It's here. The show that practically deluged anime fandom on both sides of the Pacific in hype has finally arrived on the market Stateside. After a long and pitched battle to acquire the rights, A.D. Vision came out on top, but at a price. Rumor has it that A.D.Vision paid a record sum for the rights to this latest GAINAX venture. Fans have been eagerly anticipating the release of this title since the bidding wars began.
I am here to answer the question: Is it worth it?
If you're unfamiliar with the story of EVANGELION, here's a very brief synopsis. In the year 2015, the Earth is under attack by alien creatures known only as "Angels." In response to this threat, the top-secret U.N. organization NERV has been developing synthetic robots/life-forms called Evangelions. Only a handful of special children are capable of synchronizing with and piloting these Evas, as they are called. Thus, the fate of the world rests in the hands of several 14-year-old children, who all have problems of their own.
The pace of the first two episodes provides plenty of time for both character introduction and development as well as battles and dramatic tension. Ikari Shinji, the "third child," is delivered to NERV and immediately has to pilot an Eva to repel an attacking Angel. In what may be an anime first, Shinji gets in the cockpit for the first time and, without giving too much away, gets trashed. He doesn't "automatically" know how to pilot the thing, nor is there an instruction book; this is a refreshing twist on a now-familiar concept: kid piloting giant robot.
The other characters, too, make for an interesting mix. Capt. Katsuragi Misato is endearing and funny, while Dr. Akagi Ritsuko is more of the stern motherly type. Probably the most despicable character in the show is Ikari Gendou, Shinji's father, who is head of NERV and a royal jerk. He has no people skills and thinks of the children, including his own son, as little more than tools.
The animation is nice and clean, and the soundtrack is okay. I've heard better, though. But, of course, all of this may be old news. What about A.D.Vision's "version" of EVANGELION?

Our kid protagonist, Ikari Shinji, and the first Angel.

My complaints are few. The cover packaging is attractive. As for the video itself, the color is bright, vibrant and the copy is very crisp. There is no loss of color or color bleeding.
Most of my complaints stem from the actual subtitling. I have to say that many of these can be considered minor quibblings, but they happened often enough that I found them to be annoying. At one point, we see a construction report on screen. They subtitled every line of detail on the construction report, including date of completion, building company, etc. None of this was necessary, and had they just said "construction report," I don't really think that anyone would have minded. Plus, they use a small font in white lettering over a white piece of paper, which detracts from the readability, and it's not up on the screen long enough to read without pausing the tape. This is actually pretty bothersome and causes the viewer to have to stop and concentrate on reading what turns out to be mostly irrelevant information.
This obsession with subtitling every sign, label, and printed word on the screen also extends to the items in Misato's shopping cart; again, an unnecessary distraction. I understand the desire to do a thorough and complete job of translating, but I have to say that these examples distracted rather than enhanced the viewing. Also, I understand that they are probably trying to stave off a bunch of fans saying, "Look! They didn't translate that sign," but I think what we have here is a bit of overkill.
Finally, a couple of minor translating objections. I can forgive the liberties taken with the opening song--it's kind of hard to make any sort of sense out of it and they did try to make it poetic. But what sticks out in my mind is the sign on Shinji's room (yes, another sign), which says simply "Shin-chan no heya." Quite literally, this says "Shin-chan's Room." This is a perfectly normal translation into English. However, someone apparently felt the need to embellish it and it mutated into "Shinji's Lovely Suite." I don't quite see why they felt that was necessary, but this is relatively minor. The dialog is pretty much in line with what the characters are saying, though, so I can't say that the translation isn't good. This one example just really stuck out.
So, is NEON GENESIS EVANGELION worth it? I think so, and I'm certainly not a die-hard Eva fan. The story is innovative and interesting, and some of the characters are very appealing. Is it the best subtitling job I've ever seen? No, but aside from what I've mentioned above, it's not a bad job. Should you pick it up? Yes, if you like science fiction you should definitely give Eva a shot.

A.D. VISION / 60 MIN
CONTAINS EPISODES ONE & TWO
$29.95 / SUBTITLED CATALOG #: VHSEV/001S
© 1996 GAINAX / PROJECT EVA * TV TOKYO * NAS
© 1996 A.D. VISION