Treaos Serrare said:
I'll give him being freaked out about the whole thing for maybe the first five minutes or so of battle but after his first victory he should have been all in on that shit not whining and wimping out at every available opportunity
Actually, he doesn't whine and ***** at every moment and when he does it is somewhat justifiable.
4th angel: Overcomes his fear and kills it despite being ordered to retreat
5th angle: Comes much closer to killing him than the previous two so his emotional condition during that fight is justifiable, IMO
6th-11th angels: I actually do not recall Shinji whining or complaining to any extent during these battles.
12th angel: He is literally trapped inside the angel, can do nothing to escape, and nearly suffocates to death.
13th angel: Lets see...one of his best friends, Toji, is trapped inside EVA 05, and Shinji can only watch helplessly as EVA 01 viciously rips it apart and nearly kills Toji (or in the manga actually does kill him).
14th angel: Despite all the shit that happened to him in the previous fight, he willingly returns to fight and defeat the 14th angel.
15th angel: Results in Asuka becoming a vegtable
16th angel: Results in the death of Rie
17th angel: After becoming friends with Kawouru he is force to kill him. Its important to note that at his point all the people close to him with the exception of Misato, are either dead, comatose, or have moved away due to most of Tokyo being in ruins after the 16th angel fight.
So yeah Shinji can be excessively whiny and annoying at times, but considering how fucked up his life can get at times I can't say I always blame him.
Treaos Serrare said:
there's what 4-5 girls in the series that try to get with him or at least give him the opportunity and he is just utterly clueless about them
There's really only 3
Rei- incapable of reciprocating any kind of feelings
Asuka- Definition of a ***** and hate's his guts at times
Misato- 10+ years older than him and is his guardian
Not exactly candidates for a healthy sexual relationship and I have no memory of them giving him the "opportunity", at least none that I would consider consensual.
Treaos Serrare said:
and any progression he makes at all as a character is immediately reverted to pre-eva shinji at the very first opportunity or with no reason at all in a jarring shift that would drop the transmission out of most cars
Yeah as much as I defend Shinji, even I'll admit that that the whole "one step forward three steps backward" routine can get pretty annoying. I'm hoping that by the end of EVA 4.0 Shinji will have made actually made some progress without losing it all, though 3.0 didn't exactly paint a pretty picture. I swear by the end of that film his mental condition was worse than it had ever been in the TV series.