There were a lot of directions Neon Genesis Evangelion could have gone this week. But I have to say, this one was one of the more unexpected ones. As this week we meet the Fourth Child, get another EVA unit and have Gendo destroy any chance of reconciling with Shinji. Sounds like a good time right? Let’s dive in!
Starting off, I want to give credit where credit is due. Evangelion had some fantastic English dub across these episodes. So much so I actually had to stop at the start of 18 to check that I wasn’t watching an English dub. They got legitimately full english speakers to deliver those lines, and I love that. I love the willingness to go the extra mile for just a few lines, when most anime would give us Engrish. And that isn’t to knock against Engrish much, it’s not their native language and they do what they can. Limitations of a localized production, I get that. It’s just when I do see the extra mile attempted, it’s something I think is worth pointing out. Evangelion could easily have just had Japanese there, and I wouldn’t have notice. Instead I got this, and it makes me happy. Now, onto the meat!
First up, episode 17, The Fourth Child. This one saw a lot of of Evangelion’s sub-plots come into play, lots of intrigue over giant robot fights. We see it right from the get go, during Misato’s “trial”, nice to see her defending Shinji by the way. I love their growing relationship as a sort of mother surrogate. Anyways, we hear Gendo bring up the Dead Sea Scrolls once again, and how the 2nd Facility was an “Unintended accident”. Implying that there are “intended” accidents. Accidents such as, perhaps… when all the power went out earlier on in the series? When an enemy agent supposedly snuck into the facility and turned it all off, but was never caught, long before Kaji arrived? It’s almost like someone is trying to force these moments for NERV to prove themselves, and thus gain higher standing…
Meanwhile Evangelion also talks about the Angels a bit, with some people speculating one tried to talk to Shinji. That they are, possibly, trying to communicate. What could possibly have given them that indication after all the attacks, I wonder. At the same time, we see Gendo continue his development of the Dummy Plug, using what is most likely just a Rei clone in a box. With how loyal she is to him, and with the EVA units being cloned Angels, its like Gendo is trying to make an army of remote controlled Angels. The only question I have with that though is how does it fit into his probably goal of reviving his wife? Maybe trying to replicate a mind perfectly? I’m not sure, and I suspect we will learn more later. That or I am wildly off base with my continued speculation.
On the other end, Evangelion gave us something I wasn’t expecting, a Fourth Child. I thought after Asuna we would be done, but no, our boy Toji re-enters the narrative! I’ll talk more about his specific struggles when we get to episode 18, but I thought this was a pleasant surprise. There are two things specifically that are interesting about it though. The first are the EVA units supposedly being made by America, units 03 and 04, one of which blew up in Nevada. Something about an S2 engine, and how it failed, taking the EVA unit and the base with it. Does this mean that other people are trying to clone Angels somewhere else in the world, or are they still under Gendo’s thumb? Did it fail because it wasn’t cloned from Adam like Units 00-02? It opens up a lot of questions.
The 2nd interesting thing Evangelion gave us this week though is, why are all these kids in Japan? By their titles, its implied that these are all of the kids available in the world. Yet one was conveniently found/placed in the same school as the other 3, before being discovered? By a report from a shell company of NERV? It makes me start to doubt whether or not there is anything special about them at all, or if they are just troubled children. Kids with issues that make them easier to control than most, who won’t question what they have to do. Whatever the case, it’s clearly suspicious what happened with Toji and how NERV recruited him. Especially when, technically, there doesn’t seem to be anything stopping Gendo from making multiple Rei’s to pilot EVA’s for him. With 8 episodes left though, I trust Evangelion to answer it.
Next we get to episode 18, The Choice of Life, and before the big stuff, let’s talk small details. There were a number of tiny, insignificant things here that I enjoyed, that added to the overall story. Such as Kensuke, our the other friend, asking to be made an EVA pilot, without knowing about Toji. Showing some people do want the job. Or how the class president, Hikari, has a crush on him and talks it through with Asuka. Bringing our Tsundere into the mix in a caring manner while upping the ante for Toji, if unknowingly. We even get a small bit with Rei and Toji, talking about Shinji and whether or not they should tell him, how they both care for him, etc. The episode would have worked if any and all of these were taken away, but they did a good job of building to the ending.
On Toji, I thought Evangelion did a good job here to with his inner conflict. We were initially introduced to him after all when he assaulted Shinji for how Shinji’s EVA fight injured his sister. Yet here he is, being offered the same role as Shinji, a role he hates, yet it can save the world. Not only that, but in exchange for joining, he managed to get his sister transferred to a better, NERV run hospital. I liked how he struggled with this decision across the two episodes, barely eating or playing Basketball alone. Trying to figure it out in his head, regretting his actions with Shinji and having no idea how to tell him. Ultimately deciding not to because he just didn’t have the time. It was quick, and wouldn’t have worked without his earlier introduction. But I think it did Toji justice.
Which of course is what makes the resulting explosion and finale of the episode work so well. I gotta say, I should have seen it coming, the death flags were everywhere, but I didn’t. And Shinji was just starting to get to a good place in his head to. Refusing to kill, Gendo taking over and shoving the dummy plug in there. Worst of all though, Evangelion had Shinji watch, his monitors still on, as his unit ripped Toji’s to shreds. It was incredibly brutal and I loved it. Because this wasn’t an enemy Shinji could defeat, no matter how strong, without losing something of himself. And even when he wasn’t the one to fight it, he lost. The sucker punch being he didn’t learn Toji was inside until the very end. Had Evangelion not built Shinji up so well to this point, I wouldn’t care. Yet here I am.
The only question left then is, why? Why did it explode, was it the S2 engine again? Or was Toji rejected? Maybe this clone had more Angel DNA in it or something, and so it took over? Because by its actions and Gendo’s designation, that was without a doubt an Angel, and it moved like no EVA unit. Organically twisting and moving its limbs like a beast, lashing out at anything that got in its way. Not even restrained by its lack of connecting power it seemed, making it clearer to me the armor might not be meant to move the Angel. But rather that it exists to restrain it in some way. Regardless, it was a surprisingly powerful moment. I’m not sure how much I like Toji being built up just to suffer immediately. But I am leaning towards Evangelion having done it well, with all the build up.
So all in all, how were these two episodes of Evangelion? Once again, pretty good. People keep telling me to expect the “weird” stuff as I get farther and farther in. Yet all I am finding is the “darker” stuff, the Christian imagery and such. Yes, we have the occasional weird like Shinji’s episode inside the Angel. But ultimately all of these things have worked well together for Evangelion. All playing into its core themes of Choice, Freedom, Responsibility, etc, without losing its engaging narrative. Now sure, I am a sucker for dark stories, I love tragedies. And Evangelion has become more and more tragic as it goes along, so it’s right up my alley. But assuming it doesn’t end up getting ridiculously pretentious and start relying solely on its metaphysical bullshit, I think it will have struck a good balance. With 8 left, it’s time to wait and see.
Eva’s doing fairly strongly at this point in most respects; the plot is fairly interesting and making Touji an Eva pilot was a great choice for the storyline. As was the way things went in episode 18, with one exception (see below). Eva vs. Eva and putting Shinji in that position were great decisions. Sounds like you watched the dub, but I highly recommend you also try out at least the second half of episode 18 in the original Japanese. Shinji’s seiyuu pulls off one of the all time great anime screams to end that episode.
What is frustrating is how much the show seems to bend backwards to avoid Shinji realizing that Touji is the pilot, all for that big reveal at the end. It makes Shinji look like such a clueless idiot. Plus why Misato seems so concerned about telling him, how Asuka conveniently gets taken out seconds before she’s going to tell him, etc…
Oh no, I am watching the directors cut Subs. It was a fantastic scream, but covering 2 episodes I have to try and keep to main points or else I could easily bloat these out to 2-3k word long posts. Some might like that. I doubt most would finish, haha.
As for Toji, yeah I see where you are coming from. I think it built it up well enough, and I understand what it was going for, and I think it would have worked a lot better if Toji died. I assume he hasnt because they pulled his body out of the tube, but if he had it would be like Evangelion going all in on it. As is its kinda like… trying to have the cake and eat it to.