A Hockey Team Recreated The Evangelion Intro For A Stadium Full Of Fans

As the Lehigh Valley Phantoms, the American Hockey League affiliate of the Philadelphia Flyers, prepared to take the ice, Yoko Takahashi's voice filled the PPL Center in Allentown, Pennsylvania. As phone lights synced to the music, the Neon Genesis Evangelion introduction—what could be the most iconic anime intro of all time—began on a screen above the ice. Standing in for Shiji Ikari, though, is Phantoms right winger Alexis Gendron. And instead of Evangelions themselves, it's Melvin, the fuzzy yellow Phantoms mascot with a puck for a nose.

The video, which debuted on the Phantoms' PhanCon night (a homage to ComicCon) on Sunday, quickly went viral on social media. It's got well over 2 million views and thousands of comments on TikTok from both anime and hockey fans who are delighted and baffled by the unlikely crossover. Clearly, there are some anime fans on the Phantoms staff—specifically, the creative team that makes graphics, videos, and content for social media and home games. Doug Chrin, a senior video editor and producer for the Phantoms, first brought the idea to Paul Dampier, the senior manager of game presentation, because he's a huge fan of the show.

"I've seen plenty of YouTube recreations [of the Evangelion intro] in the past, and some of them are good, but not quite the best," Chrin told Aftermath. "I wanted to be the one to create something that's the best rendition. We went all in as a sports team to be the best at something we're not primarily focused on."

Evangelion, Dampier said, is within that next tier of anime after iconic shows like Dragon Ball Z and Pokémon—it's hugely popular, but not necessarily a household name. "It's been around for 30 years at this point, and there have been waves of fans, and it's had this lasting staying power on the internet," he said. "There's a ton of great anime intros, but there's something about 'A Cruel Angel's Thesis' and that intro that is so iconic."

Chrin brought the idea up to Dampier and the creative team just days before the team's media day in October, which is when the team shoots most of its player content for the year. They quickly started brainstorming what they needed to film to make the shot-by-shot recreation happen. First, they needed a Shinji. They chose a few players from the lineup and ran them through the motions during the media day.

"Realistically, I don't know if any of them know the show," Dampier said. "I would guess there's one or two closet anime fans, but they definitely didn't know what we are doing with them. We just directed them through the motions or stances we needed them to be in."

It required a lot of trust that things would come together.

"We've worked together for a few years now," Dampier said. "We've gotten to know the players, so I think we can tell them, 'Hey guys, this is going to be weird, but I promise it's going to turn out great in the end.’ My team is incredibly talented, and I think we've done a lot of cool things over the past few years, and the players are just like, 'Sure, whatever you need.'"

After the team "auditioned" a few players, they unanimously agreed that Gendron nailed it. Several other players and staff show up throughout the video, down to Chrin playing Gendo Ikari, as well as the people who clean off the ice with shovels during TV timeouts. [Disclosure: Nicole shovels ice for her local AHL team.] The creative team, which includes Dampier, Chrin, senior motion graphics designer Isa Abdul-Rahman, senior graphic designer Tyler Harka (who did the Neon Genesis Evangelion-style Lehigh Valley Phantoms title screen), graphic design intern Molly Yatchysyn, and video production intern Chelsea Birkel, held on to the footage until the start of November, when they started pulling together the video in earnest.

It debuted on Sunday before a game against the Hershey Bears, the minor league affiliate of the Washington Capitals. Yatchysyn attended the game as a fan and recorded the footage. "It was a range of emotion," Yatchysyn said. "I almost cried again. I cried of laughter watching it in production, but it was great to finally see it on the big screen, looking around, watching people cheer, laugh."

The players are typically still in the locker room or in the tunnel to the ice while the introduction videos are playing, so the creative team hasn't heard how they feel about it. "I would be surprised if it hasn't made the rounds in the locker room at this point," Dampier said.

Because it was PhanCon, the creative team had a bunch of other anime-inspired art and videos throughout the night. One was an Attack on Titan poster illustrated by Harka, and a Dragon Ball Z-style starting lineup. It's part of a larger movement in sports to capitalize on and pay homage to the popularity of anime: the Los Angeles Chargers did an anime-style schedule announcement, the Los Angeles Dodgers held multiple anime nights, and the NBA created a merchandise drop featuring My Hero Academia imagery.

"Anime has become a big thing in the sports world," Abdul-Rahman said. "There's a good correlation between them. People love sports, and people love anime, and people love things that include a lot of action. There's a lot of action in both. Over time, it's become a lot more prevalent. There's a lot of sports fans and players who are anime fans. It's increasing each year."

Unfortunately, the Phantoms lost to the Bears in the last seconds of the third period to end the game with three points to the Bears' four. Still, the creative team was prepared: The final score displayed on the jumbotron above an image of Shinji Ikari with his head in his hands.