Do we want to get into the potential metatextual reading of that whole idea as well, that the unageing is possibly a reference to the franchise's fans between NGE and Rebuild?
As Japanese as a language doesn't use articles (or even plurals in some cases), it allows for an interpretation of Asuka's line from 3.33 as both "the curse of the Evas" (referring to the mecha in-universe) and "the curse of Eva" (italicised, referring to the franchise itself).
That would make sense. Asuka and Rei were doomed to remain 14 for a quarter of a century because statues of underage girls in skintight outfits sell better, I guess.
That would make sense. Asuka and Rei were doomed to remain 14 for a quarter of a century because statues of underage girls in skintight outfits sell better, I guess.
Did you notice also that Rei Q developed moe character traits during her time in the village? There's possibly some industry commentary going on there, too.
"Our" Asuka (the one from 2.22, 3.33 and 3.0+1.0), if I'm interpretating an on-screen NERV document correctly, appears to actually be the one who lost out.
The clincher, of course, is that 3.0+1.0 Asuka remembers very clearly what happened in the 9th Angel incident. Rei, meanwhile (in NGE, at least), does not remember what previously happened to her when a new clone is put into use: her soul is salvaged, but her memories are not.
Another interesting take, though I felt that Rei-3 did have some memories buried deep within, given her emotional reaction to Gendo's glasses & strong desire to look after Shinji, given that her character didn't directly develop that relationship with Shinji that Rei-2's had via the latter's interactions with him.
It is being speculated by some fans that the "winning" Asuka clone was used as the soul of Unit-02 just as Yui became the soul of Unit-01, but I'm not sure how much of the setting of NGE carries over to Rebuild.
Also fascinating! It would make sense that an Asuka soul is utilised within Unit-02 given an "original" revealing itself there, and the fact that there is none of Asuka's mother's backstory from the TV series in the rebuild continuity whatsoever. One thing in fact I found a bit sad about the motherhood angle being significantly tapered down in the rebuilds, except for Misato's character, though to be fair that angle was covered very well in the TV series and the most important missing aspect from there, ie Gendo, was beautifully explored in the Rebuilds.
Hiiinnteresting indeed, but I'll have to come back to it otherwise I'll never have a chance to start my next epic rebuild re-watch in the next hour or so heh.
Right, so I think I'm even more confused now but that's never a bad thing with Eva as I've learnt over time. Again, with my assumption of the reason Asuka having angel properties being that she was cloned from the merged Asuka's remains now being out, how did she get said angel characteristics? Implanted into her specifically somehow or have I missed something on this?
I think it was the same Asuka all along, since she had the same memories. Also, all of the pilots remained 14, thanks to that completely unexplained "curse of the Evas". And don't forget that Asuka turned into a ridiculously gorgeous 28-year-old in her final scene on the beach, once her Eva was gone.
And here is the beauty of Eva, with every one of us having their own perfect version of the story's canon in our own respective individual mind. So I'm with @Dai on this one, that for me there will only really be one Asuka all along, if nothing else then in spirit/soul regardless of the body being occupied, as that is what will give me the best closure for arguably my favourite character from all of Eva.
Did you notice also that Rei Q developed moe character traits during her time in the village? There's possibly some industry commentary going on there, too.
Heheh I think that would be quite a statement with the first Moe character in the history of anime to burst into tang! That little angel cross and rainbow at the neck of her suit after were incredibly Moe also... I actually winced as if in pain during that scene during my first watch (probably my EoE PTSD acting up for fear of what else may be about to befall these poor long-suffering sods... Thankfully proven very wrong heh).
Also one for you @Neil.T in case you were interested:
There is a cd version of the Evangelion Finally soundtrack, just not on AL. I came across it whilst searching for Eva soundtracks and this glorious piece from the final one's soundtrack:
Unit-01 is the most epic & scariest Eva but Unit-02/Asuka are always the bloody coolest and most badass combo, and this piece is very fitting indeed.
I have no idea why that's never come up in my Amazon recommendations. I had a look on HMV's website, and it's the same price, so I've ordered it from them to collect in store. I like to support them when I can. Thanks again, man.
Have you ordered it as well?
Also, I listened to the 3.0+1.0 track you posted, and it brought back that incredible scene of Asuka attempting to drive a stake through the heart of Unit-13. What an astounding sequence that whole part is; it's uncompromising and brutal. Much like...
Again, with my assumption of the reason Asuka having angel properties being that she was cloned from the merged Asuka's remains now being out, how did she get said angel characteristics?
From the intrusion of the 9th Angel while she piloted Unit-03 in 2.22, I would say. When Asuka pulls the miniature sealing pillar out of her left eye, Maya reports a reading of the 9th Angel inside the NERV pyramid.
It's interesting that the 2.22 script makes a point of saying that her cellular tissue was free of any invasion, but that she might have been psychologically contaminated by the Angel. It reminds me of one of the pilot synchro tests in NGE, where Asuka's rate has dropped. Misato points out that Asuka is on her period, but Ritsuko dismisses this as the cause, stating that sync rates are not affected by physical changes and that the problem is instead rooted in her psyche.
It reminds me of a couple of other things, too. One is how, in NGE, the samples collected from Shamshel are almost a 100 percent match with human DNA, differing only in material. The other is how Kaworu is shown in Rebuild to be able to do things that a human couldn't. This includes surviving on the surface of the moon without a spacesuit and walking down the crumbling metal steps on the outside of NERV HQ in gusting winds at high altitude with his hands in his pockets. A case of mind over matter? Is this the advantage brought by not ever having tasted the Fruit of Knowledge?
With 3.0+1.0's revelation of Evangelion Imaginary, an Eva that only exists because humans are capable of believing in fantasy and reality equally, Rebuild further explores its themes of the nature of our perception of the world around us and of what we are and aren't capable of as a species.
I'm squinting my eyes whilst browsing this thread because I still haven't seen the last rebuild film, but I thought that I'd post this, I got this telephone card recently and thought that you'd appreciate it, thank you.
Ok I'm sorry I've been absent for a week now. I promise I will get round to reading everyone's posts...eventually. Anyway after not getting the chance to watch last weekend I've been exhausted all week with work and not in the mood to watch new Eva but I have now finally been able to sit and enjoy the new film.
[Edit: sorry it's a bit of an essay under the spoiler tag]
3.0+1.01
First off this film was a masterpiece. Did I understand it all? No. Was it perfect? Far from it. Was it an ending worthy of Eva? Absolutely!
The first hour had me emotionally very mixed on what was happening. Shinji being self pitying, self serving, self ish, arrogant, cowardly all round d head really annoyed me. It was the very worst of Shinji.
I hated it.
On the other hand Rei's story was magnificent. If this film had just been 2 and half hours of Rei learning to live in the last remnants of humanity it wouldve been my favourite Eva ever. God it was good.
Then it was all undone. Why give Rei all this character development to only make her plot point. Her death has nothing to do with anything she does or chooses. It just happens so the plot can move from mopey Shinji to Shinji doing something. Honestly I had to stop the film and go smoke a cigarette. It is by far the most irate I've ever been watching Eva. It's just bad writing as far as I'm concerned.
Anyway then the film ends its prologue and actually starts. Next we get the most crazy light show action sequence I've ever seen and it was magnificent. Then comes the Matrix Reloaded "what are they talking about" sequence quickly followed by the Avengers Endgame let's have new battles in old locales sequence. I loved all of this. It was barmy and weird and brilliant.
Then we get into the finale and what a finale. The weird artistic character breakdowns and thoughtful discussions that Eva was built on. All out in full force. And Gendo got a real time to shine! I think Anno said he wanted Rebuild to be the the Eva he always wanted to make and for the 3rd and most of this film I was like " yeah no way you envisioned any of this back in the day." But this ending in the final act. Yeah I get it. It was great.
So there we have it. Those are my initial, no time to think about it thoughts. It wasnt perfect but it was awesome and I guess that's what an Eva finale should be.
The first hour had me emotionally very mixed on what was happening. Shinji being self pitying, self serving, self ish, arrogant, cowardly all round d head really annoyed me. It was the very worst of Shinji.
I hated it.
On the other hand Rei's story was magnificent. If this film had just been 2 and half hours of Rei learning to live in the last remnants of humanity it wouldve been my favourite Eva ever. God it was good.
Then it was all undone. Why give Rei all this character development to only make her plot point. Her death has nothing to do with anything she does or chooses. It just happens so the plot can move from mopey Shinji to Shinji doing something.
I agree that Shinji was a waste of screen time for the first hour, but it wasn't the very worst of him... at least he kept it in his pants and didn't strangle anyone this time.
Regarding Rei 6.0/Q/whatever we call her, I only half agree. Her death had everything to do with her choices. She could have gone back to NERV and continued living as a slave, but she chose to live and learn on her own terms, knowing that it would be a short life. I'm with you on the lack of impact it had on the rest of the story though. To a certain extent it shook Shinji out of his stupor, but it's annoying that this iteration of Rei is almost never mentioned again, from what I remember. It was dangerously close to fridging.
I agree that Shinji was a waste of screen time for the first hour, but it wasn't the very worst of him... at least he kept it in his pants and didn't strangle anyone this time.
Regarding Rei 6.0/Q/whatever we call her, I only half agree. Her death had everything to do with her choices. She could have gone back to NERV and continued living as a slave, but she chose to live and learn on her own terms, knowing that it would be a short life. I'm with you on the lack of impact it had on the rest of the story though. To a certain extent it shook Shinji out of his stupor, but it's annoying that this iteration of Rei is almost never mentioned again, from what I remember. It was dangerously close to fridging.
I guess you're right here too. But it was still a plot decision to have her suddenly not be able to live away from nerv. There was no basis for this in the previous film, it was only revealed at the last second and it only served to have her be a plot point for Shinji. I'm mostly annoyed as Rei has always been the most interesting Eva character for me and the first hour here does the best work we've ever seen done with the character only to turn her into a Shinji plot point. I think I'll always be annoyed about to be honest
I watched all of the Rebuilds over the past week, having not seen the first three in almost a decade and not having particularly fond memories of them. They were much better than I remember but, while there are moments of greatness (mainly in 2.22), they are essentially footnotes to the original series and are of primary interest because of what they say about the evolution of Anno as an artist and the differing sociopolitical contexts of the 90s vs now.
I loved the way that Anno played around with form and busy visual elements in 3.0+1.0; only Obayashi's most recent (and, sadly, last) works have been so visually bold.
I also got done watching this just now and I realize I came into it with wrong expectations.
I longed to see Shinji make a glorious comeback and he did, but I thought it would be manifested in a fight, maybe. But that "battle" between him and Gendo indeed shows that was never the point. I always wanted him to find mental stability of course, but I never thought to consider that his moment of triumph.
In hindsight, that was silly of me. It was extremely satisfying to see him take control of his emotions and mental state and decide to bury all of evangelion while finally facing his father.
That brings me to the thing I genuinely loved about this movie: the catharsis in getting more intimate with these characters we've known for years now and really, anything related to the way the characters in general were written. I loved Gendo opening up, as well as Asuka. I needed that. I needed to see Shinji there, fully in control of himself. I got emotional seeing Toji, the Class Rep and Kensuke. I loved seeing Rei learn how to live. It was beautifully done. I loved the added context we got for events in the past like when Kensuke talks about Misato and family.
I love that Anno got to this point where he could give us such a beautiful ending to all of Evangelion.
With that said, the movie in general has a few faults. I think it throws way too many concepts at us way too late into the game. It seems too up its own ass in its terminology and visually it's the antithesis of what I love about the series. It's way too much, all the time.
Also, while I appreciate daring action setpieces, I think having in-universe rules and limitations makes for more fun action (energy cable, battery, ground obstacles, water, ect.) and the Paris setpiece is daring and well done for sure but the designers of that fight were probably like "we're gonna do whatever the fu.ck we want". It felt like there were no rules to ground the fight a bit, even the Eva could jump and fly and turn its arms in all directions. It was weird.
A couple of scenes were also clumsy like when the two girls are trying to shoot Shinji. I wanted that over with asap.
Will read the posts on this thread tomorrow, finally!
I also got done watching this just now and I realize I came into it with wrong expectations.
I longed to see Shinji make a glorious comeback and he did, but I thought it would be manifested in a fight, maybe. But that "battle" between him and Gendo indeed shows that was never the point. I always wanted him to find mental stability of course, but I never thought to consider that his moment of triumph.
In hindsight, that was silly of me. It was extremely satisfying to see him take control of his emotions and mental state and decide to bury all of evangelion while finally facing his father.
That brings me to the thing I genuinely loved about this movie: the catharsis in getting more intimate with these characters we've known for years now and really, anything related to the way the characters in general were written. I loved Gendo opening up, as well as Asuka. I needed that. I needed to see Shinji there, fully in control of himself. I got emotional seeing Toji, the Class Rep and Kensuke. I loved seeing Rei learn how to live. It was beautifully done. I loved the added context we got for events in the past like when Kensuke talks about Misato and family.
I love that Anno got to this point where he could give us such a beautiful ending to all of Evangelion.
With that said, the movie in general has a few faults. I think it throws way too many concepts at us way too late into the game. It seems too up its own ass in its terminology and visually it's the antithesis of what I love about the series. It's way too much, all the time.
Also, while I appreciate daring action setpieces, I think having in-universe rules and limitations makes for more fun action (energy cable, battery, ground obstacles, water, ect.) and the Paris setpiece is daring and well done for sure but the designers of that fight were probably like "we're gonna do whatever the fu.ck we want". It felt like there were no rules to ground the fight a bit, even the Eva could jump and fly and turn its arms in all directions. It was weird.
A couple of scenes were also clumsy like when the two girls are trying to shoot Shinji. I wanted that over with asap.
Will read the posts on this thread tomorrow, finally!
Well Evangelion's final film has done enough to get re-invested in the franchise once again after a 9 year gap lol.
Fortunately there's other properties that may interest folks:
Neon Genesis Evangelion (Manga)
Viz Media's released all 14 volumes into 5 omnibus books. It's a really solid coverage of the original TV's story that offers a slightly different outcome to End of Evangelion. It's worth a read.
Neon Genesis Evangelion: ANIMA (Light Novel)
Seven Seas have released all 5 novel books in this scenario that takes place a few years after the events of the original TV series. I've not read it but I'm very interested to see how it is.
Neon Genesis Evangelion: Shinji Ikari Raising Project (Manga)
Dark Horse have released all 18 volumes and is probably out of print at this point. It's apparently set in a what-if scenario during the events of the TV show's final episode. It also has a 2004 life simulation game for PC in Japan.
Neon Genesis Evangelion: Eva and Good Friends (Video Game)
Released in Japan in 1998 for PlayStation, it's an import only game but if you want to experience Shinji playing Mahjong with the cast of Nadia and Gunbuster, then this is for you!
Neon Genesis Evangelion 2 (Video Game)
Released in Japan in 2003 for PlayStation 2, this is an RPG that allows you to control various characters from the TV series and follow the events of the story.
Neon Genesis Evangelion 64 (Video Game)
Released in Japan in 1999 for Nintendo 64, this is the most well-known video game adaptation of the franchise and chances are you have heard of this already. Basically you go through the story of the TV series and each level is essentially an Eva battle against the Angels. Apparently pretty challenging also.
Hisshou Pachinko ā Pachislot Kouryaku Series Vol. 1: CR Neon Genesis Evangelion (Video Game)
Released in Japan in 2005 for PlayStation 2, this is a pachinko game. That's all that needs to be said.
Kyoei Toshi - City Shrouded in Shadow (Video Game)
Released in Japan in 2017 for PlayStation 4, designed similarly to the Disaster Report games your character is in the middle of a disaster event where giant beings are attacking each other. It's a cross over that features Godzilla, Ultraman, Gamera and even Evangelion and Mobile Police Patlabor.
Super Robot Wars (Video Game)
Bandai Namco's cross-over tactical RPG franchise has featured Evangelion many times but it's also got a ton of other Gainax & Sunrise titles that do interact with the Evangelion cast if you are a fan of sci-fi, mecha and want something different for a change. For English translated releases they're included on Super Robot Wars V.
There's also the Neon Genesis Evangelion Angelic Days manga which is highly recommend. It's only 6 volumes and if you're a Rei fan it's a must read as you see her in a new much more expressive light (which at the time hadnt been done)
Something I forgot to bring up after watching both the 3rd and 4th films about Mari and given the discussions about her is maybe relavalent. In the picture of Yui holding baby Shinji theres a woman in the foreground in glasses that looks an awful lot like a grown up Mari. Does anyone think this is the original Mari like Yui is to Rei or maybe Mari's mother like Yui is to Shinji? Given the ending of Shinji and Mari being together as Anno and his wife it's another wierd layer to debate with no definitive answer but fun to think about.
I hope Anno's wife convinces him to create a slice of life Eva series, I need that agricultural porn in my life. Rei's bit was but a taste I'm not even joking
Something I forgot to bring up after watching both the 3rd and 4th films about Mari and given the discussions about her is maybe relavalent. In the picture of Yui holding baby Shinji theres a woman in the foreground in glasses that looks an awful lot like a grown up Mari. Does anyone think this is the original Mari like Yui is to Rei or maybe Mari's mother like Yui is to Shinji? Given the ending of Shinji and Mari being together as Anno and his wife it's another wierd layer to debate with no definitive answer but fun to think about.
They seemed to want to imply something about the photo, with the timing and all...
As for 2.22, it benefits from not having to set anything up and so hits the ground running and stays that way until the ending. A lot of stuff happens, all of it exciting and of consequence. It's really well paced.
I can second this, having reviewed the later volumes of the manga for the site, the story makes for a very enjoyable read - it got a great anime adaptation as well.
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I'm not even joking 
