The story of Neon Genesis Evangelion is a simple one. Its the story of a young man who takes on the responsibilities of saving the world and has to deal with the consequences of not trusting people.

Of not letting them in

If I go into massive amounts of detail here, it would ruin the impact of this story and its far more worth it to experience the series in its entirety

So I suggest you watch the TV series, the last 2 episodes and then this movie, back to back as much as you can.

Remembering one thing about all the characters you're seeing and loving.

They are liars and they ALL hate themselves on some level. Don't trust what they TELL YOU, trust what they SHOW YOU in their actions.

By doing that, when you get to the pivotal scene of "help me" you'll begin to understand what is going on.

Pray for the poor people who suffer like these souls. And trust they'll be okay if you reach out to them.

On its own, End of Evangelion gives to the fanbase every tiny little bit of what it wanted, it isn't what we THOUGHT want wanted, but its what we wanted.

And you should listen to what Rei is saying...and then realise that she's not just saying it to Shinji, she's saying it to EVERYONE - including you.

I have to walk back a worlds worth of bile and hatred of Hideki Anno for the things that I said about the Rebuilds, the man is not a hack or a fool.

He's always been a tortured genius Watch his work. Love it and spread the message he's giving.

Watching anime has always carried with it a social stigma: it is something for geeks, manchildren and perverts, not well-adjusted individuals. Of course there is the family-friendly, largely accepted anime of Hayao Miyazaki, and the teen-oriented action shows like Fullmetal Alchemist or Naruto, which are widely regarded as acceptable for the mainstream. But beyond that anime has a lot of unfortunate, 'problematic' tendencies. Anime idolizes cutesy and innocent girls in a sexual way, and in general treats women as sex objects, it has nonsensical, zany humor that seems infantile or incomprehensible to those encountering it for the first time, it is violent and graphic and often carries no 'message' for the audience, no lesson about inclusivity and solidarity. Anime fans also tend to get obsessed about anime. It seems to be addictive by its nature, drawing audiences in fantasy fulfillment and escapism, making them neglect 'real life' duties. Otaku culture is a big problem in Japan and is shunned by many anime creators, notably by Miyazaki himself.

Which brings me to Neon Genesis Evangelion. Evangelion is often hailed as a deconstruction of the mecha anime genre, in this context meaning that it took a popular anime genre and did something different with it, examined how it worked and what made it tick, took it apart and assembled the parts into something new. Evangelion gained a rabid following and merchandise relating to the show is still super popular 20 years after it was on air. This is largely because the anime introduced popular female characters that otakus love to moon over: Rei and Asuka. Both of these characters, one mysterious and submissive and the other so-called 'tsundere' meaning she's willful and antagonistic but still in love with the protagonist, are endlessly copied in other anime. (Asuka's character is partly based on the title character in Nadia, an earlier anime by Hideaki Anno.) Neon Genesis Evangelion the TV show ran out of funds before its conclusion, forcing its creator Anno to come up with two ending episodes that infamously feature hardly any animation and are ambiguous and introspective. A few years later this feature film was produced to make up for the ending: The End of Evangelion. I expect that fans of the show were waiting for it excitedly - they were finally going to know for sure what actually happened to their beloved characters. But as the psychological and surrealistic undertones of the TV show hinted, this was a story that was less about the 'what actually happened' and more about the expectations of the audience, subversion of genre and introspection, and the feature movie The End of Evangelion was no exception.

The End of Evangelion does tell the story - the literal story, not just what happened in protagonist Shinji's head. But the story might not be to the liking of fans. I don't know if Hideaki Anno purposefully wanted to insult his otaku audience and mock the entire anime culture, but it sure seems like it. The movie begins with Shinji masturbating to a comatose Asuka, a clear message on how disgusting it is to project sexual fantasies on a character that represents a vulnerable 14-year-old girl. The movie kills off every single one of the female characters that otakus love, and it does it in very frustrating ways. One survives a 12-against-1 battle only to find out that the enemies are actually undefeatable and the whole battle was a waste of time. She is eaten alive. One is blown to bits, another is shot offscreen, some are turned into orange jelly (though fans will be quick to point out that this represented only the death of their bodies, not their souls), and one grows into an alien giantess before decomposing and falling apart, her gargantuan pieces littering the landscape. And it also turns out that she was actually a clone of the protagonist's mother. (This we already knew from the TV show so it's not like we came into the movie expecting it to be another run-of-the-mill teen action adventure.) It is a brave endeavor, one that doesn't really care about what people think, concerned only with the vision of its creator. It's relentless, merciless and uncompromising. It makes no concessions - it doesn't even feature the iconic theme song of the TV show. And above all it is beautiful. It is animated smoothly, the giant robots move with the weight they deserve, the colors and compositions are expertly crafted and there are many images that will stay with you in your daydreams and nightmares and that you will come across on the Internet message boards several times. The voice actors do a chillingly good job - the shrieks are so horrible that I don't know if I ever heard anything as moving in any horror movie. I haven't seen the English dub so I can't comment on its quality.

The End of Evangelion is a robot action movie, and a good one, and it is a psychological movie, and a horror movie, and a science fiction movie, but it is also more than that. It manages to also be a commentary on anime itself, the state of the industry and the culture surrounding it. But it is also a look into the mind of the individual. At its heart it concentrates on why people do these things, why we become obsessed, alienated, violent, and the answers are found in the mechanics of the mind, and The End of Evangelion shines a light into the dark reaches of the human psyche.

Being an anime drama I largely knew what to expect from this: random plot, sci fi / fantasy elements that are overly complex in order to hide the weak plot, sexualised teens / kids. This has all that in spades but then takes the absurdity and crappiness up to the next level by having long dream / fantasy sequences that are, at best, random and gratuitous.

By the end these scenes consume the film so it is just one long, nonsensical sequence of random settings, images and scenes. In the beginning, while the plot was very weak there was at least some semblance of one and the action sequences were reasonably interesting. By the end it has gone from mediocre to ridiculously pretentious and bad.