Rebuild of Evangelion: 2.22 (2009)

Evangelion: 2.22 You Can (Not) Advance (2009)

Dirs. Hideaki Anno / Masayuki / Kazuya Tsurumaki

I said previously that the film is faithful to Dir. Hideaki Anno's original vision 'at least for now'. To expand upon that, it's more than just a retelling, it's a 'rebuild' of the story - like its English language title states. The original series fell in on itself before its ultimate completion, so a redesign isn't necessarily a bad thing, if done correctly.

The foundation upon which the 'rebuild' is constructed is largely the same as before - but as more tiers are added, the resultant structure takes on a wholly different appearance. That change becomes more apparent in 2.22 than it was in 1.11. [1]

It covers episodes 7-19, which is quite a task in such a short amount of time.

It has the obligatory 'giant robot anime' combat scenes, Angels attacking the city, giant Eva, big-ass guns and explosions, etc, but more importantly it attempts to make up for the lack of characterisation in the first film and arguably it succeeds. The series-defining introspective character studies are handled almost as well as they were in the original TV series, but (thankfully) in a much shorter time.

Personally, the mouthy, jealous, ego-centric Asuka still annoys me, but slightly less so, and her affect on Shinji is beneficial to his development. It's interesting also to note how he responds to Rei and she to him, given how he's inclined to pendulum back and forth between a potentially functioning member of the group and a disillusioned and emotionally conflicted mess.

The scene with Gendo and Shinji at a graveside is memorable, and not just for the atypical bonding that occurs. The empty grave functions not merely as a representation of something lost, but as symbolism for togetherness + absence, surface perception + inner shallowness, etc.

There's a surprise or two thrown in to keep old fans on the alert, but it still feels like NGE at heart. On the downside, the prurient 'fan-service' is turned up a notch; it's not excessive and at times even functions as a less serious form of characterisation, so it's not wholly useless.

And the ending… oh my!

[1] There's a post-credits scene that probably ought to be watched. Probably. (See 3.33.)