Understanding Neon Genesis Evangelion

What is Evangelion?

Neon Genesis Evangelion is a Japanese anime series that combines mecha action with deep psychological and philosophical themes.

The Main Character of Evangelion is Shinji Ikari a 14 year old boy who through the story suffers from depression and isolation. Shinji bared witness to the death of his mother (Yui Ikari) at age 4 cauing his father (Gendo Ikari) to become distant and abandoning Shinji while he was still 4 years old. This abandonment plays a huge role in how Shinji acts through the series, with Shinji have a complex to prove his worth to his father and wanting validation and praise, this ultimalety lead shinji to pilot Eva Unit-01. Other issue caued by Abandoenment from his father when he was so young is that Shinji can't take the initiative without orders this also caused complications with Shinji and his main love interest, Asuka.

Main Elements of the Series

• Evas: Giant biomechanical robots piloted by teenagers.
• Angels: Mysterious beings that attack humanity.
• NERV: The organization responsible for defending Earth.

The creator of Evangelion, Hideaki Anno, included many psychological themes based on his own struggles with depression.

The Main character (Shinji Ikari) of Evangelion was orginally was supposed to be a girl, the reason for the change was because the character designer, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto couldn't imagine why a young girl would want to pilot a robot and he also felt a resistance of making the main character a female after he already created female leads for Gunbuster and Nadia.

Shinji Ikari is accutally meant to be a genderbent version of Nadia Arwall from Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water.

Evangelion Quiz

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