Josh

Hands down the most disappointing series I’ve ever watched. After so much hype I can’t help but feel that this series was a waste of 9 hours of my life for multiple reasons. Shinji and Asuka are by far the most annoying characters ever. Asuka makes sense as almost all teens have attitude and constantly in need of some way to reaffirm their self worth but her constant nagging and berating of Shinji gets old extremely fast. Moving on to Shinji, somehow a child that grew up with no parents is the whiniest and most spineless person ever with no capacity of thinking for himself which seems the exact opposite of how someone who spent most of their life on their own would be. Additionally, there’s no way to keep track of how much time passes throughout the series whether it all took place within weeks, months, or longer. Following that up there are so many important characters and major world power shaping organizations that the series barely even glosses over. None of the characters or organizations have an adequate backstory or explanation (with the exception of shinji and asuka). The first half of the series is just Shinji whining and seemingly pointless battles with no apparent purpose, motive, or agenda. We’re not even told why children must be burdened with defending the world from monsters with world-destroying power, I guess viewers are just expected to not ask any questions or seek any kind of explanation for anything. The one thing that this anime does get right is the human need for compassionate relationships, the fear of rejection and loneliness, and basic concepts such as multiple realities and relative truths. All in all some good messages and themes but the world of evangelion is so inadequately explained and the character development is nearly nonexistent.