The ending of Neon Genesis Evangelion?

[jeffschmidt]

Possible Spoilers Ahead!

I know Eva is old news to a lot of people, but I just finished watching the original series last night & the ending was definitely, umm, different... (by "ending" I mean episodes 25 & 26)

For those not in the know, Neon Genesis Evangelion is a 26-part anime series. Up through episode 24 the series is about giant robots defending humanity from monsters called "Angels". There's great design, endearing characters & wonderfully intriguing religious themes & imagery. Then eps 25/26 come along and end the series in a very unexpected way. They take place entirely inside the head of the main character. Eps 25/26 contain no action & there is very little animation at all, it's mainly spoken words against static images. It's a lot like a psychology lecture, really.

So, the story goes that the fan uproar over these bizarre final episodes was so great that director Hideaki Anno crafted an alternate ending in the form of 2 feature-length movies. "Death & Rebirth" recaps the events of eps 1-24 & begins the alternate ending. "The End of Evangelion" contains the "Rebirth" portion of the D&R movie and expands it into a complete ending for the series (so I guess it's basically 1 movie, not 2).

The movie ending is action-packed & resolves lots of things that the original ending just plain forgot about. I searched out some interpretations & opinions on the different endings. What I found is that, like most any subject in the world, the opinions run the gamut.

For example:
http://mad-hatter.org/ani/eva/ -- This person loves the TV/original ending & perceives the film as director Anno's mean-spirited revenge on the unappreciative fans who just didn't "get it".

On the other hand:
http://www.escaflowneonline.com/eva/ -- This guy hates the TV ending & loves the movie. He addresses the opinion that the film is a "revenge" & considers the TV ending a complete cop-out & rip-off.

So what do you guys think? Which ending do you prefer & why?

[Paff]

I've only seen the series once, and I wasn't exactly enamored of the ending. Not just the whole "Shinji's head" thing, but the tack the series took towards the end. Now, I'll admit to not completely understanding the ending, but I think some of the ideas brought up early on in the series were never fully explored, and it could have been a lot better. When Shinji's Eva goes berserk and Asuka breaks down , I thought the show was really going somewhere good, but instead it went all over the place.

There was a screening of Death and Rebirth last Friday night at the Comic-Con. Unfortunately, I arrived 20 minutes before start time, expecting to just sit through the last 10 minutes or so of Street Fighter Alpha. But that movie went on for another friggin HOUR, and I was no longer in an Eva mood. Pissed me off, and I only watched the first 20-30 minutes of Death and Rebirth.

I also got to see the first episode of Hideaki Anno's latest series, His and Her Circumstances. This is some good shit. I'll probably pick up this show on DVD.

[Jog]

Originally posted by Paff
There was a screening of Death and Rebirth last Friday night at the Comic-Con. Unfortunately, I arrived 20 minutes before start time, expecting to just sit through the last 10 minutes or so of Street Fighter Alpha. But that movie went on for another friggin HOUR, and I was no longer in an Eva mood. Pissed me off, and I only watched the first 20-30 minutes of Death and Rebirth.

Ouch. Street Fighter Alpha before Eva? Must have been a Manga Video group screening! Well, SFA is somewhat tolerable as far as the likes of fighting game anime go, which is NOT saying much. However, Paff, you didn't miss much at all: Death and Rebirth is just a recap of the TV series with the first half hour of The End of Evangelion tacked on. It's a good recap, admittedly, but not something that you NEED to see. Not to mention that the version Manga has is the later version with all of the newly re-animated recap footage ripped out (since Gainax inserted said footage into the actual TV episodes when they aired in re-runs on satellite TV in Japan to create "director's cuts")...

I personally don't think any American fan (or new Japanese fan) can see Eva as it was originally meant to be seen anyway, simply because we know that the movies are around to clean up the loose ends. No matter how hard we try, we can't really see the TV ending as THE ending, because we always know that movie will be backing it up. The TV episodes are relegated to being something of an interlude before the "real" ending. And even if we ignore the movies, we know a clear ending is out there. Imagine the fans in Japan when Eva ended its original run... they must have been stunned (and they were...)

[Paff]

Yeah, I knew it was no major loss, that's why I skipped out. I was pissed, because if it had started on time (10:00), I'd have had just enough time after it ended to get over to the room showing episode 1 of Hellsing.

Since that wasn't gonna happen, I left Death and Rebirth to watch around a half hour of Alien, then caught Hellsing. A great series, I'll probably buy that one too...

[aoiookami]

Although I really didnt like either ending, I would easily have to go with the movie ending, just because it was hundreds of times better animated (rather than the production sketch, and repeat animation crap in the series). Even though it didnt make much sense, it was pretty much eye candy to me, and the fight with Asuka and the Eva series was rad.

BTW, I loved Hellsing as well, just got the vol1. dvd with box and "bloodbag" (shrugs) but I really love the series so far, the 2nd and 3rd eps. are just as great as the first

[ZombieDrummer]

ive just started watching this neon genesis on tv (theyve started to show the series on the uk scifi channel) and i love it!