>>281918766
The first two started out as him trying to christen his new studio and show that Eva could be "retold", which I guess is admirable at least. He absolutely checked out after that. The last two movies are an absolute trainwreck compared to the first, but his other projects like Shin Godzilla were still amazing, proving that he had the ability but not the motivation.

>>281652514
The supposed limited budget is a meme that won't die. It's leftover from the rumor that the last episode of Gunbuster was in black and white because they ran out of money for color film, and through a massive game of telephone managed to stick to Eva too. I can see why it spread so widely back before the internet and readily accessible english-language information about the industry but its persistence in the internet age is unfortunate.