"Early Access - Neon Genesis Evangelion | Episode 16 "Splitting of the Breast" Reaction & Review " by FILMBuFF from Patreon

Great episode discussion always. Evangelion has this reputation of being this deep, indecipherable anime that has lead to a kind of toxic attitude in discussing it where people who don't "get it" are accused of having a shallow understanding the story and its themes an I think this really hurts the show and its community. For me, Evangelion has always been primarily a emotional experience, so I've always been confused at takes that people that don't "get" Eva just need to read up on Freudian psychoanalysis and Christian and Jewish theology to understand it better because I think these things are only secondary to what makes the show so good. What has allowed to show to survive and stay popular almost 30 years after it's creation is the universal quality of the emotional connection people make with the characters. And I have to second your point on how good the voice acting is in this show because its something that I feel gets less recognition than it deserves. The main cast all have such fantastic performances that make their characters feel like real people, and I love seeing their VA's pop up in other anime I watch. Finally, since this post is getting so long, I'll just say that there is a better quality version of this episode that is a direct copy of what was broadcasted on Japanese television when the show aired. It' part of a DVD collection called "Archive of Evangelion" that was exclusively distributed in Japan and lacks English subtitles. While I don't condone piracy, one could hypothetically google "Archive of Evangelion" and possibly find a Internet Archive link for this full release including a higher quality version of episode 16 if they really wanted to. . .

Anonymous

The second title of this episode "Splitting of the Breast" has always intrigued me, mainly because I had no idea what it meant, so after some digging it turns out the title is referencing Melanie Klein's work on object relations theory: "It was the latter sense of the term that was predominantly adopted and exploited by Melanie Klein. After Freud, "the most important contribution has come from Melanie Klein, whose work enlightens the idea of 'splitting of the object' (Objektspaltung) (in terms of 'good/bad' objects)". In her object relations theory, Klein argues that "the earliest experiences of the infant are split between wholly good ones with 'good' objects and wholly bad experiences with 'bad' objects", as children struggle to integrate the two primary drives, love and hate, into constructive social interaction. An important step in childhood development is the gradual depolarization of these two drives. At what Klein called the paranoid-schizoid position, there is a stark separation of the things the child loves (good, gratifying objects) and the things the child hates (bad, frustrating objects), "because everything is polarised into extremes of love and hate, just like what the baby seems to experience and young children are still very close to". Klein refers to the good breast and the bad breast as split mental entities, resulting from the way "these primitive states tend to deconstruct objects into 'good' and 'bad' bits (called 'part-objects')". The child sees the breasts as opposite in nature at different times, although they actually are the same, belonging to the same mother. As the child learns that people and objects can be good and bad at the same time, he or she progresses to the next phase, the depressive position, which "entails a steady, though painful, approximation towards the reality of oneself and others": integrating the splits and "being able to balance [them] out ... are tasks that continue into early childhood and indeed are never completely finished"."

م -

Umm , what happend to monster :( ?

Ryan

The scene of Shinji breaking out of the angel is indeed iconic. It has been referenced a number of times. One was in the Chainsaw man OP.

Anonymous (edited)

tom

This episode also does a strangely good job at simulating the feeling of being in that competitive/student/academic/grades environment for me, at least it did when I first watched it. Not only with the pilot synch scores, but with Shinji rushing ahead only to get swallowed up and then Asuka/Rei being able to avoid the same fate. I don't know, it reminded me of imposter syndrome-like moments I had in school. It's not expanded on at all, because Shinji is unconscious when this is happening, but I remember feeling a vague sense of dread and self-doubt about Asuka being able to climb up the building to avoid the angel, as if I was emotionally in the shoes of Episode 1 Shinji viewing this moment and feeling perplexed at how other people were able to navigate such a situation while it seemed impossible for me. There are other moments like this in the show, though it has to do less with skill and more with knowledge. How do other people know so much? Why am I / Shinji expected to follow along with everything? What is different about my brain that makes me so clueless and helpless while everyone seems to be capable of so much more? These feelings, especially early on create a sense of adolescent dependency and tension that pairs well with the themes of the series.

Early Access - Neon Genesis Evangelion | Episode 16 "Splitting of the Breast" Reaction & Review (Patreon)

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