Mini Film Review – Evangelion: 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance

Yesterday I watched Evangelion: 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance; and it was petty good! Directed by Masayuki, and Kazuya Tsurumaki, and starring Spike Spencer, Allison Keith-Shipp, and Tiffany Grant; Evangelion: 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance is the second anime film in the Rebuild of Evangelion series. Continuing on from where the first film left off; Shinji Ikari continues his role as the pilot of Unit 1, whilst both trying to forge a meaningful relationship with his father, and contend with two new pilots in Asuka, and Mari. The film can be a bit of a difficult watch as it doesn’t really follow much of a film format, it comes across more like an extension of the original tv series‘ format, with scenes and sections coming across more like a clip show sewn together. The film though does create a cool new character in Mari, whilst allowing more development for Asuka than the original series allowed. Thankfully the film’s plot, which does follow a similar structure to the original, does allow for new story telling, which means that whilst it can be predicted a bit if you saw the original, there are still plenty of surprises and new features too. The animation is beautifully constructed, and the art style is really nice too, which means the action scenes look really cool and engaging as well. It is a bit of an oddball film altogether, but it comes with plenty of good points in it’s favour, to make the whole thing worthwhile!