www.worldanimeclub.com
T
he sound is of similar caliber, but it’s relegated to
the side in the movie; I would not listen to a single
song on this OST without visual accompaniment,
which is truly a shame, as many songs on 2.22’s OST were
fantastic while standalone. The only exception to this is
the ending theme, Sakura Nagashi, which captures the
feel of the movie incredibly well, and shows why Utada
Hikaru is very deserving of her widespread acclaim. Voice
acting continues to set a high standard, particularly Megumi
Ogata’s performance as Shinji, which I thought was very
well done and brought me
farther into an otherwise
broken movie.
The characters, on the other hand, do not deserve the same amount of
praise, in my opinion. The interactions between Shinji and Kaworu were
well executed and definitely entertaining to watch, but that’s as far
as I can go. Mari is a completely unnecessary character, and doesn’t
contribute anything of value to the overall story. Misato’s new character
isn’t explored nearly enough, and is frequently very off-putting.
Ritsuko has no role other than to deliver exposition, and Gendo’s
has about five lines in the entire movie and shares Misato’s
problem. Rei has been reset to, well, Rei (I’m sorry), and has lost
all of her characterization from the second film. And Asuka, well,
I’m not sure what to say about her. That’s the problem, really.
Her character wasn’t really developed or explore B