Anno Khara Expo Interview: Eva Going Gundam; Films/TV/etc. From Different Directors Possible

[Blockio]

delicious fandom-splits and hilarious amounts of angry rants, which can also be highly entertaining.

I mean, by all means we already have those a plenty, so I can hardly imagine spinoffs being physically able to make the fanbase at large any more toxic than it already is

We do! Even assuming that the soul of who or whatever Mari's mother was was in 05, there was absolutely no way to retrieve it after the thing went boom, much less her placing it in 02 all on her own, and then there's also 08.
Same thing with Shinji and Asuka, both pilot multiple different Evas. What matters in NTE is the soul of the pilot, not that of the mother.

Anyway, back on topic.
I am looking forward to whatever is to come, I am open to the idea; however, I'd rather not have all of it be stuff like the existing spinoffs that just takes established characters and puts them into a generic slice of life plot

[kuribo-04]

But the 02 core does get exchanged before Mari pilots it in 2.0, right (before the Zeruel fight)?

[Blockio]

It just gets removed from the body, no mention about changing it, not unless my memory is failing me completely.
Even so, there certainly would be no way to insert 05's core, as indicated by the double rainbow, that was thoroughly atomized

[The Killer of Heroes]

Gundam itself offers a wide range of tones and themes as well

Eh I really do not think this is true. Gundam has spent like, literally the last 25 years shitting out shows that offer some kind of tired metacommentary on First Gundam (To the point where we had literally two series in a row that make their big twist "What if Amuro Ray turned evil!!!????") that honestly the franchise as a whole seems kind of creatively dead to me even when the excecution of some of these shows ranges from decent to good.

Like in recent memory the only shows that didn't do that somehow were SEED Destiny (Which just retold Zeta Gundam anyways and really badly at that), Build Fighters Try (Which was lolbad anyways), and like Build Divers (Which was more lolbad than Try somehow).

The idea of Evangelion becoming THAT, of becoming hundreds and hundreds of episodes of the same ideas over and over again just sounds depressing to me. That being said I'm not opposed to Evangelion from more/different creators and artists, but Gundam really isn't the franchise you should want to model off of.

[Blockio]

I'm gonna have to disagree HARD on that last post. Outside of Seed/Destiny and Age, no mainline show did any of that.

Debate about their quality as a show aside, the point where you're drawing the line for "now it's just cheap ripoffs" falls suspiciously close to the release of the first AU - unless you provide some seriously in-depth explanation, this just seems like the usual UC elitist bullshit to me.

[The Killer of Heroes]

I didn't say ripoffs, I said metacommentary (Perhaps "evoking First Gundam" would be more accurate, wider phrase for what I mean) because yeah First Gundam is a well the franchise never seems to stop trying to draw water from as its main reference point and usually pretty obviously so. That being said they usually don't just mindlessly repeat something First Gundam did, but there are only so many times where you can do "First Gundam, but this happened" or "Our backstory is a version of First Gundam where blahblahblah happens" or "We're using XYZ from First Gundam" as a premise or key part of a story before it feels like an anchor holding things back. Just to try and give a quick rundown, Gundam X is blatantly "What if MSG/OYW ended in apocalypse" in addition to all the Newtype talk in that show, Turn-A invokes MSG and Universal Century constantly and has characters digging up OYW suits and watching archival footage of MSG (Among other shows), Ribbons in 00 is blatantly designed to evoke Amuro and is even voiced Toru Furuya who pilots the not-RX-78-2 which even turns into the not-Guncannon because of that one episode of MSG where Amuro pilots that, G-Reco does something similar to Turn-A in regards to legacy of the UC and even has final battle take place in the ruins of Jaburo, IBO blatantly tells riff on Char/Garma story as a key element etc. A lot of these shows also use some form of "There was a mecha from either the recent past or ancient past called "Gundam"" in their backstories too that the protagonist is trying to live up to the legacy of, and its not hard to figure out what that's a metaphor for.

None of these are problems on their own or in the context of their own series even (And point of a lot of them in their own series is about the need to move on from First Gundam- like Setsuna initially being inspired by not-Amuro Ray and then eventually having to kill him isn't exactly subtle as a message. But its a version of a message Gundam has done many times at this point. Its same message that the talk in X of no longer relying on Newtypes to make the path toward the future was getting at, the same message that haunts ruins of Jaburo in G-Reco etc.), but the trend as a whole gets a bit tiring the more of Gundam you watch- or at least it did in my case.

I didn't even mean this as an AU vs. UC thing, because there's probably a case to be made that this started as far back as Zeta, though I think its hard to deny that AT LEAST by X, Gundam started becoming about Gundam as a franchise for the most part, and mostly only First Gundam at that. I guess occasionally you do get Zeta done, "peace princesses" a la Relena from Wing etc., but they still don't seem to be done to nearly the same degree.

Honestly I wish more of the shows were like G Gundam and tried to do their own crazy thing with more loose connections. While there are thematic connections between G and and say what Tomino was trying to do before that show, its not nearly as obvious as having not-Amuros and the like running around as key figures of the setting(s).

[Blockio]

Ah, I get you. I do agree that Gundam as a whole is too self-referential, although for different reasons. Not to go on too much of a tangent here, but Mask from G Reco is what I would describe as the most symptomatic of this; a character who solely exists as a callback to Char, gets built up as a big deal, but his whole plotline completely runs itself aground and fails to go anywhere; it's not the taking plot points and giving them their own spin, but rather the recycling character arcs and archetypes that I think holds Gundam back.

And on that topic, I can definitely see that happening to Eva, since literally all spinoffs existing currently are either an alternate timeline of the original, or just the existing characters in a randomly chosen setting, both of which fail to carry the actual message of Eva.

[kuribo-04]

Continuing something started here (khara possibly being Anno-centric, more Eva being good or bad) since it seems more fitting here:

https://forum.evageeks.org/post/902861/Evangelion3010-Trailer-3-Discussion/#902861

@Gendo'sPapa:

it's silly to have this discussion about "future Eva" literally the day after they finally finished production on the final film

I think it's possible at any point. Anno talked about "Eva going Gundam" when Shin was still in its initial phases of production (2016), and if we go back even further, was envisioning an Eva film completely unrelated to the show before End of Eva released. I wouldn't be surprised if something new is in the works and they are waiting to announce it so it doesn't distract from Shin.

Khara doing more Evangelion works would be the most creatively bankrupt choice they could take

I respect that you don't like the idea, but I really don't see this being the case. I think the case Anno was making with 3.0 is being ignored. Right about the time Rebuild started he was talking about anime being stuck and it always being Gundam on Newtype's covers. If he wasn't going into Rebuild with these thoughts, that would have been hypocritical. 3.0 "broke" Eva as he wanted, and it's possible to go further.

Any fresh story in a world we've never seen before that the artists have there in a sketchbook that has been INSPIRED by Evangelion is a thousand times more interesting than “Story X but Eva”.

This is probably why we disagree on this. The second option seems more attractive to me.

There also comes great potential with any franchise that has gone on for a long time, developing its own language, having audience reaction to comment on, etc. Just a pool that becomes bigger and bigger.

To specify, I don't want khara to just do Eva. I'd like a mix of what you mention and more Eva.

And I think the unrealised film Anno envisioned is a good example of just how different the franchise could get (I'd really have trouble finding it now, but I assume most here know what I mean).

@Kendrix:

Personally, I like it when media has the self-control to actually end

But Eva did not end even after its "End of Evangelion" and thanks to that we got 3.0, IMO the 2nd best Eva film. And any future installment could be even less of a continuation than Rebuild, looking and sounding different, being about different themes and focusing on completely different characters.

Honestly to me Anno's Eva ending and probably future works not focusing on Shinji and co. already means Eva having the self-control to end.

[dzzthink]

Sometimes it is good to keep the main ideas that made your best works so great, so we may definitely see this in the future. Studio Ghibli's movies are very novel but they do follow some kind of general theme for most of Miyasaki's works: teenage girl character set off on an adventure in a fantasy world, meets and befriends a male character, makes friends with the main enemy, matures along the way, social commentary about war and protecting the environment. This is just based on his best works: spirited away, Nausicaa, Princess Mononoke, howl's moving castle).

Judging from the feel of some of the works by other creators (kaguya, poppy hill), there are some good pieces as well with new stories.

[Gendo'sPapa]

Honestly to me Anno's Eva ending and probably future works not focusing on Shinji and co. already means Eva having the self-control to end.

I drafted up a loooooooooooong rebuttal to this whole post going beat by beat, kuribo, but ultimately have decided to shelf it. I may take notes from it later but I have no intention of getting into this debate point by point.

Ultimately the disagreement here is you want Evangelion to become CONTENT.
I want it to stay an expression of an artists emotions while telling a STORY.

I want the artists, having told their story in this world, to end their story and continue on to new and original works. To tell stories in worlds we don't know we want until they show them to us.
You want the artists, having told their story in this world, restrain their creativity and find new ways to keep the same story going forward. You want the same story and world just with a slightly newer coat of paint.

Yes, this argument can be made against Rebuild of Evangelion. And it's a valid one to have and engage with.
This argument will be 100 times more valid and depressing if Khara uses their finite resources in the future to making Evangelion Prequels, Evangelion Sequels and Evangelion Spin-Offs. Every future Evangelion project Khara would make is time, money, artists, and resources taken from a truly new project. No, all these original projects likely wouldn't be great, nor is it rational to expect any would be as influential as Eva was, but they'd all be original and only could be made by those artists.


The odd thing is outside of the TV series and the films Evangelion has been producing huge amounts of CONTENT for over 20 years. There's so much Evangelion content out there already. Hundreds of "stories" have been told using the world and characters of Evangelion as the draw in point. They're alright. They hold no interest to me but they're alright time wasters. They're content. The argument for more Evangelion made without Anno's supervision is just a desire for that Content to move to TV and films.

Honestly to me Anno's Eva ending and probably future works not focusing on Shinji and co. already means Eva having the self-control to end" is an oxymoron that literally contradicts itself every other word and means nothing. And the idea of Khara being free to produce Evangelion sequels that aren't constrained by a need to feature, include or reference the original cast - for such a short series Eva has what may well be the most famous cast in all things anime - is foolish. It's a given if Khara made a sequel set 30 years after the Rebuilds end the number one debate will be whether or not the main character is Shinji's child and if yes then who is the mother? Who did Shinji end up? What's Shinji's story?
These are all unavoidable dilemmas when continuing a brand series with a new cast. The new works won't be able to tell their own stories without being affected by the old.

You can talk up a storm of empty words but all your arguments when removed of their effusive emptiness you just want more Evangelion content.

And that's fine.
That's where we disagree and that's where it stays.

I can give you a thousand examples of how upcoming artists worldwide are being restrained from their full potential because they have to work within the confines of a content brand. If you're making a film or TV series in the Star Wars universe an artist can do whatever they want... as long as they don't stray too far from what was done 30 years ago and what fans want. In fact, just make it cool. And it can't mess with the canon. If you're making a Batman thing it can be anything.... just, you know, it better be 100% serious or it's fucking garbage. Etc etc.

I'd rather Khara use its very finite resources to support an artist spearheading a story that is new, original, inspired by Evangelion and free to go and do whatever it wants without having to check a list of boxes for what an Eva thing should do. You want the checklist.

Last night I watched Cartoon Saloon's Wolfwalkers on AppleTV+. It was the best movie I've seen in all of 2020. Wolfwalkers was an original story inspired by folk tales and had a cast of new characters I could discover and was free to create a visual and audio aesthetic that could be all it's own. The only limitations to the telling of the story was the limitations in the filmmakers imagination. The film had no limits. It had no boundaries. It was free to go and do whatever it wanted and at no point was it shackled by the needs of a franchise. I took no preconceived notions of what it could be into the viewing. I just let it be free. And for 100 minutes I was transfixed and in awe of the pure wonder of storytelling.

I want ALL the young artists at Khara to be given that same opportunity and freedom now that they've completed Evangelion.
To go and tell any story they want free of any and all audience expectations except a hope that what they show us will be new and exciting!

You want the artists to be shepherds. They can let the sheep (stories) move around a little to graze but the main goal of the job is to always make sure the sheep (stories) never stray too far and can all be rustled back into the same fenced in bit of field at the end of the day.

[kuribo-04]

Honestly I woke up a very short while ago, and am pretty busy, so this might be shorter than it would otherwise be. But I hope my points are understandable.

Ultimately the disagreement here is you want Evangelion to become CONTENT.
I want it to stay an expression of an artists emotions while telling a STORY.

Honestly I'm not sure what you want to say with this. I don't want some of the concepts of Eva, and the potential discussion its impact and popularity would lead to to go to waste, but I still want stories. You mention later in the post that there has been Evangelion content for years, and yes, that's where I might draw a distinction. We've had games and manga with very specific audiences and fanservicey goals, stories that are trapped in a certain ecosystem and that couldn't go outside certain limits.

When I say I want more Eva stories (which Anno dooes too), I want truly free artists who want to work with Eva to tell their story. Artists going back to previously existing great art to explore new ideas isn't rare, here it's just actually possible despite copyright still being an issue. In some cases that leads to work superior than the original.

I want the artists, having told their story in this world, to end their story and continue on to new and original works. To tell stories in worlds we don't know we want until they show them to us.

That is entirely possible within the Evangelion franchise IMO, and this:

You want the artists, having told their story in this world, restrain their creativity and find new ways to keep the same story going forward. You want the same story and world just with a slightly newer coat of paint.

is precisely what I don't want, something more similar to what we've had till now in spin offs, and something most likely Anno wouldn't even let past the concept phase in his position as supervisor/director of khara.

This argument will be 100 times more valid and depressing if Khara uses their finite resources in the future to making Evangelion Prequels, Evangelion Sequels and Evangelion Spin-Offs

I really doubt anything set in the same world would ever come to fruition. I don't want that either but I don't think it's something we have to worry about under Anno's khara.

Honestly to me Anno's Eva ending and probably future works not focusing on Shinji and co. already means Eva having the self-control to end" is an oxymoron that literally contradicts itself every other word and means nothing.

It means anything new might be completely unrecognizable to us. Evangelion currently means "Anno's vision", it's what we know and have known for years. We most likely can't even imagine what might be made in the future using some of Eva's elements.

It's a given if Khara made a sequel set 30 years after the Rebuilds end the number one debate will be whether or not the main character is Shinji's child and if yes then who is the mother? Who did Shinji end up? What's Shinji's story?

I think you're kinda underselling khara's creativity here. Even that Neon Genesis Impacta short from Animator Expo did none of that despite actually being set in the world of Rebuild.

If you're making a film or TV series in the Star Wars universe an artist can do whatever they want... as long as they don't stray too far from what was done 30 years ago and what fans want. In fact, just make it cool

I don't think we should compare Disney-owned Lucasfilm to khara, but even they somehow allowed Last Jedi. I'd just expect greater liberty in the Eva franchise.

I'd rather Khara use its very finite resources to support an artist spearheading a story that is new, original, inspired by Evangelion and free to go and do whatever it wants without having to check a list of boxes for what an Eva thing should do. You want the checklist.

Rather I want an artist to prove such a checklist doesn't exist.

The film had no limits. It had no boundaries. It was free to go and do whatever it wanted and at no point was it shackled by the needs of a franchise

I'd argue that not being able to tell a story within a certain franchise would be a limitation as well to some artists. Maybe their idea requires working within it to maximize reach/impact, maybe they want to contradict all of Eva using the same language, maybe they want to fool us or just genuinely surprise us when we go to watch the next Eva. Maybe they are ready to create a masterpiece and just need khara's approval to create it.

Now I would add that looking at Anno's work you can see the potential of working in franchises.
Kare Kano is a manga adaptation.
Love&Pop and Shiki-Jitsu adapted novels.
Cutie Honey is part of a franchise with who knows how many iterations (in this case he even adapted his own film to anime).
His short film Ryusei Kacho is a manga adaptation.
The Giant God short film he worked on is a Nadia prequel.
His Rebuild is continuing his own Eva franchise.
And IMO the best example: his Shin Godzilla.


Edit: I don't know if Nadia should be on that list, but it does take some elements from 20.000 Leagues Under the Sea.

[robersora]

^
Sorry for being blunt, but I think both of you are acting like entitled, spoilt brats, lol. Anno/Khara should work on whatever the hell they want.

[kuribo-04]

∆ lol Man I'm just pointing out what I think would be a good idea. Being a spoilt brat would be that not happening and me being angry about it after the fact. Or implying that it's my way or nothing.

[Zusuchan]

Anno and Khara should by no means do whatever anyone else wants, but I don't think it's bad to say what you would like to see Anno/Khara do. Neither Gendo's Papa nor kuribo-04 seem to be saying "They should do this", but rather "I would like it if they were to do this". Nothing wrong with that.

On topic, my opinion is that Khara should indeed primarily focus on new stories and ideas that aren't related to Eva. Evangelion is their no.1 moneymaker and they are going to make more Eva stories, of course, but those should be rather comparatively few and when done, the helms should be given to talented people with new and interesting ideas who would truly make an Eva work with intriguing concepts and merits-things like adaptations of SIRP and AD and other fanservice shows that only lessen the brand should be thoroughly avoided. I don't want to see Eva become some SW-like monstrosity with dozens of new works, only a couple of which are any good, while the rest is generic fanservice. Basically-make new Eva movies/series as awesome and cool and new and unique and intriguing as possible (getting people like Masaaki Yuasa on board should help), but for the most time focus on original content divorced from Eva and, hopefully, other preexisting works.

kuribo-04: Two small nitpicks: Shin Godzilla, his Cutie Honey works, the upcoming Shin Ultraman and NTE are the only works of his that could be called parts of 'franchises', really. Also, the Giant God short film isn't a Nadia prequel, but focuses instead on one of the God Warriors from Nausicaä and even then it's not really related to the original work, since the entire short film is just a God Warrior hanging around in Tokyo.

Edit: Of course, NGE and EoE are parts of the Evangelion franchise as well, but they weren't originally part of one and NTE was a work that was created with the knowledge of furthering the franchise.

[kuribo-04]

Neither Gendo's Papa nor kuribo-04 seem to be saying "They should do this", but rather "I would like it if they were to do this". Nothing wrong with that.

Yeah, I think that's what we were going for. I wouldn't even be disappointed if they didn't do more Eva.

Two small nitpicks: Shin Godzilla, his Cutie Honey works, the upcoming Shin Ultraman and NTE are the only works of his that could be called parts of 'franchises', really.

Yeah, that's probably right.
And I did mean Naisicaa. The sleepiness was stronger there lol. Speaking of Nausicaa, Anno also always talked about continuing with adaptations of the manga. His adaptation of the end probably would really have been something. But I'm also kinda glad he has done other stuff.

[robersora]

I get you guys, but nobody asked for our opinion.
Especially when you've reached a certain size *everybody* thinks they know better what to do than you, it's rather tiresome, honestly. Especially since the people talking with most conviction are rarely even in the same field as you are. We don't even have a sliver of the shit he needs to think about, when deciding anything. It's hard lead a whole friggin studio, and unsolicited advice from "fans" is just annoying. I'm sure he has trusted friends he asks for advice and enough judgment to make a good call.

[BusterMachine4]

I get you guys, but nobody asked for our opinion.
Especially when you've reached a certain size *everybody* thinks they know better what to do than you, it's rather tiresome, honestly. Especially since the people talking with most conviction are rarely even in the same field as you are. We don't even have a sliver of the shit he needs to think about, when deciding anything. It's hard lead a whole friggin studio, and unsolicited advice from "fans" is just annoying. I'm sure he has trusted friends he asks for advice and enough judgment to make a good call.

I know Anno probably isn't listening to us, but that doesn't mean we should just shut up and not critique his decisions. Stuff like "nobody asked for your opinion" and "you don't know what it's like being in his shoes" are thought-terminating cliches, and I don't think you can just dismiss genuine arguments like that.

I also don't know why you put "fans" in quotation marks. Are you implying that fans who critique Anno's decisions aren't true fans? I hated that attitude in the Star Wars fandom, and I hate it here. Being part of a fandom means being able to critique the flaws just as much as being able to praise the good parts.

[robersora]

^
While I agree with the sentiment, when it's about a consumer product, like if a certain burger should return to the MacDonald's menu, I just think it's preposterous to argue about an artists decision of what to create next, when it's such a personal decision to make.

I put fans in quotation marks, because in my eyes fans are supportive in an artists endeavor to create from their soul instead of discussing it like some object to be consumed.



Try thinking about it this way: You wanna decide what to eat and a thousand people tell you what to get for dinner. You never asked them, and they never shut up. Everybody has a different perspective, and some of them might even be valid. In the end you lose yourself in order to please others.
Now replace dinner with something even more personal and vulnerable.

[BusterMachine4]

^
While I agree with the sentiment, when it's about a consumer product, like if a certain burger should return to the MacDonald's menu, I just think it's preposterous to argue about an artists decision of what to create next, when it's such a personal decision to make.

I put fans in quotation marks, because in my eyes fans are supportive in an artists endeavor to create from their soul instead of discussing it like some object to be consumed.

Well, like it or not, Eva is a product to be consumed. Like all forms of mass media, it exists to make money. Of course, artistic taste can factor in at some point, but acting like a movie about giant robots is an undiluted artistic creation straight from Anno's soul is just pretentious in my opinion.

And even accepting the premise of Eva being a pure auteur work, critiquing artistic decisions is still completely valid in my opinion. For example, I doubt anyone would say paintings are a form of mass media. They're individually created, tailored to the artist's taste. But criticizing certain artistic movements or painting styles is completely okay, even encouraged, in the art community. Just because something is artistic doesn't mean it's immune to criticism.

Try thinking about it this way: You wanna decide what to eat and a thousand people tell you what to get for dinner. You never asked them, and they never shut up. Everybody has a different perspective, and some of them might even be valid. In the end you lose yourself in order to please others.
Now replace dinner with something even more personal and vulnerable.

Well, I don't think Anno personally hears every single complaint fans in a whole other country have to say about his work. In the end, we're just shouting into the void. But even that can be an interesting way to analyze a work. I wouldn't recommend sending hate directly to Anno, that's just toxic. But that doesn't mean people shouldn't be allowed to critique a work in more respectful ways.

[robersora]

Well, like it or not, Eva is a product to be consumed. Like all forms of mass media, it exists to make money. Of course, artistic taste can factor in at some point, but acting like a movie about giant robots is an undiluted artistic creation straight from Anno's soul is just pretentious in my opinion.

The way you phrase this makes my head spin... Nothing is created in a vacuum, and just because its trenched in consumer culture doesn't make it any less valid.
As I seem to not have been clear enough: I'm not talking about critizising a product, I'm talking about the discourse of what an artist should do.

And even accepting the premise of Eva being a pure auteur work, critiquing artistic decisions is still completely valid in my opinion. For example, I doubt anyone would say paintings are a form of mass media. They're individually created, tailored to the artist's taste. But criticizing certain artistic movements or painting styles is completely okay, even encouraged, in the art community. Just because something is artistic doesn't mean it's immune to criticism.

You completely missed my point, so I'm trying to say it for the fourth time now as clear as possible: Nobody is entitled to tell other people what to create. It's obnoxious, it's unproductive, it's wrongheaded.