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Fruitless days, restless nights.

You’d probably not want to be Hideaki Anno back in the early 90’s.

His passion project, ‘Evangelion,’ wasn’t a global hit that left a significant mark in pop culture yet. Instead, it was still a dormant sales pitch, rejected by far too many executives by this point. [1]

His so-called best friends responded to his vulnerability with hostility, even going as far as making fun of his desperate calls for help[2].

Except for one…Takami Akai, who was ecstatic with the newfound success of Princess Maker not just in Japan, but on a global scale.

“Have you considered making it a video game?” was his question that Anno wasn’t sure about. He wasn’t really a gamer, but the sheer revenue Princess Maker was bringing in was rather tempting. At least, the idea of something that could help him out of his days sleeping in the studio, all the while feuding with executives over his unauthorized creative drives.

Anno, for the first time in a while, washed himself up for his scheduled meeting with Sega.

//

Few things about the company, he felt deeply noteworthy.

All the people, after what could best be described as ‘creative coup d'etat,’ were passionate about the company. There was this shed of “We cannot let this company we reformed by our own hands to crumble down.” He found this funny, as it reminded his ‘home’.

What was not quite like his home was its CEO, Shoichiro Irimajiri.

Throughout the production of ‘Evangelion,’ he’d ask him “How’s your health?” or “Are you feeling alright?” first before asking for any progress reports. A trait of his that’s well-known. [3]

This meant a lot to Anno. For all his life, he thought he figured out the way of life. That it’s a lonesome journey where you have to figure out the answer for yourself. Hanging out with a cynical group of people certainly further cemented that notion of his. Another brick on the wall, if you will.

But seeing the compassionate people sharing their ideals, and working together to materialize it…that was a refreshing change of pace.
//

“Neon Genesis Evangelion” ends up becoming a vastly different product (I mean, it’s a strategy-RPG now), but the core still stands: It’s still a story about human connection and its barricades, thinly disguised as a giant robot spectacle. Just not without a…seemingly fatalist [4] outlook present in End of Evangelion we saw IOTL.

Anno would still return to ‘his home’ back in the animation industry, to materialize ‘a version of Eva’ that would satisfy his creative drive. But not without promising his return if they decide to call him…

Let's move on.

//

[1] This was something that also happened IOTL.

[2] Not going into grotesque details that’d warrant a content warning, but…his friends were assholes. Let’s leave it at that.

[3] This is something Kenji Eno notes in his interviews; Irimajiri was one of the few executive suits who took their job seriously.

[4] That is, if you weren’t paying attention, which was surprisingly a lot of people back in 1997.

Francis Fukuyama suffered more than a few oversights when he first theorized his “end of history.” It was understandable—it was 1989 and the vibe was different. It had been morning in America for almost an entire decade and only a matter of time before the Berlin Wall and communism finally fell to their knees. It’s natural that at such a moment a capitalist ideologue like Fukuyama would wax poetic about history rendering Marxism antiquated; capitalism, as he saw it, had resolved all class conflict in America.
It is clear in hindsight that Fukuyama was a little too sunny in his analysis of America. While the global control of capitalism seems here to stay, given it is easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism, the social problems it creates are felt deeply by all in America except the extremely wealthy. However, Fukuyama reserved some of his most blissfully optimistic predictions for his ancestral homeland. Japanese society, as he saw it, had become an economic utopia; the tenth page of Fukuyama’s original ‘89 thesis states that “the very fact that the essential elements of economic and political liberalism have been so successfully grafted onto uniquely Japanese traditions and institutions guarantees their survival in the long run.”

Fukuyama’s optimism about Japan wasn’t without logic. Years of post-war rebuilding led to gradual prosperity, and by the end of the 1980s, Japan had become the world’s second-largest economy. In December of 1989, just a few months after Fukuyama’s thesis was published, the Nikkei index hit a record of nearly 39,000. At last, Nippon was on the verge of becoming the mighty Leviathan of the Pacific once more.

It would only take a few short years before these lofty predictions hit their snag. Japan’s bubble economy suffered an explosive pop in 1992, resulting in a recession that plagued the nation for years to come. The early signs of misfortune came in waves: the Nikkei index had fallen below 15,000 by the time August had rolled around, corporations were forced to engage in massive lay-offs and hiring freezes, and chaos erupted all over the Japanese government. Bureaucrats and businessmen alike were embroiled in scandal after scandal after scandal after scandal, opening wide a revolving door of an inconsistent 11 prime ministers in 12 years. The Kobe earthquake and Tokyo subway attacks administered a coup de grace on any semblance of optimism, throwing the entire nation into a spiritual crisis.

“Lily Hoshino, the beloved artist behind Mawaru Penguindrum, offers her cute and twisted take on the magical girl genre. You probably never thought Sailor Moon needed more hot older guys in full-body mascot costumes, but Kigurumi Guardians will bring you around!

Hakka Sasakura’s life is about to turn upside down. She comes home from a day of admiring her student body president to discover that a mysterious creature resembling a man in an animal suit has taken up residence her home. What’s more, she has been chosen to work with this strange being to fight off invaders from another dimension and save the world… and she has to kiss him to do so?!“

let's all remember the year Gainax ruined Christmas