by the sideline and watch as his efforts crash and burn just like they did 20 years ago. EoE didn't "fix" otaku, it created more of them. Let's see if he learned from that mistake or not, eh?

This is a fascinating idea, and I'd like to hear you elaborate more on it.

I have to wonder if Anno's assessment of the problems society is facing today is even correct at all. I used to agree with it without a second thought, but now I think he's been haring off into some weird territory (yeah, I know, it should have been obvious he's been haring off into some weird territory for quite a while now).

What I'm getting at is that Anno, without meaning to, became a complete and total reactionary over the last fifteen years. We already knew he was a war freak (Miyazaki joked that he wouldn't let him direct a Nausicaa sequel because he'd just use Kushana to play war games, or something along those lines). He's gone on record saying that he doesn't see any adults in Japan, even among his own generation. He just sees eternal children, stunted emotionally and psychologically by the Big Daddy Japanese Government, which is likewise stunted by Big Daddy America.

Now, I do somewhat agree with the sentiment that the youth of today need to harden the fuck up. I'm rather disenchanted with my own generation, as well as the ones that immediately preceded my own. I'm 26, and on some level I think it would be quite accurate to apply Anno's principle to myself, namely that life is suffering, and you had better get used to it, embrace it even. But at the same time, I feel like he's idealizing a period of Japanese history (the 30's and 40's) that was by any objective measure was a pretty rotten time to be alive. There were certainly a lot of good things about Pre-War Japan, but I do not think that most of those things were the result of the militarist governments of that era. If anything, they occurred in spite of the militarist government, and one could go so far as to say that the militarist government was already in the process of killing what made Pre-War Japan a unique, beautiful place. The American occupation that followed just made it worse by being a foreign occupier trying to remold Japan in its own, completely non-Japanese image.

I guess what I'm getting at is, maybe Anno is just being an angry old man who enjoys chewing on his audience and who thinks the world would be so much better if we could just go back to the old days, and maybe he doesn't realize just how godawful the old days were. After all, he wasn't there for it. He doesn't even remember the Post-War; all he remembers is the rapid growth of his youth, and the confusion and emptiness of the post-bubble years. Miyazaki wasn't there for the War Years either, but he grew up in the Post-War, and his parents remembered the War and the years leading up to it, so it was more of a living memory for him. Perhaps that is why Miyazaki seems to be more explicitly anti-militarist in his outlook. Or perhaps I have just completely misread Anno, but that is my impression of him after reading the Atlantic Monthly article he was interviewed in.

[Chuckman]

The actual ethos of Eva is pointlessly bitter and cruel. You have to deliberately ignore Anno's message to take anything positive out of it. Most people who read it as "get out and enjoy life" are actually doing that.

Ignoring his message is in itself part of the message. Why would a man who wants the audience of his work to grow up and move on want to tell them what to do?

Everything I read about the man leads me to draw the same conclusion, that he is an inspired artist but an unpleasant person and all of his opinions are overwrought or wrong.

[Maru]

The actual ethos of Eva is pointlessly bitter and cruel. You have to deliberately ignore Anno's message to take anything positive out of it. Most people who read it as "get out and enjoy life" are actually doing that.

Ignoring his message is in itself part of the message. Why would a man who wants the audience of his work to grow up and move on want to tell them what to do?

Everything I read about the man leads me to draw the same conclusion, that he is an inspired artist but an unpleasant person and all of his opinions are overwrought or wrong.

Yeah, Chuck, I had been coming to that conclusion for some time. Anno is a bit of an enigma to me. He is obviously an inspired artist, but at the same time, not. He's a one hit wonder who somehow miraculously created one of the most fascinating and profound concepts in recent memory, and then he didn't have the faintest idea of what to do with it. Look at how little he has actually done since creating Evangelion. And if his whole idea was to tell people, "get out and enjoy life, and think for yourself," he sure picked a deliberately obscure way of telling people that. You'd think the man gets off on people being mad at him.

I suddenly feel a whole lot better about just ignoring the message of the original work, such as it is, and substituting my own, as well as developing my own various head-canons. There are some works you can expect to get a single, correct, and coherent meaning out of, but I must conclude at present that Evangelion is not one of them.

[Kendrix]

While the social commentary was certainly a relevant factor, it wasn't all there is.

Shinji is very much an autobiographical product.

[Warren Peace]

The actual ethos of Eva is pointlessly bitter and cruel. You have to deliberately ignore Anno's message to take anything positive out of it. Most people who read it as "get out and enjoy life" are actually doing that.

Ignoring his message is in itself part of the message. Why would a man who wants the audience of his work to grow up and move on want to tell them what to do?

Everything I read about the man leads me to draw the same conclusion, that he is an inspired artist but an unpleasant person and all of his opinions are overwrought or wrong.

"Message" is a funny thing. Romeo and Juliet is actually a cautionary tale about the destructive nature of teenage infatuation, but most people will say it's this great romance. Sometimes the interpreter is at fault. Myself, I'd apply "unpleasant person whose opinions are all overwrought or wrong" more often to Eva fans

[Maru]

"Message" is a funny thing. Romeo and Juliet is actually a cautionary tale about the destructive nature of teenage infatuation, but most people will say it's this great romance. Sometimes the interpreter is at fault. Myself, I'd apply "unpleasant person whose opinions are all overwrought or wrong" more often to Eva fans

And sometimes the author really is just a cranky, bitter old man. I never said that Anno had nothing of value to say, or if I did that wasn't what I meant. What I meant was, I felt like there was a lot about his message, to the extent that he had one, that was either incorrect or poorly delivered. It is the author's obligation to make himself clear to the reader as best he can. I do not think you can say that Evangelion is particularly clear. It'd be one thing if it were just complicated, but it often seems to be deliberately obscure, and to take on all the clarity of mud.

Romeo and Juliet was about a lot of other things too, like the senselessness of ancient feuds. Who the hell could even remember why the Capulets and Montagues hated each other? Nobody, that's who, yet because of this ridiculous, decades old grudge, six people by my count wound up dying for no good reason. If Tybalt hadn't been such a jerk, and Mercutio less of a hotheaded moron, the whole wretched mess could probably have been avoided.

I am genuinely curious, if you think that many of the audience is overwrought and wrong, then what do you think was right about what Anno had to say that the rest of us are missing?

[ElMariachi]

If Shinji had any chances to find love will depend on some factors :
1/ if he's to struck by the "curse of the Eva" which prevents him to ages, as Asuka and Mari pretends.
2/ if 1/ is true, is it reversible? Meaning that if there exist a cure to restart the puberty process, or if simply by staying away from LCL for some time
3/ the most important : is he even HUMAN anymore? Ritsuko explicitly said in 2.0 that his huge Synch ratio is very bad news, as the more the plug depth is important(meaning getting closer to the Eva's core), the more Shinji risks to "not being human anymore"... and Shinji fused with said core... for fourteen freaking years! If we assume that under Asuka's eyepatch indeed hides a "muted Angel eye", which happened after being consumed by an Angel for what, one hour maybe, imagine what a decade and half absorbed in the core of an Angel clone could do, the probability that it profoundly changed his metabolism is very high!

Well if 3/ is true, Shinji's chance at love are utterly f*cked : no one will approach him even with a ten foot tall pole, and he will probably be for some incredibly painful experiment, if not outright executed!

If 1/ is true and 2/ is a no(as in, no cure for the curse), his only chances so thing won't get really awkward is with Mari or Asuka... now unless some really big interaction is made between Shinji and Mari, I don't think there is really a chance, besides Mari doesn't strike as the type to pursue a stable relationship(more as a one-timer flirt, if she wasn't a jailbait that is! ).
As for Asuka... well I think we are all more or less biased by their interaction during NGE, when many teasing was made, and the last episodes and EoE outright confirmed that they were attracted one by the other(even if they were to f*cked up to try to act normally), but these mutual feelings took time to blossom, the time it took for Asuka to see the depth behind Shinji's meekly behavior, and that they are not so different after all. But it took months to reach that point. Unfortunately for the A/S shippers, they barely had time to know one each other in Rebuild : not more than some weeks after they met, all hell break lose when everyone's plans crashes when Shinji starts 3I out of nowhere(I really doubt anyone, even Gendo and SEELE, anticipated such an insane outcome of Zeruel's battle). So for Shinji, Asuka is that arrogant pseudo-redhead pilot which he considers a friend, or at least a precious team mate(and an incredibly annoying flatmate), while from Asuka's POV it's some weeks thinkinf he's an incompetent imbecile without any spine, and in the end maybe he's slightly more interesting that what meet the eye... versus fourteen years as the guy responsible for making her and everyone she knows(and survived) a living hell of constant fighting and irremediably broken chance at any kind of childhood(IIRC, her voice actress compared her to an "embittered mercenary"). And that's without even starting on the fact she's now technically 28 years old!

For an A/S to eventually having a chance, I see only one thing :
- first, they will need to have some time to better know one eachother, one solution is by having another Time Skip of some years between 3.0 and 4.0(why not, Gendo will need some time to prepare himself to fight the EVA-01 powered Wunder and it's fleet).
- second, Shinji will have to adapt to this new world. THe world has changed, everyone has changed with him, and adapted their values to survive, taking a more survivalist and militaristic way of life. Right now Shinji and Asuka are "culturally" incompatible, it's like pairing an hippie with a hardass military vet, it can't work because they are from different worlds. Here again, the only way I can see it to happen is with the help of another Time Skip where Shinji more or less adapted to this new harsh world.

Then, and only then, I can see something plausible, although even then, what make Asuka interested in Shinji in NGE(their similar past and parental issues) maybe isn't even valid anymore: after 14 years with her mind occupied by survival and the destruction of NERV, she's probably long past her mommy issues!

If 1/ is false, or if 1/ is true but 2/ is a yes(meaning Shinji can age normally), you can eventually add Sakura in the mix : she's the only one who don't seems to want to eviscerate him or strap explosives to him every time she sees him. If she has some maternal instinct she could potentially have Misato's role in NGE of kind of surrogate mother/emotional support with an hint of love,6 years of difference isn't that problematic, specially if you have a Time Skip in 4.0.


Now for ReiQ, she's trying to find herself, falling for the same guy than her "other self" wouldn't really help her, besides Shinji made clear that he's not interested in her.

Which serves as an excellent transition for Rei II! It was hinted thorough 1.0 and almost confirmed in 2.0 that they genuinely love one each other. But the revelation from 3.0 about her, not counting the fact she disappeared god-knows-where, makes the viability of this ship very hazardous. In a more meta level, I think that if Anno really wants to deliver a message, he should avoid R/S : the fact that is practically incest will overshadow any message, and Evangelion risks to be more remembered as "that anime with the creepy clone-incest" than what Anno had planned for Rebuild.

Finally, Misato... well no. That was already weird in NGE with a 14 years gap, now with a 28 years gap it's even weirder, and has the same risks that it overshadows everything else, like with Rei II.

[Chuckman]

"Message" is a funny thing. Romeo and Juliet is actually a cautionary tale about the destructive nature of teenage infatuation, but most people will say it's this great romance. Sometimes the interpreter is at fault. Myself, I'd apply "unpleasant person whose opinions are all overwrought or wrong" more often to Eva fans

That's a really bad example because most people know Romeo and Juliet from movies that play up the romance angle and pop cultural osmosis. Everyone remembers the balcony scene and forgets that Romeo was madly in love with another woman ten minutes before he met Juliette and that they kill themselves in the end due to what amounts to a failure to communicate.

People don't think Romeo and Juliet is a great romance, they think the play that exists in their heads is a great romance. Such an example isn't the interpreter being at fault in the sense you mean, their fault is not reading the text itself.

3.0 is pretty bitter. The descent arc and EoE are pretty bitter.

[pwhodges]

If Shinji is really no longer human, what is the relevance of whatever the message of Eva is in the end to actual humans?

[ElMariachi]

If Shinji is really no longer human, what is the relevance of whatever the message of Eva is in the end to actual humans?

Probably something along the line of "what a measure is a human being?" or "are we defined by our origins or our actions?"

If Shinji indeed isn't totally human anymore(or worst, an Angel for total drama), it could lead to an huge angstfest for him where he will have to decide what he really want, now that he's "free" of his obligation to help mankind for being part of this species...

But still, it would obliterate any romantic chances for him.

[one-eyed]

Frankly, any romantic interest for him or his for someone already ended long ago. Romantic love or any kind love is for the living and not the dead. Shinji is among the dead, but only now he realized that. Extinguish his existence should not be considered murder but euthanasia! There is no hope, there never was and Anno made that clear in Q. (He gave the Idiot Ball for Shinji to emphasize that he should quit, he is hopeless, that all he can do is wrong, etc.).
For me, in 4.0 we will see a flashback of what happened during the timeskip. Maybe Anno take advantage of the fake previews as, for example, when Misato slapped Ritsuko (now the reason would be Akagi have hidden her crucial information about the Evas), the confinement of the NERV staff, etc. Then with 6 minutes to finish the movie, the scene would return to this apocalyptic present. Asuka, Rei Q and Shinji reach Misato. She points a gun to the head of Shinji, says: "Nothing personal, kid!" (as the JSSDF soldier in EoE) and shoots. We have 5 minutes of black screen and then the lights turn on and the movie ended. End.
The alternatives would be Shinji be hanged like the Nazis, going through the firing squad as a traitor, be placed in the gas chamber or, my favorite, lethal injection (they could use some opiate to make death almost pleasant!). There is a biblical approach that is stoning. Surely, the most democratic because everyone can participate in the revenge! All participants will feel that justice has been done; they and their loved ones have been vindicated, etc. With his death, Shinji will have done more for the happiness of the people that with his whole useless life! Of course, all this is illusion and tricks with smoke and mirrors, Gendo is loose and ready to kill the entire human race to achieve his goals. So even in death Shinji continues to be used by Gendo.

In another version, we would have the Giant Naked Gendo and a worthy end to Urotsukidōji, the Legend of the Overfiend. End.

Shinji was created by Anno/Gendo to lose, plain and simple. Regrettable, but it's the honest truth. All his hopes and dreams have always been useless and would never become reality. He was born to envy the dead and the death always evades him. I think that's even biblical.

[Maru]

Frankly, any romantic interest for him or his for someone already ended long ago. Romantic love or any kind love is for the living and not the dead. Shinji is among the dead, but only now he realized that. Extinguish his existence should not be considered murder but euthanasia! There is no hope, there never was and Anno made that clear in Q. (He gave the Idiot Ball for Shinji to emphasize that he should quit, he is hopeless, that all he can do is wrong, etc.).
For me, in 4.0 we will see a flashback of what happened during the timeskip. Maybe Anno take advantage of the fake previews as, for example, when Misato slapped Ritsuko (now the reason would be Akagi have hidden her crucial information about the Evas), the confinement of the NERV staff, etc. Then with 6 minutes to finish the movie, the scene would return to this apocalyptic present. Asuka, Rei Q and Shinji reach Misato. She points a gun to the head of Shinji, says: "Nothing personal, kid!" (as the JSSDF soldier in EoE) and shoots. We have 5 minutes of black screen and then the lights turn on and the movie ended. End.
The alternatives would be Shinji be hanged like the Nazis, going through the firing squad as a traitor, be placed in the gas chamber or, my favorite, lethal injection (they could use some opiate to make death almost pleasant!). There is a biblical approach that is stoning. Surely, the most democratic because everyone can participate in the revenge! All participants will feel that justice has been done; they and their loved ones have been vindicated, etc. With his death, Shinji will have done more for the happiness of the people that with his whole useless life! Of course, all this is illusion and tricks with smoke and mirrors, Gendo is loose and ready to kill the entire human race to achieve his goals. So even in death Shinji continues to be used by Gendo.

In another version, we would have the Giant Naked Gendo and a worthy end to Urotsukidōji, the Legend of the Overfiend. End.

Shinji was created by Anno/Gendo to lose, plain and simple. Regrettable, but it's the honest truth. All his hopes and dreams have always been useless and would never become reality. He was born to envy the dead and the death always evades him. I think that's even biblical.

If that turns out to be the case, I'm going to be disappointed. I mean, I can understand on some level if Anno wanted the audience to "get over" Evangelion and "move on" from it. I can even understand wanting to make a show that is a meditation on depression and inner suffering. But to me, it feels like doing an ending even remotely like that is just spiting the audience. Maybe I've just gotten used to it, or made my own head canon that improves it, but really the ending of EoE seems better than what you've (somewhat facetiously) predicted.

I mean, come on, even Job got a good ending eventually, and he's practically the gold standard for biblical suffering... he endured so much pain and torment, and when he finally asked why God would allow a good and righteous man such as himself to suffer, God answered him, and restored him. God wanted to see that Job would not break under pressure, but he also wanted to see that Job was not just some mindless believer. He wanted to see the moment where Job finally cried out in anguish and asked, "Why me, God?" It's not enough to silently suffer, you must know why you are suffering... or rather, know that you cannot always know why you are suffering, and that bad things happen to good people.

I'd like to think that Final will end somewhat like that. At the very least, I'd like to think that it could be a story about overcoming depression, not in a pat, simplistic way, but of coming to terms with the fact that your life is full of suffering, and making your peace with that, and using that suffering to push you forward in life. Shinji needs to find something to live for, something to throw himself into. Arguably, he already had that with being an Eva pilot, but perhaps he needs to find something better, or else commit to that first thing more fully... and given the events of 3.0 he may need to find a new profession anyway.

But to think that the story is just going to consist of "Shinji suffers because the plot says he must suffer," and that suffering is never answered, and he never really learns a damned thing or grows as a person... well, that would just suck with a capital K.

[one-eyed]

The Idiot Ball that Shinji has gained in Rebuilding Q assured me that Anno/Gendo created him only to lose and do the wrong things. I do not think Anno wants to "teach" something to somebody (not believed in EoE and I am absolutely sure now). If he wants to teach something, should take the Great Wall of China of his own eyes before complaining about the grain of dust in the eyes of others.
The "message" Anno wanted to go and that people can understand are radically different (Ironic, is not it?). Throughout his life, Shinji believed: everybody hates me, I do everything wrong, I'd be better off dead, I'm alone, everyone would be better if I had never been born and now it's all true! How to be optimistic in such a situation? And to adding insult to injury, Anno uses the music Sakura Nagashi as if mocking the situation (reminds me of the inspiring opening of Eva, a series with content aimed only to produce madness and despair. The pinnacle of dissonance. Brilliant, but sick!). Even with the appearance of Kaworu I would not have recovered my Hope. I do not understand, thought very vague and does not even believe in Kaworu’s Abracadabra.
See, for example, the omnipotent, omniscient and invincible Gendo just got scared twice in this series: the first when Shinji left the NERV and Zeruel appeared crushing everything and everyone on your way. There was Gendo, the man fated to sacrifice the whole human race to accomplish his depraved, sick and selfish desires, completely helpless and whimpering in front of Unit 01: "Yui, you're rejecting me?” Then Shinji commit the idiocy of return and Gendo recovers his composure (he rears up his butt, rears up his nose, puts his hand in his pants pocket and takes his stance ‘I am holier than thou!’ and then brags that he had planned everything. Sincerely, I (and many people!) would prefer have died at the hands of Zeruel, would have been more worthy than what happened after! Shinji should have stayed where he was and have done nothing!
The second situation, Gendo is worried about Shinji's reaction upon learning of Near 3I. He was not worried that his son was suffering; he was worried that his pawn kill himself and not fulfill the plans he had for him. If Shinji had killed himself everything would be all right and Gendo's plans would have been ruined!
Why insist on hope? I think Shinji's life ended, period, and I'm sorry and sad because I like him, was as him and I'm sure I would not do better in his situation: I probably would have killed myself after the incident with Bardiel and not feel ashamed to say it. The only joy left was that Anno is concentrating all his 'creative genius' and ‘narrative skill’ in Shinji then there not been the mental implosion of Asuka in the bathtub and her mindrape , the breakdown of Misato after Kaji's death and the collapse of Ritsuko, etc (maybe there was offscreen, but, wait! Still lack a movie, dammit!).
The only real narrative merit in Q for me is the relationship of Kaworu and Shinji. For years I heard that the connection of Shinji with Rei reflects Gendo with Yui, but I never believed it. I think the relationship idealized and messianic of Kaworu and Shinji is much more alike: Gendo thinks that once with Yui, she will forgive him, absolve him of all his sins and everything will end well, exactly what Kaworu meant to Shinji. I do not know whether Anno realized that did not work for the son, then it should not work for the father (or sperm donor who is the more appropriate term to describe Gendo!), but Anno seems to be a man who uses two types of weight and two types of measure then, maybe, Gendo win this time. It would be interesting if Gendo and Kaworu have some notion that they are in a kind of time looping and Gendo is using his knowledge to benefit only himself, finally disproving the lies and bullshit he said in EoE.

I have no hope of a happy ending for Shinji or anyone not named Gendo in Evangelion. For me, Anno spat in my face again. The first time was EoE. I never forgave him for the scene in the hospital and all respect I had for him thanks to Evangelion, Gunbuster and Nadia died that day. I was expecting something that kind of Gendo: a man of almost 50 years, insanely obsessed with his dead wife, who spends several hours a day watching the teenage clone of her, naked floating in a liquid. He had a chair ready to watch like some kind of movie and, suspiciously, is with the right hand, all the time, in his pants pocket. In the manga, he dried Rei with a towel and later he also undressed her (and did strange caresses that begun to bother even Rei!) after sessions on the dummy plug and finally, in Rebuilding, he had romantic dinners with Rei and saw the image of Yui on her. Old and sick bastard!

Thank God, I'm detoxifying from Evangelion, and the pain is diminishing.