A thought came to me just now. Why wasn't Shinji scared out of his wits after first seeing Sachiel? I mean, he hasn't seen something like this before, and i'm pretty sure he wasn't aware that it would be combing, and yet later we see him in awe at the sight of the geofront. Shouldn't he at least be in a much less optimistic mood than that after seeing a giant eldritch abomination that can survive even a pseudo nuke blast?

^
It might have been a mixture of adrenalin and resolve.

That, or the writing needed him there and the animators didn't have time to give him more of a distressed appearance.

robersora wrote:^
It might have been a mixture of adrenalin and resolve.

That, or the writing needed him there and the animators didn't have time to give him more of a distressed appearance.

Probably the latter.

He looks appropriately awestruck and terrified the first time he sees Sachiel. The rest is saved for his bluescreening and PTSD in episode two, maybe because they didn't want to overdo it before the main event. Shinji had plenty of other stuff to distract him before confronting the Angel face to face, anyway..

Technically speaking, he did see a giant monstrosity before then, at the tender age of, what was it, 4? Not that he saw it in quite the same capacity.

Not sure if that counts since (was this stated, implied or am i just wrong?) Shinji was traumatized enough that those memories ended up being repressed

Or in Rebuild, if Fuyutsuki is to be taken at face value, those memories were actually erased (presumably by Gendou, or on his orders).

The whole event went really fast, Misato picked him up right away, there wasn't much time to process it, and trying to numb out or withdraw from a situation is well known as one of his short-term coping mechanisms;

When he first saw it, the situation would just have been plain ridiculous.

He's in Japan , they are used to being attacked by giant monsters

Maybe it was an aesthetic choice to make him not super scared of the giant angel. I mean the first half of the show is a lot more steretypically anime like than the second half. Maybe they wanted that vibe.

zlink64 wrote:Maybe it was an aesthetic choice to make him not super scared of the giant angel. I mean the first half of the show is a lot more steretypically anime like than the second half. Maybe they wanted that vibe.

That would seem to conflict with how realistic he acts when he's actually asked to fight that thing/ stands before it in EVA 01.

A pacing/effect curve thing seeks limeky.