*Blur….* Recovering from the shock of the most amazing anime, the Evangelion 2.0 the movie. For your information, the sequel of Evangelion 1.0, Evangelion 2.0: You Can (not) Advance is now showing in Singapore, only at Cathay AMK Hub and Cineleisure Orchard. If you are a fan of EVA, please watch this movie in cinema, you will love it. For non-fans but want to experience some extreme mecha action with complicated yet interesting story, give this a try =)
Evangelion 2.0: You Can (not) Advance The final trailer HD
Review of Evangelion 2.0: You Can (not) Advance
Visual and Animation
Absolutely stunning. As a designer, I’m very very particular in art quality, especially for animation. However, I would rate EVA 2.0 5/5 stars for its amazing cinematography, visual details, lighting, story telling and the smoothness. The battle scenes are breath-taking and so intense that I couldn’t draw my eye away from the screen. I might miss a lot of great scenes if I lose my focus. Every movements of EVAs and Angels are so organic despite this is a Mecha anime.
There are a lot of new design for this movie, not only the EVAs have new armor and weapons, the Angels also come with new design and ability. Of cos, new battle scenes! I particularly love the scenes where 3 EVAs fight against the Eighth Angel. There are additional background settings like the repair cage 99 for EVA units and the gigantic aquarium that contains the ocean creatures.
EVA-02 with flying unit.
Clock head Angel LOL.
Characters
Due to the duration, there is almost no character development for the side characters. In Evangelion 2.0: You Can (not) Advance, the focus is always on Shinji, Rei, Asuka and the new girl – Mari <3. Unlike the TV series, the triangle relationship between Shinji, Rei and Asuka is obvious and leads the story to the unexpected development. By the way, I don't know why but Asuka's full name is Asuka Langley Shikinami in this movie.
Mari Illustrious Makinami, the pilot of EVA-05 Provisional Unit with the look of the quiet gentle school girl is surprisingly energetic and “mad”. From her battle, she is bloodlusted and constantly push herself over the boarder. She is pretty optimistic and know how to enjoy life when facing bad things, perhaps that’s the main difference between her and Asuka. In my opinion, she could be the best pilot who can truly bring out the potential of EVAs.
Story– Spoiler Alert! Read at your own risk![spoiler effect=”simple”]The story development is completely different from the TV series. There are new elements like Mari, EVA Mark 6 (EVA-06?), Key of Nebuchadnezzar and the unexpected 3rd Impact.
The fun part of the story will be how the 2 girls, Asuka and Rei do their best trying to win Shinji’s heart by preparing a meal for him (yes Asuka and Rei’s fans please complain as much as you want). However, second half of the story is sad and tension, when Asuka is infected by Angel during the EVA-03’s activation test.
There are a few contradict scenes like playing “Let’s be friend and happy together” song, while Shinji’s unit is tearing EVA-03 apart, and smashed Asuka’s entry plug with its mouth. I don’t know Asuka is alive or not, but it seems like she is blended with Angel and looks like a lump of meat. Somehow Ritsuko is studying on her. I might be wrong, please correct me if you have other thoughts on this.
Tokyo-3 City is in really bad shape. Nerv’s headquarter (the pyramid part) is completely evaporated thanks to Tenth Angel. Mari tried very hard to stop it by activating the “Beast Mode” of EVA-02 (this is amazing). With Rei’s suicidal attack, they manage to injured the enemy. However, EVA-02 is done for it and EVA-00 is eaten alive together with Rei (Tenth Angel even spit out the helmet!).
I love to see EVA-01 berserks. Do you like it?
Although Shinji performed some heroic returns with EVA-01 but it is no match with the Angel. EVA-01 is awaken due to his strong wish to save Rei from the Angel’s core. And it started the 3rd Impact, where a wish will be granted with the cost of all the lives on earth. “This the end of the world…” *Black screen* the movie ended here (really!).
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Please don’t leave your seat yet, right after the ending credits, there is a very important moment with Kaoru and the EVA-06. There is also a preview on the third part of the series, Evangelion 3.0: Q (Quickening).
When is Evangelion 2.0 available in Singapore?
Evangelion 2.0: You Can (not) Advance is only available in the cinema until 18 Nov 2009 (AMK Hub) and 19 Nov 2009 (Cineleisure Orchard). The showtime is available here. I should watch this earlier… when I reached AMK Hub on this morning there is no poster left… T____T