- Posted by: Nuclear Lunchbox

Kick the tires and light the fires, folks; The Essential Evangelion Chronicle, the esteemed guide to the anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, is going to be released stateside– and better yet, it’s going to be released in English!

For those of you who haven’t heard of The Essential Evangelion Chronicle (like myself before doing the research to write this post, because apparently I’m still a scrub when it comes to knowing about older stuff despite watching Evangelion for 6 years), it’s a comprehensive guide for the TV series for NGE. As Hobbylink Japan describes it:

“This all-color softcover book chronicles Neon Genesis Evangelion in great detail with plenty of colorful illustrations and screen captures, a character relationship chart, character and EVA profiles, a timeline, and comprehensive episode guide with checkpoints covering each Angel, vehicle, weapon, and character appearance in each episode.”

The Essential Evangelion Chronicle (dang, that name is a mouthful) is a two-part work. There’s a Side A and a Side B, as they’re called (might be more accurate to call them book A and book B, but whatever.) Side A covers the first thirteen episodes, and Side B covers the last thirteen. Side B contains the Director’s Cut episodes instead of the episodes that aired on TV. It also includes information about the TV ending and End of Evangelion.

I told you guys that we had a confirmed release date, and I wasn’t joshing you: Side A is set to be released June 2nd, and Side B is set to be released August 8th. That’s right, ladies and gents– we’re a mere month away from the first part of this collection being released, and just three more from then until we get Side B.

I don’t think I need to tell you, but just in case: GET EXCITE.

Editor’s note: The original version of this post stated that Side B contains the OA and not the DC episodes, due to a misinterpretation of Amazon’s description of the books. As pointed out by forum user Literary Eagle, this is incorrect; the book actually includes the DC episodes instead of the OA episodes. This post has been updated to reflect the correct information.

If you’d like to see LE’s thoughts on the books, you can read her blog post about them here.