20https://bestanimations.com/SignsShapes/Arrows/Left/leftarrow15.gif https://anilist.co/review/6501 20https://bestanimations.com/SignsShapes/Arrows/Right/rightarrow29.gif https://anilist.co/review/6570 This Review Contains Spoilers for Evangelion: 2.0 You Can Not Advance and End of Evangelion 520https://ghostlightning.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/utwthoraevangelion222youcannotadvancebd1080px264dtses8b521921mkvsnapshot002221.jpg Sequels can be what make or break a franchise they can be what cement a series as great or they can show that the success of the first entry was a fluke. If the first entry of a new saga plays it safe its up to the next installment to assure fans that they wont be getting the exact same thing twice looking at you The Force Awakens v. The Last Jedi. This is the task that 2009s Evangelion: 2.0 You Can Not Advance found itself straddled with. As I detailed in my review its predecessor Evangelion: 1.0 You Are Not Alone rarely deviated from the original Neon Genesis Evangelion. This was ultimately fine by me as I enjoyed the first few episodes of Evangelion enough to not mind watching them again. Plus with a new ending scene I was confident in director Hideaki Annos ability to deliver us a fresh exciting product. And after watching the movie I can assure you all that the rebuilds will be an entirely different beast from the television show. Though that neednt mean that said beast is necessarily a good one. After all one of my friends claims that 1.0 is their favorite rebuild movie expressly because its virtually the same as the original. With that in mind what do I think of the second installment of the rebuild tetralogy? Do the differences work for the story theyre trying to tell or do they bog down the product? 520https://wiki.evageeks.org/images/thumb/3/33/Eva2.22PromoRei.png/300pxEva2.22PromoRei.png I dont need to wait until the end of this review to collect my thoughts. In the time between finishing the film and sitting down to write this review I already knew that I absolutely loved this movie. In Evangelion: 2.0 You Can Not Advance we continue following Shinji Rei and the rest of NERV as they keep up the tireless fight against the Angels. Things are a bit different this time around as new characters are thrown into the mix: the fiery Asuka the smooth Kaji and the mysterious Mari. Shinji and his colleagues find themselves fighting increasingly deadly angels all the while Shinji continues to seek his fathers approval. 520https://wiki.evageeks.org/images/thumb/8/80/Eva20trailerC46mycom.jpg/300pxEva20trailerC46mycom.jpg And thats as much as I can say without giving too much away in the synopsis because besides fighting the Angels there isnt an overarching plot moving the movie forward. Fortunately the movie doesnt feel disjointed. This can be attributed to the characters and their relationships to one another being focused on. Each battle with angels either solidifies or furthers the characters motivations and/or personalities. With this while the plot could seem disjointed on paper but in practice while watching the movie everything seamlessly blends together. And speaking of battles there are a lot of them this time around. 1.0 featured three angel battles while 2.0 features five. Even the shorter ones are beautifully breathsnatchingly animated. Some of the fights are as tense as before if not moreso. The shorter ones are a lot less tense but what can I say theyre damn cool and I appreciate that theyre in the movie. Deeper meanings or no Im not going to pretend I dont enjoy the giant robots beating the shit out of monsters and other giant robots. Of course Evangelion even at its most monsteroftheweek is more than that. Thus a legitimate concern is that a whopping five battles in under two hours is too much. Honestly this is another example of sounding like something bad on paper but actually ending up being brilliant in practice. Believe it or not while watching the movie I actually thought there wasnt a lot of action compared to the first movie. This can partially be attributed to the length of some of the conflicts. Maris opening fight against The Third Angel and Asukas fight against the Seventh Angel both towards the beginning of the film each clock in at five minutes tops. A good portion of the movie then is filled with downtime. 520https://thumbs.gfycat.com/BrokenSickAmericancreamdraftsizerestricted.gif 2.0 seems to feature a lot more downtime than its predecessor showing the pilots partaking in more leisurely activities such as cooking hanging around the classroom and going on a trip to a maritime preservation facility. On first glance it might seem like this makes for a much lighter happier movie. Id agree with this sentiment to an extent. 2.0 can be much lighter and funnier than 1.0 but it can also be more cripplingly dark. As I discussed 1.0 was good at fostering a stable somber tone throughout its run. 2.0 is wildly unstable which makes for a more engaging watch. The emphasis on downtime makes it so tension is released were less on edge our guards are down. Things actually start to look up for Shinji and the gang. Gendo seems to actually be noticing his son Asukas prickliness is fading Reis coming out of her shell and theres a big party on the way. We think everything might work out when 520https://c.tenor.com/00cEC0EPzsAAAAM/hahaha.gif Our hearts are stomped on by the reality of the cruel world that the characters find themselves in. Towards the end of the film shit hits the fan and it just keeps on hitting it fecal matter flying every which way about the room. I was worried about the more comical aspects at first fearing that it would take away from the tension. Little did I know that this would be a spectacularly great thing. Downtime also helps with an aspect of the film I absolutely adore: the characters. Almost everyone seems to have a moment here from learning about Misatos past to getting another side of Gendo. We start to see Shinji coming into his own more becoming more confident in his abilities and trusting of others. He still seeks approval but hes much less of a broken birdhttps://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BrokenBird. When he runs away again at the films climax its not due to being afraid of his own lack of abilities its because hes fed up at being used believing the trust he put in others has been misplaced. In opening up he also opens himself up to his hidden aggression at times seeming as angry as the cyborg he pilots. The entire English voice cast courtesy of Funimation is terrific but whenever Spike Spencer screams as Shinji I get goosebumps. Rei as stated before opens up a fair bit and repays Shinjis kindness towards her by trying to help him with his own personal problems. Then theres Asuka Shikinami Langleyhttps://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AdaptationNameChange. 520https://wiki.evageeks.org/images/thumb/8/83/Eva222C0634.jpg/300pxEva222C0634.jpg I think its a testament to this movies handling of characterization that I genuinely felt something for Asuka. From the brief quip I made at her expense during my last review youd probably guess that I dislike Asuka. Youd actually be incorrect I loathe Asuka with every fiber of my being. A large part of this can be attributed to me disliking the prickly and abusive tsunderehttps://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Tsundere archetypes in general but Asuka in particular can be pretty nasty in how she treats Shinji. 2.0 doesnt pull any punches with Asukas introduction she immediately goes on about how much better she is than others states that she doesnt need to work with anyone calls the other Evangelion outdated test models etc. Even during her moment of vulnerability shes sure to give Shinji the moniker Stupid Shinji. Many groans were uttered at the sight of Asuka. But things begin to change. The insecure person beneath her facade seems to show herself more than I recall its obvious when she plainly states that the cockpit of the Evangelion is the only place she feels she belongs. Later in the movie Asukas humanity is showcased further when she offers to pilot a new Evangelion instead of Rei partly to allow her to attend a party. This allows me to sympathise with her now more than I ever could before shes brash and a brat but not the relentless bully that she was before. This is what allowed her misfortune to be more impactful here than it was in End of Evangelion. She finds herself hurt punished for finally putting someone else first. Its truly tragic and I genuinely felt bad at the prospect of her dying. In End of Evangelion her being torn apart by the Mass Production Evangelions didnt elicit a reaction besides horror at the gore. In the same movie Asuka being choked by Shinji didnt garner much pity either. This though was powerful. This was heartbreaking and made me come around to slightly warming up towards Asuka. 520https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/evangelion/images/b/bd/Mari27srage.png/revision/latest/scaletowidthdown/340?cb=20120518021515 Still that isnt to say I enjoyed the use of all characters. Kaji was inoffensive enough but didnt amount to much. Maris role largely amounted to showing how the events of the movie were slightly different. She doesnt add much to the story besides having a few cool action scenes which is more than I can say for Kaworu. For the past few movies Kaworus role has been simply being cryptic. His role in the last movie was to remind viewers that they werent just watching a soupedup recap movie. Especially with him appearing on the poster two times now youd think that hed do something but he doesnt have so much as a conversation with another character. His appearances have been cameos but with him touching down on Earth and essentially stealing the ending hes at least guaranteed to be more prominent in the next movie. Right? Please? 520https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/evangelion/images/a/ad/Kaworu28Rebuild1.02901.png/revision/latest?cb=20120319194657 I dont really have anything new to say in the art or music department. Things still look amazing the music whether calm or hype is awesome. Have I mentioned that I like Decisive Battle? I dont want to say the ending made the movie since I liked the preceding elements well enough but Holy Hell the ending was phenomenal. From Shinji deciding to retire at the worst possible moment to Rei and Mari launching an ultimately futile attach against the angel Mari isnt in the film much but when shes in shes in commandeering any scene shes in as her own just like Asukas Unit 02 which she somehow rocks better than Asuka herself to Shinji asserting that he is the Evangelion Unit 01 pilot to Shinji and an Ascended Unit 01 waging battle against Zeruel and saving Rei this ending was sweet this ending was tense this ending was awesome this ending was insane. I loved every moment of it and it ended on a hell of a cliffhanger. The intercharacter relations throughout the film pay off spectacularly in an ending that carried a lot of emotional weight for me. 520https://giffiles.alphacoders.com/111/111933.gif So thats what you can get out of the movie inandofitself but what about in relation to the original Neon Genesis Evangelion? Straight out the gate were treated to a completely new scenario featuring newcomer Mari Makinami Illustrious as if apologizing to the viewers that 1.0 stuck so closely to the original Evangelion. Im pretty sure thats the actual intended function of the scene because we cut to Shinji immediately after with Mari not seen again for most of the movie. The first bit of the movie proceeds like the show though with an increasing amount of changes. Towards the end things have changed significantly as Asuka is the one piloting the illfated Unit 03 instead of Toji. The ending while borrowing aspects from various episodes such as episode 23 and episode 19 is almost completely a new creation of the movie. The ending marks a distinct turning point in the Rebuild where veterans can point and distinctly say that this is the point in which it comes into its own as an entity separate from the previous continuity. Tragedy is averted as Shinji against all odds manages to save Rei while in the previous continuity Rei would have perished. The Evangelion ascends to a seemingly Godlike state making it seem less grounded in tangible rules? Mari states that things just work out for Shinji. Even as a fan of the movie this rubbed me the wrong way. If nothing else. Shinji has always been a supremely unlucky person who finds that absolutely nothing goes the way he wants it to in the end. But this is a new continuity a seemingly more hopeful one A continuity in which even if they must go through horrible trials to get there theres a light at the end of the tunnel. To some this might come across as cheap but it comes across as refreshing new take on Evangelion. Im excited to see where they take this new direction. 520https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/evangelion/images/f/f9/ZeruelRei28Rebuild29.png/revision/latest/scaletowidthdown/340?cb=20120310192456 Its funny that I praise the characterization when characterization is apparently one of the most lauded aspects of the Rebuild continuity. To many the characters seem more shallow than they do in the show. I think this can be at least partially attributed to the legitimate criticism that the movie runs under the assumption of assumed knowledge. For example people state that Misatos backstory wasnt fleshed out when at first glance I thought her backstory was fleshed out enough. But thinking about it considering that I was leisurely reading the Evangelion Wikihttps://evangelion.fandom.com/wiki/MainPage a few days ago its likely that I just filled in the blanks. Similarly a lot of Asukas attitude makes more sense if you know the deal with her mother which is something expanded on in the show. Theres also Rei speaking about how there will be more of her something that only makes sense if youve seen the show. Besides backstories prior knowledge helps other aspects of the film. This movie seemingly doesnt feature the death of any major character but if you watched Evangelion youd come to expect characters to die thus the movie generates tension through nothing other than its relation to the source material. If Im being perfectly honest its possible that my feelings for these characters were only made possible for following them for 24+ episodes prior. 520https://behindthe.nihonreview.com/wordpress/wpcontent/uploads/2009/07/Evangelion2.JPG Its very possible Anno failed his mission in making these films accessible to both newcomers and veterans. As a veteran I loved this film and Im sure there are many things newcomers can get out of it though my perception is ultimately skewed. I was afraid that Id have to write a review criticizing the new direction. If I do have to write that review its not for 2.0. You Can Not Advance emerged from the shadow of its big brother Neon Genesis Evangelion and is ultimately better for it taking its continuity in exciting uncharted territory. This movie exceeded my expectations and once again I am very excited to see what the next movie has in store. At the end of the film Kaworu almost threateningly tells Shinji that hell show him true happiness. I hope he has some in store for me as well. 520https://wiki.evageeks.org/images/thumb/3/31/Eva222C1862.jpg/300pxEva222C1862.jpg 9.2/10 A