Evangelion spin-offs are unfortunately well-known for being almost completely unlike Evangelion itself. Iron Maiden the 2nd, Girlfriend of Steel 2 or Angelic Days, however you wanna call it, is no different. This doesn't mean it is completely worthless, however, as the standard of Evangelion spin-offs is in fact so low (see Piko-Piko) that this is, quite possibly, the best Evangelion spin-off manga of them all.

This is a cute, fairly straightforward shoujo romantic drama/comedy story. Shinji is rewritten in a mostly standard shy shoujo protagonist, unaware of Asuka's growing affections for him. Asuka is the most well-developed character here, she is also reformed into a mostly standard tsundere, but she gets some interesting development with Rei and Kaworu. Rei, as you might expect, is unrecognizable and is instead a pretty standard moe girl, more and more interested in Shinji and jealous of Asuka. Kaworu is slightly present as a sort of inter-dimensional matchmaker, though he doesn't appear much, another common feature of Eva spin-offs. All of them fight for Shinji's attention, and, amazingly enough, this is the only Eva spin-off in which one of them does win his heart. Touji, Hikari and Kensuke are also present, and have some development among each other, and not just around Shinji. Much drama and some minor Eva mind-screwing does happen before that, of though. But if you are looking for anything deeper, your only bet is either the NGE anime itself (the manga's success at this is debatable) or even some fan-made stuff like RE-TAKE.

The art is okay. Nothing exceptional, but not at all bad or subpar. What might initially surprise readers is that it is *extremely shoujo*, which might come as a particular shock since most Eva fans would be accustomed to the more shounen style present in ISRP or Sadamoto's manga. Some pages are really beautiful and the characters do have a lot of expressiveness, but it does take some getting used to.

I could be wrong, but this look like it was one of the artist's first professional works, and it seems to have been successful enough to have launched her into a successful career. Overall, this is a quite enjoyable manga, if you are looking to have the Evangelion cast in a lighthearted setting and just enjoy seeing them together.