What would you change about Evangelion?

[Mr. Tines]

There's an official Gainax doujin with that premise. She gets Asuka to pretty it up for her.

SPOILER: Show

[Katana]

I can't clearly explain what I have in front of my eyes.

[Madonna]

Hmm, when reanalysing this thread I’ve really come to believe that I wouldn’t change anything about the show, not that the show is perfect by any means but everything in Evangelion seems so essential to the overall plot and message of the anime that removing anything may be a detriment rather than an improvement, and the same goes for adding anything.

Evangelion at its core is an anime where character interaction is vital, removing a character like Asuka for example will affect the rest of the characters, especially Shinji, remarkably, it wouldn’t even be Evangelion anymore if characters were removed or settings were changed.

So yes there are things about the anime which annoy me but I would hate if everything in the show went the way I wanted it to. The best anime, film, literature etc are the ones that stir up a multitude of emotions within you, with disappointment, anger and frustration being just as essential to the viewing experience as feelings of happiness and excitement are.

[Kid]

These are pretty drastic changes, so forgive me. I'll be honest, the first time I watched the series I thought Instrumentality was just going to end up as a big bust. Angels, Adam, Lilith, seeds, scrolls, all of that was just going to end up as just some space trash that a dieing alien race dumped on us.

So if I got to change the series I'd rearrange the show so that a majority of episode 25 and 26 take place while Shinji is stuck in Unit 1's plug in episode 20. That causes a breakthrough which helps him become a useful fellow and his new outlook makes everyone around him feel better, and so the kids beat the rest of the angels, Shinji isn't too heartbroken about Kaworu, then EoE takes place and right when Seele is about to execute their final plan... nothing. Turns out the Scrolls exaggerated a bit. Asuka is hurt by the MP Evas, Unit 1 goes berserk and destroys a few MP Evas, bites Gendo in half, Ritsuko activates base self-destruction, and thats that.


I am satisfied with the current version of the show and like many of you wouldn't actually change it.

[Dream]

I wanted to say this since a long time: I want to see Kaworu getting mind raped, does this make enough sense?

It quite does and it would probably be interesting. In fact i think it happened in one of those NGE games.

These are pretty drastic changes, so forgive me. I'll be honest, the first time I watched the series I thought Instrumentality was just going to end up as a big bust. Angels, Adam, Lilith, seeds, scrolls, all of that was just going to end up as just some space trash that a dieing alien race dumped on us.

Terrifyingly accurate!

[Squigsquasher]

riding a motorcyle into battle against the kaworushin hordes, butchering them like swine with skill and steel an M240 SAW until the end of time.

Suffer not the bishonen to live.

(Sorry to quote a post from the first page, but...the rage is strong with this one. Grrr... )

Anyway, I personally wouldn't change anything about the original series. However, if Anno came up to me and said "Hey, I'm making a new Evangelion TV series, and I'd like you to help me!" I'd probably change the following:

Ditch the "sleeves" look the EVas have. Keep the sleeves as part of the undersuit, but give them armour over the top like the rest of their body. Just a minor design nitpick, really.

Put in Mari, but give her considerably more backstory than what she has at the moment. I don't care if she's a transsexual, a clone, the illgeitimate child of Keel Lorenz-as long as she has some kind of defining feature other than "boobs and glasses".

Give Hikari, Touji and Kensuke some more time in the spotlight. Maybe have Kensuke as the unlucky pilot of Unit 03, for maximum irony.

Make sure that the ending is as completely different to End of Evangelion as possible. Like, completely. Ugh. I hate EOE so much (not in the "DIS FILM SUXX LOL!" sense, as it's a very well-made film, but in the "Oh my god, this is horrifying, make it stop" sense) that I treat it as completely non-canonical, so the hospital scene, Instrumentality, the various deaths, Shinji's complete descent into insanity, etc, never happened in my eyes. Give us an at least sort of happy ending, fer cryin' oot lood!

Introduce Kaworu a lot earlier. Give him some time to develop as a character, let us get to know him a bit more.

In some ways, a re-imagining of the hospital scene would be good, if they removed the fapping element completely. The manga's take on it, where Shinji is simply crying over Asuka, and Asuka wakes up and tries to strangle him, would be a good thing to work off of. I feel that the fapping scene completely ruined the character of Shinji for a lot of people, rightly or not, and I think it needs to be excised. Shinji crying over Asuka, begging for her to wake up, was a really powerful, sympathetic moment. Having him...ahem...relieve himself was less so.

Asuka+Hikari yuri, involving celery. Yes, that is a joke.

Cross-dressing Shinji. No joke. I don't care if it's a serious plot point or a jokey fanservice moment, it MUST HAPPEN.

Make Shamshel a bit less like a dick, and more like a weird centipede+jellyfish hybrid, whilst still incorporating some of the phallic elements.

[Giji Shinka]

What i would change about Evangelion?

For original series i would change the animation quality to match the awesome modern day animation, and the other thing i change would be: Removing any unnecessary filler.

Rebuilt doesn't need any changes because it is so close to perfection IMO.

[Rena]

I wanted to say this since a long time: I want to see Kaworu getting mind raped, does this make enough sense?

Yes. Yes it does...
I'd like to see that, since it might make it a bit clearer to viewers what he's thinking, if he is actually a manipulative bastard or if he is genuinely nice.
I think something that could be described as a "mind-rape" was in NGE2, when fighting Leliel.

I'd really like to see flashbacks of Shinji living with his teacher. I'd also like for Rei and Shinji to interact a bit more, their friendship didn't seem to progress much after episode 6.
Besides that, there isn't much I'd like to change. Except maybe getting rid of the masturbation scene in EOE. I didn't think it was necessary in any way.

[Monk Ed]

Except maybe getting rid of the masturbation scene in EOE. I didn't think it was necessary in any way.

What does the fact that it wasn't "necessary" have to do with anything? Is anything sexual really that bothersome? But the violence, the vicious headshots and body-rending, that's all okay?

[Rena]

I haven't got a problem with anything sexual. It has more to the fact that we're watching a 14 year old masturbate. I don't like seeing sexual content with anyone under the age of 18, full stop. I wasn't comfortable to seeing Rei and Asuka's breasts all over the place either. It's more of a personal taste thing.

[Lorkhan]

To be fair, you only saw the end result. Its not like the breasts and what not were gratuitous, and I do believe the wanking was meant to invoke "Dude, why?" more then anything else.

I can level with you on them being minors and what not, but most around that age group in the genre are more akin to miniature adults more often then not. I myself found the disembowelment and Asuka's death in general to be far worse considering how young the poor thing was.

[Shinoyami65]

I haven't got a problem with anything sexual. It has more to the fact that we're watching a 14 year old masturbate. I don't like seeing sexual content with anyone under the age of 18, full stop. I wasn't comfortable to seeing Rei and Asuka's breasts all over the place either. It's more of a personal taste thing.

To be fair we don't actually see Shinji masturbating, we just hear it and see the end result. It's more disturbing than fan servicing. It is meant to disgust, and if it goes against personal taste that's what it was meant to do. Asuka and Rei's breasts weren't on show for fan-service reasons, they were never shoved at the audience or made disproportionately large for viewer enjoyment.

One thing I would change about NGE would be to try and explore the bridge bunny characters (Hyuuga, Aoba and Maya), because they're pretty much undiscovered territory. Up until EoE we see no evidence of Maya's crush on Ritsuko, and Aoba's Reiquarium hoard is still a point of debate. If we had a bit more background on the characters' personalities I think it would be quite interesting.

[SimplyMason0]

Japanese has different cultures and standards. You wouldn't see this stuff intended in western cartoons.

I think they should have removed the physical pain stuff in the evas. Eva is said to be a show that ISN'T focused solely on the mecha but the drama. I don't think it used it to its full potential. Toji looked like he suffered more damage from the entry plug being crushed and Asuka could have died a different way. I think if you aren't going to have the story focus on the mecha, don't introduce something that has more potential like that.

I don't know if any other anime used that concept a lot better. I have no problem with the evas being clones of Adam/Lilith, just the pain stuff.

[TMBounty_Hunter]

Add more training scenes. Most importantly a mock battle between Evas in an abandoned area. Preferably 01 vs 02.

It has zero chance of happening in Final so hopefully they'll add that whenever they milk it again in my lifetime.

[Gendo'sPapa]

More side boob maybe? Or less side boob?

Okay, I was wrong. NGE has the perfect amount of side boob.

[Joy Evangelion]

The ABSOLUTE first thing I would change about Eva would be to remove Toji from the poster for Death and Rebirth, since the poster kinda makes Toji seem like a very illustrious and accomplished Eva pilot, with his crossed arms and his hair all shiny. Plusss, I think his plugsuit may also be the wrong color, or maybe contact with Bardiel dyes plugsuits...who knows?

I mean, I like Toji and everything, and I like the poster, it's just all sooo misleading.

[CJD]

Yea but Evangelion itself is just one giant dose of concentrated "misleading" injected into your brain. Hell, it misleads right from the start by being a mech show about fighting giant monsters, and yet the mechs and the giant monsters take the backseat to the character development and introspection, which ends up, in the end, being what the story is all about.

[Joy Evangelion]

Yea but Evangelion itself is just one giant dose of concentrated "misleading" injected into your brain. Hell, it misleads right from the start by being a mech show about fighting giant monsters, and yet the mechs and the giant monsters take the backseat to the character development and introspection, which ends up, in the end, being what the story is all about.

I'm glad Evangelion turned out being what it was, as opposed to what I thought it would be before I watched it...but...STILL...I just cannot get over the epic Toji on the D&R poster

I suppose I should probably just stop looking at the poster, try to erase it from my memory, and just go on with my life enjoying Evangelion as if the poster didn't exist, but I'm not sure if my mind is capable.

[Lavinius]

^^I don't see how anyone could not realize what Neon Genesis Evangelion is.
For one thing, it's bloody called Neon Genesis Evangelion.

[Nuclear Lunchbox]

Eva's initial misdirection makes it very hard to sum up Evangelion in a single sentence. Since the plot changes its own focus from time to time, it takes a lot of effort to cram everything into a concise phrase without making a run-on.