FUNimation Entertainment has acquired digital, home entertainment, broadcast and merchandise rights to Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone, the 2007 anime theatrical film written and directed by Hideaki Anno, which is the first in a four-film “Rebuild” of the groundbreaking 1990s Neon Genesis Evangelion TV anime (also directed by Anno).   The Evangelion: 1.0 movie closely follows the plot of the first six episodes of the 26-episode NGE TV anime, though some of the scenes differ substantially from those in the original and the movie makes use of new computer-animated elements.  The film’s final scene, which takes place on what appears to be the blood-soaked surface of the moon is new, and a trailer for the second film in the “Rebuild” series indicates that more substantial changes are ahead in this do-over of the arty, angst-ridden, symbol-laden apotheosis of the “teenagers in mecha save the world from a robot apocalypse” genre.

The original NGE anime, which added several layers of seriousness to the robot genre by injecting psychoanalytical elements and examining conflicts between individuality and collective responsibility in the face of crisis, was an immense hit in Japan, where Gainax, the studio that created the series, was convicted in 1998 of hiding 1.56 billion yen (about $1.56 million) in profits from the series.  Not only was the series itself a huge hit on DVD in Japan (and in North America), merchandising based on NGE was a spectacular success.  The Evangelion: 1.0 movie, which premiered in Japan in 2007, appears to be on its way duplicating at least some of that success (see “Evangelion Opens at #1”).  It opened to standing room only crowds and it earned some $20 million at the Japanese box office and has sold over 300,000 DVDs.  The film took home the “Animation of the Year Award” at the Tokyo Anime Awards.

FUNimation plans to release the Evangelion: 1.0 movie in North America in 2009.  The second movie in the Rebuild of Evangelion tetralogy is due todebut in Japan this summer.  Viz Media released the original manga adaptation (by NGE character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamoto) of the Evangelion anime, while ADV, which produced the NGE series on DVD in the U.S., published the Neon Genesis Evangelion: Angelic Days manga, which put the NGE characters in a fan service-filled high school romance comedy setting.  Dark Horse has recently announced that, in the spring of 2009, it will publish the first volume of Osamu Takahashi’s ongoing Neon Genesis Evangelion: The Shinji Ikari Raising Project manga, which is based on a NGE video game (see “Dark Horse Gets Evangelion Spin-off Manga”), and which should benefit from Funimation’s release of the Evangelion: 1.0 movie.