Evangelion

Sat through 3.5 hours of Reubuild of Evangelion (RoE) in a day. Was very much affected. The effect still lingers, I think.

Things that define my secondary school years: LAN shop lurking, Clock-tower-block-classroom break-ins, Maumu, NGE and Just the Few of Us.

I was introduced to the mecha genre with Gundam W on TV when I was barely 8. Gundam was intriguing enough for this child; I became a big fan. I mean, how cool is it to watch giant robots fight one another? That was my generation's update to the vanguard of the genre.

Then I stumbled upon this series called Neon Genesis Evangelion (NGE), in a retailer of electronics and electrical appliances located within the now-defunct Emporium departmental store (where Heartland Mall is currently located). I was in Primary 3, IIRC. It immediately grabbed my attention, and that was way before I bothered to learn the pronunciation of the title. Well, the store was looping the beginning 5-minute segment of the first episode on a few of its TV-sets, and it did so for a good few months at least. Always the same footage, but somehow I just thought it was cool enough to give it a second look, every time I happened to be in the store. After some time, the images stuck. I wanted very much to catch the rest of the series, but it wasn't on TV, and I wasn't one to beg my parents for gifts (they probably thought I was more into books than this sort of rubbish, anyway), so I just let it slide and moved on.

The next time I exposed myself to NGE was in Secondary School. I was in Sec 2, and pretty much settled into the GEP way of life. Someday, somehow, Kaa brought the NGE OVA disks and screened it after school over a number of days. After a few episodes, I was hooked. He didn't screen every episode, but it didn't matter. I took it into my own hands to scour the entire series, as well as the 2 film-tie-ins. I became pretty obssessed with those stuff for a while, and even when the initial impact of it wore off, I still regarded NGE as nothing short of epic. The symbolism seems kinda convoluted now, even pretentious, but back then everything about it points to a masterpiece of the artform. I think, that's precisely because it takes an adolescent to relate to the angst and self-loathe of another. And characters in NGE never seem to transcend that narrow spectrum of emotions. I don't think I ever cried watching the show, but I definitely felt blue, and perhaps I even enjoyed that feeling. Which was why I got hooked, I think. It's always nice to feel melancholic, in a pensive, reflective manner.

'The cantonese dub of the Kaa's EVA VCDs is damn funny' - Ian

RoE 1.0 opened in Singapore in 2008 if I'm not wrong. Ian suggested we watch it but got vetoed by Jua (obviously). I wasn't really into EVA at that point of time (NS?) so I didn't care either way. RoE 2.0 came to our shores in late 2009, and I wasn't even aware of it (granted, it only got a limited theatrical release at The Picturehouse). Not particularly enthused about the idea of repackaging the series into films and milking more money out of the fans, it did not cross my mind to watch it anyhow after the local release.

That was, until Tabris (a friend in real-life, not Kaworu's real identity in NGE) mentioned it in one of her Facebook posts. I thought, the exams are just around the corner, so why not? And turned out, it was a re-invention of the entire universe, the characters and all. A very well-done attempt at that. Re-connecting with the characters inspired a jolt of nolstagia, and realising they have become more mature, more sensible, more realistic, gave me a newfound sense of discovery. The update of the seminal series, the 'Watchmen of anime OVA', came oddly in tandem with a landmark of a personal journey - my reaching of adulthood. If the original reflects Hideaki Anno's psyche in his manic depressive days, RoE presents his re-interpretation of the premise post-recovery, exhibiting age-induced astuteness in new details. For the first time, love as a theme takes centre stage, and the plot mechanism deriving from said theme is powerful, to an almost Ghibli-esque extent. It's a breath of fresh air, no doubt, and possibly the main reason I find the films strangely affecting. It's as if, I'm suddenly 14 again, and love is distant yet comforting. Once more I looked out of my window on a rainy afternoon, skies overcast, fat drops of rainwater resonant against the glass windowpane, and Claire Littley's cover version of Fly Me to the Moon started playing in my head...

Damn, it'd be nice to watch RoE 3.0 in theatres (for once!!!) next summer.