| "Angel Attack" | |
|---|---|
| Neon Genesis Evangelion episode | |
 Shinji Ikari (center), Ritsuko Akagi (left) and Misato Katsuragi (right) with the Eva-01's head. The scene is influenced by Combattler V. | |
| Episode no. | Episode 1 |
| Directed by | Kazuya Tsurumaki |
| Written by | Hideaki Anno |
| Story by | Gainax |
| Original air date | October 4, 1995 |
| Running time | 22 minutes |
"Angel Attack"[a] is the first episode of the anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion, created by Gainax. The episode was written by the series director Hideaki Anno and directed by Kazuya Tsurumaki. It was originally aired on TV Tokyo on October 4, 1995. The series is mostly set in the futuristic, fortified city Tokyo-3, fifteen years after a worldwide cataclysm named Second Impact. The protagonist is Shinji Ikari, a teenage boy whose father Gendo has recruited him to the organization Nerv to pilot a giant bio-machine mecha named Evangelion to combat beings called Angels. In the episode, Tokyo-3 is attacked by the Angel Sachiel, who fights the United Nations Army and the JSSDF. Gendo summons Shinji for the first time and Shinji reluctantly agrees to pilot the mecha.
Production for "Angel Attack" began in September 1994 and ended in April 1995. The episode, influenced by Japanese tokusatsu, references other mecha anime series and previous works by Gainax. It scored a 6.8% rating of audience share on Japanese TV and received critical and public acclaim focused on its visuals, direction and introduction of the characters.
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