hawk of endymion wrote:Once again, for the upteenth time, I like Eva as a show. I just believe the claims of being, "revloutionary", "greatest of all time" are a little unfounded. It seems with most fans of Eva is that if you do not agree with these claims, you either don't know what's good or you didn't "get" Eva. Also, the constant revisions of Eva are making it lose its luster.
Also, shows like Astro Boy, Mazinger, First Gundam, those are revolutionary. Mixing various references to eastern and western religion with no link, doesn't. Those references are just plot gimmicks.
Well, I'm sorry
Neo but you're being subjective regarding Eva's status as well.
For Evangelion, or any other 'groundbraking' piece of entertainment, it's save to say it is a landmark, when it has made a definite impact on (a part of) society, becoming part of pop culture.
Wether it's good or not is subject of (heated) debate and personal taste, but quality notwithstanding, Evangelion has made a name for itself.
Discussing a show's importance or status has less to do with taste or quality, which are difficult to measure quantitatively, but more with popularity and (apparent) novelty.
I'm not really a fan of Evangelion, but I can see that it had -and still has- a huge following.
So, like 60's Batman, First Gundam, Transformers G1, Macross, 80's Knightrider, Pokemon (1995?) and Cowboy Bebop, it garnered a huge following offering something that at least brought alot of attention to it.
D_G, you may be better off by being more clear about putting aside your own view when discussing a show's merits. Personal taste =/= impact on society.
I like to hear what you like and why you like it, but at the same time it's good to hear what it is that made it part of pop culture or not.
Speaking for myself, I reckon a show is genre defining, when it has been very popular and is being frequently copied, homaged or having inspired other works.
In that sense Evangelion ranks as a high as the original Macross and perhaps even Gundam.
Relatively new to Evangelion was that the 'goodguy' organisation wasn't really good, and that they have essentially brought, or are bringing, doom upon themselves.
"Playing God turned wrong," is what I would call it.
Another novelty was that the EVAs were more like 'tamed' monsters than mechanical robots, and more fearsome than awesome.
A third novelty is the deconstruction of a character's psyche, in this case whiny Shinji.
I didn't find Evangelion a particularly good show, since to me it became unthreaded more and more towards the end, without having a satisfying conclusion.
That may have been the intent, or perhaps just accidental brought about by circumstance, but it didn't make for a really entertaining show.
I'd classify it more as a "could-have-been" that fell apart, than a wellmade thought provoking show, but that's just my own view.
And apparently there's a large crowd of people who thought or think otherwise and have become (staunch) fans of it.