[EVA] Ghost Rei in Episode 01 was RE: The soul in Eva 00... [somewhat Noise]

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

once at ix.netcom.com wrote:
> But for fans and people in the anime industry born twenty or thirty years after Anno, I think  even such second-hand scars begin to fade. From my outside perspective as a student of Japanese history, I'm skeptical of just how relevant WWII is to Japan's actual situation in recent decades--the "Little Boy" thesis, and all that. WWII, and especially its final years, was not typical of Japanese history, and so the idea that pre-defeat Japan was the "normal" or "real" Japan, compared to the postwar era is highly questionable. 
>
>   
I would be fairly sceptical myself. Having said that, since this brought 
it to mind, I feel obliged to bring up this  quote I came across 
recently on one of the wiki pages.

"/Anno understands the Japanese national attraction to characters like 
Rei as the product of a stunted imaginative landscape borne of Japan's 
defeat in the Second World War./ Japan lost the war to the Americans. 
Since that time, the education we received is not one that creates 
adults. Even for us, people in their 40s, and for the generation older 
than me, in their 50s and 60s, there's no reasonable model of what an 
adult should be like. "

It's from the May '07 issue of "Atlantic Monthy", or so sayeth the page 
at least.
http://wiki.evageeks.org/Theory_and_Analysis:Rei_Ayanami_%28In-Depth%29#Rei.27s_design_and_character

I honestly don't know what to make of it. My opinion is that what Anno 
is saying could just as easily apply to any post war, or more to the 
point, post television society.