I''ll get a couple things out of the way first: these scores are, in a way, relative to the other movies and the original series, and also, THIS WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS.
Story: 2
This was by far the worst of the four movies, a far cry from what made the The End of Evangelion (and its parent story) so epic. The story is a mess with more plot holes than pseudo-EVAs in the movie, it has terrible pacing, wasting precious time with unnecessary monologues that try to explain too much, adding no depth and making characters less interesting and enigmatic (special mention for you Gendo, though Kaworu
...
is a close second).
The first hour felt like a compilation of the slice of life leaning episodes of the original series that weren't included in the first three movies. The problem with this is that those episodes made sense when the world wasn't fu**ed beyond recognition and Shinji was the same age as everyone else. A part like this would've been really good immediately after the first movie or in the middle of the second one and while this part was necessary from a grand perspective, it suffers from extremely bad placement, not being able to find its own place in a movie that's supposed to bring everything to a close.
Even brushing this issue aside, there are some issues with Rei#06, certified newborn, who grows by the frame and apparently is being used by Gendo to traumatize Shinji (one more time, not like he already experienced losing Rei in 2.22...). She ends up being an even more diluted Mary Sue, expressly described as being artificially attracted to Shinji.
Of course in the mean time something has to be happening, so, to show the viewer that the rest of the world isn't COMPLETELY alienated, we follow along a pointless detour the WILLE crew take to restore part of Paris (because sure, it makes sense to store EVA spare parts only in the middle of cities, instead of secret facilities in the middle of nowhere). The entire ordeal is fairly standard for the series, though with one unbelievably easy battle for the lone EVA-08. The only worthwhile thing out of this waste of screen time is one peace of information we get about the identity of the red corruption (that being core-ification), sadly this is a pretty pointless detail as the rules that hold Rebuild's universe together aren't too consistent to begin with...
Both the climax and the conclusion are a rushed mess with many things happening at the same time, and without having the chance to explore interesting possibilities (e.g. Asuka, you're now part angel? Wow, that could've had one or two uses in the previous near fourth impact from 3.33... No, Gendo, stop! It hasn't even been three minutes since she showed her angel form! You can't.... Oh well, whatever...)
Also, regarding the EVAs fighting power: the previous inability to either finish one Mark.04B without help from EVA-01 or destroy EVA-09 without EVA-02 self-destructing in 3.33 are nowhere to be seen here, considering EVA-02 and EVA-08 destroy hundreds of pseudo-EVAs by themselves without breaking a sweat. The combined EVA-02+EVA-08 AT-field attack that produced something similar to what EVA-01 shows at the end of 2.22 when Shinji went berserk would've been really useful against EVA-13 too...
Art: 4
This surprised me the most as all the previous films are pretty strong with their art (disregarding one or two angels' appearances). Honestly it would be way higher if it didn't use some horrible 3D CG for Mega-Rei's head and a very shoddy animation for the fights inside the Doors Of Guf (the only ones with EVA-01). I get it's supposed to show that the space that they are fighting in is imaginary, but the lack of real destruction besides some textures of cracks when the EVAs trash all around stuff makes it look like a 2010s video game, and a bad one at that.
The Anti-L-Barrier rod purification in Paris was really lackluster, it felt like using a light switch and bam! Now the city is the same as it was before... this not what you would expect from a series with entire cities that get destroyed from an angel's blood + self destruction BESIDES whatever damage it might've already caused. One would assume that undoing all this red mess would be a gradual and slow process and that it should probably leave some permanent scars (e.g. we had permanently red oceans after the second impact).
There's also the problem of recycled scenes from previous movies which feels like a cheap move for a movie this big.
Finally, don't get me started on the real world footage at the very end... I mean, I get it, now they are living in a world very much like ours, without EVAs and weird sh*t, but attaching a completely different thing at the end actually reduced immersion instead of increasing it. Maybe if it transitioned from animation to a real life still frame it would've worked, but what they did instead just felt out of place.
Sound: 6
It was pretty good, I guess. The voice acting was on point but having many repeated phrases was kind of a downer. There were good songs but nothing as impressive and fitting as the bangers from the first two films. In particular I felt pretty lacking the music used during the climax.
Character: 3
To be honest, it's not lower only because I like how Asuka's personality actually showed a little on this movie and they also rectified what was done in the previous movie to Misato's character. Sadly, one great downside is that the backstory of Asuka was completely butchered and changed beyond recognition (with only her doll remaining, which now has an unknown backstory). The presence of baby Rei is a pain to the viewer, as she is several times more ignorant than the "original" Rei and behaves like a literal infant (Hayashibara Megumi still has it and gives her a great voice though). Somehow they managed to mess up most characters by inserting Shinji's classmates into the mix of characters that should've remain dead or missing, even messing up Kaworu by bringing him back as a human near the end of the film.
Misato is upgraded by being reverted back to her original character with a mix of her character from Gundam Seed, while Ritsuko is now a paper cut of her original character with no real motivation to speak of. Gendo is reduced to a unidimensional evil boss that spells out his evil plans and trys (and fails) to have Shinji empathize with him, presented to the viewer as a rehash of the unstable train car scenes from the original series. Shinji becomes a plot device to advance the movie, no longer being the mentally damaged, weak but somehow incredibly strong boy that gets unwillingly saddled with saving humanity. Mari... well... has the most screen time of anyone other than Shinji (even engaging on many more battles than him), but nothing is actually shown about her. It's interesting that while they lay bare Gendo and Kaworu's characters, nothing relevant is actually shown about this screen time eater. We are left knowing nothing about her even though she ends up being more important than the other two legendary female leads. We don't know where she came from, who's she related to, what are her motivations, or anything remotely relevant about her character.
Enjoyment: 4
While the long run time didn't help, the erratic direction of the story made it even worse. Thankfully the battle scenes, while not being so impactful (considering most weren't close calls and didn't have the high stakes of happening in/near a city full of people) still made the movie somewhat enjoyable. Mari's friendly banter with Asuka was entertaining to watch, though I can't really comprehend how the hell Mari's relationship (or lack thereof) with Shinji came to be. Honestly, with two well established female leads (three if you count Misato), Mari's character felt unnecessary ever since her introduction, but she ended up as the main female character, go figure...
Overall: 3
TL;DR: Not worth it, drop this and watch the original series if you haven't, you can also watch the first two movies after that if you want to see some of those scenes with better animation.
PS: On a side note, it is interesting that Mari was referred to as Mary Iscariot by Fuyutsuki. When considering Evangelion's heavy religious symbolism it's almost certain to come from Mary (Jesus' mother) and Judas Iscariot (the traitor from Jesus' twelve apostles), the name being a mix of the one who had Jesus born and the one that had him killed. Making a Mari a cause of death and rebirth and implying she is part of Seele's plan if not part of Seele itself. Also if we assume that Shinji parallels Jesus, Asuka's phrase: "He doesn't need a lover, he needs a mother", adds some sense to Shinji ending up together with Mari... or I may be reading too much into things, trying to justify such an outlandish decision.
Aug 12, 2021
Shin Evangelion Movie:||
(Anime)
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I''ll get a couple things out of the way first: these scores are, in a way, relative to the other movies and the original series, and also, THIS WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS.
Story: 2 This was by far the worst of the four movies, a far cry from what made the The End of Evangelion (and its parent story) so epic. The story is a mess with more plot holes than pseudo-EVAs in the movie, it has terrible pacing, wasting precious time with unnecessary monologues that try to explain too much, adding no depth and making characters less interesting and enigmatic (special mention for you Gendo, though Kaworu ... Jan 13, 2019
Usagi Drop
(Anime)
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There are some very few rare cases when an adaptation overcomes it's original material; Usagi Drop being one of these. The series itself having a very simple premise: How difficult and rewarding raising a kid is. It revolves around the life of Kawachi Daikichi and the secret daughter of his just deceased grandfather.
Story (9/10) Albeit simple, the story feels really fresh and has many interesting characters in it, from Daikichi's cousin's dysfunctional (and rather oppressive) family to Kouki's hardworking single mother and Daikichi's coworker, all great characters on their own right who in some way or the other contribute on ... Jul 25, 2017
Generally speaking GATE is not something I could recommend (unless you are really into guns/military). The plot is utter bullshit and the characters have no personality whatsoever (except the JSDF guys, those are ALL psychopaths and/or bipolar).
This show turns what was a good premise into a generic harem. Why you ask? Because apparently you give most otakus a bunch of generic girls and some big ass guns and the plot's covered for the most (even if it's blatant propaganda). Ok, so let's start with what did good: Art - 8.5: Let's face it, the animation quality is good, particularly the military equipment. The characters designs are also well ... |