Let me just start by apologizing for the delay of this post. I guess the only privilege of covering a retrospective show is you can cover it any time you want. I kid, I kid. The truth is I just binge-watched many series so I don’t have time to do this review. While I’m enjoy writing reviews, it’s no secret that it has eaten most of my free time and sometimes I miss a good old time when I still have time to watch everything and not to worry about review. Anyways, my ranting ends now and I hope I will review this piece more frequently. Now, moving on.
This episode shows us another facet of being a hero. It’s not all shine and glory, and Shinji proves to be as atypical a hero as you could imagine. Told through the point of view of new Shinji’s new classmates Toji and Kensuke, Shinji at first appears as a thorn to their eyes. His sudden spotlight for being the one who save the city strikes a wrong note to those guys, and to make it worse Toji’s sister was injured from that fight, something which he blames for the fault of the hero. To add salt to the wound, Shinji himself confesses that he did not choose to protect the city. Seriously if I were Toji, I would not stop with just one punch. Shinji’s submissive seriously gets on my nerve! But when the Angel attacks again, Toji and Kensuke has a real chance to witness what it really means to be a hero and save the world. It’s all messy. Eiji got suffered, both physically and mentally. It’s a life and death matter where you could end up death with just one wrong move. Shinji pushes himself to the limit that it borders on insanity. Kudos Gainax for creating a battle that gripping, on-the-edge and terrified, instead of going over the top like most mecha action sequences tend to do.
The original Japanese title really nails another theme of this episode. “The Phone that Never Rings” best described about Shinji’s character. The more I think about it the more I see him not really fitted for this type of job. He’s a loner, he’s submissive (look at the way he talks to himself “aim in the middle”) and worse he sees no point for himself to fight. Even in his normal school life, he has no friend. As I mentioned above the battle was gripping because we witness Shinji nearly breaks down, but the worst thing of them all is the whole mess is still working. As we learn in consequential theory, if one still produce a desired result then nothing is needed to worry about, right? In this case not in a long shot. If Shinji keeps pushing himself like that, eventually he’ll break. Everyone breaks, it’s biology; as they say in the (in)famous torture scene in Zero Dark Thirty. Seriously I think saving the world is too much a burden for our Shinji. Not that I blame him really since it’s already a very obscure idea to rely on 14-year-old kids to fight the alien. Well, we still have plenty to go but as far as 3 episodes, EVA has already established its strong grasp on the ruined and shattered theme. This time I will try to get the next episode review quicker so stay tune. Until then!
