#Neon genesis evangelion episode 4 how to
#Neon genesis evangelion episode 4 movie
#Neon genesis evangelion episode 4 series

It's very visually-driven.Д«ob: This is a great example of how to do minimalist animation and make it work. Me: What's interesting is that this is one of the least written episodes period. They're setting up the paired episode format right away, and that'll follow right up to the end, and arguably through the movies, too. There's only a couple of episodes that really function totally independently. The first two tell a connected story with Unit 1's first Angel sortie, these two tell the story of Shinji connecting with others, his classmates. I think so far, and throughout the series, episodes function in pairs. It's so watercolor heavy in the locations. But our quiet moments with him, wandering the landscapes on the outskirts of Tokyo-3, emphasize the fear and tense anxiety which hold him in their grip - and will make us feel even more deeply the dramatic stakes to come in the ever-more-nerve-wracking episodes ahead.Д«ob: First thing I'll say right off the bat- it's a great episode to understand the differences between cel and background/plate animation. And Misato is there to greet him (this episode clinches their odd familial bond). Of course, when the train passes by, Shinji is still there. Somehow this sequence plays as if Shinji really has given up, accepted that he's not up to the job asked of him I'm not sure why but, even knowing what's to come, we can't help feel with a melancholy twinge that the gig is up. Deciding that he isn't equipped to be the 21st century's Messiah, even as we know he must change his mind (how could the show continue otherwise?), there's an effective finality to the scenes in which he heads for the train station and waits for his ticket out of Dodge.

Not only does it eschew Angels for the first time, but it sends Shinji packing he quits NERV at Misato's bitter and half-ironic request. One of the striking things about this episode is how willing it is to go off-course.

#Neon genesis evangelion episode 4 series

There's something stirring about the subjectivity with which the series suddenly evokes Shinji's surroundings - broad but gorgeous strokes represent the landscapes through which he ambles, until he comes across good old, dreamy but down-to-earth Kensuke, playing war out in the fields. This is a very painterly episode, filled not just with compositions which border on abstraction and impressionism, but outright quotations from famous artworks, from Van Gogh's sunflowers to Friedrich's wanderer above the clouds. No one pays any attention to the hysterical disaster film, focusing instead of catching some sleep, making out with a date or - in Shinji's case - morosely reflecting on his misery and occasionally looking up to bewilderingly absorb his surroundings.

Again we have effective examples of the discrepancy between the apocalyptic stakes of this future society and the mundane everyday incidents which occur within it.

#Neon genesis evangelion episode 4 movie

Later he will pause in a movie theater, watching a movie which - from the sound of it - involves the Second Impact. We find him sitting morosely on the subway, with a series of innovative dissolves establishing both the time that passes as he rattles along on the underground railway, and his total isolation from his surroundings - as schoolgirls gossip, old men snore, and workers pile into the car with weary relief, Shinji remains totally removed and unmoving, playing and endlessly restarting the audio on his headphones, drowning out the universe around him. When the episode begins, the boy pilot has simply disappeared from the apartment he shares with the suddenly quite concerned Misato (sometimes she's a party girl Shinji must clean up after at others she is a kind of mother figure for him - this episode is one of the latter cases). This time we're allowed to pause, to soak in the environment, along with Shinji who has run from his duty. The tone is meditative rather than immersive: even while the last two episodes withdrew from the mile-a-minute pace of the premiere, they still piled on information, character development, and story advancement. Unsurprisingly (this is often the case with exceptional examples) the episode is a bit of anВ aberration There's no Angel attack, unlike the last three. In both style and thematic depth, this is one of the finest episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow blogger Bob Clark. This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television showВ Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995