End of Evangelion and what it means to me.

The End of Evangelion is as the title suggests is the ending to a series called
Evangelion. Initially, the series ended with Episodes 25 and 26 and was very
confusing to the fans, the creators had ran out of budget to do a lot of animation
so they had to resort to doing something a little different.
To establish the characters

Shinji is the main character, hes the pilot of Evangelion Unit-01. He

is a very emotionally damaged but caring person, he wants praise
yet fears others in fear of being hurt. This is a result of seeing his
mother die when he was at the young age of 3 and his father
abandoning him.

Asuka is the pilot of Evangelion Unit-02. She seeks to put herself

above others as the creators put it, constantly striving to be the
best. This has more layers than initially shown, with her mother
having killed herself, prior to that acting like a doll was Asuka, this
shaped Asuka to assert her independence and act as an adult. She
has a crush on Shinji but as both of them are unable at sharing their
feelings, this leads to a lot of Asuka taunting Shinji.

Rei is the most mysterious of the three Evangelion pilots, she is the
pilot of Unit-00. She is very confused with her emotions, she
connects with Shinjis father after he saves her life, but begins to
distance herself from him in favour of Shinji. After Shinji had saved
her life on one occasion, she was unsure of how to react as Shinji
was crying in happiness, so she was told to smile by him.

Misato works within the organisation that Shinji, Asuka and Rei are
with. She becomes the caretaker of Shinji in Episode 1 and later
takes in Asuka as she is introduced into the series. She was
estranged from her father, but after his death to save her in
Second Impact (this concept will come up later), she had very
mixed emotions as she couldnt live with a relationship anymore.
She later fell in love with someone who reminded her of her father,
and ended up running away. She is a competent and strong Tactical
director at work but her home life is more goofy.

The final two episodes delved into the psyche of the characters, Shinji an
emotional wreck after the death of someone that he believed truly cared for him
(as a major part of his character is being nervous and believing people were
against him), Asuka had her mind attacked forcing her to come to terms with
some of her relationships with others and herself which really just ruins her
mentally and Misato questioning what she wants. This is all relates back to the
main character, Shinji having to connect with others to find who he is.

But to get back to the topic of End of Evangelion It starts off in a very odd
manner, Shinji is sitting alongside Asuka as she lays in her hospital bed
recovering from having her mind attacked. She is comatose and Shinji is
pleading for her to wake up as he needs her help to cope with his feelings. He
shakes her and pleads for her to say something (even if it means he gets
berated). He accidentally reveals her breast while shaking her then starts to
masturbate, afterwards calling himself the lowest of the low. This act fits in with
Shinjis emotional state throughout the film. He has seen death and destruction,
some caused by himself (including the murder of the only person he feels that
understands him and the near murder of a friend that came from their
Evangelion being infected by the alien enemy throughout the series, leaving his
friend with a missing leg).
It cuts to Shinjis father, Gendo, speaking to the organisation Seele. They are
discussing using Shinji and his Unit-01 to continue something called the Human
Instrumentality Project that would be used from Third Impact, which involves
everyone being reborn and becoming one with each other, at least for Seele.
Gendos plan is to use it to reunite with his wife and Shinjis mother. It had been
revealed that earlier in the series that the Evangelions contained the souls of
the pilots mothers, this is the case with Shinji, his mothers soul is trapped within
Unit-01 (as is Asukas mother, her soul was transferred into Unit-02 after her
death but well get onto that later).
Rei leaves her house in another scene, before she leaves the scene cuts to the
broken glasses of Gendo, this shows that the bond between her and Shinjis
father is now completely shattered, as she was given the glasses after Gendo
had risked his life to save her, creating a strong bond between the two. Now that
bond has broken.
Shinji is laying down with his MP3 player, in the series he had used it as an
escape from reality, but it shows that the device is out of battery, symbolic of the
fact that its time for Shinji to confront the world.
An attack on the Nerv HQ (organisation Shinji, Misato, etc. work at, not really
important enough to bring up before) orchestrated by Seele and the UN, its
pretty much a massacre as they arent prepared to fight Humans. Its advised to
get Shinji and Asuka to their Evangelions, despite being in no shape to fight, with
Shinji being a complete wreck and Asuka is barely conscious. Rei is nowhere to
be found, Gendo locates her but they go somewhere else to initiate Gendos
plan.
Shinji is then found by Misato, but he is just broken and claims that he wants to
die, she tries to get him to go along and help but he is very unresponsive and
only wanting of Asukas help. Shinji is told about another Evangelion series
that will be used to achieve Third Impact and its his job to destroy them, but
again hes still very broken at this point in time and sits in a fetal position.
Asuka is then shown in her Evangelion, also in a fetal position, stating shes still
alive and doesnt want to die over and over again. She then has flashbacks to

her mother and eventually realises her mother has been with her all along in the
Evangelion. Stating she has always been protected and watched over by her
mother, she proceeds to deliver quite the fantastic display of destruction against
the attacking forces. Seele sics their own Evangelion series on her, as part of
their bid to start Third Impact and then their Human Instrumentality Project and
they proceed to get destroyed by Asuka in another wonderfully animated scene.
As this is happening, Misato tries to convince Shinji that he needs to get in his
Evangelion, but he wont as he deems himself unable too after masturbating
over Asuka or killing his friend Kaworu. Misato has to shout at Shinji to tell him it
doesnt matter if she doesnt know where hes coming from, he cant give up and
lose hope, if he does then everyone else will be killed. He needs to answer his
own questions like why is he alive. Misato dies from a gunshot would received
earlier while escorting Shinji.
Asuka continues fighting the Evangelion series, while Rei and Gendo do down in
front of something needed to initiate Gendos plans, however they are held at
gunpoint by a Nerv employee who found out the truth behind Gendos idea. She
attempts to self-destruct the base but to no avail, Gendo then pulls out a gun,
says the truth is.. followed by silence but you can see him speaking leaving
this open to interpretation, and then he murders her.
Then during her fight, Asuka mentions her mother which provokes a reaction
from Shinji, caught by surprise, Asuka ends up being taken out by a weapon she
didnt see coming, her Evangelion also runs out of power. The Evangelion series
rebuild themselves and reactivate, then proceed to attack Asuka while shes
down and this seemingly kills her as she makes one final reach for the sky and
then is seemingly killed. Shinjis Evangelion then frees itself and gets Shinji away
to enter it, he calls out to his mother. Evangelion Unit-01 awakens and Shinji
proceeds to go up, the Evangelion sports a pair of wings, they really dont have
any known purpose though. Shinji seeing Asukas Evangelion destroyed leads to
him letting out a scream, wrapping up the first part of End of Evangelion.
While it seems convoluted, and was quite frankly challenging to explain, this is
just the tip of the iceburg. The second part is much more in tune with the original
ending that aired on TV. Part 1 did a fair amount to add context to some scenes
in the TV ending such as Asukas Evangelion at the bottom of a lake or Misato
laying on the ground.
The first half, to me, represents rebirth. Shinji and Asuka are both seen in the
fetal position, absolutely destroyed by their experiences. They both realise that
their mothers are with them which gives them the strength to try again and use
their Evangelions. This also fits in nicely with Seeles plans.