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EuropeanQoheleth
Reviews
Messiah: Trial (2020)
Responding to another review
Sigh It wouldn't be the internet without dismissive antitheist rhetoric. Wsv calls God a magic dude in the sky. Yet more of the antitheists lumping together anything they don't agree with. If ''magic'' or ''superstition'' is anything they don't agree with then these words don't mean much. If x just means ''thing I don't agree with'' then x could be anything anyone arbitrarily decides it is. As for having faith in people now that seems to me a delusion. How many more awful things must people do to each other all of the time in every continent before the human race realises how rotten it is? If the gods are all delusions and if humanity invented them like the antoheists claim then actually it's people who are the problem.
Shameless: Lost (2019)
Responding to another review
Sigh Internet antitheism. Every year it's as bad as the last. AA try to help people but davidson here he calls it a myth pushing cult presumably because they talk about ''God; whatever you conceive Him to be''. The more thei nternet anitheist call something a cult or a myth the more I think that these words are absolutely meaningless coming from them; anything they don't agree with seems to be a myth or a cult so they're not making anything else look bad, they make themselves look extreme. If these people are so much smarter than everybody else like they think they are then why do they not have the brains to figure this out? Well the guy called having children a selfish act of capitalism (fail to see how it's either of these things) so I guess ridiculous hyperbole is to be expected.
Manifest: Icing Conditions (2020)
sigh Here I Go Again
Well an alternative rock act is in the soundtrack so of course it's rubbish. Now on to one of the other reviews; that it's an allegory for fundamentalism. Well he then says it's like religion as a whole so...he's saying it's an allegory for all religion and not fundamentalism then? He says it's about blindly follwoing stuff which is rich coming from an internet atheist; the sort of people constantly regurgitating the four horsemen's talking points since the late 2000s. He says he's surprised the show wasn't cancelled. I'm not unfortunately; if something being pollyannaish was grounds for it being cancelled then Moracle On 34th Street would never have been made (oh how I wish it was). Long story short the samei nternet antitheist rubbish yet again; ''It appears (to me) like the worst aspect of religion (actually the way some diehards APPROACH religion rather than religion itself) so this is like a religion and therefore bad''. For a bunch of people who say the Bible is an old book the internet atheism sure never improves with each passing year.
Slipknot: Disasterpieces (2002)
Despicable
As if the constant negative reviews and far right hyperbole weren't enough fedor8 now for some reason is stooping to dumping on people's appearances. When you're in a hole, stop digging; don't point a high-powered drill at the earth and drill to the earth's core. If ever there was a case for an account being banned it's his. I have enough problems without constantly running into his tiresome, opinionated rants which I doubt anybody else appreciates either. When does it end? Why can he not realise his ''efforts'' aren't achieving anything? Have you no restraint? At long last have you no decency left sir?
Shin seiki Evangelion Gekijô-ban: Air/Magokoro wo, kimi ni (1997)
Well that was (not) worth my time
There's a Gift Grub skit where Ronan Keating tries to get an acting job and one of the parts he tries for is Gone With The Wind Again in which Scarlett O'Hara asks ''Rhett, if you go again where will I go again? What will I do again?'' This film is like that.
There's pointless Christian symbolism in a work that espouses secular existentialism, again. Shinji is cowering even though if he doesn't fight there'll be even more death and destruction, again. There's some quite horrific images, again. Disgusting and unsubtle sexual imagery, again. A lot of images thrown together that I'm convinced never meant anything to begin with and the fanpeople are reading too much into it, again. Shots that go on for too long (in spite of all of the sponsors they had this time so presumably it wasn't the budget this time) again. I knew I wouldn't like it but I gave it a chance, again. There was an unsatisfying ending, again. Vanity of vanities saieth Qoheleth, there is nothing new under the Evangelion sun.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Discrimination (2017)
At least he stopped strawmanning God
He says that to have a society that's free for everyone the ability to discriminate should be kept in check after he brought up a hypothetical bakery refusing to make a Nazi cake and also refusing to make a gay marriage cake. What liberals fail to remember in these cases is that these cakes could be got elsewhere and so the people looking for them don't actually go without them.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Natural Law Theory (2016)
You know how this goes
Hank objects to natural law theory saying that if we were built with the ability to seek and recognise the natural law then why do we violate it all the time? I respond that we also have the ability to be rational yet we do stupid things all of the time, the ability to get along with people who are different yet we're tribalistic all of the time but nobody infers from those examples that rationality or getting along with people who are different don't exist. Nobody will exhibit behaviour x everywhere at all times and if there are so many people on the planet then a lot of things will happen all of the time.
He brings up Hume's objection that just because things are a certain way that's not necessarily how things ought to be and says that survival and sex are natural desires but these could lead us to commit murder or sexual assault. However, natural law doesn't exist in isolation to other laws; the Church says murder and sexual assault are inherently wrong and so murder and sexual assault are misuses of natural desires and the problem is with the offenders and not the laws themselves.
He asks rhetorically what if people can't or don't have a children; is that a sin? If he had only done a little research he would have seen that the church doesn't teach that not having children is wrong.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Divine Command Theory (2016)
MORE Internet Atheist Talking Points
(Internet atheism must be the worst of all possible atheisms since if it was any worse it wouldn't exist).
He does one of the atheist chestnuts about the Bible forbidding stuff that we today don't see any problem with. As usual with the atheists these verses are from a few books...in one Testament...the Old Testament.
He says that if you've read your Bible you'll know that God commands killing when He feels like it but he uses the example of Abraham being ordered to kill Isaac but if you've read your Bible and even if you haven't you'll know that the point was not that Isaac would actually be killed; He was testing Abraham's loyalty and it's not too unreasonable to test the loyalty of a human given that He took the Israelites out of captivity and they then worshiped a golden calf as opposed to the all powerful being that had actually helped them.
He says that if something is good because God commands it then that makes a tautology; God commands what God commands but Hank didn't tell us what is right and wrong or why it's right and wrong. If there aren't any good reason to abandon your current views you're justified in sticking with them.
If God referred to another source there would be a source that would be better than Him in some way but as a perfect being there couldn't be something better than God in ANY way and so the 2nd horn of the euthyphro dilemma can't possibly be true.
"How do we know which rules to follow and which ones not to follow?" he asks. Well if God appointed a leader of His church then it's a safe bet that that this leader would have the authority to decide which rules do and do not apply given his knowledge of scripture and the nature of God. Jesus (God the son) said to Peter that he was the rock on which the church would be built and obviously this wasn't a literal rock. The successors to Peter are either the Popes or the Patriarchs of Constantinople since Protestants have no hope of claiming that any of their churches were the ones Christ founded as Protestantism didn't come about until 1517.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Determinism vs Free Will (2016)
Sawing off the tree branch one sits on
He says that determinism is true because our brains are physical things and so would be as deterministic as any other physical thing. This however assumes that materialism is true; which it isn't. According to materialism nothing exists except the physical but there isn't any physical evidence for this and therefore it's self refuting; a sort of atheistic sola scriptura.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Indiana Jones & Pascal's Wager (2016)
15 episodes in and still no better
He brings up Russell's teapot but the problem with this analogy used to criticise religion is that a teapot comes from someone, using something on purpose to make the teapot and at some point in the future we could make a rocket that could carry people to Jupiter and they could toss the teapot into space. It doesn't come from nowhere, by nothing, for nothing and at random which is how the very universe itself came about on an atheist worldview. The teapot analogy also fails in that it says you can't prove a negative but we certainly can; we can prove that Nairobi is not the capital of Ireland nor is Tokyo or Reykjavik.
He says that if people don't approach belief in a rational way they could end up killing people or denying rights to certain groups. Denying rights to certain people isn't inherently wrong; rights are based on things outside of themselves. The liberal approach to rights nowadays seems to be that people should get to do this or that because they want to but on that grounds you're justified in denying people rights because you want to do so and the other is that morality is relative so you can't say no to someone getting to do what they want but if morality is relative you also don't have any reason to say yes to people being allowed to do whatever they want. As for killing people well yes murder is wrong but surely self defense is fine and if people will want to murder you for your beliefs (Stephen Farrow for example) you're justified in wanting to kill them in self defense for your beliefs.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Conspiracy Theories & Epistemic Responsibility (2016)
Internet Skepticism; ''I don't believe in x and I don't believe in y either, therefore x is like y, checkmate other side.''
He implies that it's epistemically irresponsible to be religious since wrong beliefs can have negative consequences both for you and people around you. If this episode was before the other episodes about religion then this wouldn't be too much of a problem; obviously to make a claim first and then say that you'll give reasons is fair enough; you can't be sure that someone doesn't have a point even if they're wrong until you've heard the reasons but in this philosophy series he gave his reasons first, they didn't hold up and then he made his claim which is false since the reasons behind it are false. In any case surely it's atheism that's an irresponsible worldview; if you think the very universe itself came from nowhere, by nothing, for nothing and at random you can't do science properly or have a consistent worldview. If the universe is a physical thing and so is a bunsen burner you could just sit in the lab with hand outstretched and wait for a bunsen burner to just pop into your hand from nowhere, by nothing rather than just getting off of your backside and picking up a bunsen burner.
Crash Course: Philosophy: The Problem of Evil (2016)
Schroedinger's Atheism; God's not real but He's bad
He says that "Why is there evil?" is one of the least answerable questions there is but actually it's very answerable.
He says if God is all knowing He knows about the evil in the world, if He is all powerful He can stop it and that if He is all good then he would stop the evil. A problem with this is that it assumes there aren't any good reasons for Him to allow us to suffer which the atheists never are able to prove but I can think of a reason; we're antifragile. Antifragile means when something takes a beating although it doesn't get away unscathed the experience causes it to improve and suffering therefore improves us. For example with the suffering I've seen from nasty youtube comments I know not to read responses to my comments and this prevents me from getting into an even worse mood than I tend to be in. Not only therefore is suffering not pointless but it is beneficial and to prevent it would be to prevent a means by which we can improve; something a loving father wouldn't do. There's no contradiction between God allowing suffering and being loving.
He brings up about Old Testament verses in which God wipes out whole populations for bad behaviour and says that God isn't all good as a result. But by what standard? As an atheist how would Hank choose what's evil; many atheists deny that objective or absolute good or evil exist and the few atheists that did come up with a moral system were just renaming; Nietzsche's will to power was simply selfishness and might makes right and therefore not morality but subjectivism and strength. Rand was simply Nietzsche made political and Machiavelli's moral theories were also selfishness. Under evolutionary theory (which of course the atheists accept and rightly so) then we're better off cooperating in order to survive and so the "moralities" of the main atheist thinkers are actually bad for us and should be rejected. In fact, on a might makes right or selfishness worldview God was well within his rights to destroy populations; He wanted to and He could; a gold standard exercise in Nietzsche's will to power! On an atheist worldview, in any case, the Bible is a load of rubbish so God never killed anyone anyway so there's nothing for the atheist to object to and so if God doesn't exist in any case then He isn't evil.
He brings up "natural evil" by which he actually means suffering. There's no moral dimension to natural things like disease or hurricanes; they simply exist. I refer you to my 2nd point in this section.
He says you can't say that evil (again he misuses the term and means suffering) makes us stronger because evil can kill us. True but not always; most suffering doesn't kill us and so most suffering is worth experiencing. If we got comfortable in this life we would take our minds of off earthly things and would then behave badly (the Catholic Church before the Reformation and the western countries in the 21st century anyone?) and endanger our passage into Heaven; a place of much more happiness for a much longer duration. It would be a faustian bargain.
Crash Course: Philosophy: What Is God Like? (2016)
Regurgitated Ad Nauseam Internet Atheist Talking Points Part III
He mentions that God being omniscient,omnipotent,omnibenevolent, omnitemporal and omnipresent aren't mentioned in the Bible. The idea that your religious ideas can only come from the Bible is itself not found in the Bible so this objection is irrelevant. Worse yet he's demonstrably wrong that God's omnipotence isn't in the Bible; in Job chapter 42 verses 1 and 2 it says "Then Job answered the LORD and said: I know that you can do all things and that no purpose of yours can be hindered."
He brings up the one about "Could God make a rock so heavy that He couldn't lift it?" Well there would be no point to making this rock in the first place. On Earth we have no need for another rock and in Heaven a rock wouldn't be of any use anyway; Heaven is perfect and you can't improve upon perfection. Whether God could or could not do something that's pointless anyway is irrelevant; pointlessness is a defect and since God is perfect he wouldn't do something that's pointless.
He brings up another common objection that since God is all knowing and omnitemporal he exists in the past, present and future and so he knows the future but He also gave us free will so is freedom just an illusion he gave us to make us feel like we're in control? As Massimo Pigliucci (an atheist) pointed out on an episode of Question Time you might see a car about to hit the wall but that doesn't mean you'll stop it from hitting the wall. Hank tries in vain to respond to this but fails to realise that if God is all knowing; He knows that you could change your mind, which would make a different future and being all knowing God knows what that future would be like and so his previous objection that God's attributes contradict one another doesn't hold up. There's also the fact that He knows that we could make different decisions than the ones we are currently on course to make and so He knows what the future would be like if we made those decisions as opposed to the ones we are currently likely to make. For example He knew what would happen if Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa and what would have happened if Hitler had not launched Operation Barbarossa but He didn't influence Hitler to pick either option and so we do have free will to an extent.
He asks about could God sin and says that if God is all powerful He could sin but if He is all good then He can't so there's a contradiction. If could means is able to then of course He can sin but again there's no point; He has nothing to gain by it and if He did something which He tells us not to do that would undermine his credibility and also not only would nobody benefit from that but there would be unnecessary suffering and to make, rather than allow, people to suffer unnecessarily would be pointless and therefore not something a perfect being would do. If could means might then it's not the case that he might sin as I've just demonstrated.
He brings up about if we ask God for something in prayer well He knows already what's best for us so it doesn't matter whether we pray for it or not and that if it's something we're better off not having then it's best we don't get it. This seems reasonable as far as things which we are able to get for ourselves but let's say it was both something that would be good for us and something we can't get for ourselves for example a miracle that would make a previously wicked person change their ways and so be a benefit to the world as opposed to yet another broken bone in society's body. Well we can't get it ourselves but God can so we ought to ask Him; He may have wanted to do it anyway but asking God for something morally good to happen is a morally good thing to do; an open display of a commitment to righteousness and so we should ask for this. Hank admits that there would be benefits to asking for things in prayer even if the things asked for in the prayers aren't granted but then restates his mistaken belief that God's attributes contradict.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Aquinas and the Cosmological Arguments (2016)
Regurgitated Ad Nauseam Internet Atheist Talking Points Part II
He says that St. Thomas Aquinas came up with 5 arguments for God existing in the hope that if one wouldn't work then if there were 5 at least one would work. He doesn't explain why he thinks this is why Aquinas came up with 5 and, say it with me everybody, the same could be said about atheism; if one argument would be enough to prove atheism why are there dozens? Ironic that he accused Anselm of begging the question in episode 9 when he clearly begs the question here within a minute of the video beginning.
He says that Aquinas isn't necessarily right in thinking that there couldn't have been an infinite regress. However, in a regress one thing came before another, another came before that and so on and for something to have come before something else then obviously it was there in the past but an infinite regress therefore means that there was an infinite past which is a contradiction in terms; if the past was eternal we'd still be in it but the past by definition is what we're no longer in.
He says that Aquinas' arguments don't prove that it was the one God of Christianity that's true; yeah but if they hold up then it's curtains for atheism and agnosticism and then other arguments can be made for which god or gods exist. What does an atheist care what the circumference of a square circle is if square circles don't exist?
He says that if God caused the universe then what caused God. I'm surprised that someone with his intelligence would ask this question as God by His very nature is timeless; nothing caused Him because He was already there.
Crash Course: Philosophy: Anselm and the Argument for God (2016)
Regurgitated Ad Nauseam Internet Atheist Talking Points Part I
He says that in theology atheism isn't an option but he seems to forget that there are religions that don't have a belief in God/gods. Maybe I'm splitting hairs here but anyway.
He talks about the back and forth between St Anselm (author of the weakest version of the ontological argument, usually the only version internet atheists bother to address) and Gaunilo (a French monk who parodied the ontological argument by saying that it could prove the existence of anything for example it would be better for the best island you can think of to exist and therefore it does exist). He says that Anselm responding to Gaunilo's island objection by saying that God is a necessary being is begging the question. It isn't however. To beg the question it would have to make one ask " Why is God a necessary being?" but it doesn't; as a nonphysical being God isn't made of anything and so doesn't depend for His existence on anything else and to posit something as an explanation you don't have to explain the explain the explanation, otherwise we'd go on forever explaining. ("What's the difference between an invisible, intangible gardener and no gardener at all?"). One used by Antony Flew against religion. Ah but here's the thing; if there's a garden there's a gardener; otherwise you've got just another indistinct piece of grass that will get overgrown, the animals can trample and ruin the flowers willy nilly and sooner or later it can't be considered a garden as opposed to nothing in particular. Another reason why the invisible gardener is a poor objection is that if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it; say it fell on an uninhabited island and then lightning set the forest on fire and then the tree is gone well even though nobody was around to hear it it fell nonetheless and so whether or not something exists doesn't depend on our very limited human ability to experience it. Nobody was around to hear the Big Bang and yet a lot of people (myself included) believe that it happened!
Kidô senshi Gundam ZZ: Pureryûdo ZZ (1986)
Nothing special
This is essentially a recap episode (though we're briefly introduced to the new characters as well) for the Gundam series as a whole thus far. Such a thing is hardly necessary nowadays as we don't have to wait until next week for another episode but it seems a strange choice for the time as well; starting a show with a recap episode is something I've hardly ever seen if at all. I could have done without hearing Zeta Gundam's annoying first opening theme but not a bad episode otherwise.
Shôjo kakumei Utena (1997)
Repetitive
In each episode there's a ''Do you know do you know?'' scene, the talk of breaking the world's shell and a duel in which someone tries to win Anthy from Utena. Utena is on the backfoot but then magic and Utena wins. Wash, rinse, repeat. The walk up the stairs before the duel got so tiresome that even the makers realised it and sped it up 2/3 of the way through the show.
Supposedly there is a lot of symbolism in Utena (could the sword slashing the rose be a reference to sex? Or maybe it's just another inspiration the show took from The Rose of Versailles) but knowing anime fandom I have my suspicion that actually there isn't any subtext etc. And that it isn't accurate to say I don't get it but rather there's nothing to get.
Shinseiki Evangelion (1995)
The 2nd most overrated anime ever (One Piece is the most)
Almost every anime with a rating above 5 is overrated but this is the most overrated anime in history. Legend of the Galactic Heroes has a demented fanbase as well but it's far smaller.
The characters are unlikable;
I've seen Haganai, I know unlikable characters when I see them! Misato is an alcoholic and little more than a fanservice character at first but for some reason she was chosen to look after Shinji. Asuka is an annoying jerk who really needs to chill out. Shinji himself starts as a poor man's Amuro Ray and never becomes a 3 star Amuro. The thing about Luke Skywalker and Amuro Ray is that they started off whiny but that was to be expected and they matured. They are heroes. Shinji doesn't mature; he's a protagonist but not a hero as such.
Overused elements
There are 6 slaps in this 26 episode series. I know it's a military organisation but surely there are better ways of dealing with people ON THE SAME SIDE? Robots going ape happens 4 times if I remember correctly. Couldn't they have built better ones?
Wish fulfillment for young guys
(Just look at the ratings statistics, males like this show a fair bit more than females).
The protagonist is a young male who gets to live with a (slightly) attractive woman and be the person responsible for saving the world. Were that not your cup of tea there's the shy girl and pale skinned, blue eyed redhead for him. Now people may say ''but what's wrong about wish fulfillment for a certain demographic? A lot of anime is like that.'' True but people tout Evangelion as being more than that, as being some 5 star highbrow masterpiece. It isn't. The psychological stuff at the later episodes is there because they ran low on money and had to economise somehow so you get the elevator scene and the Kaoru about to be strangled scene as well. People then mistake the confusing stuff as being deep. The reason people like supposedly deep anime is not because it's actually great and deep but because it makes people feel smart for watching them. I've been there; in 2009 Chaos; Head and Lain were my favourite anime and I thought they were 5 star artisanal masterpieces but I moved on (Chaos; Head unfortunately has a Rei clone, Ayase. Lain isn't bad but it's not good either.)
Stayed too close to Gundam's long shadow
The first episode was a blatant ripoff of the first episode of Gundam, somebody gets slapped and there's a red suit. Early on the show was too like Gundam but when it tried to do its own thing that didn't work out too well either.
For about 13 years I kept running into videos of Evangelion, memes about it, people saying it's deep and revolutionary and one tvtropes article picture after another of it (yeah, in 2008 and 2009 I actually used that postmodernist piece of tripe of an excuse for a website). Based on a weekend of research I did years ago I expected to find every episode OK but that I would end up hating the last 2 episodes. Actually of the first 24 episodes I found 8 of them bad and I did indeed hate episode 25 but 26 was OK. On balance then I was even more disappointed than I thought I would be and I had spent 4 days watching the whole thing (in Japanese with subtitles) just because of its reputation, which like a lot of reputations is a pile of nonsense.
Long story short weigh voices; don't number them (as Immanuel Kant had said).
Shinseiki Evangelion: Owaru Sekai (1996)
Relativist tripe
Having watched JesuOtaku's review of Evangelion back in the day I was worried about the show spouting relativism (postmodern existentialism as JO called it although both postmodernism and existentialism are both relativist so it seems redundant) and that it would be in the last 2 episodes that it would do it. I thought I was in for a lucky escape but then the 19th minute came along (what is it with Evangelion and things changing in the 19th minute?).
Ritsuko says that ''only what you can feel for yourself right now is fact''. Er no, that's a feeling and the facts don't care about Eva fanboys' feelings.
Fuyutsuki says that ''and your memory of those things will become the truth for you''. Nonsense. There's no such thing as truth for me and truth for you. I remember on youtube someone saying that KWS' cover of Please Don't Go was the original version but when someone pointed out that it was KC and the Sunshine Band who sang the original he said ''Well it was the first for me'' and then the one who had responded to him said that reality doesn't work that way. Our memories are subjective; truth isn't.
Ritsuko says that there are truths that change with time but generally they're less important than the ones that don't. Which political party is in power changes but the fact that humans are tribal doesn't.
After Shinji asks what reality is Rei says it's his world and the Nerv men agree with this. Again this is nonsense. If someone thinks the law of gravity doesn't exist and then jumps out of an airplane at 20,000 feet they'll die no matter how strongly they might not believe in the law of gravity.
I can see why relativists would like Evangelion but if you're not one then don't waste your time on this darn show.
Shinseiki Evangelion: Saigo no Shisha (1996)
Had promise but it did (not) fulfill it
Shinji meets a boy called Kaoru and it seems that Kaoru has a crush on him but that could just be a ruse since he is in fact an angel, apparently sent by Seele to set things in motion. He and Shinji have a very tense fight but with Misato on the verge of ordering a self destruct of the base Shinji gets the upper hand and traps Kaoru in his Eva's fist...for a minute and 3 seconds. Another pointlessly long scene due to Fianna Fail level bad budgeting. The last 2 episodes await me...the only ones bar the first episode that I expected to hate. Oh well, as Magnus Magnusson would say ''I've started so I'll finish.''
Shinseiki Evangelion: Semete, Ningen Rashiku (1996)
The infamous elevator and mind rape scenes
Asuka is understandably still upset about her mother's suicide but is also still annoyed about having supposedly lost in some way to Shinji. 10 minutes in the elevator scene starts in which Asuka and Rei are just staring, and not at each other either, for a full minute punctuated only by a sneeze from Asuka. I know that Gainax were low on money at this point but this is ridiculous. Asuka slaps Rei (that's about the 4th slap in the show now) and then leaves. For the record the elevator scene as a whole lasts 1 minute and 54 seconds. Asuka then declares she hates everyone (hmm, a redhaired, blue eyed, pale skinned teenager from Europe who hates everyone, just like me in my teens) which I can certainly understand. The mind rape begins 16 minutes in (and ends 21 minutes in) which is creepy at first but at 19 minutes in they just keep recycling footage and this goes on for a minute which is the problem with the late episodes of Evangelion; the psychological stuff was put in not to be deep but because of budget trouble. They needed an excuse to keep using the same stuff. With Asuka in no state to keep fighting Gendo has Rei retrieve the lance of Longinus and she then does an Olympic worthy throw of it which somehow goes up into space and destroys the angel. Asuka is upset at being saved by Rei. OK I get that she reminds her of a doll which reminds her of her mother's mind going but it seems ridiculous still.
Shinseiki Evangelion: Otoko no Tatakai (1996)
Here we go again
Shinji is (justifiably) mad at Gendo (again) so he decides not to pilot an Eva and runs away (again) but seeing the fight not go well he decides that he wants to after all. It's the 19th episode and still Shinji doesn't get the message that there isn't any other option. He may not like piloting an Eva but if he doesn't then best case scenario someone in Nerv will die and he'll feel worse than he already did and of course worst case scenario is the human race goes extinct. It's the problems of one person against the entire human race and the only way it's gone on this long that I can think of is that they knew full well that they were pandering to young awkward guys so Shinji must have no character development. Anyway he does save the day albeit after the Eva eats the angel (yeah, it's as gruesome as it sounds) and looks genuinely horrifying. Apparently something big is about to happen. An awakening of some kind.
Shinseiki Evangelion: Shi ni Itaru Yamai, Soshite (1996)
Asuka must (not) keep acting this way
Asuka's pointless jealousy of Shinji winds up with her saying that he should take the lead, which he does and ends up getting trapped by the angel. More introspection, yay (not)! Gainax's infamous mishandling of the budget is on display as one shot (of Shinji with his eyes closed) lasts for 26 seconds and I worry that the rest of the show will be like this; pointless introspection and shots that are far too long for no reason other than Gainax had run low on money. Shinji breaks out and ends the episode in a hospital bed yet again. He looks at his hand and declares that the smell of blood is still there.
Shinseiki Evangelion: Seele, Tamashii no Za (1996)
Seems the more psychological half of the show will (not) be any better
Here we have a recap episode. These things are hardly necessary nowadays with DVDs and such but they don't seem entertaining anyway. After recapping taking up half of the episode Rei then goes on a big stream of consciousness round of psychobabble which contains the line ''I am myself.'' One of the worst lines in anime history and in what people have so often touted as one of, if not the best anime. During testing Eva 01 goes nuts (oh come on, another mech malfunction?) and tries to kill Rei after she supposedly tried to invade Shinji's mind (how the pilot's mind and the machine are so connected I don't understand).
Bokura no (2007)
Poor Man's Evangelion
Bokurano affected me. I don't mean the mood, I can certainly handle depressing anime, what I mean is the quality. Bokurano, like Gundam SEED Destiny, is the sort of anime where I watch it knowing it's bad but not too bad and with its interesting premise there's a good anime just waiting to come out so I keep watching it, waiting patiently for the good anime to emerge. It never does and I give up. With Bokurano however I had made it to the last episode so I finished it off.
Chiaki Ishikawa sings the opening and ending themes quite well plus the characters and animation are tolerable but somehow it's just not fun to watch. In a way Bokurano is unbelievable. With its young pilots operating a huge mech to defend against invaders not of this Earth it's similar to Evangelion which is similar to Space Runaway Ideon with its ending and a teenage boy piloting a huge mech to defend his home against the invaders who up to that point were having little trouble against the international alliance just like Mobile Suit Gundam. In other words Bokurano is a 00's anime which is like a 90's anime which is like an 80's anime which is like a 70's anime. Had I been familiar with Evangelion when I started watching Bokurano obviously I would have given it a miss and watching it at night in December wasn't the best idea either but it's not any more fun in April and unlike the manga the misery in the show is tolerable. Though if I remeber correctly they also left out the whole reason why it was called Bokurano in the first place...