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The Riddle of Feel posted:In order to procure their goal of a "better" future (which is actually a global murder-suicide)... The Riddle of Feel posted:To become truly self aware, to wake up from the comforting fantasy of Instrumentality into the harsh world is to realize that we're already in hell and no one is doing anything about it. The world is depressing, brutal, bleak, and temporary. Yui gives us some speech about the possibility of happiness and stars and poo poo but what the gently caress does that even mean? It's a platitude delivered by a lunatic committing suicide to escape the responsibility of caring for her child. Speaking of massive disconnects...  I mean I suppose technically something could be a global murder-suicide and a comforting fantasy at the same time, but Yui's "suicide" was almost certainly prompted by the likelihood that SEELE would just straight-up murder her, and she then spends the entire length of the series protecting and guiding her child despite being unconsciously submerged in a ravenous monster. And still manages to shepherd him into rejecting said murder-suicide. She still has to answer for abandoning him to Gendo, but nobody's perfect and what little we know about their relationship points to her having a blind spot about him. (I quibble because despite that I agree with 90% of your post.) EDIT: If anything I would compare Yui to the impotence of anti-war movements, since her greatest mistakes are trying to work within the system and her passive, unresisting fatalism. She's not part of the Cold War machine, she's just an inadequate counter to it. Shinji's mom is a hippie who actually got the keys to the universe but couldn't rock the boat hard enough, because she just "goes with the flow" (In her own words, in at least one translation.) Although that might be putting too American a face on a Japanese show. yellowjournalism posted:Neon Genesis Evangleion Thread: This is the result you wished for. Neon Genesis Evangelion Thread: Yui Did 9/11 Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 08:12 on May 23, 2013 |
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May 23, 2013 07:41
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kthegreat posted:What's up with Rebuild 3 ? - We had Shinji trapped inside Eva-01. - We had exposition on the nature of Evas and Nerv. - We had a new Rei. - We had Lances. - We had an Angel absorbed by an Eva. - We had Kaworu. Boy did we have a lot of him. Character-wise, I think the biggest change was the removal of Asuka's descent into depression. A bit of it has been repackaged into Shinji's development. Even SEELE being removed as a threat is just to make way for another head-to-head conflict in Nerv vs. Wille. Otherwise Rebuild 3 keeps the events and shuffles them a bit. The end result is mostly the same, at least as far as the protagonist is concerned. He's depressed after Kaworu died, he probably blames himself for it, etc. But yeah the tone of Rebuild 3 is very different than the tones of the other two Rebuilds and the original series. One could argue that the last two full-feature movies weren't necessarily the "right" way to present a twist like this. I know I would have been more than satisfied with a "What if ?" comic book format, and the last two Rebuilds being more like the first two, story and tone-wise. quote:Religion chat ITT For Abalieno, I don't want to go too deep into religion chat, especially on a show about giant alien-robots fighting giant aliens (I'm being facetious), but I really haven't learned of the Holy Spirit that way. Ever heard of the phrase "Being Visited by the Holy Spirit" ? Yes the Holy Spirit comes and goes. I get what you're saying, believe me, but I think comparing Anno's trinity to Christianity's trinity is going a step too far. I feel we'll be talking past each other at this point and maybe we should leave it at that. The way I see NGE, it's that it uses various elements of different religious beliefs (Kaballah and Christianity in particular) to construct the narrative. But it fails to embrace those beliefs completely (at least as far as Christianity is concerned), and at the key points you get Anno's message instead. I think it's better for it. For example, and I'm trying to keep this short here, instead of eternal salvation we get a message of self-acceptance. Edit: Added some quotes Double Edit: Saw your words, The Riddle of Feel. Thread delivers. bof_man fucked around with this message at 09:15 on May 23, 2013 |
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May 23, 2013 08:54
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kthegreat posted:I just watched Eva 3.33. What the gently caress was that poo poo? I have no idea what just happened. This had almost nothing to do with the two movies before it. I feel so confused and insulted. Just because you don't understand something doesn't make it bad. Oh poo poo, I just validated "art". I'm meeeeltiiiiinnnnng...
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May 23, 2013 13:31
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bof_man posted:The way I see NGE, it's that it uses various elements of different religious beliefs (Kaballah and Christianity in particular) to construct the narrative. But it fails to embrace those beliefs completely (at least as far as Christianity is concerned), and at the key points you get Anno's message instead. I think it's better for it. For example, and I'm trying to keep this short here, instead of eternal salvation we get a message of self-acceptance. I think it's designed to unite two approaches, without necessarily making them compatible. One is the occult, personal journey towards truth, exemplified by the Kabbalistic imagery, Shinji's introspective visions, and ultimately episodes 25 and 26; the other is the dogmatic approach, where God is incomprehensible and unknowable and tests our faith rather than our understanding, exemplified by the Angels, Kaworu, and ultimately EoE, all of which borrow more heavily from Catholicism. These two approaches are equated with Yui and Gendo so it's not exactly endorsing either of them, but both lead to Shinji and if you "get" Shinji then you get the important parts of Evangelion. You could even take the action arc and the Classified Information as an olive branch to the atheistic crowd that would rather understand the show as pure science fiction. EDIT: Actually I guess Gendo's more like a Protestant but whatever, equating it with SEELE would be even worse. Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 17:27 on May 23, 2013 |
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May 23, 2013 17:22
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:(I quibble because despite that I agree with 90% of your post.) Agreed with you and The Riddle of Feel, that's dope. We are extrapolating tons of poo poo based on minute loving glimpses of characterization and slices of implication but it's still dope. Eva is crack. 3.33 really really grew on me, I was making fun of kthegreat but I totally understand-- I felt a little let-down after my first viewing, but now I just keep rewatching it and hoping that on my 5th viewing and if I keep clicking on Asuka's cameltoe enough it'll unlock 4.0 ninja edit: I did actually feel uncomfortable writing that but jesus christ they really do just shove these things in your face, plus I cracked myself up
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May 23, 2013 20:25
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The Riddle of Feel posted:Rei is an attack on the meek, submissive woman Can you expand on this? It's very easy to read her as a fantasy meek submissive woman (and legions of fans are apparently happy to do this) but I don't find that satisfying.
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May 23, 2013 20:52
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Popcorn posted:Can you expand on this? It's very easy to read her as a fantasy meek submissive woman (and legions of fans are apparently happy to do this) but I don't find that satisfying. It seems simple enough to me - Rei spends most of the series being manipulated and even somewhat abused in large part because she's been conditioned to do so - to meekly submit to Gendo's whims.
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May 23, 2013 21:18
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Spiritus Nox posted:It seems simple enough to me - Rei spends most of the series being manipulated and even somewhat abused in large part because she's been conditioned to do so - to meekly submit to Gendo's whims. and she loves him for it, for a time anyway. I don't quite get why Rei seems to love Shinji by the end. At least Rei III does, I think (Talking series not rebuild)
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May 23, 2013 21:23
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Probably because he's the only person to actually think about what she wants?
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May 23, 2013 21:29
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Popcorn posted:Can you expand on this? It's very easy to read her as a fantasy meek submissive woman (and legions of fans are apparently happy to do this) but I don't find that satisfying. There is some quotes on her from Anno here: http://wiki.evageeks.org/Statements_by_Evangelion_Staff Anno posted:Rei is someone who is aware of the fact that even if she dies, there'll be another to replace her, so she doesn't value her life very highly. Her presence, her existence - ostensible existence - is ephemeral. She's a very sad girl. She only has the barest minimum of what she needs to have. She's damaged in some way; she hurts herself. She doesn't need friends. This one when he was told that the American audience favors Misato is quite telling: Anno posted:I'm surprised. In Japan, the overwhelming favorite is Rei. They can't handle strong women such as Misato and Asuka.
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May 23, 2013 21:31
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Anno posted:Rei is someone who is aware of the fact that even if she dies, there'll be another to replace her, so she doesn't value her life very highly. Her presence, her existence - ostensible existence - is ephemeral. She's a very sad girl. She only has the barest minimum of what she needs to have. She's damaged in some way; she hurts herself. She doesn't need friends. But you could make a case for this, as Anno describes it, being a fantasy. This girl is tragically romantically alone and sad and weak. I will protect her. I will feed and clothe her. I will paw at her breasts as she lays numbly beneath me.
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May 23, 2013 21:36
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I disagree with Riddle of Feel's assessment that the final scene in EoE is symbolic of the post-Cold War generation inheriting a dying planet. It's a very interesting take on the series and I don't disagree with his conclusions, but I don't think Anno purposely set out to create such a nihilistic portrait of modern life. Bleak, depressing, painful, definitely, but ultimately meaningless and futile? Ehh, that's a little too grimdark for my tastes. Yui's speech at the end of EoE isn't some incoherent spiel about love and rainbows; she's very lucidly saying that as long as you're alive, you don't know what tomorrow will bring. You can continue to wallow in your self-imposed narrative of isolation and abandonment, or you can be open to the near-infinite gamut of experience life has to offer, even if some it is painful. Saying "all epiphanies go up in smoke because the world is hosed anyways" is kind of disingenuous to the source material, since Evangelion is primarily a story about our difficulty in connecting with others, and I honestly don't feel the brainchild of a depressed anime director would say so much with so much gusto for the final takeaway to be "yeah, life does suck". EoE's ending is dark and depressing and bleak but its tinged with a very cautious optimism that will, ultimately I think, make all the difference for Shinji.
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May 23, 2013 21:38
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Edged Hymn posted:Saying "all epiphanies go up in smoke because the world is hosed anyways" is kind of disingenuous to the source material, since Evangelion is primarily a story about our difficulty in connecting with others, and I honestly don't feel the brainchild of a depressed anime director would say so much with so much gusto for the final takeaway to be "yeah, life does suck". EoE's ending is dark and depressing and bleak but its tinged with a very cautious optimism that will, ultimately I think, make all the difference for Shinji. Even without getting into the more existential aspects I believe the message about the hollowness of epiphanies in the context of depression and self destructive behavior is very important. Unlike how the TV series and many other works present it, very often you are not in this continual blind state that is finally resolved by some profound personal conclusion. You drift in and out of that blind state and have epiphanies from time to time that solve little if anything. The realization that you have a problem or finding a path to solving your problem are very important, but they're nowhere near the final step a lot of fiction likes to portray it as because it make a very climatic and cathartic ending. So while I agree that there is always tinges of optimism and hope in such epiphanies it's dangerous to grab solely onto them and ignore all the dark and hosed up things that still outweigh it. Which I guess plays a lot into 2.22 and 3.33. Now on the existential side of things: quote:Yui's speech at the end of EoE isn't some incoherent spiel about love and rainbows; she's very lucidly saying that as long as you're alive, you don't know what tomorrow will bring. I'll just note that a lot of classic existential literature deals specifically with this concept and many authors either find it terrifying on it's own or false, because you know deep down that tomorrow will bring no answers and eventually your death. 'Waiting for Godot' immediately springs to mind.
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May 23, 2013 22:34
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Popcorn posted:But you could make a case for this, as Anno describes it, being a fantasy. This girl is tragically romantically alone and sad and weak. I will protect her. I will feed and clothe her. I will paw at her breasts as she lays numbly beneath me. I really can't bring myself to read that scene as sexy. It's really obvious that Rei thinks nothing of it (either because she has no concept of sexuality or, equally plausibly, because she just doesn't regard Shinji that way) and Shinji, having realized the "dream" of walking in on a girl changing, simply ends up shamed and confused. It's a basic harem anime scene torn down because one participant doesn't care and the other is a semi-realistic teenager instead of a wish-fulfillment effigy. The criticism isn't aimed at Shinji for wanting to befriend her (I mean, jesus, two lonely people who might as well be siblings start to get along. THIS ISN'T A BAD THING), but rather at Gendo who treats her as a tool and a doll and projects his emotions for Yui onto her. It's patronizing and kinda incestuous and it comes back to bite him ( ) in the end.
Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 22:44 on May 23, 2013 |
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May 23, 2013 22:40
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To be fair, you could read Shinji as developing romantic feelings for Rei. Certainly in Rebuild. I don't really find that too incestous since it's not like Rei is literally Yui (again, failing to see this is one of original Gendo's downfalls), but it's not as though there's any real-world basis for comparison.
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May 23, 2013 22:44
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Spiritus Nox posted:To be fair, you could read Shinji as developing romantic feelings for Rei. Certainly in Rebuild. I don't really find that too incestous since it's not like Rei is literally Yui (again, failing to see this is one of original Gendo's downfalls), but it's not as though there's any real-world basis for comparison. Gendo (presumably) raised Rei and she regards him as a father. It's not genetic ick like Shinji/Rei would be, just a massive abuse of authority and power. There's probably a more nuanced way of saying it than using the same term for both but either way it's portrayed in a pretty negative light. And make no mistake, it's literally the cause of his downfall -- Gendo treats Rei as expendable and as having no human will and in response she defies him and he loses his shot at Instrumentality. It's a parallel with his relationship with Yui -- similar to how he fails to retrieve her from Unit-01 because he doesn't realize she wants to stay, how he can't get her to accept the Dummy Plug because she's acting to protect Shinji and not to serve his interests, etc. As for how Shinji feels about Rei, I think the original series is pretty clear that it's platonic (at least post-Ramiel). You're right that it'd be easier to argue otherwise with Rebuild but it's still pretty ambiguous. EDIT: I'm dumb and totally misread your comment. I'll leave it there for posterity, though. To actually address it: Rei is a clone of his mother. She reminds him of her, to the point where he sometimes can't tell which one he's thinking of. She really isn't an appropriate romantic partner, even if there isn't an obvious real-world analogue. (Although, again, I'm pretty comfortable with the "sibling" descriptor given same-genes, same-parent, and the fact that she's given the name that Yui and Gendo decided on if their child were a girl.) Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 23:01 on May 23, 2013 |
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May 23, 2013 22:48
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I see that. I've little idea what would work for Shinji as romantic partner material, I'm just saying I don't find the idea of him hooking up with Rei THAT incestuous - and I still don't think the sibling comparison is entirely apt. We frown on incest in the real world because 1: it's tremendously unhealthy for any potential children and 2: family dynamics make it really difficult to establish a relationship that isn't based on some skeezy-as-hell power dynamics. I'm not sure how I'd describe the dynamic between Shinji and Rei, but I don't know that I'd call it familial - if only because Shinji (and possibly Rei) isn't aware of their biological ties and neither of them have a real idea of what a family dynamic even is.
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May 23, 2013 23:09
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:I really can't bring myself to read that scene as sexy. It's really obvious that Rei thinks nothing of it (either because she has no concept of sexuality or, equally plausibly, because she just doesn't regard Shinji that way) and Shinji, having realized the "dream" of walking in on a girl changing, simply ends up shamed and confused. It's a basic harem anime scene torn down because one participant doesn't care and the other is a semi-realistic teenager instead of a wish-fulfillment effigy. I totally accept and agree with this. So then how do you respond to images like this? 
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May 23, 2013 23:11
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I don't know that's entirely fair. You're going to expect marketing to accurately represent the themes and dynamics of the material it's based on?
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May 23, 2013 23:13
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Popcorn posted:I totally accept and agree with this. Marketing people are the scum of the Earth. Rebuild addresses it with Rei III (Shinji is disgusted and terrified by the image of someone he cares about transformed into an obedient puppet, and Rei's own arc in 3.33 is the beginning of an uphill struggle to become something more than that) and more amusingly, with GNR's leering, decomposing corpse.
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May 23, 2013 23:17
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That reminds me - what do you make of GNR's appearance in 3? She's far too small to be a direct carryover from EoE, but unless Gendo was up to some weird poo poo over the timeskip (not unreasonable, I suppose) I'm not sure what's up with that.
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May 23, 2013 23:20
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cafel posted:Even without getting into the more existential aspects I believe the message about the hollowness of epiphanies in the context of depression and self destructive behavior is very important. Unlike how the TV series and many other works present it, very often you are not in this continual blind state that is finally resolved by some profound personal conclusion. One of my major issues with Eva; EoE is barely more realistic than the series, which on the other hand was a pretty weak epiphany to begin with. "I think I can learn to love myself" isn't even the first step, it's more like realising that the path exists. Which is pretty profound at the time, but there's a long way from "Congratulations!" to mental health. Popcorn posted:But you could make a case for this, as Anno describes it, being a fantasy. This girl is tragically romantically alone and sad and weak. I will protect her. I will feed and clothe her. I will paw at her breasts as she lays numbly beneath me. You have to be pretty hosed up to fantasise this, though. Given how satirised and then subverted Rei's "submissive female" facade is already, how could he take it further?
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May 23, 2013 23:27
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Spiritus Nox posted:That reminds me - what do you make of GNR's appearance in 3? She's far too small to be a direct carryover from EoE, but unless Gendo was up to some weird poo poo over the timeskip (not unreasonable, I suppose) I'm not sure what's up with that. I have no idea. Everything to do with Unit-01, the angel that merged with it, and Unit-06 is completely incoherent. Most of the other details about the timeskip can be reasoned out from things Misato or the crew of the Wunder say, but it's like logic breaks down the closer you get to the point of Third Impact. Which, to be fair, is exactly what Ritsuko told us would happen at the end of 2.22.
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May 23, 2013 23:29
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:I have no idea. Everything to do with Unit-01, the angel that merged with it, and Unit-06 is completely incoherent. Most of the other details about the timeskip can be reasoned out from things Misato or the crew of the Wunder say, but it's like logic breaks down the closer you get to the point of Third Impact. Which, to be fair, is exactly what Ritsuko told us would happen at the end of 2.22. Fair enough - though did you mean to refer to Unit 13 instead of Unit 1 there? The twelfth angel doesn't weird me out that much - the way I see it, the Angels probably continued to attack over the course of the timeskip (as implied by the complete absence of the eleventh) and Nerv still had an interest in destroying them. I figure Gendo sent Kaowru and the Mark 6 out to meet the Twelfth Angel (Probably before Misato and company broke off, since Asuka and Mari acted like they'd seen the angel before), only for it to merge Armisael style with the Mark 6 and descend to terminal dogma (possibly like the trailer showed!  ) before Kaowru went "gently caress it, this isn't going to end well" and impaled the Mark 6 to prevent it from fully initiating another Impact. Once Gendo has a machine capable of removing the spears, he'd necessarily need to kill the last Angel...because of SEELE/NERV reasons, I guess - hence ordering Rei to behead the Mark 6 and release the Angel.I don't think there's too many holes in that theory.
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May 23, 2013 23:35
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Spiritus Nox posted:Fair enough - though did you mean to refer to Unit 13 instead of Unit 1 there? No, I mean Unit-01 -- the one that got speared and somehow ended up in orbit. Unit-13 is the one that Kaworu and Shinji pilot down to Terminal Dogma, which we also know nothing about, but it's just regular mysterious instead of "how did we get from A to B?" mysterious.
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May 23, 2013 23:40
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Oh! I got confused because you were talking about the Angel that merged with it, which made me think of the Twelfth enveloping Unit 13. I'm not sure the thing that Asuka fought had actually merged with Unit 1 - I got the impression that both it and the container housing the Eva were manmade, and the Angel had simply been mounted on it to keep trespassers away. And yeah, that's definitely mysterious. Nerv is the most logical answer as to who would put Unit 1 in space under such heavy guard, but considering that Gendo could use it to launch an Impact and win his whole drat game, that raises the question of why not just store it at Nerv HQ - Gendo's clearly confident enough in his ability to keep Wille away or he wouldn't still be using the place.
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May 23, 2013 23:45
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From what I can gather, Shinji and Unit-01 started Third Impact and Kaworu and Unit-06 used the Spear of Cassius to stop it(which we saw in 2.22), which is why Kaworu referred to it as "Near-Third Impact"--because the process was halted. Then the Twelfth Angel attacked and infected Unit-06, which descended to Terminal Dogma and picked up Third Impact right where Shinji left off. Unit-06 and Lilith were sealed away using both Longinus and Cassius. NERV or SEELE decided that Unit-01 (with Shinji and Rei inside) was too dangerous and shot it into orbit inside that 3D crucifix vault either before or after Third Impact.
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May 23, 2013 23:53
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Spiritus Nox posted:Oh! I got confused because you were talking about the Angel that merged with it, which made me think of the Twelfth enveloping Unit 13. I'm not sure the thing that Asuka fought had actually merged with Unit 1 - I got the impression that both it and the container housing the Eva were manmade, and the Angel had simply been mounted on it to keep trespassers away. I think you're still thinking of the wrong Angel. I'm talking about the one that Mari and Rei fought in 2.22, that ate Unit-00 and Rei, and whose body (briefly) took on the form of Rei/Lilith when Shinji pulled Rei's soul out of it. Spaghetti arms angel. It would help if I could remember any of the names besides Ramiel and Kaworu.
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May 23, 2013 23:57
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:I think you're still thinking of the wrong Angel. I'm talking about the one that Mari and Rei fought in 2.22, that ate Unit-00 and Rei, and whose body (briefly) took on the form of Rei/Lilith when Shinji pulled Rei's soul out of it. Spaghetti arms angel. Oh. Oh yeah. That's Zeruel/Rebuild's Tenth Angel by the way. I keep forgetting that Giant Red Rei melted into Unit 1 at the end there - it was only really apparent what was happening for a couple of shots. What's so incoherent about him, by the by? I thought Zeruel was really straight forward - big bad angel kicks rear end and eats Rei, pisses Shinji off. Shinji getting sufficiently pissed off (possibly about Rei specifically from what Gendo said) pushes Unit 1 towards its awakening - which is finished when Shinji plucks Rei's soul out of Zeruel and the Eva merges with its remains. Cue armageddon/Kaowru.
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May 24, 2013 00:00
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He's my theory. Spoilers I guess : There's two Lances on the corpse. One is in Eva-06 to contain the Angel, and the other is in GNR (love that acronym). It's a bit obtuse but I think the idea is that the two Lances don't overlap, i.e. they are both meant to contain the entities separately. Also notice Eva-06's pose : It's trying to push or pull the Lance out. Here's my take on it : GNR died when Third Impact was interrupted, and Gendo used the Lance of Longinus to stop GNR's decay. He surely didn't want to loose GNR. Later, Eva-06 was used to contain the 12th Angel. This was done without Kaworu, based on his line that Eva-06 had been modified to be autonomous. It's also based on the sorrow and regret in his voice when he speaks of Eva-06. The Eva probably used its Spear, the Spear of Cassius, to do the deed. This means it impaled itself to contain the 12th Angel. Seeing as the 12th Angel is probably Armisael in the Rebuilds, meaning it gets killed by getting absorbed and blown up in another GNR explosion in the original series, there's some basis for that theory to work. I see two scenarios from this: 1) The Angel was already at GNR and it's literally where it got stopped. It was trying to contaminate GNR. Later Gendo had the Spear of Cassius removed and a Lance of Longinus used instead in his plan to trick Kaworu. 2) Gendo had the Eva-06+Angel moved to GNR, did some snafu to merge Eva-06 to GNR, and switched the Spear with the Lance, unbeknownst to Kaworu. Afterwards Gendo sealed the place to make sure the setpieces wouldn't be touched until his plan was ready to be set in motion. When I wrote "The Punchline" concerning Act 3 of Rebuild 3, I meant it. It's literally the culmination of a prank Gendo played on Kaworu to get rid of him. Edit: Clarified scenario #2 bof_man fucked around with this message at 00:11 on May 24, 2013 |
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May 24, 2013 00:01
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Spiritus Nox posted:Oh. Oh yeah. That's Zeruel/Rebuild's Tenth Angel by the way. I keep forgetting that Giant Red Rei melted into Unit 1 at the end there - it was only really apparent what was happening for a couple of shots. I was working under the assumption that Giant Red Rei and Giant Decomposing Rei might have been the same entity. Zeruel himself isn't confusing, just what happened to his remains. Maybe Unit-01 absorbed it all, I dunno.
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May 24, 2013 00:02
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cafel posted:Even without getting into the more existential aspects I believe the message about the hollowness of epiphanies in the context of depression and self destructive behavior is very important. Unlike how the TV series and many other works present it, very often you are not in this continual blind state that is finally resolved by some profound personal conclusion. You drift in and out of that blind state and have epiphanies from time to time that solve little if anything. The realization that you have a problem or finding a path to solving your problem are very important, but they're nowhere near the final step a lot of fiction likes to portray it as because it make a very climatic and cathartic ending. I think this is the one of the series strengths, but I can't help feel it is also its big weakness. I think Shinji learns enough lessons throughout the series to not be as despondent as he gets, though he certainly has reason to still have issues. Which, unfortunately, makes me think his feelings are just whatever the writers need them to be at the time to make the episode work.
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May 24, 2013 00:18
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Marketing people are the scum of the Earth. Spiritus Nox posted:I don't know that's entirely fair. You're going to expect marketing to accurately represent the themes and dynamics of the material it's based on? You guys are assuming (I assume!) that that artwork is somehow "outside" of the Evangelion "experience", and can be safely discarded. I find that a little hard to accept considering how ubiquitous art like that is across Evangelion media (something specially apparent if you've ever spent some time in Tokyo). I'm not so willing to dismiss it because it doesn't fit my preferred Evangelion worldview or whatever. But I guess that sticks us in sticky "what is canon anyway" territory. But that image isn't actually that far removed from the depiction of Rei (and Asuka) in the series anyway. Does it actually contradict anything in the show? Rei wears a skintight plugsuit, after all; these kids could have been wearing bulky astronaut suits or even just their normal clothes (as Shinji gets to more than once), but Gainax went with the skintight suit instead. We frequently see her in vulnerable, even sexualised situations, though they're not necessarily meant to be erotic per se, as has been discussed... My feeling is that as much as Anno does criticse the fantasy of the submissive female, and the sexy anime babe generally, to do it he has to set Rei up as a passive sex doll in the first place. I've never really been able to resolve the issue in my mind, though, and I'm never completely convinced we're not just "supposed" to lap the fan service up because we're all horny otaku or whatever, rather than interpret it as a searing critique.
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May 24, 2013 00:22
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Popcorn posted:My feeling is that as much as Anno does criticse the fantasy of the submissive female, and the sexy anime babe generally, to do it he has to set Rei up as a passive sex doll in the first place. I've never really been able to resolve the issue in my mind, though, and I'm never completely convinced we're not just "supposed" to lap the fan service up because we're all horny otaku or whatever, rather than interpret it as a searing critique. I've always taken it to mean that Anno/Gainax are entirely okay with T&A fanservice, and fantasizing about a helpless, submissive partner is the only thing they're criticizing. This is entirely consistent with how Evangelion portrays Rei, Asuka, Misato, and women in general. (As well as Shinji's relationships with them.) It's not the criticism I'd launch if I set out to direct a science fiction meta-commentary on the state of nerd media, but I'm willing to give it a qualified pass considering that in the actual work itself, even the characters it objectifies the most still have clearly developed motives, agency, and inner lives of their own. Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 00:31 on May 24, 2013 |
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May 24, 2013 00:27
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By the way, this has nothing to do with anything, but living in Tokyo did change how I saw Evangelion, which in retrospect was completely predictable. It's this incredibly dense, futuristic city, but it's built assuming that the next major disaster (earthquake, tsunami, atom bomb, angel attack) is going to happen at any second, so there are these signs everywhere reminding you what to do in an emergency and where to go. The subway particularly resonated with me. The kids swiping their tickets on the ticket machines, and the complex networks the Eva units get routed through to get to the surface... Nerv's just the Tokyo subway really.
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May 24, 2013 00:27
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:I've always taken it to mean that Anno/Gainax are entirely okay with T&A fanservice, and fantasizing about a helpless, submissive partner is the only thing they're criticizing. This is entirely consistent with how Evangelion portrays Rei, Asuka, Misato, and women in general. (As well as Shinji's relationships with them.) So what does that mean for Shinji and his handful of anime spunk?
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May 24, 2013 00:29
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Popcorn posted:So what does that mean for Shinji and his handful of anime spunk? Exactly what he says it means: "I'm so hosed up."
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May 24, 2013 00:30
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Exactly what he says it means: "I'm so hosed up." Yeah, but isn't it "OK" to perv over Asuka, because she isn't a passive sex doll?
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May 24, 2013 00:31
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Popcorn posted:Yeah, but isn't it "OK" to perv over Asuka, because she isn't a passive sex doll? She was in a coma - I don't know that you can get much more passive than that.
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May 24, 2013 00:32
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| # ? May 24, 2024 23:00 |
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Spiritus Nox posted:She was in a coma - I don't know that you can get much more passive than that. Sure, but that could mean a couple of things... 1: "Asuka's pretty hot, huh, anime fans? Pretty sassy, pretty sexy? OK, you wanna see her boobs? Here you go! Oh this scene is completely unsexy and joyless and Shinji (you) points out how hosed up he (you) is. Bet you feel kind of sick and pathetic now, huh, anime fan? gently caress you! Hope you learnt your lesson! Never objectify women in anime!" 2: "Asuka's pretty hot, huh, anime fans? Pretty sassy, pretty sexy? OK, you wanna see her boobs? Well, OK, but in this particular instance we'll make it unsexy because she's in a coma and you should feel bad for finding her sexy right now, but only right now."
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May 24, 2013 00:35
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