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Evangelion Illustrations 2007-2017 Book Review

“Evangelion Illustrations 2007-2017” offers up plenty of art but little else.

In this oversized softcover book, fans get a plethora of hand drawn, CGI shots, and digital art images of their favorite characters like Shinji, Rei, Asuka and the titular mecha from “Evangelion 1.0,” “Evangelion 2.0,” and “Evangelion 3.0.” Each image is accompanied by an artist credit, the date of creation, the image source (AKA where it’s from) and sometimes a small blurb to give readers context as to what the art was for. In terms of the sources, let’s just say there is a lot. Expect to see art from pre-sale tickets, DVD booklets, teaser illustrations, posters, movie program, magazines, postcards, CD covers, art from various exhibits, Evangelion store art, numerous promotional tie-ins and ad campaigns, tourism, merch, packaging, cover art, mobile games, stickers, and t-shirt illustrations.

“Evangelion Illustrations 2007-2017” is a bit of a frustrating on release. On the positive side, the book contains a ton of images. It truly is a celebration of the massive amounts of artwork from this franchise in this 10 year period. Evangelion fans and completists will no doubt adore seeing such a breadth of images in various sizes of character poses, more suggestive pieces, and bizarre tie-ins. I say bizarre because there’s something quite peculiar, comical, and creative about seeing Evangelion characters hawking products like UCC Milk Coffee, Fender guitars, Schick razors or posing near a 7-11 or Tower Records. My personal favorite pieces, however, are 3 striking images titled “Godzilla Vs. Evangelion” by Mahiro Maeda, Takashi Murakami, and Yuji Kaida, but I may be biased as a Godzilla fan.

On the downside, there is very little written content aside from a few aforementioned blurbs about the where image came from. There is not even an intro, an, epilogue or character identifications. Granted, you get your money’s worth art wise, but a few other written pieces would have gone a long way here.

Overall Thoughts: If you’re an Evangelion fan, this is a must own book as it contains a wealth of stunning art from this 10 year era of the franchise.

July 13, 2019 - Posted by nicklyons1 | Book review | Evangelion, Evangelion 1.0, Evangelion 2.0, Evangelion 3.0, Evangelion Art, Evangelion Illustrations 2007-2017 Book Review, Mecha, Viz Media