Evangelion: 3.0 + 1.01 Thrice Upon a Time

Sequel to Evangelion 3.33: You Can (Not) Redo

Genre(s): Mecha, Psychological, Drama, Sci-Fi, Action

Age-Appropriateness: 17+ (Profanity, violence, gore, brief nudity)

Platforms: Amazon Prime

Episodes: One 2 hr. 35 min. movie

TheAwersome Rating: 8.6 / 10 (Finally, a satisfying conclusion)

Premise: Following NERV’s failed attempt to retrieve the Spears of Longinus and carry out the Human Instrumentality Project, the destruction caused by the Fourth Impact has been largely averted. In a state of disarray, Shinji Ikari, Asuka Langley Shikinami, and Rei Ayanami travel to Village 3—a survivor settlement free from Earth’s ruination. There, Shinji slowly comes to terms with his past, developing an entirely different life from his days as an Evangelion pilot.

TheAwersome’s Thoughts: You know that feeling when you’ve been sitting in a meeting that could have been an email, and it’s already one hour past its scheduled end time, the entire time needing to take a dump? Then you finally do, and sit back down in your chair and EVERYTHING about the world is insanely pleasant and ridiculously comfortable? That’s what this felt like. Character exploration and development (for nearly all characters this time) is satisfying and intricate. Animation is absolutely out-of-the-park phenomenal. There’s a good dynamic of cool/intense/horrifying fights, very human mundane slice of life aspects, and deep psychological surgery.

Being Evangelion, however, it is not without the expected scenes of “wow, what drugs were they even on for this part?” but they get back on track before the entire train has been off the rails for too long. By this point, you’ve been around the Evangelion block a few times (watched the series, likely watched End of Evangelion and have watched the Rebuild movies) so it’s a bit harder to have any gut-wrenching reveals, but boy howdy it’s still a satisfying ride.

TLDR: A satisfying, cathartic finale to all Evangelion.

Congratulations! You’re done with Evangelion! You’ve made it through everything! And for those of you who are just reading these reviews and wondering “Do I really need to watch ALL of this to have watched Evangelion and ‘have the Evangelion experience’?” I’m going to be straight with you. No. No you do not. I’d say you’re fine watching the original TV series and End of Evangelion. 

If, however, you really liked the series and want more (or you were left unsatisfied and with many questions), the Rebuild series is an EXCELLENT addition/alternate route. Animation and production quality are leaps and bounds better than the main series, and you aren’t in “psychological therapy limbo” for nearly as long. I do not recommend watching JUST the Rebuild series though, because it builds heavily on the original, and in the end is a different experience. There are additional characters in Rebuild that aren’t in the original, and many of the characters that are in both are written differently, accentuated with Asuka’s name being changed for the Rebuild (Asuka Langley Soryu in the original, Asuka Langley Shikinami in the Rebuild).

If I were to do a side by side “Rebuild VS. Original (Original including End of Evangelion)” it’d be very similar to how I view Majora’s Mask VS. Ocarina of Time. You can’t really enjoy Majora’s Mask to nearly the same extent if you haven’t played Ocarina of Time. Objectively, however, I think Majora’s Mask is a much better game, despite being far less iconic, groundbreaking, canon, and timeless than its predecessor.  

You’ll likely enjoy this if you enjoyed:

• Any previous Evangelion installments
• Darling in the FranXX (Kind of applies to all of Evangelion)
• “Learn to be human” elements of Violet Evergarden, No Game No Life: Zero