WTF? The ENDING of Neon Genesis Evangelion

➡ The text is a discussion about the Cartoon Cabal’s experience with the anime series, Neon Genesis Evangelion. They talk about the series’ confusing timeline, the unique way it was created, and the impact of its budget constraints on the animation quality. They also compare it to other shows like Pluribus and discuss the series’ controversial ending. The conversation ends with a reflection on the violent imagery in the series and the importance of watching all the episodes to fully understand it.
➡ The text discusses a creative meeting about a complex series, where the narrative is non-linear and the characters’ experiences are deeply psychological. The series, which includes a movie, explores themes of depression and self-loathing, particularly through the character Shinji. The text also mentions the concept of Instrumentality, where everyone’s consciousness merges, and the challenges of depicting this. The series’ soundtrack plays a significant role in setting the mood and the narrative’s pacing.
➡ The text discusses the complexities of a series, focusing on the character Shinji’s journey through depression and identity crisis. It explores the concept of Instrumentality, where everyone becomes one, and the world ends or transforms into a spiritual energy. The text also debates the ending of the series, where Shinji chooses to live in a difficult reality rather than a fantasy. Lastly, it mentions a series of movies called ‘Rebuild’ that retell the original series but are less well-received.
➡ The protagonist, Shinji, goes through a series of events in a film where he feels his worth is only tied to piloting a suit, which he later discovers is controlled by his mother. Despite the dramatic events and revelations, Shinji doesn’t seem to change or grow as a character. The story ends with him choosing a life of solitude and depression, reflecting the creator’s own struggles with mental health.
➡ The discussion revolves around the anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion, focusing on its unique storytelling and character interactions, particularly with the character Shinji. The speakers also discuss the series’ use of religious and occult symbolism, and how it was incorporated into the plot. They debate the concept of Instrumentality, a key plot point in the series, and its various interpretations. The conversation ends with a reflection on the series’ ambitious nature and its impact despite its abstract and complex narrative.
➡ The text discusses the author’s thoughts on an anime series, focusing on its unique elements like sound effects, animation style, and the use of live-action footage. The author also mentions the cultural differences between Japanese and American audiences, and how these might affect their perception of the series. The author expresses a preference for the original series over the remakes, despite acknowledging some flaws in the original. Lastly, the author discusses the importance of episode sequencing and character development in maintaining viewer interest.
➡ This text discusses the struggles of a character dealing with depression and the need for others’ support. It also touches on the unrealistic aspects of sci-fi concepts and the dynamics of relationships. The text ends with a promotion for a podcast and merchandise from Paranoid American, using a song-like format.

It’s almost like the ultimate, like depression fantasy to be just become a puddle of goo with everyone else. So it’s more abandoned. Games at the Cartoon Cabal beyond what’s Just in the Name at the Cartoon Cabal See, just at one cost comes fame at the Cartoon Cabal So much for the fun and games at the Cartoon Cabal. Hello, welcome to the Cartoon Cabal, where we have come to the end event of Evangelion, which is not the end of Evangelion. That was the movie we covered in the last episode. This is the episode 26 that came out before that.

This is also confusing. But we’re here. We’re talking about the finish of Evangelion. No, no, you. You can’t. The finish is actually Evangelion 3.0 1.0 thrice upon a time, which I think was iterated upon and became 3.33 plus 1.11. That’s a headache for our future. But here we are on episode 26. Take care of yourself. Is Matt here? Is Paranoid American over there. Today we’re bringing in Mark, and I have to read what you wrote there. The CEO of Pile of Red Goo Incorporated. Yeah, he told me to give my job title. So I’m just going to declare myself president of the Red Goo because everyone else is red goo.

How about black goo? Yeah, I get black goo. Dibs. Well, I think black goo is something different that’s like. That would be interesting to see what the red Goo does when it meets the black goo. Yeah, well, there’s still tar on Earth. That’s what’s going to happen in Instrumentality, though. That’s for sure. The black goo meets the red goo there, doesn’t it? So it’s pretty interesting going through this now because of what’s on TV recently, namely Pluribus. You can’t really separate those two things. Bring it up a bit, because I. I only watched like the first Pluribus and it’s one of those things where I thought it was okay and I just didn’t continue like you and I were, like, maybe.

And just to let people know, Mark and I podcast a whole lot about movies, Twilight Zone films and fills time enough. Podcast, that’s my plug. But yeah, we were thinking about Pluribus, but we kind of. We didn’t get the hook in to talk about it. I guess better that you watch this first and then you see Pluribus, because then. Because otherwise the frame of ref. Like for me, the frame of reference was Pluribus and a few other movies. And concepts. But now when you see Pluribus, it’ll remind you of Neon Genesis Evangelion, at least the movie.

Well, yes, Pluribus is. Is made by Vince Gilligan, who, you know, as is most of his work that’s well known, like Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. He tries to separate himself from judging any of the characters as as much as humanly possible, to the point where there are people who unironically think that Walter White is a super good, great, good guy, and they’re just allowed to believe that because the show doesn’t. It forces you to make your own decision about it, which Pluribus does as well. At no point so far has Plurib absolutely come down on Hive Mind is evil or good.

Well, maybe a couple of. A couple of parts would make you think about it, but it’s. It’s very like End of Contact. Like you have to make your own decision. Like, is, Is this good? Is this bad? I. I think Ava tries to do this, but I, I don’t. I think it kind of messes up every single time being neutral. And I don’t. I don’t even think that that’s necessarily weakness. I don’t think that you’re supposed to necessarily, like, instrumentality is just something that happens. It’s sort of like the creation of the Internet. Like, it just happened.

We can’t. It’s pretty easy to say the Internet ruined everything. Well, the Vince Gilligan analogy, I think, is actually a perfect one because here you’ve got. And by the way, I do respect the approach of, like, I don’t judge my characters. I just judge my viewers on how they judge my characters. What a, what a fun troll that would be. But also look at how both of those properties came to being right. Pluribus, Vince Gilgan literally created an entire neighborhood and, like, pre planned everything out and had, like, knew what the story was going to kind of do because of it, the way that TV is put together and how Vince Gilligan works.

Right. But then if you look at how Neon Genesis Evangelion comes together, it’s almost like someone stole a car and they’re just driving it around in a. In a city they’ve never been to before and they’ve run out of gas like three miles ago. That’s kind of the feeling. Even though they’re both doing the same things, you know what I mean? But like, one is very meticulously pre planned, had budget things work as they’re supposed to. And this one, we’re totally flying by the seat of our pants. Yeah. Take care of yourself. It’s like, I think I mentioned it a little bit in the movie or maybe last episode, but makes me think of Don Herzfeld’s rejected, whereas he goes nuts.

It just becomes crazy Squiggles and Take care of yourself. I like the episode, but it does become like. I feel like I’m watching everything. Literally like, oh, they can only afford Coptic color pens now. Oh, they ran out of money for that. Now it’s just pencil sketches and then black and white photos. And then in the middle of it, there’s this alternate universe thing that seems like it’s a pilot for a reimagining of the show that would make more money, that has all the animation in the world in it, which is until that runs out too, because that turns back into markers at the end of it.

Right. It’s reality disintegrating. By the way, there is a video game based on that particular pocket. You know, you do. Okay, good. Girlfriend of steel 2 is the. Is the Japanese title. I think it’s Iron Maiden in English or something. So is this. You guys first watch through the series? Yeah, that’s because I was. One of the reasons I drugged you in here is because 30 years ago, most of my friends, including you, were watching Neon Genesis Evangelion. Sorry, we like saying all three names around here. It’s fun. Yeah. We decided that you have to say the whole thing.

Okay. Well, my first experience with Neon Genesis Evangelion was VHS tapes that were at my local fun video store. And we watched all of it. And interestingly, I mean, this was such a. It was a video store that was just called Video Store. It was in Little Five Points in Atlanta. And some of the videotapes were dubbed and some of them were subtitled. So we would. My friends and I would just bring one to my house. And we just didn’t know whether it was going to be one or the other when we started it up. And then we didn’t know that End of Evangelion existed because I think it got a home video release in the US like in 2001, which was the year I was watching these originally.

So I kind of experienced it as close to in real time as a non Super Weeb was able to. And the way that we did it, I don’t know if this was your doing, Mark, but we did the series up until episode 25. Then we watched the movie the End of Neon Genesis Evangelion. And then we watched the very last episode, episode 26. I do think that that was maybe a good way to do it. That was Luke’s idea. I’m such a nerd about behind the scenes stuff that I still kind of prefer the release order because, as you may have noticed, an end of Evangelion is particularly aggressive and.

And part of it is because of the amount of hate mail they got. Apparently the hate mail they put on screen is sort of a recreation and none of it is the actual hate mail they got because you notice that some of it is, you know, looks like artists made it, so that makes sense. But there’s definitely stuff that’s. That says like Hideakiano, kill yourself or something like that. And apparently some of the live action footage, there’s a guy flipping the bird in it, which I couldn’t make out. But, you know, at the time I watched it originally, it’s like, I.

I remember re watching 25 and 26 almost immediately because there is a bunch of stuff that’s. You’ll notice that there are a few scenes in these episodes and forgive me, they kind of run together in my head, even though I, I think I have them separate. But there’s specifically a couple of extremely violent stills in them where somebody’s like, head was blown off and you’re just like, what, what happened? And you sort of find that out later. But yeah, I. I still think that you kind of have to watch all of it. What? I think that the last couple episode, the aired episodes.

Right. Ignoring the movie for a second. The last few Arab episodes, they almost turn into mood boards at a certain point. Maybe I’ve just been to too many creative meetings where, like, I can. I can see what’s happening screen. Like, I can see the limitations that they were under. But it’s also like, okay, these are the animatics. Oh, there’s just like a shot list, I guess, in Japanese at one point. But I, I got what they were trying to do and I saw the ambition in that approach. So I, I don’t know if I needed it to.

They couldn’t have done that for the first 20 episodes by any stretch. But after I’m invested and I can see how much they’re trying to tie up. And truly, when we ended up watching the movie, I felt like the American in me needed them to spell out some of the things that the movie spelled out. So then everything, well, okay, maybe 10 or 20 of what came out in episode 25, I understood. And maybe like 10 of what came out in 26, I understood I was at like a zero without the movie. I, I think that all of it kind of explains because the pacing of 25 and 26 are kind of the characters talk and then there’s, I guess not a narration, but like a big wall of text that comes up.

But it’s like the narrator talks, the characters talk. So it’s kind of. It’s like you get a bunch of exposition at the end, which is kind of good. It’s better than. Because the series as you know, throws you into it at the beginning, like very much like it’s, it’s in fact, I think what the third episode is a flashback to what happens in the first episode, basically. Or was it the fourth episode? Yeah, just as much as Disney, for sure. Well, it was like there was a big fight scene that happened in basically Shinji’s first encounter that didn’t.

You didn’t actually get to watch until like the second or third episode. Right? Am I remembering that correctly? Oh, yeah, that’s right. Yeah. Because he’s. He wakes up in the hospital room. Yeah. So it’s like they, yeah, they go ahead and tell you that it’s going to be like a weird non linear story. But I definitely, you know, so much of this episode and the last one are kind of almost like a stage play that you would barely tolerate. If this was. If Shinji was your kid and you went to their school to see the stage play and it was this, you would be like.

But that makes sense because it’s all happening inside Shinji’s head. And this is probably what the inside of Shinji’s head is. You have to assume that other people going through Instrumentality are like, everyone they love shows up and they just hug me like we’re good. Right. Okay. Later, like Gendo is getting reunited with his wife. Right. So he’s. He gets a happy ending. Maybe an Instrumentality where Shinji is so full of self loathing, which is what this episode is all about. What is it called in Maoist China where they stick someone in the middle of the circle and all and tell them everything wrong with them? Struggle session.

Oh no, that was like troubled teen industry or like the Elon School or something. No, there’s this. There’s a specific one that, that they had someone out there remembers the name. But yeah, it’s just like you get someone and they literally sit in the middle and everyone else tells them like things they’ve done wrong and you know. Yeah. And it has some ironic name, of course, because it’s communist China. So. Yeah, well, yeah, it’s. It’s it’s impossible. I don’t think that Anno necessarily wanted Shinji to be the self insert, but he definitely is. And this is definitely.

The whole series is about depression. Even though from the. The reading I did recently, it’s like the reason the series took the turn that it did was he started reading about psychology and became interested in it. So I think if a person is very prone to depressive episodes, starts reading about psychology, then this is what happens. So Shinji is the otaku in himself that he hates. Yeah. Also. I mean, Gendo is also kind of what a Shinji would. It’s. It’s like how a depressed person would write a dad. Because I don’t know about you guys. Everyone I’ve met who’s as powerful as him, I’ve never met anyone that powerful who would end the world to be with their wife again.

That just. That strikes me as completely kind of. I think I haven’t met many powerful people, though. Well, deep down, really a family guy at heart. You can tell, which is wildly. And I guess it is an anime. So whatever. I can’t go. It’s wildly unreal. It’s also wildly unrealistic that everyone’s in love with Shinji. And one of those two. Or the angels are eating each other. Yeah, we are missing a bit of that in episode 26. I was thinking maybe 25 does this as well, but I noticed because I watched 26 again just before this and was listening more.

Since the visuals are just mostly stills, I was listening more of the soundscape. And I feel like a lot of the soundtrack on this episode does like a lot of heavy lifting. It starts off with that weird ethereal stuff, and then it kind of comes together for a while. We get the happy time interlude that breaks down back into the weird ethereal music. And then there’s like a big fanfare to make to congratulate you for you for watching this series at the end. Congratulations. Congratulations you for watching it. O Metoga zaimus. I will say for certain that soundtrack is burned into my head forever.

The weird drone, dissonant stuff, that’s just what plays in your head now? No, I mean, I just. I could. I. I know exactly how it sounds. And could I say I could play it? Episode in particular. Yes, it was in the last one as well. So, yeah, both of these episodes, it’s almost like they, they. They go together. Like End of Evangelion is, you know that. I don’t know if you guys looked this up, but End of Evangelion was sort of released, as do two things. Well, when you watch it, it’s got the cards to tell you.

This is episode 25. This is episode 26. It’s directly in the movie, so they’re different versions. Just. Episode 25 was called Air. When I watched it the first time, I mean, the. The episode 25, that’s the. The end of Evangelion, which. I’ve always been fascinated by that because for the. For an episode of this series to be called Air is, like, really frightening because almost all the episode titles are like, well, it’s playing box Air. What? That’s. It’s a. That’s the music again. Oh, I was just thinking more like. Like Asuka’s corpse being, like, torn apart by birds.

Well, hey, if you want to double entendre, you can, but. Okay, I guess that’s the thing you have to watch. End of Ang Belly. I can’t say it now. Anyway, you got to watch the movie to realize that basically, who’s living and who’s dead in Instrumentality, Masato is dead. She shot. Is this a reflection of Shinji? Well, no, she says that. She says this is a reflection of what you think of me. Does she’s not. No, she’s not shot. She’s the teacher now. She’s in. No, we’ve established the Instrumentality means that everybody who’s ever lived. That.

That means that a cave person who died 20 billion years ago will suddenly be awakened and have to have someone go, unga, bunga, you are part of everyone now. And they’ll have to learn how to use a cell phone and go to high school in their head, I guess. I don’t know. This is ridiculous. Well, no, but. But if you compare that to Pluribus, though, like, here’s where Pluribus makes it make sense. Where it’s not that the caveman has to understand anything. It’s that now the collective has a little bit more caveman. It’s now, like, 0.01% more caveman than it was before that dude woke up.

And then that just keeps adding until the point where everyone that you talk to is everybody. So that you don’t really talk to Shinji. Like, you could be talking to Oscar and you’re talking to Oscar and Shinji, or you can talk to Shinji, and you’re talking to both of them, too. Like, you can’t get away from the entire world, no matter who you’re talking to. And I. I wonder how much of that is. Is what was in the original Vision for this. Or is that if you go and talk to a Shinji, you’re talking to Shinji, plus everyone else is sort of in the room versus you’re talking to all of them at once.

Well, I think that this series wisely does not show us, because what we’re seeing is him accepting Instrumentality. We have to assume that Instrumentality doesn’t actually begin until after this. So. And the writing here is not. I don’t know, the writing on Pluribus attempts to. But the other thing about the writing on Pluribus is that the characters are always hiding something from you. Like the hive mind is hiding things from us, the viewer, which it has to. Because it’s impossible to write that for the most part. It’s like very difficult to write the character who knows every other character.

Because. Because it’s. Because it’s difficult. Because we can’t understand that as people. We can’t possibly. But yeah. So this version, unlike Pluribus, this includes dead people because Gendo wants to be with Yui, so she’s. I just wonder if Gendo doesn’t, if they’re all fooling themselves. Because once we’re in this interview session, there are. Some of them are distinctly saying, I am not. I’m not Masada. I’m a reflection of what you think of Masado. Right. So is. Is Masada Soldier somewhere else having the same experience? I kind of wonder. It is. Yeah. Not everyone. I’m sorry, that was.

The difference between episode 25 and 26 is they stopped using that language in episode 26. Remember, 26 begins with a little place card that says it’s impossible to have time to do all of this. So we’re only going to show you the Instrumentalification of this one guy ran out of money. Yeah, well, I mean, you can’t do that anyway. Like, you. You would have to make an entire other series if everybody goes through Instrumentality. And it would be pretty boring, honestly. Oh, yeah. Well, the last episode. Yeah, we have the interviews, like of our three or four main characters, right? Yeah.

But you know who’s conducting the interviews? Presumably, part of Instrumentality is that people start entering your head and talking to you and then. And then they all clap, and then you’re. Then your pile of red goo. See, my. In the way that I interpret this. Again, first, watch through. I’m still making sense of it, but the Instrumentality seems like it would be almost impossible to separate from the world just ended or everyone just became one, and that there’s no more physical material Anything left. And it’s all just sort of like an amorphous spirit energy that’s being experienced and trying to like collapse in on itself.

I get the, the exact opposite impression. In Pluribus, for example, it’s a very material, physical world. Everyone’s still alive. This one, it feels like the world’s already gone. And I think part of that’s just because we saw for the first 20 plus episodes, Just Cities being wiped off the map and just angels destroying buildings and just everyone just constantly is dying and getting hurt. So it makes more sense that everyone’s dead now. And you could almost explain to me that everything that happened in the movie 25, 26 in the movie, all is happening within like the three second moment that the bomb goes off and everyone dies.

And we’re just seeing like a very stretched out version because, like, all the things that happened in this last episode 26, where it’s Shinji going through an identity crisis, he goes from, you know, I can disappear because I’m unworthy of existing and oh, woe is me. And most people are showing up and they’re just being like, shinji, we don’t even care about you enough to hate you. Like, you think the world hates you, you’re just some dude, like, no one really cares. And then he’s like, oh my God, I guess that is good. Okay, my life is worth living.

And. And coincidentally, that came after Asuka becomes his girlfriend in this, like, alternate version of his mind. And. But all of that could have happened in the three seconds it takes for the bomb to like, enter your vicinity and then suck out of the air, out of the room, and then you’re dead. So, yeah, the ordering I have. And obviously I do think you need to take the last scene. I. I kind of like Luke’s suggestion of 25 movie 26. But then the last scene of the movie. Well, the last scene of the movie does change things.

And because Shinji is back into living in a weird hellhole now, is that a happy ending? Because he’s still. He’s his own person. I think it is. Tries to strangle Eska for a minute, but. Yeah, well, it’s, it’s a happy ending because you don’t want Shinji in your Pluribus. Like, if I’m gonna be, I don’t want Shinji to, to be part of it. Well, yeah, he’s Carol from Pluribus now, and so is Asuka. And Asuka is the guy from South America now. I think it’s from Central America. Anyway, what I was gonna say is that the thing about the end of the series is this is depression, right? You.

What you want is. I want to be a. I want everyone to be close to me. I don’t want to have to eat. I don’t want to have to do anything. I don’t want to have to pile the ava. I don’t want to, like, it’s like. It’s almost like the ultimate, like, depression fantasy to be just become a puddle of goo with everyone else. Like, everyone has to be around you. You. You have sucked. It’s like that the. Was it squid people? I think the. The idea that people who have no spine come to you with their tentacles and they use their tentacles to suck all of your life force out so they could like walk around using your spine.

It’s like, basically this is the ultimate version of that. Is that Shinji’s an energy vampire? Essentially, yes, he’s an energy vampire. And then the. The end of the movie sort of retcons it slightly where he, after all that, decides, actually, no, I don’t want this. I want to strangle Asuka on a beach. No, no. I mean, there is the thought that what happens in this episode is basically so, you know, mind bending and disturbing, that he’s like trying to check if that’s actually a person. Well, I mean, it’s a weird way to do it, but. But the other.

Well, the other. And she responds and he stops. Right. Well, the other part of the movie is that. Is that, you know, he’s completely freaking out for a lot of it because there’s a giant ray who loves him unconditionally and is mutating a bunch of heads and, and is doing a bunch of weird stuff. Bodies are exploding. You could also look at that as sort of an extrovert introvert thing. Like, no, I don’t want this. I don’t want this person who really wants to be around me. But, but realistically, like, Asuka is kind of the perfect person for Shinji because she is the kind of person who will make him do things and will not give up on him.

Because I don’t. Angry. Let me just. Just to put it in a polite way, if Shinji and Asuka get married, Shinji’s not dying of old age. Shinji is leaving the earth early. At some point, you can just see that he would be beaten down so quickly that, you know, she. She would be, I think him strangling her. It almost feels like self defense. Like it’s going down this route. Of maybe they will grow old and die together. But like he knows that she’ll kill him at some point or she’ll make him want to die. So then he’s taking her out first.

Like it makes me depressed. I think what, what realistically would happen is because her mother hung herself, he’ll just keep threatening to kill himself and she’ll eventually just get tired of him and then run away and then call him on the phone and be like go ahead and do it. And he’ll like think about doing it but then he just won’t melted now he’ll get really overweight and then have a gambling problem. And then, then, then he’ll. He’ll get like three penguins to move in. Shinji being overweight with a gambling problem, he’s immediately more interesting like just by those two.

Those two facets that normally would ruin a character. Those things would help him so much. Well the basically do you guys. Are you guys open to any rebuild spoilers at all? You can toss. Well, okay. Anyone that cares hit the 30 ahead. But we go for it. Give us get it to it. Okay, I’m gonna keep it like kind of vague. Wait, what is rebuild? You have to explain this to me. I haven’t read ahead at all. It’s a series of movies that were also a train wreck, but basically they were announced in I don’t know, 2005.

No, no, the first one came out in 2007. So and the last one came out, I believe 2023, whatever it was, the development cycle for them was the same length as from the beginning of the series to the the first movie coming out. So basically it was supposed to come out 2007, then 2009, then. Then like the three and four were supposed to come out in 2010 or 2011. So it just. What happened was the first movie was kind of a recap of the first half of the first third of the series, I think. And the second movie at the end of it, it gets kind of.

It takes a swerve. And then the third movie is. There’s a time jump and everything’s completely different. And it’s very hated it. People don’t like it. Compared to how much people loved the original TV show airing ending. Absolutely. It is less well liked and I for that it’s more boring than that even though it’s a film. And then then basically what happens is there’s a. There’s an inserted character who is basically a self insert for Anna’s real life wife. And at the end of the entire series, Shinji ends up with her, which people do not like that either, because she’s basically kind of an energetic, fun character with no baggage.

Okay, well, pilots shouldn’t date other pilots anyway. That’s just bad news. It’s. I understand that in real life, you need a partner that doesn’t have that, that is functional and you can work with and live with, but that’s not always the best thing for a drama. Anyway, stuck with Shinji, though. He. It almost feels like he should be alone. He should disappear and be unworthy of existing because ultimately he. He. He gets it. By the. The very last episode. It’s almost like he’s been thinking what we’ve been thinking. He’s thinking like, the only reason I have any value is because I’m in this suit and I’m doing these things.

And even deep down, maybe he realizes it, maybe not, but that he’s not even really doing anything. The suit’s doing all the stuff is that the Ava’s doing everything for him, and he’s kind of taking all this credit. And then he finds out that it’s his mom. So his mom’s been doing at all the cool stuff for him. She’s the only thing that’s been giving him a backbone and a reason to live. It kind of makes them feel even like, less value, right? Because not only has he been putting on this charade, but, like, his mom’s been behind the whole thing.

It’s funny because it really is kind of like there’s a lot of reflection in episode 26 about how the Ava. Piloting the Ava is the only thing that makes him interesting or whatever. And really, it’s like finding out. It’s like you’re getting driven to. To the dance, and then you find out it was your mom doing it the whole time. You know, like, imagine just, I don’t know. I don’t know, thinking you’re really cool and then finding out your mom’s been paying for it the whole time. Whatever it is. Whatever it is. I mean, I guess this is like a mental break.

Not break, but a mental breakthrough that people do need to make in adolescence, lest they become, you know, arrested development sort of people. Right? Like, you do have to get to that point where, I mean, he breaks down his ego. We have reality construction. There’s, like, the Monad. There’s nothing there. Okay, let’s add a dimension. Here’s a line. Now you can walk around that’s, you know, very much like mystery school reality construction stuff. You can Be a squid if you want. But isn’t that kind of the story of the whole series? It’s someone making an idea from scratch and they’re massively depressed, so the whole thing is mismanaged and it just kind of goes to hell at the end.

And it really is kind of, I don’t know, chaos magic. Once we start building the monad, though, we kind of get past Shinji stops saying, like, I hate myself. I hate myself quite as much. And then we have congratulations. Like, the key does turn when we have a scratch. So this is. This is where I was paying the most attention on, like the. The transition. Because it’s all about I’m worthless and everyone hates me. And I. And I always make this note of just like Shinji, it’s even worse than everyone hates you. It’s that, like, it’s the Don Draper meme.

Like, I don’t even think about you. Like, you’re over here, like, giving yourself a pity party and it’s just like, oh, yeah, that Shinji guy, he still exists. And let me just say objectively, I think he is right. If you’re talking about this, like, post apocalyptic future where angels are coming down. If Shinji, after everything we know about him, he has literally no value to the world unless he is in this Ava, right? If he’s not in the Ava, he. He’s doing nothing aside from, like, jerking off on girls in hospital beds. Like, that’s probably like the only thing that he really did in this entire series with his own agency.

But. But he goes from this, like, horrible, oh, woe is me. Everyone hates me. And then it turns into a Bob Newhart style ending a little bit like halfway through where he kind of wakes up and it’s Asuka and she’s like making a joke about him having Morningwood. And then Ray turns into a Southern bumpkin. It turns into like a sitcom. Someone gets hit in the head, right? They get kicked in the head by a horse and everything changes for a little bit. And then at the end it just turns into him on top of the world.

And the entire, like, ensemble cast, like the whole Simpsons intro comes out and they kind of congratulate him and clap. And then they turn and look at you and they clap at you and they’re like, congratulations to all the children. But as the floor turns into the world, it is a destroyed world. So this is the choice the. The Happy Time, you know, high school anime, which they intentionally were trying to stuff every cliche they could into that sequence. I appreciate it. It didn’t like. It felt like that was self aware the way they did it.

But also I did not feel like this was a happy ending. It didn’t feel happy by any stretch of the imagination. It felt like Shinji did something horrible. No, if we take. It’s. If we take it a few years later, it’s Matrix choice. You want to live on Zion or do you want to live in, you know, eat your steak in the Matrix, Shinji has chosen Zion, it seems. Well, it’s. It’s the. Like I said, it’s the depression ending where it’s just, yeah, I want to be a pile. I want to be a pile of goo.

I don’t want to have to think about anything. And. And also I. I mean, I know Anna wasn’t thinking about this, but he would have. He was. He had a major depression episode before making this. And what he thought to himself going into this is he’s going to make something about not running away. And that’s why Shinji keeps saying, I must run away constantly, all the time. That’s his catchphrase for like the first half of the series, basically. And the next one of the next major depressive episodes he had was after making the third Rebuild movie.

And after that he went. Made Shin Godzilla, which is. He credits with revitalizing him, even though it sounds like he didn’t really get along with. With Toho that well either. But, but a guy with a lot of depression. He has a lot of output though, when. Yeah, Mori, which is a person who is a forest. That’s. That’s the Japanese term for people that just don’t leave their room. I mean, that’s, That’s a deeper depression. Anno’s making, you know, series and because like this series is him exercising those demons. I think like this, this. He would be Shinji if it weren’t for him working on this series and inserting himself into it.

That’s like the only way that he’s not becoming Shinji is by doing this. I think it’s kind of both, like, it’s survivorship bias. Like, everybody likes 80s music because you’ve only heard the 80s music that actually stuck around because I was alive in the 80s. A lot of music sucked in the 80s. You don’t hear it anymore. But I think it’s like there are plenty of people who have major depressive stuff. He just also has the thing where he just has to work on things and is very good at it because I know he like assisted Miyazaki on something like in the last 10 years.

Oh, there were little bits. There was a bit of Evo that actually Ghibli animated. Just as a favor or something, I guess. Or just for funsies. Well, I think it was for money. But what does Shinji do? Shinji doesn’t work on anything. Shinji doesn’t have any hobbies or interests or anything. It didn’t. I feel like I’m not being overly hard on him, I feel like legitimately. And it’s interesting because this is one of the few series slash movies that I do feel is cohesive relatively. And it also is a good example of something that I was willing to watch and enjoyed that doesn’t really have a traditional character arc.

Like. Like the protagonist doesn’t ascent. In my opinion, protagonist does not go through any major transformation. Like, everything that he needs to go through to have a transformation happens to him. Like, all the coolest, horrible, great things happen to him. But even at the end of it, he’s really no different than at the very beginning. I don’t see any sort of character build. And I’m not saying that in that, like, it’s a. Like a loss in the series or anything. Like, it’s not a point being taken away from it. It’s just interesting that here’s a protagonist that went through all the motions and still is the same person at the end.

It’s almost like that also really carries over to the rebuilds, where it really is a lot of people talking to Shinji, and that definitely is a threat. In episode 26, it’s like people talking to Shinji. You don’t really see a whole lot of the other characters interacting with each other, saying, oh, I. You get more of that in the movie, obviously, but I would. Yeah. This whole episode’s a weird inner world. You know, we’re so close to the edge of AI where we can just, like, make our own Neon Genesis Evangelion episodes, maybe in, like, the next four or five years or something.

And I really do feel that, like, a cooler version of Shinji, like the same vibe, the same, like, bland, boring aspect, but with some personality. Doug. You put Doug instead of Shinji. And I feel like this series could be completely rebooted in such an interesting, like, juxtaposed way. Well, Otto said something recent. Well, not recently, the last several years, where at some point he was trying to set the rebuilds up to open up Evangelion. So it could be like the new Gundam, which is. You guys know, Gundam has many, many, many series. But I think he changed his mind on that.

But there’s something announced for the 40th, 30th anniversary of the series, and nobody knows what it is yet, even though I think it might just be like a theatrical play or something. Right. I like the premise and I get the analogy, but it’s like, Gundam is cool because everyone gets a robot suit, but Evangelion, it’s like, yeah, but your robot suits, your mom, you have to, like, go around and, like, ride inside your mom. It has, like, less of the marketing edge. I think, actually that’s. That’s a great marketing edge. Like, if they just led with that, then maybe.

Maybe more successful. Yeah. Well, I did just go into 711 a few nights ago, and they. The EVA, you know, lottery ticket things back. You can get a ticket and maybe you get stickers. The last one is a crucified unit one with, like, lightning and crap behind it. Yay. So where did you guys land on. On the Christianity stuff? Because I do feel like it was just sort of. They’ve all really said that we just used imagery that we thought looked cool. I think that some of it is. Was probably absorbed through osmosis because there is kind of a fire and brimstone act like aspect to the movie.

Stuff where people kind of just explode when they. Or whatever. Gendo gets eaten by the Ava because he’s bad. I’d say, like, if we had to give it, like a rating, I’d give it like a solid four, maybe four and a half on how well they implemented actual occultism and Kabbalah. And I think that they were like. They probably earned three and a half of those points in the last five episodes where they actually show the angels all arranging themselves into the Sephirot. And then like, they. They sort of combine and turn into this one big thing.

And it really did tie the analogy. It almost felt like maybe in the last. In the 11th hour, they went out and hired an actual occultist. And they were like, fix some of this forest. Tie up some of these ends. And they were like, ah. You just go, bing, bong, bong. You do a little Sephiroth angels explode. You show a big egg, and I think you’ll be good. And they were good. But I think, like, for the first 15 or so episodes, every time they would bring up an angel name or they would make some reference to, like, the Kabbalah, Matt and I were kind of like, are they just phoning it in? Because the.

The very first two episodes, I watched like, three or four versions of them, and One of them had the VO for the VO guy. Like, the actual. One of the directors, I think, on the U.S. version of, like, the English direction. And he was also making those claims that. Yeah, they just kind of threw in some of this occult stuff. Figured it would make it more interesting. A lot of this was sort of just tacked on towards the end, but I. I definitely came around closer to, like, midpoint to the end of the show, but again, only earning maybe like a four.

Four and a half at the most. Yeah, it’s. It’s sort of like how Castlevania handles vampires, where it’s really just. It is an anime plot. I mean, it is subversive. Like, it get. It gets subversive points. Like, you definitely don’t think that it’s just going to get sadder and sadder and then the world ends, which is like, not. Not an arc that many things did at that point. I think it’s more common now, but. And. And the fact that it’s like the robots are your mom and everything’s, like, sad and painful. I think there is silver lining here because we’re getting the sad version of the world ending because we have to watch it over Shinji’s shoulder for the most part, because he’s kind of like the vehicle, the protagonist of this.

But I think there’s like a silver lining version of it through Shinji’s dad or even through, like, Seal, because they describe. Maybe I’m just getting sold on the poison here, but it. It seems like they’re describing this, that everyone has to die because we can’t evolve to the next step in our current physical human forms and all the limitations. So you basically kill everyone. You take all their atoms and energy or whatever, and you shove it into this big, like, egg sac vessel, and then that thing gives birth to whatever we’re supposed to be next. So that could be the silver lining, is that the world has to end in order for the new next step in evolution to begin.

But again, maybe that’s just like, Here, kid, you know, take one of these. You’ll love it. Well, Instrumentality isn’t clearly explained at any point. And apparently there were many different drafts of what that would be. And I think the. Without many spoilers, it seems like it sort of changed again in the rebuilds. Yeah, I don’t think you can explain too much. Right. The more you explain of Instrumentality, the more you have. It has holes in it. Did you guys read anything about the. The option? Because Otto did, like, he, like, air had a Script, but, like, episode 26 or the end of.

The end of Evangelion was basically written after everything else. Did you guys read in some of the. About some of the potential ideas? Oh, yeah, I had the wolf. The wolf werewolf one. Yeah. That. I. I found that out yesterday and was very amused by it. Yeah. Yeah. That was spoken of in our last episode, the one before it. So I feel like there was been a sterilized stronghold surrounded by wolf ment board somewhere with ideas and just darts on a wall all over the place. Yeah, it’s like, that’s one of the things. Like, I want to see that, but that would have been horrible.

Like, people would have been making fun of that. That forever. Like, we would be laughing about it now. Yeah. It’s good to go out a little bit more abstract, you know? Well, just. It. It does line up. Like, I don’t think. I don’t think it’s, like, 100 perfect, but. But you’re getting the inner. The inside of somebody turned into goo, and then you get the outside just watching people explode into goo. So it’s like. It does. I mean, it’s not Shinji’s first time. He already turned into goo. What? Around episode 19. They were stuck in the AVA for a month.

Yeah. Yeah. It’s not his first goo experience. Yeah. This one made me reflect a little bit, too the end of this series. And this is a little bit of a stretch, but I feel like there were some times, maybe in, like, my senior year in high school, that I turned in some finals that probably should have, like, not let me graduate. But the teacher was like, I know what you’re capable of, and I can see the potential in what you did. And I’m shocked you even were able to turn this in, let alone. So it’s like, I’m gonna pass you because you deserve to, like, graduate, not because you actually submitted something that, like, earned you a way to get out of here.

And I feel the same way about this series. It’s almost like at the very end, like, this series deserves to end and deserves to graduate. It deserves for me to kind of understand what was going on. But I’m. I’m giving it so much leeway just because, again, I, like, I see the potential and I see the ambition, and I respect that more than if they had pumped, you know, 8 million to urtel. Let’s talk about, like, a Disney release where they pump, like, $120 million and just make, like, a horrific set of CGI dwarves or something, right? Like, I.

I would Prefer to just see animatics and see the ambition behind it. Yeah, it’s. It’s interesting and unique and. And if it doesn’t 100% work, it’s like, you know, we’re human, but part of being a human being is you can see the marker drawings and. And like your brain can bridge the gap where. Whereas if it’s like sloppy CGI flying all over the place and it just explosions and you know the good guy isn’t going to die, then your brain goes to sleep because you’re being fed nothing. You know, it’s. I’ve got. I’ve got two notes left.

One, my cello lessons did work out. I have orchestra practice on Sunday. Also, just one thing, bridging the gap. Kind of like you were just saying all the. All the sound effects during the weird ethereal music is just like all very attuned to all of Japan. Like every Japanese person hears all of those sounds every day. So I did find that that’s one thing where the Japanese audience would be grounded a little bit more during that stuff than the. Than American audiences. What if I’ve watched so much anime that I’m familiar with all the sounds. Oh, you also been in Japan a few times, but that too.

But there is something that just like I’m going to hear all of those sounds on my way to work after I leave my room today, you know, so there is a difference between seeing a lot of anime and it’s just like that’s the world around you all the time. So that grounds the episode, I think, a little bit more. That’s why I think the soundscape and soundtrack to this one so important and making it work. Even though we de. Evolve into pencil sketches. So speaking of the de evolution towards the end there, there’s only one thing that personally I wasn’t a huge fan of and that was the live action footage, photos and stuff.

Like I. If I were to go back and imagine, okay, I’m watching this in the late 90s, there definitely was an aesthetic of let’s show some black and white footage. It’ll be this cool juxtaposition. But watching it now in 2026 and seeing it, I just felt like I rather would have seen more animatic static drawings than any of like the live action stuff. I think that might be a little more of a grounding for the Japanese audience because I am going to see images that look like most of those pictures in the next 12 hours. You know, it was also a style thing.

I think anime would do That a little bit more than American animation would. That said, I did prefer the color live action Matsumoto footage in the movie better, but also the fact that you don’t get any of that until the last two episodes. Like, if they had sprinkled it in here and there throughout the rest of the series, then maybe it would have, I guess, you know, like, folded in a little bit easier. But this way. Like, for example, there was an earlier episode where they. I can’t Matt. You know, like those special terminology. But like, all of a sudden it was like a commercial and you would see like, word bubbles and like crazy, like, glitter effects.

When someone said something like they. They kind of like went all out on this, like, funny, campy effect. And that worked even though they only did it like that one time. But here it’s such a jarring different effect that it took me out of it again. Maybe, like. Maybe Matt’s watching. He’s like, oh, yeah, that grounded me again. I’m watching. I was like. I feel like I just got. I just saw like a cut scene on like a PlayStation 1 game. The. The thing that definitely took me out of it the most was the production IG logo at the beginning of the of end of Evangelion.

It was like some cartoon dinosaur or something. They look terrible because they were like, starting to move to CG at that point in CG in 1997. Yeah, it’s just not good. But yeah, there’s also the interesting. There’s some of that experimental footage and stuff. I’m sure you guys talked about it already in the movie where you get something like all of the drawing, like the entirety of the animation for episode 26 might flash in front of your eyes and like two seconds in the movie, it’s kind of. It is like a stark reminder of that you have to manage your series.

Like, like, you know, I’m. I’m. I blame capitalism for plenty of things, but, like, you do have to like, manage your budget and your team. And they ran out. That was a failure. That studio was also mismanaged. I think it. I’m sure people are hate animating the show by the end. Gainax. Gainax, I believe, went out of business like this year. Happy 30th. But yeah, but I mean, everything Evangelion related was pulled out of G’s control by like 10 or 15 years ago because they. Because they mismanaged everything. So. Yeah. Defunct. December 11, 2025. Oh, okay.

Happy month anniversary of them being gone. I guess we’ll drive this one to A close. Unless someone’s got another big thought they want to throw on this. Those are my last two notes. I just. I just want to say that I agree with Shinji that he can disappear because he’s unworthy of existing. To hear that they bring him back in the rebuild. If I was rebuilding this, Shinji would not be part of it. I get. He’s like the self insert of the creator. He still needs to go. Well, he gets his life into. I mean, what if.

More spoilers, skip ahead again. What if Gendo like gained a bunch of powers and became cartoonishly evil and opened a portal to hell? Would you like it better then? Would you like Shinji better if you had to fight that? I don’t like the rebuilds. I’m just gonna come down on that. Come down on. I do not like them. The. The art style is much more boring, even though it’s much fancier. And you get a bunch of more exploding mechs and tanks and stuff. But it’s like. Well, the. The review I got from Maddie, a friend here in Japan, was.

Yeah, you know how there’s like a three minute battle and in the series now they’re like 30 minutes. I was like, I don’t know if that sounds good. I don’t like them. I’d rather just re watch the original series including episodes 25 and 26. Hey. I mean when I watched them the first time, just like now, it’s like this is a weird swing and they’re just gonna do it and you’re gonna go along with it. And I’m happy to indulge weird self indulgent crap if it’s just interesting. But if. If episodes 25 and 26 were really episodes one and two, would.

If you. Would you have made it to episode 20? Absolutely not. This is. I am the kind of person where like, like a sunk cost fallacy. Like in the end of Neon Genesis Evangelion, like, like basically. You’re familiar with Death Note? Somewhat. Well, Death Note, Season 2 of Death Note had this insane opening with just a bunch of like, like screaming new metal in it. And I saw that. I would see that show up on like Adult Swim and it was like, oh man. And then I watched an episode of it and it’s just like a guy in the library studying for 30 minutes.

So I never watched any of the rest of the series. Apparently it is basically like a crime procedural detective thing. Yeah. Episode four of Evangelion, it’s going to be Shinji waiting. 30 minutes of Shinji waiting for A train, you know, so. Yeah, but. But yeah, this series. And just to point out the Vince Gilligan. What was the Fly episode of Breaking Bad. Right. I feel like that’s another good example of, like, if that was the only episode you ever saw, you’d be like, this is that show that everyone’s going crazy about. Yeah, but that’s why it has to be episode four of season three or whatever it was.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. But, yeah, I’m. I’m glad. This. This is still one of my favorite series. I don’t think I really said that out loud, but the flaws do make it more charming. I. I was. I just randomly. The algorithm now knows to, like, feed me Evangelion stuff, so I, like, see articles and stuff coming up. And there was one that was interesting. They were talking about the episode. I remember exactly which one it was, but it was when Shinji and Asuka are learning to be in sync with each other, and they’re, like, playing games and they tie each other, and there was this, like, long thread of all these people.

Like, this is my top five anime episodes ever across all different. And not just Evangelion, but all animes. And I was thinking, like, that was a badass episode. I don’t know if it was to the point of, like, my favorite anime scene ever, but I don’t know. Now, thinking about it, like, that was a really solid, solid episode. Like, I wish there was more of that. That one did have a character arc. You. You. You see the montage of them learning something. Yeah, he grows, but he kind of loses all of that within, like, the next episode.

But, hey, that’s depression for you, is that basically, no matter what you go through, you’re probably going to have another depressive episode where you won’t pilot the Ava and someone will, like, slap you. And. And then what it is is that he slips into depression when there’s not someone else around him to, like, snap him out of it or, like, stop. You know, shut up. Stop sulking around, get in the freaking Eva and go and kill that damn angel. Like, that. He needs someone to do that. And when people have their own things going on because angels are eating each other out there, then he kind of goes into this ball of like, oh, everyone hates me.

Why is everyone neglecting me? It’s like, bro, look around. Like, the city just exploded. And you’re sitting here like, how come no one’s help helping guide me? Well, it’s like the. The. One of the underlying things of the series is you. You do need people. Even if they. Even if you think they hate you, you really do need them. So you should all become a pile of red goo. And then you. Then you won’t need people anymore because they’ll always be around you, soaking. Soaking you up all the time. And actually, you know, you shouldn’t become a pile of red goo.

I’m. I’m anti Instrumentality when they come. Come down on the anti. Oh, don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. How do you untry it? I guess you can get out of the goo if you’re Shinji. It’s also not a thing, I believe, that you get to vote on. No, also, that. That is like one of the most unrealistic sci fi concepts. Like, even the pluribus thing is much more realistic because there’s like, no dead people involved and they have to eat and stuff and. And they die sometimes. So, like, that. That is much. That’s also, like, it’s not just magical.

Like, this is. This is literally magic magical goo. But I don’t know, maybe the goo does have to eat. Maybe it like, just eats plankton for a thousand years. Well, it eats. It eats angels. Maybe it eats bunny rabbits. Like, it just just like goes around eating trees and stuff. It just. Just eats, like everything that’s not an animal. Not gory enough. Angels. All right, well, yeah, more angels just keep coming in. The red goo just keeps fighting them. Yeah, that could be a series, actually. Very abstract one, especially if we get the nice abstract angels from the later episodes.

Yeah, angels are great. Also, and I also, we haven’t talked about Karu a lot. I don’t think he came up in this episode. 20. He’s not in this episode. He also strikes me as like. Well, aside from the obvious permission to be gay thing, he’s also kind of like the perfect person for an introvert to, like, be with alone. Like, he’s sort of like, I’m going to. I’m going to comfort you no matter what you’re going through. And it’s like you could see the two of them together, and then 10 years forward, they’re. They’re both just inside all the time and they’re living in a filthy apartment.

He. He gives me the worst human trafficker vibes out of any. Oh, no. He seems like such a. Such a red flag. He’s like, me too. I got a special island where we can have a very. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. There are a few people I’ve met who are serial monogamists, but they absolutely Also have to have an open relationship. And I don’t know how to explain this, but Karu kind of has those vibes too. Like, he’d be like, no, I love you. I’ll provide every need for you. I met this guy, I’m gonna bring him home.

Is that okay? Because, you know, if you really love me, I can bring this other guy. I feel like he. He’s just out in public, just doing poppers. Yeah, completely, like inopportune times. Like, why, why right now? We’re. We’re in the movie. I love you. Just do some more poppers. Anyway. Well, so, yeah, it’s just go hug somebody. Don’t merge with them. Okay. That’s your final takeaway? Yep. I guess Mark, I’ll go in the short plug mode, but I guess yours goes with mine. Time Enough podcast podcast. 1999 films and filth. Mark and I blither, blather and jibber jabber quite a bit.

So. And I’ll do another podcast plug too. I do reviews of old conspiracy documentaries from 80s and 90s called under the Docks. So we’re going back to our roots. We were watching so old Michael Sarion. We’re gonna get some David Icke up in there. We’re gonna do some Jordan Maxwell. Might even find some old like William Cooper talks and find out a way to turn like mystery Babylon series into a podcast about one of the OG podcasts. But if any of that sounds interesting or even just normie documentaries, check out the under the Docs podcast. And hey, if you’re subscribed to the Paranoid American podcast, it just shows up in your feed automatically like magic.

All right, all right. I guess it’s time to turn merch into some red goo. I don’t want to do it. I’m just gonna strangle you on the beach. If that’s okay. Just buy something Just buy something from Paranoia American Just buy something Just buy something from Paranoia Merrick. Get some merch, buy some art Click that link add to the car say it back need that print Nod your head, give consent buy a comic three or four Think this thought I want more Buy a sticker from the store Think this thought I want more Just buy something Just buy something from Paranoid American Just buy something Just buy something from Paranoid American Paranoid.

Yeah I scribbled my life away Driven the right to pay Willing enlightenment your brain give you the flight my plane paper the highs ablaze somewhat of an amazing feel when it’s real to real you will engage it your favorite of course the Lord of an arrangement I gave you the proper results to hit the pavement if they get emotional, hate maybe your language a game how they playing it well without Lakers evade them whatever the cost they are to shape shift snakes get decapitated Met is the apex execution of flames you out nuclear bomb distributed at war rather gruesome for eyes to see max them out that I like my trees blow it off in the face you’re despising me for what though calculated and rather cutthroat paranoid American must be all the blood smoke for real Lord give me your day your way vacate they wait around to hate whatever they say man it’s not in the least bit we get heavy roll tape when a beat hit so thank you you well fuck them for real you’re welcome they never had a deal you’re welcome man they lacking appeal you’re welcome yet they doing it still you’re welcome.
[tr:tra].