Neon Genesis Evangelion is closer to being the classic of anime than anything else in the medium. The amount of debate that follows Evangelion is absurd from the controversial ending of the TV series Asuka vs. Rei clearly Asuka is better to the craziness of End of Evangelion discussion follows. There have been so many essays written about certain characters or episodes that its mind boggling. Additionally the sheer number of shows that were influenced by Evangelion is almost to the point of incomprehension. No one can deny that Hideaki Anno has created probably the most influential and perhaps the most important anime of all time. WARNING: There may be some lighter spoilers in the second to last paragraph where I discuss some of the complaints with Evangelion feel free to skip that one if you havent seen the show yet Evangelion just did so many things right. It didnt overload you with information at the beginning it just slowly and carefully fed you information with each episode not overwhelming you with info dumps like many shows do these days. I wont say that they never info dump you but when they do its usually something that the watcher has a slight understanding of anyway making it more digestible. Piggybacking off that point it doesnt bog the watcher down with characters either. Shinji Misato and Rei are clearly the focus of the first 7 episodes and it doesnt deviate much from that. Then Asuka makes her appearance And the show gets 10000 better and the focus shifts. Evangelion is kind of clever that way with its characters sidelining even Shinji to develop whoever theyre focusing on. Of course the soundtrack is phenomenal. A Cruel Angels Thesis is one of the best openings out there even two decades later. Fly Me To The Moon is a great ending with all its different versions keeping it unique throughout 26 episodes. The regular soundtrack is good too though I dont have too much to say regarding that. Artistically youd never be able to tell that Evangelion was made in 1995. Its just so beautiful and fluidly animated that its comparable to many of the more recent anime. The color palette is something to be commented on too. The neon heh colors used to illustrate the Evas is beautiful adding a pop of color to a show that can be extremely heavy at times. A couple of things to address however are two complaints I see fairly often. Those would be the TV ending and Shinjis whining being annoying. Not to be contrarian or anything but I really liked the TV ending. In my opinion it suited the message that Evangelion was trying to get across the whole time. The message that you cant close yourself off from people push them away and expect them to treat you with respect and kindness. We see Shinji and Asuka struggling with the same problems in opposite ways throughout the entire show: connecting with others. In fact thats kind of the overarching theme of Evangelion illustrated by their struggles with the Hedgehogs Dilemma. I just think that Shinji reaching the conclusion that he did was a beautiful capstone to that struggle closing his character arc in a satisfying manner. Speaking of his character arc many people complain that Shinjis whining is unbearable. I have one simple statement to make concerning that complaint: Hes 14 with the weight of the world thrust onto his shoulders. Of course hes going to buckle under that weight would you have been able to handle that kind of pressure at 14? Its kind of a double edged sword too. If he had been too capable of handling the burden then people would complain about him like they do Kirito from Sword Art Online like that hes a Gary Stu who can do no wrong Which I disagree with by the way. But I digress. As a conclusion Evangelion is phenomenal. Sure you could debate certain aspects of its story or narrative but the fact remains that its objectively really good. I dont like it when people tell others that you have to watch a show but in Evangelions case it may be the exception. Its simply too good and its legacy too great to pass up.