Originally Posted by
RoydGolden
Again, it's not the same Shinji technically (it's not like this one actually raped Sakura or even likely had a Sakura figure in their life). But more importantly, given how easily forgiven he is in certain materials (even Hollow Ataraxia paints him as more a joke then anything) I can believe Nasu actually intended Shinji to come off as a sympathetic, though fatally flawed character. At least in the first two routes, anyway.
I think the scope of his abuse in Heaven's Feel was something that may've been shoehorned in to ramp up the ~suffering~ for Sakura and make her seem more like a tragic heroine (as if she wasn't enough so already). Another reason some peeps say that HF is poorly thought out, since almost the entire route is engineered to make things as horrible as possible for Sakura until the very end, to the point of possibly even derailing certain characterizations that Nasu envisioned (like Shinji who ends up almost a cartoon villain in that route). Not sure, but I wonder. It'd make the 'Shinji = everyman' comment a little less baffling (and disturbing).