Sci-Fi Countdown - Star Wars (CinemaVille discussion w/ Bob Clark for Wonders in the Dark)

Bob Clark's final podcast for the Wonders in the Dark sci-fi countdown covers the first Star Wars film, a/k/a Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977). I made another guest appearance. We talk about the film's unique legacy, connection to the larger saga, and other matters in the seventy-minute-long episode.

Sci Fi Countdown - The End of Evangelion (CinemaVille discussion w/ Bob Clark for Wonders in the Dark)

This morning, I posted my only official entry in the Wonders in the Dark Sci-Fi countdown: an audio discussion with Bob Clark on the film The End of Evangelion, which ranked near the very top of my own ballot.

“The End of Evangelion” is an unusual spin-off of a TV series (only “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me” might be more unusual). It both concludes and subverts the series, veering way into experimental territory while still wrapping up the narrative which the show “Neon Genesis Evangelion” began. I’ve covered the film in almost every form imaginable – reviews, written conversations, visual tributes, and video essays – so I decided to take a new appraoch this time. With Bob Clark’s permission, I stepped in as a guest host on the CinemaVille podcast and together we analyze the film, exploring its connections not just to the series but to the Czech play R.U.R., and Dante’s Divine Comedy. There’s a lot to dig into here, some grab some popcorn and get ready to start tumbling down, tumbling down, tumbling down…

Visit my entry for The End of Evangelion on Wonders in the Dark

Last week, I appeared on Bob's podcast Cinemaville to discuss the series Neon Genesis Evangelion (from which the film is spun off); this time, I took over as guest host to introduce, conduct, and edit the conversation myself. Thanks to Bob for allowing me to step into his shoes for an episode, and I hope listeners enjoy the experience.

Here is the podcast itself:



I've also participated in many other Wonders in the Dark genre countdowns over the years. Here are the previous films I've covered: Marty (both versions) and a video essay on Lady and the Tramp for the Romance Countdown; Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid for the Western Countdown (make sure to check out the comments, where the scholar who edited the 2005 version responded to my review and the controversy surrounding his cut); a video essay on Modern Times for the Comedy Countdown; An American in Paris, 42nd Street (including a video essay), and a visual tribute (using Arlene Croce's prose) to The Gay Divorcee for the Musical Countdown.

Obviously, this is not my first rodeo with The End of Evangelion (nor is it Wonders in the Dark's - Allan Fish wrote about it back in 2011). I've created a "3 1/2 Minute Review" video essay; a video essay comparison of Twin Peaks and Neon Genesis Evangelion (including the film); a lengthy prose essay; a two-part printed conversation with Bob Clark about the film's story and style and its characters; an entry in my Favorites capsule series; and screen-cap visual tributes to a battle sequence and the climactic apocalypse. I even devoted an entire week of blog posts to the subject last year.

Sci Fi Countdown - discussing Neon Genesis Evangelion on Bob Clark's new podcast, "CinemaVille"

This is officially Bob Clark's entry in the Sci-Fi Countdown, going on right now on Wonders in the Dark. But since we'd discussed this series Neon Genesis Evangelion so often in the past, he invited me as his guest his brand new podcast "CinemaVille". Both endeavors are worth checking out beyond just this entry, and you can read more about Evangelion over on Wonders:

The Sci Fi Countdown: Neon Genesis Evangelion at #72

Here is the podcast itself:

And that's not it for my involvement with the countdown, the podcast, or Evangelion. On Tuesday, I will be contributing my own entry to the show, taking over Bob's show for an episode as a guest host (with me questioning him this time) to discuss...well, we'll leave that as surprise! See you then.

Meanwhile, make sure to check out Bob Clark's impressive essays on the first six episodes of the series, the film Evangelion 2.0, and the proper way to screen Evangelion films, as well as Wonders guru Allan Fish's own take on the series and film The End of Evangelion, and of course my own episode guide, accompanied by extended chats with Bob for each episode.

Neon Genesis Evangelion - The End of Evangelion, Part 3 of 3: discussion w/ Bob Clark on the film's characters

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

Foreward: Ending the Evangelion conversations

Three years ago this week, on November 2, 2012, I published my first conversation with Bob Clark on the subject of Neon Genesis Evangelion, episode 1. He was the one who introduced me to the show a year earlier and when I decided to do an episode guide (my first since Twin Peaks in 2008) I realized that it would be good to have him on board. He was much more familiar with the series than I was, and perhaps even more importantly he had a grounding in both the conventions of the anime genre and the techniques of animation in general.

We conducted seven chats to accompany the first seven episodes and then took what I expected to be a short break over the holidays while I worked on a short film and devoted my blog to promoting it. Starting ongoing series without having the end already in sight is a big risk, and sure enough nearly a year and a half passed before Bob and I got back into the flow of things by discussing episode 8 (this time, we also brought the Japanese film blogger Murderous Ink in to offer additional comments - his last contribution was shared yesterday).

That was the spring of 2014, when I was just beginning to fall under the spell of Twin Peaks again (a bigger obsession than anything I've experienced in the past decade) and so after we reached episode 16, the Evangelion project paused once again. This time I had been wise enough to hold off on publishing our discussions, knowing that I didn't want to do so until we had covered everything through the finale and follow-up film at which point I could leisurely schedule the entries on a weekly basis without any further hiatuses.

The opportunity finally arrived this spring, a year after our last pause. This time I was able to give Evangelion the attention it deserved, exploring the fandom and the mythology in a way I never had before (even though I'd watched the series several times up to that point). Bob's and my conversations grew even longer and more intense as we reached the final stretch of the series climaxing with a chat on The End of Evangelion that spanned several hours over two different nights.

The first part of that discussion - dwelling on the themes, motifs, techniques, and mythology of the show - went up yesterday. Today's conclusion focuses on the characters - specifically very brief discussions of Ritsuko and Gendo, longer discussions of Misato, Kaworu, and Rei and a very long, in-depth discussion of Asuka, before concluding with our reflections on the enigmatic Yui. Shinji, of course, figures into most of these different character sections as well.

And with that, my conversations on Neon Genesis Evangelion with Bob Clark - which have formed the core of this episode guide since its inception - will come to an end. In the future, due to logistics and my desire to quickly build up a bigger backlog, I don't plan on doing episodic discussions for my TV viewing diaries...but I am hoping to have series-spanning conversations whenever I finish a show, both with Bob and with other contributors as I go. Next up is The Prisoner, and now that the end of this Evangelion series is in sight maybe I will finally start watching it so that I'm ready to start posting the entries in a month!

Meanwhile, the Evangelion series will continue for another four weeks, as I will offer solo reviews of each Rebuild film before wrapping up with a full directory for the entire series, gathering all the entries in one convenient location. But first, here is my most extensive conversation yet with Bob, a final look at the personalities and themes that made The End of Evangelion, and the show that inspired it, so great.

Final conversation with Bob Clark (part 2)

Neon Genesis Evangelion - The End of Evangelion, Part 2 of 3: discussion w/ Bob Clark on the film's style & story (+ final comment from Murderous Ink)

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

Yesterday I posted my weekly Neon Genesis Evangelion review, on the film The End of Evangelion. My conversation with Bob Clark was so lengthy this week that for the first time I separated it from the review (which was also longer than usual) and split it in two. Today we discuss the film's animation, visual motifs, music, mythology, and the whole mind-boggling concept of Human Instrumentality. Tomorrow the discussion will conclude as we focus on the various characters of Evangelion. Both chats will focus on the film but also occasionally dip back into the series to reference open or unresolved points.

But first, here is Murderous Ink's final contribution to the Neon Genesis Evangelion series:

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episodes 25 & 26 - "Do you love me?" & "Take care of yourself."

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

Even if it had just stuck to the teenagers-fighting-robot formula and alternating-action-and-contemplation style of its early episodes, Neon Genesis Evangelion would have been an excellent series. The first six chapters of the saga offer rich characterizations, stunning visuals, and an intriguing mythology which are enough to sustain our interest. Enough...but Hideaki Anno had so much more up his sleeve. The introduction of Asuka, a fiery personality who startlingly alters the tempo and tone of the show with her dynamic introduction. A series of deceptively straightforward yet clever monster-of-the-week episodes in which we can almost believe that Evangelion has settled into its routine. And then things get truly weird. The appearance of genuinely avant-garde sequences like Rei's vision or Shinji's escape from inside an abstract Angel, moments of bold visual and conceptual exploration that are barely contained by the surrounding genre trappings. Character moments that dive deeper and deeper into their despairing hearts, suggesting things may not turn out well after all. Spectacular meltdowns. Dazzling montages. Unbroken still shots and stretches of silence. Titles flashing across the screen, voices cascading across the soundtrack, samples of sublime classical music juxtaposed against images of visceral violence. Whispers and hints of a tangled mythology unraveling and reassembling before our ears and eyes like the Lance of Longinus as it is hurled beyond the limits of earth's atmosphere.

And then finally...these episodes, ideas and images and sounds so wild and sensorily overwhelming that they can't be even be contained within a single unit of the show, spilling out over the final forty minutes of Shinji's journey from the empty streets of a seaside city to the echo chambers of his own entangled consciousness. For twenty-four episodes Shinji has been told - and told himself - not to run away. Now as space itself folds and expands and disintegrates, running away is no longer even an option. There's nowhere left to run, no surface to run across, he is everywhere and nowhere.

Welcome to the Human Instrumentality Project.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 24 - "The Beginning and the End, or 'Knockin' on Heaven's Door'"

Note: The Back to the Future video I announced on Monday is now up, just in time for today (the "future" day that Marty McFly traveled to in Back to the Future Part II). Happy Back to the Future Day! Now back to another sci-fi story taking place in an alternate version of 2015...

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

This entry covers the Director's Cut version of Episode 24.

In many ways the last (semi-)conventional episode of the series, "The Beginning and the End..." wastes no time reminding us how far the characters have fallen into doubt, despair, or destruction. Following an explicit flashback to her childhood trauma, Asuka is discovered lying near-comatose in a tub, naked and exposed to the sky in a derelict apartment building whose roof has been torn off (no "unfamiliar ceiling" this time). Rei, or rather Rei III, floats through the fog of her life/lives wondering who she is and for what purpose she has been sent. These are familiar human questions all the more confusing when you are a cloned person containing the soul of...a goddess? Possible answers flash before our eyes with dizzying speed and it is difficult to grasp any of them. Anyway, even Rei is more alone than she's ever been because her "spares" were just destroyed by Ritsuko. And Ritsuko's isolation is made physically explicit as Gendo Ikari visits her in a cold, metallic space where she he has been locked away as punishment for her betrayal. She reveals that she has been sleeping with the commander and joins the rank of broken souls that seem to clutter his dedicated path (Cmdr. Ikari refers to Eva-01 as "Yui" - his "dead" wife - further hinting at what that path may entail).

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 23 - "Rei III"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

This entry covers the Director's Cut version of Episode 23.

The final stretch of Neon Genesis Evangelion presents a cascade of revelations. No longer are we leaping from episode to episode, battle to battle, against the backdrop of slowly unfolding mysteries and suggestions. The feeling is that we are building toward a climax, as characters die physically (Kaji), spiritually (Asuka) or both (Rei). Although in Rei's case is it "both"...or "neither"? The preview at the end of the last episode informed us (in a disarmingly cheerful delivery) that Rei was going to sacrifice herself to save Shinji, and indeed this is what we appears to happen in the battle with the sixteenth Angel. Just as the previous Angels infiltrated the minds of Shinji and Asuka (in the first case ambiguously, in the second case with a clearly destructive purpose), so the latest Angel literally crawls inside Rei's skin on the way to her mind.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 22 - "Don't Be."

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

This entry covers the Director's Cut version of Episode 22.

You've heard the term "mindfuck"? Perhaps it was coined specifically for Asuka Langley Soryu. Not only does she experience a monstrous psychic invasion in this episode, she also characterizes it in explicitly sexual terms. "Don't come inside me!" she screams, and in the Director's Cut version of episode 22 she opens the episode, in flashback, by propositioning Kaji and yelling angrily, "I'm an adult! So look at me!" He won't, but the Angel will - orbiting in outer space it captures her Eva in a cascade of blinding light, accompanied by the "Hallelujah" chorus from Handel's "Messiah." We may be reminded of a particular antecedent in religious art: Bernini's Ecstacy of Saint Teresa, with its highly sexualized image of the gasping saint being pierced by heaven's arrow, wielded by an angel who seems to be mounting her. Or rather, we may be reminded afterwards - at the moment the immediate impression is too viscerally overwhelming to take in much more. Because if Asuka is being mindfucked, so are we.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 21 - "He was aware that he was still a child."

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

This entry covers the Director's Cut version of Episode 21.

Origin story, flashback, even prequel - call it what you will. After twenty episodes of allusive hints toward the shared history of the characters, dropping cryptic clues about various motives (both personal and organizational), and constantly reminding us that the past which haunts the present cannot be recovered...Neon Genesis Evangelion recovers the past. And it's surprisingly effective; in fact, this is probably my favorite episode of the series up to this point. Above all, I'm a sucker for backstories - especially when we get to visit them firsthand. Motion pictures, be they cinema or television, live action or animation, even narrative or experimental, root their approach in observing moments unfold in physical reality. Just as in everyday life, movies and TV episodes give us a sense that time moves forward as a general rule. But of course memory works differently onscreen. As I wrote about Fire Walk With Me, the film which rewinds Twin Peaks to before the TV show began: "Movies have a unique and potent ability to break one of the surest laws of our existence. Time can be shattered, history unearthed, the past rediscovered."

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 20 - "Weaving a Story 2: oral stage"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

In nearly every episode, Shinji has piloted the Eva to do battle with an Angel. At the end of the last battle, the Eva (miraculously achieving a 400% sync ratio with its pilot) devours the Angel and the S2 rocket which powers it. Shinji is literally taking the enemy into himself. Appropriately enough then, this episode sees a new battle in which Shinji fights the Eva - although every single word of that statement could be contested. Is he really fighting the Eva - or himself? Is he "fighting" a "battle" or is he in fact harmonizing with a greater being, or with another plane of consciousness? Shinji's physical form has disintegrated into the "soup of life" flowing within the Eva's flesh. He becomes quantum energy seeking and avoiding its own ego. How on earth can Neon Genesis Evangelion represent this metaphysical/psychological experience?!

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 19 - "Introjection"

My video on Neon Genesis Evangelion and Twin Peaks, due on Monday, has still not been released. It will hopefully go up later today. Keep an eye on this post. Meanwhile, here is Wednesday's regularly scheduled entry.

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

We begin with Shinji furious at his father for overpowering him in the Eva. It's a low moment for the young pilot, suggesting that even when he's in the cockpit of his giant puppet, he isn't truly pulling the strings. More surprise is in store...when another Angel attacks, and Shinji is gone (he's "quit" once again), the Eva refuses to activate. Rei can't get it going, and neither can the dummy plug. But Cmdr. Ikari's response is extremely personal, and most likely accurate: "It's rejecting me." Only when Shinji returns does Eva-01 activate. The pilot's rage fuels an aggressive and effective plan to get the Angel outside and pound it into submission. The battery runs out, and the Eva itself takes over...rendering the "berserker" escape of episode 2 mild in comparison. Flesh emerges from the "binds" of the Eva suit, a new arm materializes where one was torn off, teeth jut out of the locked maw, and the Eva becomes not a robot but a savage animal, seizing its enemy, tearing it apart, and devouring its essence. It's an amazingly visceral moment for Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 18 - "Ambivalence"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

We pick up exactly where we left off...the Eva-03 is on its way, and Toji appears morose. Wonder why? Everyone but Shinji seems to know who the next pilot will be, even as the show half-attempts to keep the audience in the dark. We are never explicitly told until the end of the episode when we see Toji's half-dead body extricated from the wreckage. This could have been a powerful reveal, but the hints are telegraphed too many times beforehand. Nonetheless, Shinji's stunned reaction hits home as does the NERV staffers' shock and horror as a routine test turns into something else entirely (c'mon - how many tests end up routine in Evangelion?). This crew, seemingly unshaken by the disappearance of thousands in the previous episode, is deeply disturbed when they must turn their firepower on one of their own machines...and the young boy piloting it.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 17 - "Fourth CHILD"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

Neon Genesis Evangelion constantly reminds us that it's about childhood...and adulthood, how the two categories overlap and yet stand worlds apart. This tangle spreads far beyond the usual confusions of adolescence. The children are exploited and endangered (to put it mildly) by their elders, forced to grow up too quickly. And the adults, burdened with professional responsibilities far beyond their youth, seem unable to establish any true stability in their personal lives. But if the adults deal with its confusion through bureaucracy and suberterfuge, emotionally distancing and isolating themselves from the outside world, the children have not yet learned these skills. This is their weakness - and their redemption.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 16 - "Splitting of the Breast"

Earlier this week I published my video "The 3 1/2 Minute Review of Neon Genesis Evangelion"

Also, I'm on Tumblr now! Mostly tumbling in a vacuum though, so please follow & share the stuff you like, if that's your thing.

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

I was going to begin this entry with the comment, "This is where Neon Genesis Evangelion goes off the rails, in the best sense possible." Before doing so, a little internet research turned up the fact that, indeed, this is where the series began to depart dramatically from the original series script - in part based on Anno's own interest in psychology following a period of depression. If the previous episode returned us to character study after a long stretch focusing on action-packed Angel battles, "Splitting of the Breast" fuses this character study with the larger, overarching sci-fi context. The result is one of the strongest episodes yet and, as I was originally inclined to write, a feeling that the self-contained world of the show - with its ever-battered but ever-resilient NERV infrastructure, characters whose flaws and strengths we love in equal measure, and hinted-but-not-quite-explored atmosphere of intrigue and treachery - is starting to disintegrate.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 15 - "Those Women Longed For the Touch of Others' Lips, and Thus Invited Their Kisses"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

It's all about intimacy...fleeting, insecure, perhaps impossible, but yearned for nonetheless. For the late-twentysomethings attending yet another wedding, this intimacy is located in the past, a hazy, alcohol-fueled remembrance of carefree college days. These memories may be as chimerical as the guests' own tipsy reflections in the lounge's glass windows, hovering against the dreamy cityscape beyond. For the bratty, boisterous teenage girl this intimacy exists in her restless imagination, perpetually contradicted by the messy facts of life - an older man entirely uninterested in her childish crush, or an awkward roommate whose suffocating kiss is "definitely not something to do to kill time!" For the lonely boy at the story's center this intimacy is buried somewhere beyond reach, his bond with his father emphasized by the anniversary of his mother's death yet only made more elusive by her absence.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 14 - "Weaving a Story"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow blogger Bob Clark (Murderous Ink will return next week).

In many ways, this feels like a filler episode: re-using previous footage, retracing past events, attaching several disjointed sequences, and limiting the central dramatic crisis to a few minutes of screentime. Even the ending - Unit-00 marching down a long corridor with the never-before-mentioned "Lance of Longinus" - initially strikes us as a non sequitur. Certainly this has less of a narrative throughline than any of the earlier chapters, especially considering the last few episodes were settling into the groove of "standalone adventures with our Eva pals."

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 13 - "Lilliputian Hitcher"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

While the previous episode was more interested in the thoughts and feelings of the characters than the mechanics of their battle plan, in "Lilliputian Hitcher" the two approaches are intimately linked. The metaphor is explicated when Ritsuko describes how NERV's operating system (Magi) was designed to reflect her own mother's various roles - as mother, scientist, and woman. In Neon Genesis Evangelion, even the machines have feelings and it takes the most (seemingly) cold character to make us aware of this. As with humans, this sensitive structure makes the machines both powerful and vulnerable. This link between human and inhuman is echoed when Misato observes that the angels are "searching for a system that can cope with any situation." Think an alien, Terminator-like mechanical ruthlessness, right? But as Vice Cmdr. Fuyutsuki immediately adds, "That's truly the system of life itself."

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 12 - "She said, 'Don't make others suffer for your personal hatred.'"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

In one of the show's boldest beginnings, we witness the infamous Armageddon of 2000. A stark title card places us in the past: "fifteen years ago" (and of course watching the show now, this chronology is as true as it is surreal). We are in outer space, hovering over the moon as in the distance a silent explosion ripples along the earth's surface. From this cold, omniscient viewpoint we move closer to discover a scarred, exhausted figure moving through the blistering fallout. In his arms is a young girl and as he carries her toward a capsule that can shield her from this destruction he looks like Abraham carrying Isaac, only the role has been reversed: this man is sacrificing himself to save his daughter from the wrath of angels.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 11 - "The Day Tokyo-3 Stood Still"

This series is an episode guide to the Japanese anime television show Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995 - 96) and the spin-off films. Each entry includes my own reflection on the episode, followed by a conversation with fellow bloggers Bob Clark and Murderous Ink.

Every now and then, Evangelion likes to test its futuristic, techno-savvy characters by robbing them of their basic resources. They typically prove themselves inventive, if not exactly cool under pressure. Perhaps our cast has an advantage over most sci-fi ensembles in that they are all (at least those in adulthood) survivors of an apocalypse; while they may be blessed with sophisticated technology, they don't particularly take it for granted. Even the children have had the carnage of the "Second Impact" drilled into them, with the recurring challenge of Angel visitations keeping them on their toes. As in Operation Yashima the machine city of the future loses all electrical power. But this time it is not a military decision and the cause is unknown (sabotage is suspected - as Cmdr. Ikari sagely muses, "Mankind is still its own worst enemy"). The results display a fair amount of admirable ingenuity, if also some inadvertent ridiculousness as the challenges mount.