List of Neon Genesis Evangelion characters
The Japanese anime television series Neon Genesis Evangelion has an extensive cast of characters that were created by Gainax. The show's protagonist is Shinji Ikari, a teenage boy whose father Gendo recruits to the shadowy organization Nerv to pilot a giant, bio-machine mecha called an Evangelion and fight against beings called Angels.
The character designs were drawn by the artist, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, who designed each character to be easily identifiable from their silhouette. The personalities were based on that of Hideaki Anno, the show's director and main scriptwriter. Many of the heroes in the second half of the series suffer trauma or physical violence that exacerbates their anxieties and fears, and the episodes give ample space to their inner monologues, in which they question the meaning of their actions and lives. This narrative choice culminates in the two final episodes, whose narrative pivots on Shinji's streams of consciousness; the finale, however, does not clearly conclude the plot.
In Japan, the characters received favorable audience reception, becoming the subjects of merchandise and winning popularity polls. Critics had mixed feelings about their psychological exploration; some reviewers appreciated their complexity and depth and praised Anno's script, but others found the characters to be stereotypical or problematic, and disliked the insistence on their weaknesses and characterization. The show's last two episodes proved to be controversial, since the plot is eclipsed by moments of introspection. Neon Genesis Evangelion characters, especially Rei Ayanami, also inspired later anime series, creating or helping to spread new stereotypes in Japanese animated productions.
Conception
The studio Gainax studio chose interpersonal communication as the main theme of Neon Genesis Evangelion, insisting on portraying inter-generational relationships, such as those between parents and children. The studio wanted to create a series that reflects on the lack of communication in contemporaneous Japanese society, which was considered to be in ruins. The director of the series, Hideaki Anno, an otaku since his youth, experienced depression after the conclusion of his previous anime series, Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water, and poured his emotions into Neon Genesis Evangelion, making it a reflection of his feelings:For each character, Anno took cues from a part of his personality, stating that: "All the characters of Evangelion are me". Shinji, for example, was conceived as a mirror of his self: "both the conscious and unconscious part". According to him, moreover, Kaworu Nagisa and Gendo Ikari represent his shadow, the dark, unconscious side of an individual's psyche. Kazuya Tsurumaki, assistant director of the series, stated that the autobiographical intent can also be detected in the female protagonists and secondary characters, such as Misato Katsuragi, Rei Ayanami, and Ryoji Kaji, saying, "Every character is ultimately the same. On the surface, different 'seasonings' have been used, but inside are very similar". Anno also said Shinji and the other main characters are not to be considered only a mirror of his personal experience but a reflection of the other members of the series' creative staff as well. According to him, "It's strange that Evangelion has become such a hit – all the characters are so sick!"
In 1993, about two years before the series aired, the production studio established a temporary lead on the creation of the characters in a presentation document titled New Century Evangelion Proposal. Much of them were already outlined, despite differences in script. Anno did not follow a well-defined plan for the development of the protagonists; he improvised as the episodes passed and following his instincts, as in a "live performance". The original project also included a girl character named Yui Ichijō who was similar in appearance to Rei but had dark hair; this character never appeared in the final version of the show.
The blood type and date of birth of each character were almost always identical to those of the character's voice actor, the exceptions being Toji, Kensuke, Kaworu, and Rei, whose date is never explicitly revealed in the series. Anno named most of the characters after ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy in World War II, while others were taken from comic-book characters and the novel Ai to gensō no fascism by Japanese writer Ryu Murakami, from which the names Toji Suzuhara and Kensuke Aida come. The show's character designer was Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, who had worked with Anno on Nadia; Sadamoto was asked to develop a design with a "relatively subdued appearance". Sadamoto gave the characters immediately distinguishable features and silhouettes, trying to reflect as much as possible the interior of each of them. Initially, Anno proposed using a female protagonist, following Gainax' earlier projects GunBuster and Nadia, but Sadamoto was hesitant about the idea, not understanding "why a girl would want to pilot a robot". Sadamoto suggested having a male protagonist, Shinji, and Asuka became the show's co-protagonist.
Development
Anno began working on Neon Genesis Evangelion with the idea the setting and characters would evolve as the story progressed. He continued to rely on his personal experience and avoided depicting "human dramas", perceiving the task as difficult; he thus preferred to represent Evangelion as a "documentary" rather than a drama. While working on the third and fourth episodes, he set the goal of surpassing other television series in development and psychological depth. The first episodes focus on Shinji's relationship problems and his constant attempts to approach Rei in "Rei I" and "Rei II". The creative staff felt dissatisfied with the result, considering it too heavy. To give a different impulse to the second part of the series the irreverent, exuberant character Asuka was inserted in the eighth episode, "Asuka Strikes!", which is the center of many comic and typically adolescent situations. In the following episodes, despite their communication difficulties, the show's protagonists are portrayed with the lightness typical of comedy following a conventional, science-fiction anime scheme. The episode's scriptwriter Shinji Higuchi, who is known for the humorous and lighthearted character of his works, intervened and the characters' development became more positive. In the following episodes, Misato opens up to Shinji and talk to him about her painful past; Asuka shows a sweeter and more-caring character, the cold commander Ikari helps his subordinates and praises his son.The last episodes would have closed the story and the protagonists' journey; for the ending the writers originally planned a scene in which Gendo would have said "Live!" to his son Shinji, similar to the ending of Gainax's earlier show The Secret of Blue Water, in which Captain Nemo utters the same phrase before sacrificing himself. During the first broadcast of the series, Anno responded to animation fans with anger, accusing them of being excessively closed and introverted; for this reason, he changed the atmosphere of the show's second half, making the narrative even darker and more introspective. This change of direction is reflected in the protagonists' development. While being criticized, Anno decided to make the characters Asuka and Toji undergo physical and psychological violence, which was considered unsuitable for a television show in a protected transmission time.
According to Michael House, native English translator for Gainax, at the beginning Anno had the idea of ending the anime with a scene of Shinji smiling and with the full maturation of the characters, who would be able to establish healthier relationships, but towards the middle of the show, he realized this could not be done in a credible way. Anno would have failed in his intent, creating characters who were too closed and problematic. Asuka, for example, was initially inserted to lighten the tone of the series, and only as the show progressed it was decided to pay attention to her inner fragility. At the same time, breaking a taboo of Japanese television, Anno focused on the sexuality of the protagonists, inserting in the twentieth episode a sequence of implicit sex that includes a long, off-screen shot of Misato making sounds of pleasure in bed with her lover Kaji. The director said he wanted to show the audience, and especially children, how sex and violence are an integral part of human life.
In the show's fourteenth episode, Anno wanted to investigate Rei Ayanami, whom he felt he had not adequately explored and with whom he felt less affinity than the other characters. Running out of ideas, an acquaintance of Anno lent him a book on mental illness. Since then, Anno tried to include more concepts from psychology and psychoanalysis into the show. The show's main theme thus became the deepening of the human inner lives and reflections on interpersonal communication are depicted through streams of consciousness of the protagonists. Shinji's character was deepened through internal monologues, as in the sixteenth and twentieth episodes. The last episodes also suffered from the tight production schedule; they were made in a short time to meet the deadlines. In the twenty-fifth episode, the protagonists undergo a psychoanalysis session in a dark theater, retracing their childhoods through flashbacks. By rewriting the script, Anno focused only on the psychology of the main characters with a special focus on Shinji, completely abandoning the main plot and not offering a clear conclusion to the anime's narrative. He tried to deliver a message to and criticism of the otaku world and himself, as a long-time otaku.