Fanfic What happens when you take a horrible, Pretentious Series and proceed to make it awesome Via Warhammer
Like my title say's, this is basically what happens when you take a terrible, horrible, VERY PRETENTIOUS franchise, and proceed to inject Warhammer 40 into the Main Character's Childhood, which in turn makes the Main Character into a Magnificent Bastard, make another, emotionless character......well what happens to her is too good to spoil, and proceed to make an' Franchise i DESPISE into a story I couldn't stop reading for a while. The Writing itself ain't bad.
Fanfic Byakugan01's Review
Well, this was also my first REAL introduction to the world of NGE. W H40k, now that was something I was already intimately familiar with. I knew the basics of NGE-who and what Rei was, who Asuka was, who Shinji was, the EVA's true nature, etc, etc. But this-this is the work that actually made me appreciate the potential inherent within the NGE universe. As someone who LIKES Crazy Awesome and Shout Out s, I loved this fic. Seeing how the butterfly effect of what happened by changing Shinji's childhood did was also interesting. Above all, though, this fic was fun to read, and kept me glued to the computer more than was probably healthy for me during the previous fall semester. I was actually disappointed when I ran out of chapters to read, and so I simply re-read some of my favorite chapters. It is very, VERY long. However, it is also very, very good if you don't mind the Shout Outs and Crazy Awesome. Definitely am hoping the author will carry it through to the end. I must say say-even if it ends like Canon!Evangelion, the ride was definitely worth it.
Fanfic Willbyr's review
This is one of the standards by which all Crack Fics should be measured. Bpen's done a truly outstanding job of being able to explore just how deeply Evangelion could be changed by adding 40K into the mix in the manner that he has. The characters, for all of the warping that happens, still manage to maintain their canon selves enough to not be totally unrecognizable, and the changes to the Angels and the battles against them are a lot of fun to read, as are the hijinks that the pilots get into in the quieter moments. That being said, Rouge Angles Of Satin does show up fairly frequently, and the levels of Marty Stu that Shinji exhibits, the huge number of Shout Outs, and the sheer outrageousness of the story may turn off readers with a low tolerance for such things. Still, I'd recommend this without hesitation. On a personal note, this fic was my introduction to both NGE fanfiction and 40K, and was one of the very first works that I discovered through TV Tropes.
Fanfic Sneebs' review
I'm probably going to get Inquisitors up my arse, but this didn't rock my world as much as it was supposed to. While very funny and deliciously off-the-wall, characterization couldn't have become less flat if they were the main female cast of Disgaea. Regardless of what the Author say he's doing, Shinji manifests the dread character blight of Marty Stu-dom as he defies Eva-canon laws of physics and wins the fanatical loyalty of the staff of NERV with such defiance of physical laws. Characters simply side with Shinji because the author wants it to turn out that way. Recommended, but with reservations. If you feel like something silly and off-the-wall, then by all means indulge yourself; if your're a overly serious and pretentious prick like me who likes proper grammar & spelling with decent characterization and storytelling, go and have a bit to something to drink instead.
Fanfic Tacitus's review
I have had little knowledge of or interest in Evangelion, yet this fan fic sank its claws into me so deep I was compelled to do little but read it for three days straight as I watched an unfamiliar world slowly change into one I knew intimately. It basically operates under the thesis that Anything + Warhammer 40,000 = Awesome, and is entertainingly successful. So Eva Unit 01 + W40K = Principio Eternus: "The enemies of man will die, by my hands they shall be broken." Shinji, allegedly one of the greatest pusses of all animedom + W40K = a mixture of Captain Carrot and Paul Atreides. Creepy dead-eyed child Rei + W40K = something too hilariously awesome to spoil. Sure, some may cry Marty Stu or Plot Derailment, but it's a fun what-if scenario with enough Genre Savvy and pop-culture references to counteract the occasional spelling error. Highly recommended: the prologue alone is marvelous, and it actually made this troper reflect upon how much an impact the game had on his own development.
Fanfic A story from a very different time.
If there was one persistent thing in the Eva fandom up until the mid-2010s, it was the notion that Shinji sucked terribly. This led to all kinds of stories where Shinji gets over his issues, becomes a badass, saves the planet, gets the girls, and gains about 50 pounds of muscle. And of course, this story is the king of them all: as it probably should be, because from the pure perspective of what it was aiming to accomplish, it accomplished its goals with aplomb. It contorts the world of Eva to fit the hypermasculine, chest-pounding, quasi-fascistic framing of 40K, with full success. For all that this review tells you not to read it, from a sheer craft perspective, it's creative, the fights are good, the prose is at least competent, and it's frequently funny. There's talent here.
But nowadays, it seems people are becoming aware that Shinji was supposed to be a flawed character and not a reader-insert fantasy, and so we're seeing increasing warmth and focus on his actual feelings and motivations—what he wanted, how his life affected him, and how he stands as a depiction of depression and self-loathing. He wasn't done perfectly, but he remains one of the most unique protagonists in mainstream anime. And in that modern mindset, this fic comes across as, er, kind of hateful. Shinji's angst is framed as aberrant, immature, and wimpy—which is exactly the thing you need to tell depressed people in real life. Not that their feelings are valid and they're not alone, but that they're pathetic and need to grow up. And to be sure, I do not believe that a fic must by nature duplicate the original's themes, but I do believe it should recognize them, and respect them for what they were. I do not detect recognition or respect here, and for a case study, let's talk Kaworu.
People in those days never seemed to get Kaworu. This makes sense, since nobody got Shinji, and to get Kaworu is to pay attention to Shinji. Kaworu was the only character in the series who made Shinji happy with no reservations and completely accepted him—and Shinji has to kill him. That's why it's tragic. But if you don't get why Shinji felt that way, then Kaworu just seems weird and yaoibaity. And so in this fic, he's jury-rigged into a weird antichrist-cum-shounen rival, who's in love with Asuka, of all characters, so that Shinji can be such a chad that he wins Asuka anyway.
And you know, I think that good long shot of Shinji holding Kaworu with no animation had more emotional resonance than every single scene Kaworu had in this whole reinvention. For all its darkness, for all talk of deconstruction, Eva was built out of love for the genre that spawned it, for Ultraman and sentai and super robots, and out of a desire to show deeply written and achingly personal characters living in their world. Shinji and Warhammer 40K was built out of disdain, so crushes those achingly personal characters under its boot before shooting them in the face and giving a pithy remark.