Just saw the second part of Rebuild of Evangelion in the cinema yesterday.

If you ever had any negative impressions concerning how gloomy and pessimistic (as well as mindf*ckingly confusing) the original TV series was, you can throw that all away now.

For Anno Hideaki has kept true to his word and delivered a totally different and satisfying "reimagining" of the Evangelion story.

For starters, Shinji is actually less wimpy and more GAR. He seemed more in control of things than his pathetic TV counterpart ever could.

Rei is now showing more humanity and is assertive than before (arguably even more than Nagato Yuki, bar Yuki in Disappearance of course   ).

And Asuka (now Shikinami Asuka Langley) is less angsty, making her less annoying and more likable.

And the new girl, Makinami Mari Illustrious, she's pretty much won over me now. (Being voiced by Sakamoto Maaya helped) Though her screentime was shorter than thought. Hopefully it'll increase next episode.

Pardon me on my random mumblings below as I try to recall what I just saw. Needless to say, IT'S FULL OF F*CKING SPOILERS.

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I now declare myself a "Born Again Evangelion-ist".

Needless to say, some basic knowledge of Evangelion is still needed before watching this, at the very least, watch Rebuild 1.0. Or else you'll most certainly end up like a blind nun in a fish market. (Whatever that meant, but I know this blogger that liked using these ridiculously nonsensical metaphors   )

For you guys in North America and Europe, when the DVD comes out, GET IT. 8)

Fan rejoice! A live action remake of of the popular series is currently in the works and will be released as early as end September.

Produced by Total Media Agency, the movie will a re-telling of the story which focuses on the events after the Third Impact, where Shinji inexplicably finds himself back in the past before all things went awry. Shinji is bestowed with the opportunity of a lifetime where he is able to rewrite history, possibly leading the world to a better future, or to its inevitable doom. Starring acclaimed Japanese actor Narusawa Kenichi who takes on the role of Shinji Ikari, Ever RE-TAKE will hit the box offices come September 26.

Full trailer at the studio's website. Source via Canned Dogs. YHBT.

Mastermind of the Otaku Instrumentality Project.

Oh wow, sure is slowpoke.jpg around here, but I guess it's better than nothing at all. After what seems like ages after the first Evangelion movie was first aired in Area 11, this third world country of mine finally decided to bring it over. The fans were pleased. I was slightly amused, since this would be an actual opportunity for me to fall in love with the series. Did it work?

Naturally like any excited otaku, the whole bunch of us were at the vicinity much earlier than we should have been. As such, the best way to kill time was to hang out at an eatery talking about weaboo shit.

Setsuna's TDD-1 jacket. Every Full Metal Panic fan present wanted to pry it off him.

At the cinema itself, where we were to collect the tickets from some makeshift booth. Incidentally, the anime forums I hang out at made it a joint event with some otaku club in which Kurogane was part of.

Stalker-tan watching everyone sign their names on the To Stalk list.

The tickets. I was sandwiched in between wolf-x and Setsuna for the duration of the movie, hoping those EVA fags would actually shed some light on the story along the way.

Venerated member of the Anime Shrine forums and organizer of the event, linkinstreet. He's kinda like the Gendou of the group, hence the following impersonation:

Definitely lacking something, which is why I improved it in the OP image.

Group shot photo nicked from Aoshi. These people had way better cameras but they couldn't at least include something of higher res ¯\(º_o)/¯

So yeah, what about the movie itself? I can't really compare this against the original considering the fact I've never watched past the first episode, though it was fun rewatching the scenes that I was familiar with. They had to obviously jam in several episodes into the movie which was just about an hour and a half long, so EVA newfags like myself had a hard time keeping time, though fortunately I've heard bits and pieces of the overall plot, so I wasn't entirely confused. Apparently the predominantly wussy Shinji is more likeable here compared to the original series, not that I could tell, since he was pretty annoying here too, initially. Not sure if the EVA oldfags in the cinema were happy, but I guess they were generally satisfied with the entire thing, though you could hear them sounding off their fanboy rage during the censorship of certain key scenes, namely Rei's nipple shots. Lawl Eva oldfags. In the end, it was quite an experience watching the much talked about Evangelion in its remade and bigger budgeted glory, especially when the entire cinema was full of like-minded weaboos. Then again, I remain steadfast and don't see myself converting to an EVA fan anytime soon, but who knows, with the proper indoctrination, that might well change, though I highly doubt it. Next week: Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo!

Click here to view the embedded video.

The 'full' version of Beautiful World, though I'm not sure if it's official or anything. Some clips are recycled as much as 3 times, making it look pretty fanmade. -_- But even if the video gets a tad repititive, the song doesn't, it's currently stuck in my head (argh) and makes for pretty good study music.

I'm not an obsessed fan of Eva, but some how I just can't wait for subs or DVD. The animation looks pretty good and polished up, that's already a major plus factor. Topped up with what Eva is famous for...mind-bending concepts and intriguing psychology, not to mention controversy--it's going to be a great ride down momery lane for the long-time hardcore fans. Maybe I'm slow, but I had to read the Wiki entry on Instrumentality trice before I got the gist of it.

.......(three times??)...

Ok maybe I am slow. -_- midniteblu out.

Image source: Wikipedia.

I just have to write about this coming soon movie (not the live action) right after reading about it at Memento and watching the trailer at Youtube despite the packed schedule. :P Yes, I know I am very out-dated but seriously, I haven't been updating myself much with these news and info.

The first movie of the Rebuild of Evangelion tetralogy releasing on 1st of September 2007 in Japan is EVANGELION:1.0 YOU ARE (NOT) ALONE. Upon watching the trailer here, I actually didn't see much difference from the series. Of course the graphic is more advanced with the usage of 3D and the artwork looked more refined.

Most of the scenes looked exactly the same as the series to me and I seriously couldn't tell if there's any difference because the last time I watched the series was like about 9 to 10 years back? Then, I read somewhere that the first movie comprises of the first few episodes of the series. Only then I realized that Kaworu was in the trailer. If the first episode is somewhat the introduction of the series, Kaworu was brought in very early here. Which means, the plot could be different from the original.

Besides that, I guess the design of the EVAs and Angels would be slightly different. I am not too sure about the EVAs but on Wikipedia, a picture of EVA01 from the trailer was put up and described as the new look. As for the Angels, according to Memento here (scroll down to the comments), the design of the 4th Angel, Shamshel is different.

I don't see any sign of Asuka therefore I am expecting her to appear only in the second movie which (according to Wikipedia) will be released next year.

The cast consists of the original seiyuus that voiced the characters in the original series.

The theme song is Beautiful World by Utada Hikaru and the remix of Fly Me to the Moon. I didn't really like it when I initially heard the new remix when it was first released. However, I had gotten used to it by now and kinda like the jazzy tune but... I still prefer the original version by Hayashibara Megumi! ^^;;

I wanted to include the trailer here but the coding for the embeded object doesn't seems to work. Anyway, go watch the first trailer on Youtube and the third on Memento.

- gaiden