Neon Genesis Evangelion: Episode 22 DIRECTOR'S CUT FULL LENGTH Reaction!
Added 2022-08-11 13:00:08 +0000 UTC**ANGELIC HEADPHONE WARNINGS**
Actual Reaction post-Mini Recap starts at 25:40.
I wanted Asuka backstory...but...this was far more disturbing, outrageous, and psychologically haunting of an episode than I could have anticipated! The entire episode DRIPS in thrilling and horror aspects and yet somehow finds a way to go about as over-the-top as you can think...while still be subtle?! HOW?!
And we still have FOUR EPISODES and FIVE MOVIES TO GO. I'm not sure where we're going from here, but I am getting more and more nervous the deeper we're diving into the despairing and haunted minds of our characters left to fend with an ever-growing Angel threat and not many options left...
LINK TO REACTION: https://streamable.com/zy6zyn
Thank you for watching with me and for all the support!
Comments
Wow, this information is AMAZING!! I definitely want to talk about all those different psychological terms in a future discussion!! Thank you for taking the time to go through all that --- they apply SO WELL to Shinji and Asuka in this (and Rei to an extent) and YES, someone translated the German conversation as well and in the Discord talked about the four voices of "Asuka" from this episode! CRAZY!!! I hope you enjoy my rambles on Episode 23! :) Thanks for the information and comment!!!
Romaniablack
2022-08-18 12:04:01 +0000 UTCI’m so happy that my comment was helpful! I don’t think that Asuka is passing the anal stage unfortunately 😅 but I’m so excited to hear how you analyze the rest of evangelion going forward! This might be my favourite episode because of the horror and psychoanalysis elements, and this might end up being my longest comment, because we have lots of German to translate and psychoanalytic terms to define! I apologize in advance for the incoming wall of text. First off I think that on the point of castration anxiety, Asuka consistently berates Shinji for “not acting like a man” Shinji also takes on traditional female roles in cooking and cleaning for her and Misato, even his personality which is non confrontational, shy, and innocent in regards to sexuality are stereotypically found in female characters. While Asuka, in an example of penis envy, is loud, ambitious, aggressive, and overtly sexual, all typically male tropes. I just love Kaji more and more as this series goes on, he really try’s to be a positive adult influence in Asuka’s life, but she’s so obsessed with “not being a child” that all she wants from him is to replicate her idea of an adult relationship. This idea was most definitely formed from witnessing her fathers sexual relationship with her stepmother. We see Asuka recive a phone call from her step mother, she switches to another fake personality to communicate with her. The conversation translated: Hallo Mutter ("hallo Mutter") Achja ("Really") Wir haben uns schon so lange nicht mehr gehört ("has been a long time since we have talked") Danke gut ("thanks, good" ) Und wie geht es dir ("and how are you?") Soll ich ihn dir mal vorstellen? ("want me to introduce him to you") Ach niemals ("ah never") Er ist ein Einzelkämpfer ("he is a lone wolf" would be an adequate translation, otherwise it would be literally "he is a lone warrior" but a better word would be "solitary") Ja ja ("yes yes") Wirklich? ("really?") Achso, das ist aber toll ("ah ok, that is great news") Phantastisch ("fantastic") Hoffentlich wird es nicht regnen ("hopefully it won't rain") Ich muss bald schlafen gehen ("I have to go to bed soon") Tschüss Mutter ("bye mother") Gute Nacht ("good night") And true to the anal phase, Asuka finds herself at odds with an uncontrollable bodily function, menstruation. She has a breakdown in the bathroom stating her hatred for Misato, Shinji, and her parents. She also reveals the truth, that she hates herself and this fact is a large contributor to why she pushes others away. She observes Shinji and Rei happily conversing at the train station and is immediately angered. This indicates her jealousy of Rei and Shinji’s relationship, as well as frustration at what she feels is Shinji’s ability to endure trauma without compromising his agreeable personality. I loved your reaction to the elevator scene, truly a fan favourite moment. I really liked the connection you made between the theme of menstruation and the line from Rei’s poem, “a woman who does not bleed”. The German words that appear on screen during Asuka’s breakdown are: penlich (awkward/embarrassing/painful) most likely referring to the uncomfortable memories she is being forced to confront, Steifmutter (stepmother), Der verlust (the loss) meaning the loss of her mother but also her childhood and her innocence. After the Angel has completely broken her psyche, we see a plethora of words on screen, many of these are psychoanalytic terms. Privation is the first term I want to define: privation occurs when there is a continuous disruption of the attachment between a child and their primary caregiver (most often the mother) which is thought to cause long term cognitive, emotional and social difficulties for the child. We absolutely see this in Asuka not only with her Mother replacing her with a doll but also in her father being far more concerned with his mistress than Asuka. Masculine protest is another term we see in this montage. Masculine protest is a term coined by Alfred Adler in the 1930’s, and is used to describe a woman who has rejected their feminine condition (think reverse womb envy) revolting against what they think is a permanent perspective of inferiority to men. Another behaviour commonly associated with this is hostility towards other women, and aggressive sexual behaviour. We see examples of this in Asuka’s hostility towards Rei, her competitiveness with Shinji, as well as her aggressive behaviour. Reactive formation is perhaps the most interesting term shown when applied to Asuka. Reaction formation is a defence mechanism in which a person unconsciously replaces an unwanted or anxiety inducing impulse with its opposite, often expressed in an exaggerated or showy way. A classic example would be a child who bullies another child that they have a crush on. This is clearly present in Asuka with her exaggerated aggressiveness towards Shinji, even her attitude towards Misato and Rei are likely reaction formations of her desire to be closer with them. Attachment behaviour i believe is referring to the attachment theory by John Bowlby published in 1969. This theory operates on two factors, the model of the self and the model of the other. If a person has a positive model of self and a positive model of others they can form secure relationships. But if a person has a positive model of others but a negative self model the individual will display anxious, self doubting and sensitive behaviours(Shinji). A person with a positive self model but a negative model of others will be self reliant but find themselves avoidant and distant from others (Rei). Finally if a person has negative self image and a negative model of others, they will be self sabotaging, unpredictable and isolated (Asuka). Shadow, also called the shadow aspect, is an unconscious aspect of the personality which does not correspond with a persons ideal self image, leading the ego to project this personality and repress it. We see this in Asuka’s repressed feelings for Shinji conflicting with her desire not to need anyone. Reparation is a rather obtuse and complex term from Melanie Klein(1921). Klein theorized that children go through diffrent “positions” during their life. The paranoid-schizoid position occurs first, the infant is only concerned with survival of the self and can view single entities (ex.the mother) as separate “loved” and “hated” objects. For example if the child is hungry and wants to breast feed but the breast doesn’t come and are instead bottle fed, the infant will develop a concept of a hated breast completely separated from the loved breast that the child feeds from. The next stage occurs multiple times even into teen years, the depressive stage. Reparation occurs when an infant in the depressive stage of klein’s model realizes that both good and bad objects are in fact different aspects of the same entity , this induces guilt in the child for its hateful feelings towards the loved object and this is where reparation, the desire of the child to repair the mental image of what it once hated occurs. I think we can actually see this occur with Asuka’s self, her desire to repair her shattered self image and repress feelings of self hatred, and in Shinji who we actually see try to repair the image of his parents in episode 16 “mother was smiling” he tells himself to avoid the possibility that his father murdered his mother. Finally, an interesting fact about the scene where Asuka is confronted with her various personas stating “this isn’t me!” Every time the sequence repeats it’s actually a different voice actress, in order: Misato, Rei, Hikari, Ritsuko and Maya. This really relates to the concept states multiple things In EVA that there is a different “you” inside everyone who observes you. I’m looking forward as always to Thursday, enjoy episode 23 and I hope I didn’t bog you down with so much info 😅
MaleniaTheSevered
2022-08-14 18:18:58 +0000 UTCSee, those scenes with Asuka are some of my favorites in the episode, so that's crazy they were add ins! Wow! Thank you for that info!
Romaniablack
2022-08-13 12:42:13 +0000 UTCOH WOW! I didn't realize that! That's so cool!! Thank you for pointing that out!!
Romaniablack
2022-08-13 12:41:34 +0000 UTCI appreciate you letting me know!! :D That is helpful! :D
Romaniablack
2022-08-13 12:27:17 +0000 UTCAlso, the director cut episodes are designated using number with an apostrophe (Episode 22 vs Episode 22') during the mid-ep title card. Assuming Anno means "the episode number+prime," which is a mathematical term "... a point rotated, translated or reflected might be represented as (x′, y′)." So, these are episodes than have morphed from their original. It isn't episode 22, but episode 22'
Nicholas NB
2022-08-11 21:06:43 +0000 UTCThe new scenes in DC are: Intro scene with Kaji and Asuka, Asuka at the train-station trying to call Kaji, then seeing Shinji and Rei. Asuka in the bathroom screaming she hates herself, and Misato reacting. Smiling doll looking at Asuka, and baby Asuka trying to comfort normal Asuka. The whole scene with Rei pulling out the Spear. The spear kinda morphing as it hits the AT field.
Simon Lemon
2022-08-11 15:28:25 +0000 UTCI think they are officially known as "Directors Cut" so you're not doing anything wrong, I was more pointing that out because it's easy to be confused about it all haha.
Simon Lemon
2022-08-11 13:47:18 +0000 UTCI can only IMAGINE! There's so much with this episode, I can't imagine the original version in comparison!
Romaniablack
2022-08-11 13:43:03 +0000 UTCI figure I'll just keep the "Director's Cut" label on these last few episodes, since otherwise, everyone on YouTube will ask me if this is the "original" or "unedited" versions, haha! I figure it just makes it simpler. :P But good to know!
Romaniablack
2022-08-11 13:42:30 +0000 UTCThe directors cut label is slightly misleading, since none of the new footage existed before they made the DC version.
Simon Lemon
2022-08-11 13:41:06 +0000 UTCThis episode was the most changed from it's TV counterpart. It's not so much that stuff was cut, they added a bunch of new scenes to this version. And changed A LOT of shots to look better, the original episode is super inconsistent in art quality. One third of this Episode was changed or altered from the original TV version. The original had a much more rushed pace due to being in the standard 24 minutes format.
Simon Lemon
2022-08-11 13:35:07 +0000 UTC
