she probably didn’t understand the ending then, because the End of Evangelion has a happy ending, it tries to pass a message. At the end it seems as if Shinji tries to murder Asuka, but I believe that isn’t the case. Shinji and Asuka didn’t just wake up on that beach, there is a time gap between the scenes, and we know that because in one of the scenes you can see graves on the ground (the big logs), which were built by Shinji for his friends, one of the logs has Misato’s cross on it, which is a little rusted, that means it should have been there for a while, we also see that one of the logs is broken in half, scripts of the ending have been leaked and it is known that at first the ending was supposed to include a scene in which Asuka wakes up in the sea and breaks her grave, thus indicating her will to live, this scene did not make it into the movie but since the log is shown to be broken it is considered canon, anyway, Asuka peobably found Shinji lying on the ground and layed by his side. Then Shinji saw Asuka and started to strangle her, this together with her saying “disgusting” later leave the viewers confused, so I will try to analyze the two characters and explain why they behaved the way they did, as well as to how the ending is actually hopeful. Shinji’s has always been trying to escape reality, through his mp3 listening to songs 25 and 26, through the Evas, and even through the instrumentally project. Shinji, who has spent a large part of the series being passive and self-loathing, avoids getting close to anyone because he fears being rejected and abandoned by them, as he was by his father. The ending is actually hopeful, and to understand it I want to remind you the scene in which Shinji, in his dream strangles Asuka in Misato’s kitchen: Shinji is in a dream version of Misato’s kitchen and fighting with Asuka as Pen-Pen looks on, responding to her accusations that he didn’t know her at all that he couldn’t possibly know her, because she never talks about herself, and how unreasonable it is for her to expect him to know her when she won’t tell him anything. Rei appears and asks if he ever tried, and Shinji responds that he did, but couldn’t. Asuka asks how she could like someone who doesn’t even love himself. Shinji responds that maybe he could learn to love himself if she tried being nice to him, gets angry and smashes a chair, then wraps his hands around her neck and strangles her. Shinji, who has spent a large part of the series being passive and self-loathing, finally gets angry and blames Asuka (and by proxy the other people in his life) for his inability to get close to others. Asuka and Rei respond, with some justification, that Shinji also has to take some blame; he avoids getting close to anyone because he fears being rejected and abandoned by them, as he was by his father. In the end, Shinji manages to get over his fear of rejection and chooses to reverse Instrumentality and go back to the world where people are separate and can choose to reject or abandon each other. The card translation says that Shinji started to strangle Asuka because he wanted to confirm that rejection and denial exist once more. By going back to a world where rejection and denial exist, Shinji has admitted that he feared them, and faced that fear. He has confessed that Asuka’s and Rei’s accusations in the earlier scene were true, that he locked people out too tightly because he feared abandonment. As Shinji strangles Asuka, she reaches up and caresses him, countering that although rejection and denial exist again, acceptance also exists again—people have the choice to accept others into their hearts, just as they have the choice to deny others. And with this, Asuka confesses that Shinji’s accusations in the earlier scene were true: Asuka resisted, at every level, accepting Shinji (and by proxy, everyone) into her heart, by yelling at him, demeaning him, and violently rejecting the rudimentary efforts he did make to get closer to her. But now that Shinji’s managed to stop fearing rejection from everyone, Asuka’s learned to stop rejecting everyone. Shinji knows he can’t passively wait for someone to accept him; Asuka knows that she can’t keep rejecting everyone. Realizing that Asuka intends to stop rejecting him, Shinji breaks down in tears. Asuka responds “Kimochi warui”; to accept someone feels weird, foreign, and disgusting to her, because she’s always resisted it. At various points in the series, Shinji and Asuka almost manage to get closer—in Episode 15, Asuka compliments Shinji on his cello playing and then forces him to kiss her, but then violently rejects him by feigning disgust and running to the bathroom to wash her mouth out. Shinji doesn’t realize that Asuka was sincerely trying to get closer to him, or he realizes it, but won’t follow up because he’s afraid of being rejected. In Episode 22, after seeing her talk on the phone with her stepmother, Shinji tries to have a real conversation with Asuka about family, but Asuka is all pissed off because Shinij surpassed her sync ratio. In the final scene of End of Evangelion, they both realize their own culpability in the situation and decide to start trying to become people who are able to accept one another. At the end, both characters have grown, no matter how bad reality may be they now can finally learn to love them selves, because everywhere can be heaven as long as you have the will to live, since they will always have the chance to be happy, what happens after is up to the viewers to decide.