hroughout the last few installments, Neon Genesis Evangelion degenerated into a monster-of-the-week cliche, with a new mysterious Angel invader popping up nearly every episode to challenge the NERV agency's child-pilots and their robotic Evangelion battle-suits. Despite the increasingly innovative natures of these monsters, the series was getting predictable.
That trend ends suddenly with a series of new developments, thankfully having more to do with the people behind NERV than its never-ending wave of battles. The newest episodes focus more sharply on the cast, as Commander Misato finally comes to terms with her old lover Ryoji, Gendo Ikari's darkest plans slowly push their way out into the light, Rei seems almost ready to face her feelings, goodhearted jock Toji Suzuhara pokes his head diffidently back into the picture, and Shinji and Asuka actually kiss ("to pass the time," she claims).
But the most critical disclosures have to do with the Evas themselves, and the critical information about them that Gendo and NERV have been withholding all along. Their true nature, and Gendo's goals for them, push Evangelion sharply toward its past and future simultaneously. On one hand, Shinji makes the same choices and confronts the same consequences he faced in the series' opening, when he first abandoned NERV--but this time, he makes his decision with a strength of character and resolve he's only recently developed. On the other hand, Evangelion seems to be barreling toward its conclusion with ever-increasing power and momentum.
Philosophy is a walk on a slippery robot
Of the newest installments, Genesis 0:7 is easily the weakest. Its episode 13 hauls out yet another Angel, this time a weak Star Trek-esque nanotech threat that plays out amid a backdrop of frantic editing and lackluster revelations about Ritsuko's mother. Episode 14 features a farcically dry government summation of all the battles to date, with the emotion and pathos wrung out of them to ironic effect. Despite cosmic poetry and archly significant Dead Sea Scrolls references, these vignettes are little more than a speed bump before the stunning developments that follow.
The six episodes of Genesis 0:8 through 10 form a breakthrough story arc that outshines even the series' former highlights. As Shinji faces a lingering death inside one of the newest alien invaders, director Hideaki Anno puts aside his obvious love of attenuated still tableaux and experiments with iconic images and challenging internal dialogues. Shinji's attempts to face himself are written deftly and executed with rare visual playfulness, and his personal breakthroughs, while not conclusive, are a traumatic victory the series has begged for since its first episode.
Even the mecha battles reach a new height of feral savagery, and Anno's animation takes a corresponding quantum leap. The sequences involving berserk Evas are unsettling, especially in their unexpected gore content, but they're also eerily beautiful. It's hard not to wonder how they'd appear on a full-size theater screen. And it's going to be harder to wait for the last few installments. If only the final payoff is as thrilling as this buildup...
