Neon Genesis Evawhatthehellion!!!

[Fearless Freep]

OK, the first 20 or so episodes were pretty typical but entertaining "Mecha versus the Aliens"

...and then it got weird....really weird  Very engaging and interesting...I'm watching the last episode now...but it's just way off the deep end of what I expected

[BeyondTheGrave]

Yes it does get weird. You should check out the movies "Death and Rebirth" as well as "End Of Evanglion" for even more strangness.

Also It been rumored that the reason for the weirdness of the last episodes was the director Hideko Anno (sp?) had a nervous breakdown after his girlfriend died.

[dean]

The series is exellent, especially for the wierdness.  When I discovered, years after I watched [and loved] the TV series, I found out about the two 'movies' which were also excellent.  I enjoyed this series a hell of a lot.

Also, as usual, there have been rumours around about Neon Genesis being made into a live action movie, though one wonders how that would work.  I'll have to look it up on IMDB later and see what news there could be...

[Just Plain Horse]

Yeah, both "final episodes" are pretty cool, in different ways.

I had a friend who watched the "insrumentality" version with me and said it pretty well summed up his view of all things... I had a somewhat harder time wrapping my brain around it at first, but it grew on me after repeated viewings.

On the other hand, the other version captures the way the Japanese seem to have an uncanny ability to give pure insanity form. Maybe its something in their water...

All in all, an interesting series... despite the fact there was something I didn't like about every character in it, but that shows how good the characterizations are.

[Fearless Freep]

Well, I've got "End of Evangelion" on tap...wasn't sure of "Death & Rebirth" was just a summary...

[dean]

I thought Death and Rebirth was half a summary and then the other half something new?

Anyway, they were both great: since I hadn't watched the series in a long time, the summary really got me into the mood, and made me remember all the stuff I had forgotten, which was great.

[Just Plain Horse]

I can't stand watching the dubbed version they show on Cartoon Network- it totally destroys any shred of an attempt to make the series intelligent and thought-provoking. It's about damn time Americans got over their inability to deal with other cultures and started watching international media outlets in their original languages with subtitles for the uninformed... I'm getting pretty tired of hearing ridiculously high-pitched screams and the like. Better to get the appropriate mood than hear constant whining and bickering.

[Fearless Freep]

I watched the last few episodes with both english subs on and dubs on...very bizarre tring to make a cohesive thought from two different trains of dialog in one conversation

Both have weakness, so I take what I can find

[akiratubo]

Evangelion = s**t.

If it were possible, I'd grab that little bastard Shinji by the throat and shake him until I heard something break.

[Just Plain Horse]

I'm pretty sure everybody who's seen it says that at some point in time... You know a character's flaws have an effect on you when you find yourself screaming at the screen, "Do something!"

[Fearless Freep]

I admit I did want to grab Shinji and say "the whole world is depending on you, you can't quit!!!" after his frst mission and subsequent desire to bail.  I thought Nerv was a little too quick to let him go....and to quick to let him back in

There was a lot more I wish was told about the Angels, the motivations of Sele, the Human Instrumentality Project,  and what Ikari was up to.  I felt like I was watching a short version of a much more involved story and I kept waiting for the pieces to be fit together.  I guess in the end, it didn't really matter, but it was darn frustrating at times.

[Just Plain Horse]

I always got the feeling Gendo Ikari was torn by duty and guilt- duty to save Japan and guilt over what he's doing to his son, and since he runs things at NERV, this was why they let Shinji go when he wanted to get away. Ironically, Shinji's desire to run away- to aviod potentially painful situation- may be a result of his virtually nonexistant relationship with his father. Shinji's instinctive response to conflict is avoidance, which pretty much annoys anybody due to the situations present here. If a giant monster is attacking your whole world, and you are the only one who can stop it, trying to avoid the problem isn't going to make you any friends... assuming they survive. Gendo seems cold at first, but in truth he is very reserved and pragmatic because he knows he's dealing with a delicate situation (his son, his son's piloting the Eva, the future of the whole world depending upon these things). Even if he didn't feel anything for Shinji, forcing him to pilot would be disasterous. In a way, it could be seen as a metaphor for fatherhood...

[Scottie]

Horse wrote:

"I can't stand watching the dubbed version they show on Cartoon Network- it totally destroys any shred of an attempt to make the series intelligent and thought-provoking. It's about damn time Americans got over their inability to deal with other cultures and started watching international media outlets in their original languages with subtitles for the uninformed... I'm getting pretty tired of hearing ridiculously high-pitched screams and the like. Better to get the appropriate mood than hear constant whining and bickering."

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That's one of my biggest pet peeves with English converted anime as well. For some reason, the dialogue translation from Japanese or Chinese or Korean or whatever to English is like playing that operator game. A story is told at one end of a chain of people and passed along person to person until it reaches the other end. But during that time, words are changed little by little and by the end, the story is no longer intact and a large portion of its meaning has been lost. Very few shows are able to retain their poignancy this way, the only one which I can think of right now is Cowboy Bebop. Not only are the words consistent, but the pitch, ferver, and tempo at which they are delievered matches excellently to the original Japanese voice actors. I actually prefer the English version to the Japanese subtitled version simply because the translation is faithful enough to enjoy.

[Just Plain Horse]

Oh, I don't mind making a few dozen or so references... I'll start with the most innocuous- albeit noticable, and move onward.

MXC: Spike TV deserves a small kudos for knowing how to use bad dubbing for proper comedic affect. The name Kenny Blankenship shall forever be burned into my memory...

Ghidrah, the Three-Headed Monster: Belucci Productions (immortalized for their dub of Prince of Space by the fine folks at MST3k) give a real mixed bag here. The guy who dubs the traitor/assasin does a good job, the detective's voice is fair, but the rest aren't too good. The one who does Norioko, the dective's annoying sister, really gets on my nerves. Plus, they get the monster's name wrong...

Scryed: I like the guy who does Ryuho's, and Kazuma's is tolerable, but Cougar's is insufferable! Make him stop! And why do all the female characters try to sound like their in a children's cartoon? The one who's always saying Kaza-kun just makes me want to hit her...

Gamera vs. Gaos: Every single damn character is pretty annoying in the English dub, but susprisingly, the little kid isn't the worst this time... it's the two lackeys that follow the head construction foreman around; what's worse, they threw in a "comedic" sound effect any time Gaos eats people... WTF?

ADV's/ Cartoon network's English dub of Evangelion: Is it wrong to want the Angels to kill ever human being? Well, they sound so unharmonious, one wonders what cruel god would put such harsh noises in these creatures... to make the suffering worse, we are given the Japanese theme song, complete with phonetic subtitles! ARGH!

Gamera vs. Zigra: To listen to the English dub of this movie is the audio equivilant of sadomaschism. The high-pitched voices of the children, the "voice" of Zigra... like a blunt instrument...  Kill me now, please!

Do you disagree? Try just a few of these, and see how you fare.