Eduard_Khil

Neon Genesis Evangelion is a show with a legacy as complicated as its own lore. It is irrefutably one of most important anime series of all time, if not one of the most important works of pop culture for an entire generation. But it’s also one of the single most difficult to explain series in existence. The show is a profoundly complex mix of Christian imagery, Jewish mysticism, post-war atomic paranoia and your standard-fare Japanese giant battling robot puberty allegory. All of these themes have been compacted into 26 episodes, in which the majority are 20 minutes long, resulting in one of the most maligned endings in TV history. An ending which still has people furious over twenty years later. It can be argued that the chosen ending, focused almost entirely within the mind of series protagonist Shinji Ikari, is not only the most satisfactory way the show could have ended - but also what is fully responsible for turning a Great show into a Groundbreaking show.
It is important to acknowledge exactly why it is that people hate Neon Genesis Evangelion’s ending so much. We spend a full season with our heroes, Shinji, Rei, and Asuka as they attempt to thwart a cataclysmic invasion of angels and as the mysterious organization SEELE attempts to bring about something called The Human Instrumentality Project. But our final two episodes, as the Instrumentality Project begins and the souls of all humanity begin to merge, shifts gears to a purely internal point of view. It’s a drastic refocusing and change of narrative format, and we’re presented with a psychological profiling of our main characters in the form of internal monologues. The audience is left with questions like “What actually happens to Shinji, what actually happens to Asuka, and what… actually happens?”
The trouble is, all these questions are in a sense, meaningless. Or, rather, meaningless when considered outside the context of Shinji.
But to truly understand our main character Shinji, we need to understand series creator Hideaki Anno. Despite Anno’s incredibly robust catalog of high caliber animation credits, his skill as an animator isn’t responsible for Neon Genesis Evangelion’s lasting impact. At least, not alone. It’s his lifelong battle with clinical depression that's most responsible. His search for meaning and personal resolution, his growing disillusionment with otaku culture, went on to inform every decision he made when he was given the opportunity to make his own show, the one that would go on to be his masterwork.
This is what the Neon Genesis Evangelion is actually about. Hideaki Anno’s own battle with depression.
Shinji, as a character, is an audience surrogate, yes - and it’s easy to be distracted by the power fantasy of being charged with piloting a giant robot to save the world. But he’s also an author surrogate, and the show is fundamentally built around Shinji’s core depression. From the moment we meet Shinji, we’re introduced to his depression. Immediately, we understand the distance he feels from his father Gendo, and his inability to be close to people. This is his war. His battle is not with the invading angels, it’s with himself. People who derisively suggest that Shinji, just go get in his robot and don't seem to recognize that he’s fighting his battle even when he’s not physically fighting. And when he does physically fight, it’s only in the service of trying to make his dad proud and close the distance between them. This is something directly acknowledged in episode 12. We see most of the show unfold from Shinji’s point of view, which justifies the overbearingly fatalistic tone of the show. After the near mass-extinction of the human species, barely spends any time setting up the stakes of saving the world - it overwhelmingly feels like all is already lost. A relatable feeling for anyone who has struggled with depression. The show isn’t ABOUT saving the world - not holistically.
It’s about these characters saving themselves. A good show will tell you what it’s about, and time and time and time again, Evangelion does exactly this. Every single element of the show points back toward the same end. Shinji wanting to be closer to his distant father Shinji wanting to feel close to his dead mother Rei’s inability to relate to other people Asuka’s desperation to feel valid and wanted Gendo wanting to be with Yui again Misato expressing her sexuality to feel close to anyone, Adam and Lillith attempting to rejoin The very goal of the Human Instrumentality Project, bringing everyone together with no boundaries.
The lore and backstory are this very same theme. The lore is rich with things Hideaki Anno turned to for solutions. Theology and mysticism are so present that they’re impossible to miss, but most apparent to references to the Kabbalah and searching for unity of the soul through angelic means. Then there’s philosophy, transparently present in episode titles like The Hedgehog’s Dilemma, which is a nod to Schopenhauer’s parable of people’s inability to become emotionally close with each other without hurting each other.
And there’s psychology - Freud being the obvious reference point, Shinji’s maternal attachment — his literalized return to the womb by being placed inside a robot with the soul of his mother, that effectively floods with amniotic fluid.
Then there are the actual science fiction inventions, like A.T. fields - a field described as a barrier to the soul, or a literalized obstruction to people becoming close together. Ultimately, every single theme and every single device in the show comes back to an intra-personal struggle with meaning and depression. And THIS is what the show is actually about, everything else is just set dressing. The final two episodes are not some random internal monologue, and despite popular belief, they’re also not the accidental result of budget cuts. This is an authored attempt by Hideaki Anno to break through to the audience with the absolute most pertinent element of the show: that despite theology, despite psychology, despite philosophy, despite everything, one truth remains clear: final healing comes from within.
Shinji recognizing his own depression, his own inability to connect, the singular focus of the character, comes to a head the one way it can. In his head. And him coming to the conclusion that he needs to accept himself, accept suffering, and learn to be better is the single most mature way this show could end.