Neon Genesis Evangelion pokes fun at one of anime’s biggest tropes

The first half of “Three Times” takes place in a quiet village, where Shinji, Asuka, and Rei take a break from the action. Their old friends Toji, Kensuke, and Hikari have grown up into adults and built a peaceful, normal, domestic life, and the pilots were cursed not to. Shinji breaks the curse and gives his friends the opportunity to live that life.

In Shinji and Rei’s final scene together, she is holding a doll representing a baby. Motherhood has been a major theme of Rey’s character going back to the original Evangelion, and it’s clearly a dream she was never able to achieve, especially with the newly introduced curse.

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Shinji and Asuka’s farewell takes place on a surreal beach with red-colored water, a scene familiar to “Evangelion” fans.

“The End of Evangelion” ends with Shinji and Asuka lying together on the same beach; They seem to be the only ones who chose the painful uncertainty of reality over the bliss of non-existence. Shinji choked Asuka as she caressed his cheek. Shinji stopped and began to cry, while Asuka looked at him in disgust and whispered, “How disgusting.” This scene is a microcosm of the relationship the two share and the world they live in, where people can continue to hurt others over and over again even if all they care about is each other (which is one way… “Evangelion” is like “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”). Shinji and Asuka have always I was on this beach – but no more. They admit that they once loved each other, but they have grown apart and it is time to move on. To show this time is different? Asuka is finally an adult; Her old Eva suit was half torn up and her braids were discarded on the floor, as they were no longer of any use.

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Shinji’s final act is to give the world a new beginning. He and everyone else can only be happy in a world without evangelicals (god, I wonder what Anu is saying there), so this is the “Neon Genesis” he created. In the final scene, the adult Shinji meets Mari at the train station and they escape into a new world, the real world, a world full of possibilities. Eva’s curse and the cycle of stagnation it represented has been broken.

In “The End of Evangelion”, Misato tells a catatonic Shinji that in order to live, he cannot be afraid to make mistakes. She keeps making the same things over and over again, learning a little more each time, which is inevitable when you choose to accept the risks that life brings. At the end of the movie, Shinji accepts this as well; His happiness is not guaranteed, but he better give himself the chance to find it.

The message of Evangelion has never changed (accept yourself, because you are all you are forever, and go find your happiness), it has simply evolved. Anno finished “Evangelion” the first time around by leaving his characters in a state of uncertainty, and returns to them to end their journey. By allowing his characters to grow and move forward, he hopes his fans will too. If Shinji and Asuka learn that there is way more to this life than in Evangelion, why shouldn’t we?