Rating: 
Summary: A Wonderful Set
Review: Neon Genesis Evangelion: Widely acknowledged as one of the most complex, philisohpical, and intelligent animes ever created, it is distinct in many ways. While series that involves various forms of mecha are a dime a dozen when it comes to anime, the wonderfully designed EVAs is only one part of what makes the series so great. The complex story, with the widespread use of symbolism, is very well written and scripted: it doesn't always make everything completely clear, but rather asks the viewer to think and infer on the true happenings.Beyond the story, the art direction is very well done, though nothing that elevates the series a postion of being the best. The sound is good as well, but like the graphics, not special. They are there to present the series, and they do a capable job of it, but never detracts attention away from the focus on the storyline. EVA is not without it's faults. Ironcailly, the strongest aspect is also the source of the problem: the storyline is so deep that it may even seem illogical, disconnected, and incomprehensible to some. But allow your mind to delve deeper while watching, and you will be rewarded with one of the most enjoyable anime series of all time, and one of my personal favorites.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing-loads of replay value
Review: This series is excellent. The characters are excellent, the voice acting is of very high quality and the technology is very interesting. People who complain that the series had no ending are wrong. They have forgotten that Hideaki Anno was only using the giant robot aspect as a vechicle for his psycho-analysis of the human soul. He is clearly very much in love with technology (look also at Gunbuster) and Christianity. NGE is like a series version of Akira-you have to watch it again and again to understand what happened. The last two episodes are very disconnected from the rest of the series, but that is deliberate as Anno was trying to make the viewer feel as discombobulated as Shinji. This series was better than any reality TV show-it explored a whole human mind. The only complaints I have about the series is that the 5th child should have appeared four or five episodes before he did, so the viewer could have become emotionally attached to him. And also the fact that you never get to see Evangelion fully de-armoured. Apart from that this is a great TV series, and the idea of the A.T. field is pure genius!
Stuart Strachan
Rating:
Summary: Excellent, that's all that needs to be said
Review: The opening has a song that I couldn't get out of my head for weeks. The EVA's are amazingly cool. The characters and development.......genius. I got the second tape way back in 99 from a friend because I had heard good things. That summer, nearly all my money went into buying the Evangelion series. I would watch the tapes over and over (my favorites being tape 1, 6 and 10. Their DVD counterparts are 0-1, 0-3 and 0-6). I loved thinking through what would happen, how the Eva's worked, and just WHY Shinji's Eva always went berserk. I nearly cheered when Shinji trumped Asuka's piloting scores. Granted, I too was disappointed by the final episodes, but that's to be expected when you know what happened. Anno's original end to the series was so violent, so bloody and so disturbing that parental organizations spoke out, and he churned out the [junk] we see in 25 and 26 (Keep in mind that he originally meant to air the endings on the Japanese equivalent of network TV). Do yourself a favor, however. Buy this set and wait for Manga Entertainment to put out the movies this summer. It'll be worth it.
Rating:
Summary: Review of Neon Genesis Evangelion
Review: To begin, I must state that this is truly the most magnificent anime ever created. This statement, of course, has a natural bias, as every review does, but I digress. This series begins on an abnormal bent, which is always favorable, particularly considering the proliferation of mediocre anime that satisfies those who are considered 'anime newbies (a term utilized to describe those who have little or no experience with anime). Though it begins as seemingly a simple 'giant mecha' anime, after the first episode (and even towards the end of the first) you'll become aware of a very complicated and subtle plot development. This grows throughout the 26 episodes, concluding with perhaps the most wonderful conclusion any anime should have (I preferred it to the 'End of Evangelion' alternate conclusion). In between the beginning and delightful finale, a complicated and thought provoking plot develops concerning the attacks of the 'Angel' beings against earth, the fate of the planet, and life itself. With a theological basis, this anime takes an extremely philosophical standpoint on every aspect of life and thought via the trials and tribulations of the complicated, multi-dimensional cast, as well as the 'Evangelions' themselves. I consider this anime, Neon Genesis Evangelion, to be the greatest anime ever created, and reccomend this ultimate collection to anyone, regardless of whether or not they are an anime fan.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant
Review: I will keep this short. This is a must see series. Not for the average mind. This may cause disturbance in a highly complex mind. My recommendation is to watch something much more mellow after watching this since this series is remarkably deep. Have fun!
Rating: 
Summary: Action packed, but don't leave your brain at the door.
Review: Neo Genesis Evangelion is everything I expected it to be and it was also not what i expected at all. I thought this was going to be some sort of a Macross or Gundam Wing spinoff, but no it is unique and original unto itself. It lures you in with it's giant robot battles, makes you think with it's interesting perspectives on God vs science, and it makes you fall in love with all of its interesting characters. The animation is beautiful, the music is harmonious albeit overplayed throughout the series (it is supposed to be a television series however). Definetly a must have in any sane anime lovers collection. There are two reasons for me giving it only 4 stars however. One is that ADV did a pretty bad job putting this out. 8 DVDs? Give me a break. They could have fit this on less easily. Also the video is a bit shaky but it's easy to ignore. The second reason is that the movie delves straight into the depths of philosophy towards the end. The robot battles stop coming, and the plot starts unraveling, leaving you and your brain to process it all. I didn't like how they played out the last two episodes and left the series off. All in all, loveable characters and an exciting story and involving plot make this one of the most interesting anime series I have seen to date.
Rating:
Summary: Great anime, bad ending...... really really bad ending!
Review: I finished watching the whole collection. The story is great! Loved the characters and the animation. The story is original and intresting. The plot.... well that has yet to be seen. the last 2 eps completely ...! What the heck happened I really don't know... Though the rest of the series minus the last 2 eps is really great. Hopefully the 2 movies coming out will give some closure to the whole series. If I didn't mention it before, in the collection there is no ending. Leaves you completely hanging with some lame, abstract psycho babble in the last 2 eps, go figure! Just so you know from what I hear the movies that are coming out still don't give you closure. Hey I'm still gonna get them cause I just have to know for sure. I say it was worth getting the collection even though there was no ending and what ending it does have makes no sense. I suggest you borrow or rent and if you like it buy it to add to your anime collection.
Rating: 
Summary: Possibly the most over-rated anime ever.
Review: Neon Genesis Evangelion starts out as a very promising series: nice animation (as one expects from Gainax Studios), a driving soundtrack, and some interesting concepts. This is what gets it two stars instead of one. By the time it ends, however, it has descended into a morass of psychobabble, pretentious and overblown imagery, and acquainted us with characters that simply cannot carry the weight of what's being placed upon them. According to some sources, Hideki Anno's psychologist recommended that he work out some of his psychological problems in his art. If that's true, it's unfortunate. Evangelion, while possibly an interesting psychological study, fails as a series. It tries to do too many things, and ends up failing at all of them. On one level, Evangelion seems to be a mecha show -- earth against the aliens. On another, it appears to be a parody of these things. On yet another, it tries to be a philosophical investigation. But it never completes any of these attempts. It's too serious and focused on its technology to be a parody or deconstruction of the super-mecha genre; the characters are too weak and ineffective to be a serious mecha show; the philosophical/religious material comes too late, and is too fuzzily explicated, to be an anime of ideas. Evangelion's only true claims-to-fame come as side issues. The limitation of the "Eva" units for power is an interesting, and fairly realistic, problem (one of the major "real life" problems for such personal combat machines has always been "where can they get that much power?"). Eva has the dubious distinction of having the single most ineffective "protagonist" ever. Shinji Ikari makes Tenchi (of Tenchi Muyo) look assertive and decisive. He has the decision-making capacity of a jellyfish, and the spine of one as well. He bounces passively from one situation to the next, and even his few attempts at making a decision are abortive and useless. Of course, he isn't deliberately offensive, either, which at least puts him ahead of his father, Ikari Gendo -- possibly the single most evil man in anime, and certainly all-time champion in the "Worst Father Ever" sweepstakes. Evangelion ALMOST makes sense if you view Gendo as the Antichrist and everyone else as his poor puppets. The female characters are just as bad. All of them are basically screwed over by the male figures in their lives. Shinji avoids being put into the abuser category only by being ineffective. The most effective of the characters is Misato -- and she's a hard-drinking woman whose personal life is in shambles. Ayanami Rei is a flat-affect, staring blow-up doll for much of the series, and what little emotion she's allowed to express demonstrates that she is, if anything, even more screwed up by Gendo than Shinji is. Asuka, the classic Gainax redhead, manages to get all the objectionable characteristics of a Gainax Girl without any of the good ones; she's hot-tempered, obsessive, arrogant, and impulsive. All in all, a tremendous disappointment; Gainax created some of the great classics of anime (Gunbuster, Nadia, Wings of Honneamise, and Otaku no Video), but here they kept only their animation skill, and left any decent characters and storytelling behind.
Rating:
Summary: ONE OF THE BEST ANIMES EVER but...
Review: Evanglion is one of my favorite series ever but it possibly has the worst ending of any anime ever. I think it is a good series to buy but it is imperitive that you STOP AT EPISODE 22! I know what you're thinking "what is this lunatic ranting about now?" Well I am serious. I bought this and I really liked. I watched the first two episodes long before the rest of it, which promted me to buy the series, but once I got to the third volume I was hooked. It was kind of a lazy Sunday and I intended to watch just volume 3 and possibly four, but after finishing 3 I went to 4 with good enthusiasm then I went to 5 seriosly interested then I went to 6 totaly enthrolled in the story then I went on to 7 as a full blown adict. It was good, really, really good! But there was a problem. I was involved in a very thick and tangled plot for which I craved answers to so many questions that were presented but as I finished episode 24 (and none of my questions had benn answered) I wondered how they could make two more episodes after what transpired in that. The answer to my question was this, they didn't! Episodes 25 and 26 the supposed conclusion answered nothing and I mean NOTHING!!! They even went as far to have a five minute alternate universe, it was all just a dream thing and all the charecters are just normal people, but that wasn't the worst of it, no they weren't done yet. There were five more minutes that had nothing to do with anything like the rest of episodes 25 and 26. They were just siliquies and randon intervers in some void that had nothing to do with anything, and it was so bad that you wished it had all been a dream like they had started to say, and maybe it was. You just don't know!
So you have come to except why you should not watch episodes 25 and 26 but why not 23 and 24 you ask. Well, they begin the downward spiral. Have you ever encountered an unexcusable break in charecter that just made you mad? In episode 23 and 24 that happens to every charecter! I actually had trouble sleeping after this, not because it was scary or deeply disturbing (on a psycological level anyway) but because I was so mad. So for one last time let me re-iterate STOP AT EPISODE 22 OR YOU WILL REGRET IT. Now there is hope and I do encourage you to buy the series. The ending was so bad that they made a movie with an alternate one so you can watch that instead. I haven't seen it on amazon yet but it is out there and I know someone who has it so you should be able to find it. In the meantime, I am going to find the movie so I can get some closure.
Rating:
Summary: Anime's greatest accomplishment
Review: Far and away, Neon Genesis Evangelion is the greatest accomplishement to come out of the anime style, or animation in general, ever. It is not for everybody (what is?); it is long, slow to start, and very, very complex. But once you have completed it you will know that nothing has even drawn near to evangelion in terms of character development, story depth, and general polish and design. It made me think, hard, about a huge amount of things and raised questions that no other media I have seen has ever dared to ask. A word of advice: if you are interested, go all the way. If you do not see the series through to its conclusion, you will be left confused and with a sour taste in your mouth. Furthermore, do not watch the last 2 episodes (25 + 26); they were replaced by Gainax with the "End of Evangelion," not to be confused with Death and Rebirth. Find the DVDs or VCDs or whatever, but find it. It is the culmination of 8 hours of myth and mystery.
To sum up, it is absolutely brilliant and a must see for anyone interested, but make sure you are in it for the long run.
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