some interesting naming conventions in evangelion:
- asuka calls rei ‘yuutousei’, not ‘wondergirl’, which can be loosely translated as ‘honor student’
- shinji refers to asuka as simply ‘asuka’, but calls rei ‘ayanami’. likewise, rei refers to shinji as ‘ikari-kun’, adding the proper honorific at the end
- asuka calls misato ‘misato’ without honorifics. a child referring to an adult without honorifics is considered extremely impolite in japan - for point of comparison, shinji first calls misato ‘katsuragi-san’ and later eases into ‘misato-san’. before you say it’s because she’s german, asuka is steadfast in calling kaji ‘kaji-san’ (she even refers to him as ‘kaji-senpai’ on one occasion)
- misato usually calls shinji ‘shinji-kun’, but sometimes she’ll jokingly refer to him as ‘shin-chan’ - a petname typically reserved for toddlers. imagine toji getting called ‘to-chan’ and you’ll get an idea of how cheeky this is on misato’s part
- on a similar note, the petnames ritsuko and kaji reserve for each other are especially hilarious. ritsuko refers to kaji as ‘ryo-chan’ and kaji refers to ritsuko as ‘rit-chan’ (consequently, ritsuko is the only character in nge who calls kaji by his first name, which is ryoji). ‘rit-chan’ and ‘ryo-chan’ are weirdly infantilizing/overly-affectionate; they only do this within the earshot of misato with the obvious purpose of annoying the shit out of her
- gendo still refers to fuyutsuki as ‘fuyutsuki-sensei’ (’professor fuyutsuki’); everyone else calls him ‘vice commander fuyutsuki’. old habits die hard
- misato and kaji refer to each other on an entirely last-name basis; misato calls kaji ‘kaji-kun’ and kaji calls misato ‘katsuragi’
- there are many different ways to refer to your father in japanese, but shinji refers to gendo as ‘otousan’. typically, children will use ‘otousan’ when speaking to their father and ‘chi-chi’ when speaking of their father, but shinji makes no such distinction, which says something about the emotional distance there. (interestingly, misato flip-flops between ‘otousan’ and ‘chi-chi’ when speaking of her own father. when does she use otousan? when she’s talking to kaji about her father)
- rei never once calls asuka by her name. the name ‘asuka’ never leaves rei’s mouth once. rei refers to asuka as ‘the pilot of unit-02‘ or simply ‘anta’ (‘you’) when speaking directly to her
sneakysneakysnakes:
it just hit me that the first time we see shinji, he’s trying to call misato but there’s no signal - aka trying to communicate with her and failing - and that’s pretty meaningful and if the writers were so genius that they did it on purpose i’ll be forever impressed
shinji calls two people in the show: misato (episode 1) and gendo (episode 11) - in both instances his calls don’t go through or disconnect halfway in and both misato and gendo represent conflicting/addled parental authority. the telephone is nge’s interpersonal stage prop (misato gives shinji a cellphone with the hopes that he uses it to make friends at school, launching a discussion re: the hedgehog’s dilemma when he doesn’t) and helps to inform a lot of eva’s inter-cast relationships so 👁 🔍 whenever it makes an appearance
it’s been a while since i’ve dropped some freebies! here’s all 4 volumes of the official evangelion LINE stickers, full sized and transparent. feel free to use for just about anything.
all 167 stickers are sorted by character/pairing. this post will be updated if any new stickers are released – enjoy!
Keep reading
Anno Hideaki has often admitted to drawing much of his Evangelion inspiration from vintage UK sci-fi and media (check out the character comparisons charts for Gerry Anderson’s UFO or The Avengers British original, to name a few) but this one takes the cake.
re: gendo ikari, and how gendo as a character is talked about within the fandom and the selective attention/dissonance that’s implicit in the framing of him solely as “The Bad Dad™”
when i think of gendo, i don’t necessarily zero in on his shitty parenting, because that’s basically a given for any parent in eva ever. i think of his using women – orienting women so that they directly (rei, naoko, ritsuko) or indirectly (misato, asuka) further his goals. obviously yui (and rei iii, since she’s ‘half’ yui) beatifically trumps his ace in eoe, but for the most part, he exercised unlimited amounts of emotional, physical, and psychological control on rei i+ii (and the whole thing is excruciatingly uncomfortable and suggestive in its visual language - something that i hardly, if ever, see people talk about); he used naoko/ritsuko for their minds and their bodies; it’s suggested that he deliberately capitalized on misato’s righteous anger by allowing her access into the paramilitary+gehrin, and what would later become nerv. remember when fumihiko tachiki said that gendo embodies the central core of evangelion, in that everyone’s moving around him while he stays still? passive, atypical control – even his relationship with shinji is unassertively neglectful. gendo doesn’t need to do anything because he’s relying on what’s dubbed ‘divine feminine energy’ (ultimately realized in lilith, his secret ace in the hole) to do his bidding for him.
i’m not very interested in gendo commentary/analysis/etc that acts like his neglectful parenting is the main cornerstone of his character, especially since that doesn’t uniquely differentiate him as a character from dr. katsuragi, naoko akagi, asuka’s father, etc. gendo being a terribad father isn’t the point – gendo is more so an expression of insidious power, masculinity, and immortality. and i think people stress on his parenting because shinji is the main character, and by being constantly privy to shinji’s adolescent frustrations and anxieties it’s harder to see how shinji and gendo are so fundamentally alike – more than anyone is willing or ready to admit. because what does shinji end up doing with his adolescent frustrations and anxieties? he takes them out on asuka, rei, and misato. the “gendo as the nondescript, one-note evil mastermind dad and shinji as the flawless cinnamon roll we must protect at all costs” is so hilariously ironic for that reason.
More interpretations of Eva through the Becker lens
circuitbird:
It’s worth noting that both SEELE and Gendo have mechanisms for eliminating the fundamental Death Anxiety in ways that Ernest Becker suggests are doomed to fail.
The terror of the mind/body dualism – which, in Evangelion, is symbolically represented by the Fruit of Knowledge and Fruit of Life – cannot be resolved through carnal reverence nor traditional religious means. Both are alternate versions of personal delusion in which existential meaning is sought through faulty channels: the body, which by definition cannot lend itself to spiritual transcendence, and monolithic faith systems, which are themselves imposed hero systems that cater deceitfully to the fear of oblivion they intend to absolve.
SEELE = a symbol for the classical religious pathway, in its singular control and perversion of spiritual goals. This is echoed by the imagery that represents SEELE, from the angel-like appearance of the Mass Production Evas to the biblical/numerical significance of the seven organization members.
Gendo Ikari’s agenda = a symbol for the bodily pathway, since his desire to reunite with Yui is precisely that: desire. His goals are rooted in the corporeal dimensions of human love and attachment, and he is clearly not satisfied with her occupation of a purely spiritual space, or at least not one that is separate from him inside Unit 01. His obsession with this physicality is so all-consuming that he creates a clone of her – Rei – to serve as the body vehicle for his ultimate plans.
The focus is then on Shinji, the despairing boy, the individual, to discover his own purpose and existential value for himself. And his only hope for doing this is by directly confronting the terror of oblivion, the terror of death and of fundamental aloneness, in all its forms. Only then can he truly transcend. There is a reason why he is the hero of the story.
it crushes my spirit that the adults of evangelion aren’t talked about more. especially misato; she’s intended to be the secondary protagonist yet is talked of as though she were a supporting character, a sidekick, or a deuteragonist - forever doomed to be a talking point to the extent that her actions motivate shinji’s personal growth
whatever it is that makes evangelion good, misato, ritsuko, kaji, yui, fuyutsuki, and gendo are just as emblematic as the pilot kids. all of these characters have compelling and interesting stories of their own. but there’s nary a whisper when the adults get misinterpreted among casual and serious fans alike; the show goes to great lengths to debunk a lot of popular fandom interpretations that persist to this day (for example, think about how many people assume misato is a slut with a high “body count” when the show explicitly mentions her only having been with one man)
if you’re watching nge, focus on the eva adults! their backstories, their motivations, the parts of themselves they keep hidden or concealed. there’s plenty to learn and love by watching misato, ritsuko, and kaji’s old friendship that you can’t get by watching shinji, asuka, and rei interact with each other. you’re missing out, otherwise
