Story: Wow....where exactly to begin? Asuka likes Shinji, but she won't admit it. Rei likes Shinji...and will admit it...after a while. Touji and Hikari ARE together and provide a sort of...parallel relationship. Kensuke likes Asuka but Asuka cannot stand him at all. Shinji, of course, completely indecisive and has to spend an incredible amount of time being annoying before deciding exactly which girl he has his heart on. That's it...the entire story. Oh, wait. Sorry. Kaoru is in....love with Shinji? Yes....yes he is. That is is. The entire storyline is completely one layer deep. They try to throw in the Angels and the Eva's...but the attempt is terribly conceived and the "battle" is quite poorly drawn. All the complexities that made the original Evangelion are gone...and the only thing that's left is a terribly flimsy premise for a manga. The ending is terrible as well. How many of you saw the ending of the show and went "What...just...happened?" Well...this is kind of like that, only there wasn't a great beginning or middle part. And as for which Shinji picks....take a giant guess....95% of you will be right. I'll give you a hint...if you're hoping for the same person I hoped for...you're wrong.
Art: The only reason why the characters are recognizable is because they are referred to by name so often. I don't understand at all why someone chose this guy to do this manga. He completely, completely butchers EVERYTHING in this. I kept looking at Shinji and Rei (especially Rei) going "who the HELL are they?" There are almost no backgrounds at all, except when there's a scene change or when the artist decided to draw a window or tree. I don't mind having pages mainly blank, but the art that's in here is almost insulting. I could rant almost forever about how terrible the art in this is...but it would be a lot easier for you to download a chapter, preferably in volume 3-6 (that's when the art REALLY crumbles apart) and view it for yourself.
Character: During this entire manga I spent my time reimagining what it would be like if this manga was more like Evangelion....and honestly, the version in my head was a LOT more entertaing (at least to me) than what was on the page. Every character in here is practically stencilled from every harem manga ever made. Shinji is, of course, completely indecisive. He gives the illusion that he's debating between the two, Rei and Asuka, but he knows which one he goes with. The characters have absolutely no depth at all. Even Kaoru, who people STILL debate about, is so shallow and weakly developed that even I was feeling so bad for him.
Enjoyment: I finished this manga....I barely read the last 3 volumes, by the end of the second volume I had stopped hoping that it would improve. It never did improve....In the hands of almost anyone else, this manga would have been incredibly amazing. I was so suprised by how terribly handled this manga was. It'll stand on my bookshelf as the worst manga I have ever purchased and read....and that includes Kingdom Hearts (I've mentioned that before)
Don't read this, unless you're really curious. If you hate it in the first volume and think that it might improve, I am telling you right now that it won't. This has nothing to do with evangelion except for the name and the characters. There is absolutely no appeal in this anime. Don't get me wrong, I was HOPING so badly that was going to be amazing. I thought that this was going to be my favourite manga...my favourite series. Sadly, it vastly underperforms. So...read it, or don't read it. Just please, don't be like me and expect it to be amazing because it has the name "Neon Genesis Evangelion" attached to it.
