Let me put this in terms you might understand.
[ATTACH=full]2743[/ATTACH] "What is my arc?"
Yes, lots of confused people will project when talking about Evangelion and various other things and say that it's good because it's doing a certain thing they've been told good art stuff does, like characters having ARCS, SYMBOLS MEANING THINGS, and so on. This show has such a confused reputation largely because people like it, get a sense it's really good in some kind of way that must be prestigious, and then start looking for what they've been taught are prestige markers. Plenty of popular works are weighed down by this. Silent Hill 2 is an example I use a lot. It's very simple and on the nose in everything that it's doing. Most of what's said about it is gibberish. This comes out better if we have someone trying on hand I can use as a case study.
Now as for Shinji, does he go anywhere? I think his mind moves fairly authentically in the patterns of someone who is seriously emotionally disturbed. Because of course, he is a creation of an emotionally disturbed man. I find the tv ending to Evangelion doubly compelling as an experience of this nervous messed up character breaking through to a kind of strange personal catharsis, and getting a sense that the creators, or Anno, might be to. Is it rational? Have we made some kind of tangible progress we could map to some kind of psychological theory of the mind? No. But look at everyone clapping. Look at him smiling now. Go Shinji! Go Anno! CONGRATULATIONS!
I've seen it. Not my favourite Gainax thing and it's been a while, but I've seen it. For me it's Gunbuster and Diebuster.
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