Forum - View topicREVIEW: Neon Genesis Evangelion [Omnibus] GN 3
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_V_
 Posts: 619 |
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The weird thing to me is how Sadamoto's manga took almost twenty years to complete, yet drastically cut out many portions of the TV series. Granted, what got cut out was mostly the "Action Arc" which had a lot of filler in it.
But everything between the end of the Cube Angel fight and the fight against Eva-03....is extremely rushed. This is all the worse because major character Asuka doesn't even appear until after the Cube Angel fight (a major complaint for years is Asuka's relative lack of pagetime in the manga). Wouldn't it have been strange if....the Eva Manga actually had more side-stories than the TV series? Well pragmatically that would have taken longer to finish. The artwork is amazing though, actually looks like the series, seeing as Sadamoto was the character designer. And yet, fundamentally, I never really got what to make of the choices he made; particularly regarding Kaworu but also Rei, Asuka, and even Shinji: the mentality and motivations of the characters are very slightly different; not drastically, but you get the feeling that this is *Sadamoto's* interpretation of these characters, when fundamentally...the characters were the result of a gestalt creative process in which multiple people contributed multiple ideas. Basically I don't know if Hideaki Anno or Tsurumaki would agree with all of his choices. Frankly, I'd be less annoyed if Shinji and Kaworu had a flat-out sex scene - many anime series have bishounen relationships. But what's so weird is how they honestly didn't seem to present it that way, I mean it's "love" but in a platonic sense, the way E.T. the Extra-terrestrial loved Elliott. But the ambiguity is more annoying than if they'd gone with one or the other. |
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sainta
 Posts: 989 |
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I think I've said it before but I find the manga version of the characters more likable than their TV counterparts. Shinji is funnier and more teasing while Asuka doesn't complain several times. Maybe it's less realisitic but the sad parts from the TV series such as Shinji's depression still happen. Also, this manga deserves an award for making me understand an Evangelion ending.
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_V_
Posts: 619 |
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Well yeah, but that was the whole point: they weren't stereotypically likable characters.
Arguably, if you make Shinji a well-adjusted fun to be with party animal ladies man who exudes confidence....he isn't really "Shinji" anymore other than the name. The one twist I think alternate versions can do is showing...alternate points of view, to show nuances to characters that we did not at first realize; not changing their actions, but examining them differently. Case in point, they ran out of funding near the end so they added in all the extra scenes for the director's cut episodes, right? There's this one brief insert in a flashback showing that Asuka, after failing to convince Shinji to kiss her back (he's just catatonic) and rushing into her room....cries out of loneliness that he doesn't reciprocate her attraction. This provides more insight into why Asuka behaves as she does without really changing her actions: she struggles with abandonment issues so she's an attention-monger screaming "look at me"....because she genuinely has nothing in the way of social skills. Thus the extra scenes demonstrate that she really wasn't taunting Shinji...that was just her ridiculously bad attempt at human interaction. |
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R. Kasahara
 Posts: 703 |
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I've considered double-dipping for these omnibus volumes; they look really good. Either way, can't wait for the "regular" Vol. 14
I agree with pretty much everything you've said, though I think that in some ways, the characters are more realistic/believable-- particularly Shinji, who seems more like a regular kid at his core in the manga (he even has fun once in awhile!). As a protagonist, I find Manga Shinji to be much easier to identify with and relate to. |
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jr240483
 Posts: 4446 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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Well i hope the manga doesnt have the same ending as the end evangelion movie otherwise i would be seriously pissed.
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Haser
Posts: 4 |
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No, that isn't really true. You are mixing up scenes. Asuka provokes Shinji into kissing and he accepts (he's not in any way catatonic, it's called being embarassed and not quite knowing where to put your hands. I'm pretty sure we've all been there...). Then, we are shown Asuka going to the bathroom and making an annoyed expression/pretending to puke (she isn't crying, nor does she go in her room/the kiss isn't important enough to her to make her cry...). The room scene is referred to ep. 9 (wall of Jericho), even then she wasn't crying. What Asuka complains about (in the mindrape) is the fact that Shinji doesn't hold her (not that he doesn't kiss her or that he isn't attracted to her). The idea is to convey Asuka's insecurity and need to receive confirmation and appreciation from other people. To the point where, even when she's kissing Shinji in a non-romantic way (remember that in the anime she's shown to be mainly in love with Kaji) she still feels uneasy when he doesn't hold her. She subconsciously perceives the lack of a hug as a lack of confirmation /rejection, which causes her to feel uncomfortable with herself (similarly to how she gets angry when Rei ignores her), even if she's consciously aware of the fact that Shinji didn't mean to offend her. Also bear in mind that Asuka knows that Shinji tried to kiss her when she was sleeping in ep. 9 (Shinji ends up telling her about it...) and that in the episode of the kiss (ep. 15) Asuka goes out on a date with a university student, then kisses Shinji and then flirts with Kaji, all in the same day. The kiss is Asuka's attempt to prove to herself that she's mature enough for that kind of stuff (it's not a case that it happens after a failed date) and Shinji simply fails to make her feel comfortable about it. That's the point of the scene. It is nowhere near as big of a deal as you seem to remember and it is not a matter of attraction... As for the manga itself, i have to say that i didn't like it as much as the anime... From my perspective the changes made to the characters are huge and it suffers from being too Shinji-centric (like the rebuild). The characters are indeed more likeable but likeability is not what made those characters interesting in the first place... Agree on the quality of the art though. |
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jr240483
Posts: 4446 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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yesh.
when it comes to unstable female characters asuka is probably the queen. which is why in the series she and shinji are the least liked characters in the series , and Rei and Kawrou are. |
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