[Anime] Hideaki Anno's 'The End of Evangelion' — The Return of Us Who Cannot Become One

[From YouTube channel 'Convincing Anime Trailers']

Introduction: It Should Have Ended, Yet It Has Not

The final scene of 'The End of Evangelion' is incredibly famous. However, despite its fame, perhaps we have not been able to describe that scene well. The world has met its catastrophe, the grand plan has proceeded to its end, and everything seems to be over. Nevertheless, what remains at the end is not a sense of accomplishment or salvation, but merely the raw, visceral presence of another Shinji places his hands on Asuka's neck, Asuka touches his cheek, and finally, she says, 'How disgusting.' That line resonates both as a rejection and as a return to reality.

The reason this ending is so unforgettable is likely because there is no simple answer there. For instance, it does not end because they understood each other. Nor does it end because they are completely severed. Rather, this work seems to depict the fact that even after the dream of becoming one is shattered, the other remains as an other, and the world continues, discomfort and all That is why I believe that ending holds a strange weight, different from simple hope or despair.

This work, often called the 'Old Theatrical Version,' has frequently been discussed as a 'cryptic apocalyptic tale.' However, what is truly difficult may not be the settings or terminology, but rather the distance between humans depicted therein. I want to become one with someone. Yet, becoming one also means losing both myself and the other. Where did this work land at the end of that contradiction? This time, while briefly looking back at the flow from the TV anime series to the old theatrical version, I would like to read this work not as a 'story of completion,' but as 'a story of returning to a world where one must still live with others after completion'

Chapter 1: Before the End of the World, the Heart Was Already Broken

To put the story of 'Evangelion' very briefly, it is a story of boys and girls caught up in a battle against mysterious enemies. The protagonist, Shinji Ikari, is summoned by his father, from whom he has lived apart for a long time, and is ordered to pilot the humanoid weapon Evangelion. He throws himself into battle alongside Rei Ayanami and Asuka Langley Soryu, but that battle does not stop at merely confronting a crisis. As the story progresses, what comes to the foreground is the desire to be acknowledged by his father that never reaches him, the anxiety of the image supporting him crumbling, and the fragility of the heart that wants to touch others but inevitably ends up getting hurt

In other words, even at the stage of the TV anime series, 'Evangelion' was already more than a story of 'a battle to save the world'; it was a story of 'people who cannot maintain their sense of self well' Shinji seeks approval while fearing rejection by others. Asuka is supported by an image of strength and excellence, but when that image wavers, she collapses all at once. Rei seems to be quietly accepting someone else's desires, yet she remains decisively an other somewhere. While there is battle on the surface, in reality, the knots in their hearts were becoming precarious from a much earlier stage.

In that sense, the old theatrical version is not a separate entity disconnected from the TV series. Rather, it is better to say it is a work that redraws the crisis that sank into the inner self in the latter half of the TV series from a different angle In the final two episodes of the TV series, the inner selves of Shinji and the others come to the foreground more than the events of the world itself. The old theatrical version reflects that same crisis, this time from the side of the world, from the side of events. The invasion of the organization, Asuka's desperate battle, the rupture between father and Rei, and the activation of the Human Instrumentality Project. Looking at it this way, the old theatrical version is not a negation of the TV series, but rather another destination that shows what was happening on the outside

Therefore, one cannot isolate just the ending of this work. By the time we reach that beach, it has already been a long time of accumulating the inability to connect well with others, the absence or excess of parents, being forced into roles, and the crumbling of one's own contours The end of the world comes after that. In other words, the catastrophe depicted in 'The End of Evangelion' is not a disaster that suddenly fell from the sky. It is also the final scene of a heart that had been breaking for a long time, finally dragging the world along with it.

Chapter 2: What is Completion? The Dream of Becoming One and the 'I' That Disappears

At the center of the old theatrical version is the Human Instrumentality Project However, just following this project as a mere setting will likely not reach the core of this work. What is important is what it was trying to do. Completion is a dream that tries to dissolve the boundaries of humans separated into pieces, and eliminate loneliness, anxiety, and pain A world where one does not have to be rejected by anyone. A world where one can be free from the suffering of not being understood. If you hear it that way, it might seem like salvation. In fact, for Shinji, who has been continuously hurt by the distance from others, that temptation must not have been small.

Here, I want to recall the AT Field which repeatedly holds important meaning in the work. Appearing in battle as an invisible wall that blocks the opponent's attacks, it often resonates as something overlapping with a 'wall of the heart.' It is like a membrane that separates others from oneself, somehow maintaining the distance where getting too close leads to hurting each other, and being too far leads to loneliness The hedgehog's dilemma, which was also suggested in the TV series—the metaphor that one wants to get close seeking warmth, but if one gets too close, the needles hurt each other—well describes the human relationships throughout this work. The AT Field must have been the boundary that supported that very contradiction of 'wanting to get close, but it hurts.'

Thinking about it that way, the contours of what completion aims for also become clear. Completion is a plan to lose the AT Field Eliminating the wall of the heart, dissolving the distance with others, and making loneliness and anxiety disappear. But is that really salvation? Because the disappearance of the boundary with others also means that the distinction between 'me' and 'you' itself becomes ambiguous. Instead of not getting hurt, the contour of oneself is also lost. Instead of not being rejected, the subject that desires itself fades away. Completion is a plan to eliminate loneliness, but at the same time, it is also a plan that erases the very conditions for us to be us

Here, if we place the three registers mentioned by Lacan as a very simple auxiliary line, the contours of this work become a little easier to see. The Imaginary is the realm where the fantasy of self-image and unification works. The Symbolic is the realm where language, relationships, and social positioning are established. The Real is the realm of pain, discomfort, and things that cannot be processed by those, and cannot quite become language. People maintain themselves by barely connecting these three However, completion does not accept that gap or lack, but tries to pretend it never existed from the beginning. In other words, it can be read as a state where the imaginary dream that distance with others and one's own lack can be erased and one can become one has become too strong

Of course, imagining itself is not bad. Everyone wants to be accepted by someone and dreams of a relationship where they are not rejected. The problem is when that dream tries to erase everything: the distance with others, one's own insufficiency, and the pain of the body. If the AT Field disappears, the wounds might indeed decrease. But at the same time, the contours that separate oneself from others also melt away. That sweetness and terror reside in completion at the same time.

Therefore, the question of the old theatrical version is not simply a story of 'is completion good or evil?' Instead, it is do we really want to eliminate the distance with others? Do we desire a world where, in exchange for having no pain or discomfort, we even lose being ourselves? This work confronts us with that question in the extreme form of the end of the world. And the final scene appears as one, all too bitter, answer to that question.

Chapter 3: The Child Who Cannot Reach the Father and the Man Who Cannot Become a Father: The Twist Between Shinji and Gendo

One of the sources of suffering that Shinji continues to carry throughout 'Evangelion' is the existence of his father, Gendo Ikari. Gendo is the cold-blooded leader of the special agency NERV, and at the same time, he is Shinji's biological father. However, despite being a father, he provides almost no words as a father. He did not summon Shinji because he wanted to see him as a son, but because he needed him to pilot an Eva. Called only when needed and pushed away once his role is fulfilled. Within that relationship, Shinji harbors a desire to be acknowledged by his father, yet he never grasps how to get closer to him.

The pain of this father-son relationship is likely not just about them being 'clumsy parents and children.' For Shinji, Gendo is a figure who gives him a role, but not one who accepts him through words. The orders reach him, but the acknowledgment does not. Therefore, Shinji can only have a relationship with his father by piloting the Eva, and that relationship only deepens his wounds each time he does so. He wants to be acknowledged, but the conditions for being acknowledged are always tied to pain. This twist drives him further into a corner.

However, watching the original theatrical version, it becomes clear that the problem does not lie solely with Shinji. Rather, it is Gendo who has failed at 'being a father'. He is a man who moves a massive organization and continues to make decisions even in extreme situations, but that strength is somewhat hollow. This is because at the center of what drives him is not a sense of responsibility as a father or loyalty to order, but an obsession with a single woman.

That woman is Yui Ikari. Yui was Shinji's mother and Gendo's wife, but she was lost in a past experimental accident. Although she is absent from the beginning of the story, she casts a very large shadow throughout the entire work. For Gendo, Yui is both his late wife and the very loss he cannot let go of. While many of his actions appear on the surface to follow the grand plan of the Human Instrumentality Project, in reality, they are strongly dominated by a deeply personal desire to reach the lost Yui once again.

What becomes apparent here is that the man who should be in the position of a father is actually acting as a human being trapped by loss before he is a father. A father is supposed to have the role of sending a child out into the world and bridging them into a world of words and relationships. However, Gendo does not open Shinji to the world, but rather draws him into the circuit of his own desires. The voice that commands Shinji to pilot the Eva is closer to an extension of his obsession to retrieve what was lost than it is to a father's guidance.

What I want to recall here is the AT Field we looked at in the previous chapter. It was a wall that maintains distance from others, but also a boundary that establishes oneself as oneself. However, Gendo cannot accept that boundary. Instead of accepting the reality that Yui is lost, he tries to touch her again, even by using the structure of the world itself. In other words, he leans toward the dream of restoring unity with what was lost rather than living in a world of words after experiencing loss. In that sense, Gendo has not only failed to be a father, but has also failed to accept the distance between himself and others.

As a result, the relationship between Shinji and Gendo is deeply twisted from the start. While Shinji is a child who wants to be acknowledged by his father, he cannot receive stable words from that father. On the other hand, while Gendo is in the position of a father, he exists not as one who guides his child, but as one who is pulled back into the past. Because of this mismatch, a void that never closes remains between the two until the end. And that void is likely one of the great anxieties that supports the world of 'Evangelion'.

When the Instrumentality Project is activated in the original theatrical version, it is depicted as a world-scale event. But at the same time, it can also be seen as the personal desire of a man named Gendo inflated to the extreme. What he was seeking was not reconciliation with his son. Nor was it the salvation of humanity in general. Rather, it seems he was trying to open a path to the lost Yui, even by using the structure of the world itself. Thinking of it this way, the tragedy of this work lies not only in the catastrophe that came from the outside, but also in the fact that the desires of a man who could not become a father ended up involving the world itself.

Chapter 4: Those Forced to Bear Desires: The Positions of Rei and Asuka

Rei Ayanami and Asuka Langley Soryu are both decisive figures for Shinji, but their ways of being are quite different. Rei is quiet, does not show much emotion, and is a person who somehow slips out of our understanding. On the other hand, Asuka is intense in both emotion and words, and clearly tries to show that she is superior. When considering the ending of the original theatrical version, this contrast becomes very important.

First, regarding Rei, she is depicted not just as a heroine, but as a place where various desires are concentrated. For Shinji, she is a presence that has both a closeness that makes him want to reach out and a distance that he can never fully touch. For Gendo, it is even heavier; she is treated as a special circuit leading to the lost Yui. He overlays the presence of Yui onto Rei's body and her very existence. Therefore, Rei stands as a being forced to bear someone else's loss or desire before she is a girl.

However, that does not make Rei a merely passive existence. Rather, what is important is that she does not remain obedient to that role until the end. While she appears to be a vessel that accepts the desires of others, she deviates from that at a decisive moment. She does not become a being that simply fulfills his wishes according to Gendo's intentions. Because of this shift, Rei finally rises as an 'other' who is not a substitute for someone else. I believe the magnitude of the role she plays in the original theatrical version is not just because she is the key to the plan, but because the 'existence placed there for the desires of others' is not simply reclaimed as is.

Here, too, the problem of the AT Field lurks. Wishing to connect with someone while being unable to fully overlap. Being burdened with someone's wishes while still not becoming that person themselves. Rei is a being whose boundaries with others appear extremely ambiguous, yet she behaves as if to reclaim those boundaries at the very last moment. Therefore, she is both a medium for the dream of becoming one and a presence that shows that the dream will not be completed exactly as someone intends.

In contrast, Asuka is a person who tries to support her 'self' more overtly. She wishes to be excellent as an Eva pilot, and to be a person who is stronger, more beautiful, and more needed than others. That wish is not mere vanity or confidence. Rather, it is so desperate that she cannot maintain herself without it. Asuka is barely standing by clinging to the image of a 'strong self'. That is precisely why, when that image begins to waver, her collapse becomes so intense.

Asuka in the original theatrical version 'Air' bears this in the most cruel way. Inside Unit-02, she stands up once as if to confirm that she can still fight and that she is not yet finished. Her pride and attachment to life are strongly expressed in that scene. However, that brilliance does not last long. In the face of overwhelming violence, what supported her self-image is thoroughly destroyed. Asuka's tragedy lies not just in her defeat, but in the destruction of the very image that allowed her to be herself.

If the Gendo we saw in the previous chapter was unable to live in the present due to his obsession with the lost Yui, then Asuka could be said to be a person who can only stand in the present by leaning on an image of 'how she wants to be.' For her, the AT Field is more than just a wall that rejects others; it is the final membrane for maintaining her own image—that is why when that membrane tears, she loses not only the distance from others but the very footing that supported her.

Viewed in this light, while Rei and Asuka are contrasting, both are figures deeply entangled in the 'desires of others' and the 'images that support themselves.' However, the way they are entangled differs. Rei is a place of silence where others entrust their meanings, while Asuka is a person who tries to construct that meaning herself—Rei is placed at the center of others' desires, and Asuka entrusts herself to her own image. Neither remains a safe support in the old theatrical version. That is precisely why the position Asuka takes in the world that returns after the completion holds such great significance.

Chapter 5: We Do Not Return the Same Way — The Difference in Shinji and Asuka's Return

The reason the scene of completion leaves such a strong impression in the old theatrical version is likely because it shows, simultaneously, the sweetness and the terror of the disappearance of boundaries—a world where one does not have to be rejected by anyone. A world where one does not have to endure loneliness. A world where the AT Field—the barrier that separates us from others and keeps us as ourselves—is lost. In that place, the suffering Shinji has carried for so long certainly appears to soften for a moment. However, that softening comes at the cost of others ceasing to be others. The pain disappears only because the distance from the other and the contours of the self become ambiguous. Borrowing from the organization of the previous chapters, completion can be called a dream where the creaking of the Symbolic and Real is swallowed, and the unification of the Imaginary covers everything.

To this question, Shinji finally chooses not to remain in that dream, even if in an extremely clumsy way. He returns to a world where rejection, misunderstanding, and pain still remain—in other words, it is also a re-acceptance of the AT Field. Having a wall between oneself and others, the fact that oneself and the other cannot become one, and living with that distance. This is not a gentle recovery, and it is far too scarred to be called a mature decision. Even so, he does not dissolve completely into the dream of fusion called completion, but returns once more to a place with distance, a place with language and relationships. In that sense, I believe Shinji returned to the Symbolic while still containing the pain of the Real.

However, that return is by no means clean. The first thing Shinji does when he appears on the beach is not to express the joy of reunion or call out with words, but to put his hands around Asuka's neck. This act is incredibly shocking. But when you think about it, it is also a scene that exposes the contradiction of Shinji that has permeated this entire work—he seeks others, but when others are truly there as others, he cannot endure that distance. He wants to get closer, but is afraid of being rejected. He wants to be understood, but is hurt by the inability to understand each other. The extreme of that appears in the form of that strangling—in other words, I believe it is both the violence of the returned subject and the manifestation of the terror of having returned to a world where others exist.

In response to this scene, Asuka reaches out to Shinji's cheek. This is one of the moments in the old theatrical version that is most open to interpretation. It can be seen as a gesture of forgiveness, or perhaps just a final confirmation. But what is important is that the way she touches him is placed as something extremely subtle, neither an embrace nor a rejection. Asuka has neither accepted Shinji nor completely rejected him—that ambiguity is precisely why this ending is not closed off to either reconciliation or despair.

Here, it becomes clear that the returns of Shinji and Asuka are not the same. Shinji rejects the fusion of completion and accepts the direction of returning to a world with distance from others. There is, at the very least, the impetus of 'returning to a reality with walls.' However, Asuka's return is a bit more bitter. This is because she returns after the self-image that supported her has been thoroughly destroyed. Being excellent, being needed, being superior to others—those imaginary supports were largely torn apart in the old theatrical version. Therefore, it looks as if Asuka, rather than 're-choosing a world where others exist' like Shinji, could no longer remain within her self-image and was pushed out of it.

I think this difference is very significant. For Shinji, the return is accepting separation, however clumsily. In contrast, for Asuka, the return is being forced to place herself in a world after her illusions have broken. Even standing on the same beach, their positions are not the same. Shinji is on the side of beginning to accept that they cannot become one. Asuka is on the side of experiencing the roughness of the Real after the collapse of the illusion that they could be one. That is precisely why that final line has a different resonance than Shinji's return.

Asuka's 'How disgusting' is not merely an insult. Of course, it is a word of disgust, but that is not enough. That is because it is also a word that announces that an other who cannot become one is there, and that their body, their desire, and their helplessness have appeared before her once again. If completion was a dream that erased everything—the distance from others and one's own incompleteness—then 'How disgusting' is a word that announces the complete failure of that dream. It is a word that rejects the sliminess of fusion and insists that the other remains as the other. And as long as she is voicing that discomfort, Asuka, too, has returned to the world of language and relationships. But that return does not fix anything. Rather, it clearly states, just once at the end, how bitter the world they have returned to is. Herein lies the cruelty of Asuka's return.

Therefore, the ending of the old theatrical version is not a scene where the two happily return to reality. Rather, it is a scene where both are thrown back into the Symbolic, each in their own way, while still containing the pain of the Real. Shinji returns while seeking others but unable to endure them. Asuka returns after the collapse of her self-image, in a way that forces her to put that discomfort into words. There is no understanding or consensus between the two. But even so, the other did not disappear. Fusion without an AT Field was rejected, and a world with walls begins again. The reason the ending of the old theatrical version is unforgettable is because it ends by leaving the weight of this 'other who did not disappear' as vividly as possible.

Conclusion: After 'How disgusting,' the world still continues

What remains after finishing 'Air/Magokoro wo, Kimi ni' is not a sense of resolution. Rather, it is the opposite: a sense that something hopelessly troublesome has remained precisely after everything has ended. It could be called the body of the other, the opacity of desire, or the inability to understand each other itself. What completion promised was to erase that trouble. A world without an AT Field, without loneliness, anxiety, or the gap between others. But this work did not ultimately choose that dream.

Instead, what was left was the two of them on the beach. The two who could not become one. Or perhaps it is better to say the two who, after rejecting the act of becoming one, still have to face each other. There are no words of hope there. No encouragement, no declaration of reconciliation. What is placed at the end is the all-too-blunt word, 'How disgusting.' But I believe that is precisely why that ending is strong. If the world is to continue, it cannot be based on clean understanding, but only on the reality that the other remains while we are unable to erase such discomfort.

To borrow Lacan's words, completion may have been the ultimate extension of the dream of the Imaginary. The dream that if one could become one with someone, lack and loneliness would disappear. But what the ending of the old theatrical version shows is not the happiness beyond that dream, but the reality that only begins after descending from it. Shinji and Asuka returned to the world of language and relationships, that is, the Symbolic. But it is not a world that has gently regained order. There still remains the roughness of the body, the opacity of desire, and pain that simply cannot be processed. In other words, they returned to the Symbolic while carrying the discomfort of the Real.

In that sense, 'How disgusting' is a word that closes the ending, but at the same time, it is a word that indicates the world has not yet closed. That word declares the inability to understand each other. But at the same time, it also shows that the other is there, along with that inability to understand. There is rejection, disgust, and pain. But the other is still there. The ending of the old theatrical version does not show a future where we can understand each other. Rather, it is a world that does not end, even while carrying the inability to understand.

Therefore, this work did not just depict despair. Rather, I think it depicted the reality that can only be seen after rejecting easy salvation. Not being able to become one. Having walls. Being hurt if you get close. And yet, having no choice but to return to a world where others exist. Perhaps we have been remembering that coldness and weight for quite a long time because of that final line.