Shinseiki Evangelion continues to amaze me -- there are some utterly incredibly brutal scenes that will either enthral or disgust the viewer. Add to it some effective direction, and you'll suddenly forget that you're watching an animated feature. Anno again borrows heavily from his past projects, and once again, it's highly effective. Many will probably end up saying, 'here we go again' -- but the build up is well executed. There are two scenes that completely captured my attention -- Ayanami Rei's desparate gambit to stop the Angel was obviously unauthorised by Gendo, and the final transformation of EVA-01 into its true form: a primal beast, born unto its new world. I found the manner in which Anno chose to portray this creature -- obviously modelled after primates, and possibly some influence from '2001: A Space Oddessy,' -- highly effective, with the glowing eyes shilouetted against the twilight skies sending shivers down my spine.

Where the visual direction is nothing short of spell-binding; the series is beginning to confuse me further. The stories seem to be dragging on, as if there's a contractual length to be met, and there's not enough material to fill it. The acting was again pushed to its limits, and unfortunately, Ogata Megumi isn't quite up to the task. But then, the material she's given is pretty difficult, considering that most of her lines in the second half consisted of one word. (We also picked up the English dub by miskate -- but perhaps that was a good thing, since I hadn't looked at the English version since volume 1. Well, perhaps I should have left 'sleeping dogs lie,' so to speak. The English dub voices are all from the 'Eddie Murphy School of Shouting.' While they try to impart some sense of nervous tension, none of the voice actors have the necessary skills to pull it off.) Still, the direction of this one episode alone makes following this series worthwhile.
- AN, 98.02.15