Why is Shinji Ikari so polarizing?

While Shinji may not be a badass, cliche robot hero, he is however more real to than most of the heroes I find in mecha anime. Most mecha heroes start off like Shinji until they become some sort of unstoppable badass, Anno gleefully subverts and deconstructs the Hero's Journey by 'not' making Shinji heroic character and making him a real person. Shinji is pretty much the anti Simon in that while Simon destroys that hero mold, Shinji is 'destroyed' by hero mold. Despite this this, he continues to fight the Angels and depending on the ending, he accepts that he need to open to others despite the pain.

Maybe I can relate to Shinji because I am introverted and I have lot of thoughts to myself but for those who are extroverted or extraverted, they may not understand Shinji (or any other Evangelion character) too well. Truth be told, Shinji is lot more loved in Japan than in the West but with that said, why Shinji such a polarizing character on both sides of the world?

A lot of people suspect the reason is precisely that viewers identify with Shinji. People see themselves in him, and many of them don't like what they see...

Also, cultural differences. A lot of people in the West like their heroes to be awesome, tough, masculine badasses. Wish fulfillment after all. For a character to be the exact opposite is rather unsettling.

Well, being realistic doesn't necessarily mean likable. Shinji just rubs a few people the wrong way, which is sort of understandable. He's absolutely relatable, but I can see how some would find him grating for the same reason.

I love Shinji, though. I think he's great.

I don't think Shinji is "real person". As far as standart badass character get above us normal people as far Shinji get below. He is as much unrealistic as them, whole thing is he is on opposite part of spectrum...

edited 7th Aug '12 2:38:59 PM by Tenzen12

I disagree. Shinji is very much the kind of person you'd expect to come about of someone like him (read: like us) being placed in such a dangerous, high-pressure position. It's because of this a lot of people don't like him. It's because we want to think that, in his shoes, we'd all rise to the challenge and become unstoppable badasses who get all the chicks and save the day with our awesome One-Man Army powers. We think he's a wimp, and that we could do better. But we couldn't. Thinking that way is simply a way of protecting the fragile human ego. Shinji forces us to look at the reality behind our fantasies, and for a lot of people, that's upsetting.

Of course, being a traditional hero isn't all it's cracked up to be either. Hello Dean, hello Shirou...

edited 7th Aug '12 2:51:02 PM by KSPAM

Probably because while he may be realistic, he's not entertaining as a mecha hero. I think you guys are overthinking this, like some sort of "OH NO HE IS LIKE US AND WE HATE THAT"

We just hate how he's a complete wuss and it makes for an unlikeable character.

However there is potential there for him to be a good protagonist and not a "Cliche Robot Hero" as people say (which bugs me)

See Super Robot Wars Alpha

edited 7th Aug '12 2:51:13 PM by Thorn14

Again, there you go. You want to think he's a "complete wuss" so you can preserve the integrity of the escapist fantasy super robot shows offer. It's just basic human nature. We don't like to think badly of ourselves, so when we're forced to confront our own shortcomings, we get upset.

And besides, you can't make a generalization like that. I personally found Shinji to be very likable. Even at his worst he was still sympathetic. And I think the way he tried his best to meet the unrealistic expectations set before him despite his own failings makes him far more admirable than any run of the mill hero. The fact that he just keeps going because he feels responsible enough to think he has to up until the moment he utterly breaks just makes him all the more endearing in my eyes.

edited 7th Aug '12 2:55:25 PM by KSPAM

If you think you are like him, Good luck. Try not violate your girl friends...

He had already long since broken by then. It wasn't his fault he was a little unhinged. Besides, it's not like he thought it was a good thing. He hated himself for it after. To be honest, it came off as seeming almost like drunk driving...

I think that even if it's realistic and believable for them to act that way, if the main characters constantly bitches and moans to you about how much life sucks it's going to be unentertaining and grating.

I myself have no problem with Shinji, I didn't find him bad enough to be annoying, but that's my best guess for why a lot of people dislike him.

I found his whining in the first episode annoying (though understandable), but I never actually outright hated him. I was just kinda neutral toward the guy.

That being said, not sure.

edited 7th Aug '12 3:01:46 PM by PhysicalStamina

I think Shinji is quite overdiscussed as a character, as a result of him being a prominent, well-known example of a baffling (for westerners) character archetype, that expands to most heroes in otaku-anime, and for many of us, he was the first notable example, so he became a handy symbol of some supposed new ominous trend that is damaging anime (compared to western expectations).

Kind of like how every anime that is not violent is getting discussed in terms of how similar it is to K-on, because that random Slice of Life series somehow became so memetic, infamous, well known, that it is used as a synonym for "boring show", "moe art style", "school setting", "sexualized show", etc.

edited 7th Aug '12 3:03:53 PM by Ever9

Nope this guy was wreck even before he started pilote EVA. He is emotional cripple who get into cockpit only to get attention of his bastard father and when he didn't he just attemped run away.

In whole anime isn't single person that isn't broken. This anime is first and most notable example on Dysfunction Junction page for xxx sake!

edited 7th Aug '12 3:09:28 PM by Tenzen12

Don't really love or hate him, although I think I got sidetracked somewhere when I became more interested in Misato's story than in his.

Oh and I am dropping this thread. I don't think there is much meaning in it anyway.

But he came back. Not because he wanted to, but because he realized he had to. No matter how fucked up you think Shinji is (I absolutely will not argue that, emotionally, Shinji is damaged goods), you cannot say he didn't do his best. Sure, maybe at first it was about making his father recognize him, but it became more about responsibility, and his duty. No matter how much he hated it, he had to do it. It wasn't going to go away. And even though he doubts himself, even tries to run from it a couple times, eventually, he keeps coming to the same conclusion. This is my responsibility, and I can't run from it forever.

If you ask me, that's a lot more mature than a lot of adults I see nowadays.

edited 7th Aug '12 3:13:16 PM by KSPAM

@ Tenzen: Really, and I thought he did it to spare a heavily-injured young lady from having to do it. You know, as in helping people.

If you ask me, it's NERV's management which comes off as incredibly stupid and unrealistic here.

Here's this kid who might be NERV's final and best hope. He's the Commander's son, and even if he doesn't care a crap about him personally, to save appearances and keep him a fit pilot, he'd invest at least some distant effort on keeping him up for the task. Instead, they dump him away for years. When they resort to him, they put the triple load of piloting, studying and working as a maid/domestic slave for his commanding officer on him, after manipulating him emotionally, blackmailing him and coercing him to pilot. Except for Misato, who at least cares to some degree about him even if she doesn't stop using him as her servant, they seem to go out of their way to make him actively hate the organization. They don't put absolutely any effort whatsoever on training him previously or afterward, the way they did with Asuka and even Rei. Considering how the girls perform with previous training, and yet how Shinji outdoes them without it (even if only because Unit 01's link grants him a plot coupon), if they had bothered at all to raise Shinji as a soldier they'd have had an unstoppable beast that would have breezed them through the series.

But no, of course they couldn't do that despite it being the logical thing to do, because Plot Said So.

And then they complain and take it off on the kid when he doesn't live up to their expectations.

Honestly, what the fuck. People with that kind of setting goes beyond the evil, which would be okay for a shady global organization; they are Stupid Evil.

edited 7th Aug '12 3:36:07 PM by NapoleonDeCheese

Shinji is so polarizing because people have forgotten what he's actually like and treat him as a symbol of his archetype. He's really much less annoying than many of the similar characters

Exactly. But remember, their goal wasn't to defeat all the Angels. They wanted Third Impact. So the total destruction of each pilot's psyche actually inevitably aided them during the eleventh hour. Which leads to my own personal theory as to why no one in this series can get decent help. At some point, either NERV or Seele took it upon themselves to eliminate all therapists still left alive after Second Impact so they wouldn't have anyone competent enough or emotionally stable/sane enough to stop them from initiating Instrumentality during End of Evangelion.

edited 7th Aug '12 3:59:14 PM by KSPAM

I don't think they killed all the therapists, though I agree with what you say.

In Shinji's case, even though he clearly needed psychological help long ago, he's the type that just naturally slips through the cracks because he doesn't ask for help, plus I've heard somewhere that the Japanese don't really believe in therapy.

Rei's reason for not getting a therapist is obvious.

It's Asuka that boggles the imagination. She really, really needs help just as much as Shinji, and you'd think her dad would notice... I suppose the confident attitude fooled everyone, including herself. Her academic success must have helped too.

Speaking of which.

Also, Rei is NOT a robot, unlike what the commentators are saying.

In Shinji's defense, if someone made me live with Asuka, I'd be pretty pissed.

But still, lol.

Agreed.