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Reason for existing, raison d’être. The reason why we’re allowed
to be here.
—Episode 25, “Do You Love Me?”
hy do we exist? What’s our purpose in life? These are some
of the oldest questions in philosophy and also form the heart of
Hideaki Anno’s Neon Genesis Evangelion.
While on the surface Neon Genesis Evangelion may seem to
be just another story of epic giant robot battles, fans know that
there’s much more to it. The focus is actually the personal
struggles of the young EVA pilots and those around them, look-
ing to find meaning in their lives. Here we see echoes of Albert
Camus, who famously wrote on what he labeled the only really
serious philosophical problem: suicide.
Camus argued that “Deciding whether or not life is worth
living is to answer the fundamental question in philosophy. All
other questions follow from that” (The Myth of Sisyphus). Like
any typical teenagers, the three main characters question their
own reasons for existence and attempt to find their own iden-
tities. It’s this deeper exploration of the search for meaning
that has led to the show’s lasting cult status. Come for the
robots, stay for the existentialism.
Duty, Meaning, Loneliness
All of the three main characters initially try to answer these
questions through their identity as EVA pilots, drawing their
purpose, their meaning, and their identity from piloting the
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The Desperate Search
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HEATHER BROWNING AND WALTER VEIT
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EVAs. Shinji takes on the task of piloting an EVA with a sense
of duty. He does so mechanically, and it’s clearly difficult for
him. Though he starts by claiming that he pilots for the sake of
others, he comes to realize that his motivations are more self-
ish. When piloting the EVA, he gains praise and attention from
others, particularly his father, and this makes him feel valu-
able. Without his task he feels worthless, unable to accept that
the people around him might like him for any other reason
than his role as an EVA pilot.
Though, in the beginning, it’s clear that he doesn’t enjoy
piloting the EVA, over time Shinji increasingly accepts this
role. After his father overrides him and uses his EVA to destroy
Unit 03, putting Toji at risk, Shinji decides not to pilot the EVA
again. But when he sees his friends defeated, he realizes he
must step up and returns to NERV, begging to be allowed to
pilot, gathering his courage and for the first time owning this
as his identity: “I’m the pilot of Evangelion Unit 01. I’m Shinji
Ikari!”
Rei takes a similarly dutiful attitude towards piloting her
EVA. Quiet and unassuming, she follows orders as she is given
them. Yet we also see that it’s through piloting the EVA that
she feels connected with others, telling Shinji that it’s “her
link” to everyone and that she “doesn’t have anything else.” She
places little value on her own worth or safety, as shown when
she steps up to shield Shinji from the attack of the fifth Angel,
risking her own life in the process. At Asuka’s goading, she
even admits that she would give up her life if ordered to by
Commander Ikari. It’s through piloting her EVA that Rei feels
connected to the world, as though she has some worth. It’s all
she has.
Asuka also finds meaning in piloting an EVA, but for differ-
ent reasons. For her, it’s about succeeding and being the best.
This desire to prove herself often leads to her rushing into bat-
tles unprepared and ending up defeated. Her insecurity is fur-
ther evident in her ongoing rivalry with Shinji. Asuka’s sense
of purpose is derived from the recognition of others. Her child-
like need for attention shows itself in the way that she con-
stantly performs, calling others, especially Shinji and Kaji, to
watch her as she acts. Her response to Shinji’s question about
why she pilots an EVA is “Why else? To show the whole world
how talented I am!” When Shinji enquires “To let them know
you exist?” she replies “Yeah. Something like that.”
She also tries to find her connection to others through pilot-
ing the EVAs. After losing against several Angels and finding it
increasingly difficult to block the memories of her traumatic
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past, Asuka is no longer able to sync with her EVA and must
be withdrawn from battle. She falls into a deep depression,
feeling the loss of her identity. Without the validation she
receives from piloting the EVA, she no longer feels like her life
is worthwhile.
Suicide is a recurring theme throughout the show, consid-
ered by several characters as a means to escape the apparent
worthlessness of their lives. For Asuka this is perhaps most
striking, since her mother hanged herself, an image that still
haunts her. For Camus, suicide wasn’t an acceptable response
to the meaninglessness of existence. Many existentialists, such
as Jean-Paul Sartre, thought that we can face this by creating
our own meaning. Camus argued instead that we need to revolt
in the face of a life without purpose and enjoy it anyway. Neon
Genesis Evangelion follows the journeys of the characters as
they similarly discover their own ways of finding meaning in
their lives.
Although these characters are seemingly finding their
meaning in their work, it’s evident that what really matters to
them is trying to find attention from, and connection to, others.
The work they do is only instrumental in pursuing this goal.
For them, true meaning is found in these human connections;
however, they struggle to ever get what they need from others.
This is an example of the Hedgehog’s Dilemma.
The Hedgehog’s Dilemma
The Hedgehog’s Dilemma arises from the writings of Arthur
Schopenhauer (though he talks about porcupines, animals not
closely related to hedgehogs), and forms the title of the fourth
episode of the series. Schopenhauer tells of porcupines, coming
together for warmth but driven apart again by the pain of each
other’s spines, drawing a parallel with the human condition of
creating distance between ourselves because of our desire to
avoid harm. Though we crave connection, we aren’t ever able to
fully satisfy this desire. He writes:
A number of porcupines huddled together for warmth on a cold day
in winter; but, as they began to prick one another with their quills,
they were obliged to disperse. However the cold drove them
together again, when just the same thing happened. At last, after
many turns of huddling and dispersing, they discovered that they
would be best off by remaining at a little distance from one another.
In the same way the need of society drives the human porcupines
together, only to be mutually repelled by the many prickly and dis-
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agreeable qualities of their nature. The moderate distance which
they at last discover to be the only tolerable condition of intercourse,
is the code of politeness and fine manners; and those who trans-
gress it are roughly told—in the English phrase—to keep their dis-
tance. By this arrangement the mutual need of warmth is only very
moderately satisfied; but then people do not get pricked. A man who
has some heat in himself prefers to remain outside, where he will
neither prick other people nor get pricked himself. (Parerga and
Paralipomena, Volume 2, pp. 651–52)
This pattern is repeated throughout the series. The characters
all feel lost, and alienated, because of a lack of strong connec-
tions to parent figures or peers. They have experienced pain
and losses that make them wary of growing close to others, and
they employ defensive mechanisms to try to protect themselves
from further pain.
Shinji has never really belonged anywhere, his life a series
of “unfamiliar ceilings.” He was abandoned by his father after
the death of his mother, and his father remains cold and dis-
tant, only reaching out when he needs Shinji for something. To
avoid further rejection and abandonment, Shinji has become
obedient, trying to follow orders and please others by piloting
the EVA or playing the cello at the advice of his teachers. He’s
also defensive, unwilling to allow anyone to get really close.
Shinji deals with his fear of hurt and rejection by running
away, leading to his repeated mantra throughout the series: “I
mustn’t run away.” He runs away not just literally, by leaving
when things get hard, but also figuratively, by avoiding things
that are difficult. The very act of hating himself, of feeling like
he doesn’t matter, is itself a form of running away, of avoiding
having to engage with life, or with others.
Rei has similar issues with Gendo, who acts as a father fig-
ure to her. Although he shows some attachment to and protec-
tiveness toward her, this is a result of her link to his late wife,
Yui, as well as his need for her as part of his Instrumentality
Project. Rei is well aware of the reason for his attention and
though she craves it, she understands the reality behind it. Rei
also suffers from a feeling of disconnection and a struggle with
self-identity, as she is a clone and thus doesn’t feel entirely
human. In response to this, Rei is an isolated and almost
robotic character who separates herself from others. She
doesn’t seem to know how to interact with them but passively
does as she is told and accepts what happens to her without
complaint, strikingly illustrated by a scene of her lying naked,
impassive, below Shinji, after he accidentally falls on her. She
then gets dressed and leaves without saying a word.
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Asuka also suffers from childhood abandonment, with her
father absent, focused on his work, and her mother first having
a breakdown that leads to her taking a small doll as her child
in Asuka’s place, and finally committing suicide. When Asuka
overhears her new stepmother telling her father that she could
stop being a mother if she chose, this terrifies the young girl.
She develops a steely determination to be strong, living with-
out relying on others. She protects herself through her loud
and aggressive behavior and as her struggles intensify through
the series, she begins to express hatred towards everyone,
including herself.
These traumas, rejections, and abandonments in the char-
acters’ pasts lead them to be afraid future harms, building up
defenses to protect themselves. All classic examples of the
Hedgehog’s Dilemma. In fact, the idea is introduced directly in
the series. In Episode 3 (“A Transfer”), Ritsuko tells Misato
about it, in an attempt to help her understand Shinji, explain-
ing that he may be scared of taking risks with others because
he could be hurt again:
RITSUKO: Shinji might be the kind of person who can’t make friends
easily. Have you ever heard of the Hedgehog’s Dilemma?
MISATO: Hedgehog? Those spiky animals?
RITSUKO: Hedgehogs have a hard time sharing warmth with other
hedgehogs. The closer they get, the more they hurt each other
with their quills. People are also like that. I think some part of
Shinji is afraid to take that risk because he’s afraid of being hurt.
MISATO: He’ll figure it out eventually. Part of growing up is trying again
and again using trial and error to work out the right distance to
avoid hurting each other.
This dialogue is poignantly delivered over scenes of Shinji
walking and sitting quietly alone amongst his chattering class-
mates. Because of Shinji’s past hurts, he now feels unable to
get close to others, scared of being hurt again, and simultane-
ously hurting others in return.
Episode 4 tackles this parable head-on, and we get a
glimpse at its possible resolution. After fighting with Misato,
Shinji runs away. Misato realizes that both Shinji and she are
scared of lashing out at one another, leading to further hurt
and withdrawal: “The Hedgehog’s Dilemma, huh? The closer
they get, the more they hurt each other. I get it now. He talks
like that because he doesn’t know how else to express his feel-
ings.” The visuals of this scene, Shinji’s speaking face fading
into Misato’s, further emphasizes the similarity between them.
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Heather Browning and Walter Veit
This leads her to race to the train station to try to stop him
from leaving, only to find that, remembering her words, he has
decided to stay. They have both made an effort to overcome
their tendency to hurt or withdraw, in order to benefit from the
warmth that comes from connection.
The Human Instrumentality Project
That’s how everyone’s Instrumentality began. Parts they were miss-
ing, hearts they had lost, that emptiness in their hearts was filled. The
Instrumentality of the heart, the soul, begins. Everyone’s Instrumen-
tality begins, returning everything to nothingness.
—Episode 25, “Do You Love Me?”
I’m tired of being . . . alone.
SHINJI, Episode 16, “Splitting of the Breast”
The early episodes on the Hedgehog’s Dilemma are a teaser of
what’s to come. Hideaki Anno uses the small-scale story
between the characters in the beginning to later reveal and
connect the plans of the secret organization SEELE and their
Human Instrumentality Project.
The isolation we have seen in the characters, the prior hurt
and abandonment that leaves them damaged, and scared to
connect, while they crave the love and acceptance of others, is
exactly what SEELE plans to overcome using Instrumentality.
Throughout the series, the Angels are able to generate AT
fields that cannot be penetrated by any conventional weaponry.
This is why the EVAs are a necessary weapon, themselves able
to manifest these shields and penetrate those of the Angels.
Close to the ending of the series, however, it’s revealed that the
AT fields actually arise from possession of a soul. They hold
together the ego, or sense of self, protecting against others.
These are physical manifestations of the psychological barriers
between individuals.
Here, the plot converges: SEELE (the German word for
“soul”) aims to destroy these barriers that separate humans
from one another, solving the Hedgehog’s Dilemma by merging
all souls and overcoming the problems of alienation and loneli-
ness by making everyone whole. Instrumentality is the dissolu-
tion of the self into the collective, the loss of boundary. In this,
there are echoes of Heidegger, who saw the self as having an
authentic form of being (which he called Dasein) that involved
identification of the self as separate from but interacting with
the world of others; whereas the inauthentic being would
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The Desperate Search for Meaning in Life
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choose to lose themselves in the world of others, the They.
Instrumentality is thus a form of losing the self and giving into
the They. The motivation for this project is to bring everyone
together, a single soul, filling all the empty spaces in the hearts
and minds of people. A world in which there is no authenticity.
Shinji is shown a world of complete freedom, a world in
which there are no others. However, he’s disturbed by the
emptiness of this world and realizes that it’s the presence of
others in the world that provides the boundaries by which he
can define himself: “If nothing exists outside of yourself, you
can’t determine your own shape . . . You visualize your own
shape by seeing the wall between ‘self’ and ‘other’. You can’t see
yourself unless others are with you.”
Although he has his own self, it’s only meaningful through
contrast with others. This idea is raised in the work of some of
the post-Kantian German idealists, such as Johann Gottlieb
Fichte and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. They explored the
idea that the awareness of the self could only be fully realized
through the presence of others. It is only in contrasting your-
self with those around you that you can recognize your own
identity. It is the interaction between self and other that is cru-
cial for human awareness and experience. Although the other-
ness removes some freedom, without it, the self cannot exist.
Instrumentality erases these barriers and thus the self
along with it, a consequence which leads to losing what it is
that makes a person human in the first place. This is an out-
come that Shinji is unwilling to accept. He fears that by joining
with others, he will lose himself and realizes that although he
has internalized the rejection of others and started to hate
himself, thus building the protective walls that keep others
out, he could learn to like (or love) himself, and that he wants
to continue to exist. As he draws these realizations, the manu-
factured world around him shatters. He breaks through once
more to the world containing others and he finds himself sur-
rounded by congratulatory friends and family. Although aware
that separation from others will re-create the barriers and
allow the fear and loneliness to return, he accepts this as a nec-
essary cost of the potential joy that can be achieved in relation-
ships with others and chooses to return to the world, thus
making the same choice possible for others. In the end, it’s
Shinji’s will to live, and will to be a self, his desire to retain his
identity through his separation from others, that allows him to
break free from Instrumentality and create a new world.
The failure of Instrumentality is driven by this unwilling-
ness to accept the loss of self. The conclusion we’re led to is that
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connection with others can only be made meaningful through
the separation of individuals, despite the pain of isolation that
this entails. The story suggests that the meaning the charac-
ters seek can only be found through human connection, their
relationships with one another, but maintaining some distance.
During Instrumentality, Rei defends the idea that she has
an identity found through her interactions with others. She
gains a sense of self, independently of her clones, through these
connections: “I am the real me. I became myself over the time
that I’ve existed and through the connections that I’ve formed
with others. The person I am is shaped by my interactions with
others. Interactions with others and the passage of time will
change the shape of my heart . . . Those are what created the
person that I have been, the object called Rei Ayanami. They
will create the person I will be.”
The value of connections with others is emphasised
throughout the show. Although the characters struggle with
their fears and hurts, we also see that they’re able to
strengthen and grow through the connections they make with
one another. This is particularly true of Shinji, and it’s the rela-
tionships he forms, and the ways in which they change him,
that ultimately decide the fate of humanity through
Instrumentality.
Misato acts as a parent figure, helping him feel accepted
and at home and in the end it’s she who pushes Shinji to meet
his destiny, challenging him to grow up, and start making deci-
sions for himself. He also develops bonds with his fellow pilots,
Asuka and Rei. These relationships are conflicted and ambigu-
ous. Like typical teenagers, they are navigating the compli-
cated strands of friendship, family, and romance. However, it’s
obvious that they truly care for one another. In the end, this is
what causes Rei to put her faith in Shinji, rather than Gendo,
determining the entire outcome for Instrumentality.
In The End of Evangelion when Shinji breaks free from
Instrumentality, it’s Asuka whom he finds at his side back on
Earth. The relationship which Shinji builds with Kaworu, the
Fifth Child, and seventeenth Angel, is a key defining one for
him. Their relationship is ambiguous, sitting between friend-
ship and romance, and they quickly become close. Kaworu
encourages Shinji to think about himself and his place in the
world and tells Shinji that he loves him, the first time that
Shinji has ever heard those words. In the end, when Shinji is
fearful of Rei/Lilith as she tries to take him and Unit 01 into
her hands, it’s when Kaworu’s form emerges that he joyously
accepts the union.
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Through these relationships, Shinji builds more confidence,
becoming stronger and more assertive. Instead of simply trying
to follow orders and please others all the time, he begins to
stand up for what he wants and make decisions for himself.
Eventually, it is his connections with others that help Shinji
find himself and save humanity. The meaning that he has
sought for himself is discovered in defining his identity
through his relationships with those around him. He accepts
that it is better to continue to exist, with all the pain that it
may entail, than to lose himself in the formless safety promised
by Instrumentality.
We may remain hedgehogs, unable to ever completely shed
our spikes, but we should never stop trying to seek that
warmth, the human connection that defines us.
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